Otlichnyy Mayak (The Great Beacon)

All great houses rise through the greatness of a single generation and fall through the folly of another.  Families of ancient and noble title may endure endless cycles of sovereigns and lieges, revolutions and uprisings, conquests and crusades, famines and pestilences, only to descend into ruin by the taking of title of an unready, foolish, cruel or simply unlucky successor.   

For Otlichnyy Mayak, a landhold of six thousand acres seated a dozen miles to the east of Orenburg, that successor was to be a young man by the name Artyonm Aleksandr Yahontov (“Tyoma”).  Over vast eras, upon the estate of Otlichnyy Mayak had been born great inheritors of the Yahontov name who rose to high title and wealth through marriage, through conquest, through royal favor.  Though diluted by time and denamed through the vagaries of noble ascension and decline, by the Nineteenth Century, traces of Yahontov blood ran through the veins of nearly the entirety of the legions of dukes, marquises, barons, counts and viscounts that populated Russia’s Royal Court and indeed, most noble houses throughout Europe.  Even princes and tsars, kings and emperors continued through their blood, the nobility of the Yahontov line, albeit unknowingly.

Seated as it was on Russia’s Southern oft-disputed and ill-defined border with Kazakhstan, the Yahontov estate had proved exceedingly valuable to centuries of monarchs in Russia’s ruling west, first as a military bulkward to repel incursions from the East and later as a northern outpost on the Russian Silk Road from Moscow to Almaty and beyond.  Though battlefield courage and cunning earned earlier generations a richness of title and the favor of faraway sovereigns, riches of the more material sort alluded the family until the explosion of trading between Asia and Western Russia in the Sixteenth Century triggered in Otlichnyy Mayak an evolution from frontier fortress into essential commercial waystop.  

Unlike the seafaring Silk Roads of Western Europe, Musovite traders were forced to rely primarily on terrestrial voyages through the vast hostile deserts of Kazakhstan, requiring safe enclaves on Russian soil upon which caravans could regroup, restock and rearm.  Throughout this era, the Yahontov Family exploited Otlichnyy Mayak’s proximity to the border to amass great wealth and noble favor, rising from a military house of knighted heirs to the upper echelon of the oligarchical merchant class controlling strategic trading points throughout South Central Russia.  At the height of the family’s fortune, the craggy citadel towering over the Southern knolls of the estate was converted from an unsightly stronghold into a small palace, serving as the seat of two generations of royally titled Yahontovski dukedoms, providing distant though plausible royal aspirations.

But that was long ago. 

By 1805, the husk of the estate shared only its name with the greatness of former generations.  Since the apex of Otlichnyy Mayak and the Yahontov Dynasty, nearby Orenburg developed as a prime competitor of the estate, Russian alliances with the Kazak Hoards established a tenuous military stability in the region, and the slow and treacherous routes through Khan controlled territory were largely replaced with western routes via maritime travel over the Caspian Sea and land routes through the newly established cities of Oral and Guryev.  As its geographic utility declined, Otlichnyy Mayak slowly converted back to a simple dvoryanin and Tyoma Yahontov, if he were to live to inherit the title, would bear the simple designation of Dvor, a landed gentry without claim to royal heritage.  

This inheritor of the Yahontov legacy was a slight teen of uncommonly brittle build. His sour visage, scarred by illness and injury, bore the appearance of a weary and sickly man many times his age. The fragility of Tyoma’s feeble physique was balanced by his severe and hostile countenance, an aggression that engendered apprehension despite his weak and anemic bearing.  He was hated by all he encountered on the manor and was of ill-repute by those in the surrounding villages who had had the fortune of avoiding the regrettable happenstance of an encounter with the young master, a prospect that all sought to avoid whenever possible.  

Tyoma likewise sought to avoid such unwanted encounters; disdainful of servant and serf alike, the bitter princeling had no sympathy for the piteous condition that decades of his family’s neglect, abuse and misfortune had inflicted upon the wretches laboring away upon the landhold.  To the extent that he considered the sentiments of the peasants, Tyoma fancied (quite mistakenly) their obviously deliberate evasions and aura of hushed vigilance in his presence as evidence of a filial respect for their future liege.  He also maintained the belief that his scorn for the peasantry was considered by his family and peers as a virtuous dispassion demonstrating the legitimacy of his inheritance and readiness for rule, much in the manner that stockmen intentionally decline to bestow names upon their cattle lest they develop an attachment to beasts destined for the slaughter.  

This perception was, as well, quite mistaken.

On a scorching, arid evening three weeks prior to the anniversary of his sixteenth year, Tyoma was informed by his widowered father Viktor that Tyoma was to relocate to Moscow in the Fall to complete his studies at university there. The reasoning for Tyoma’s displacement from Otlichnyy Mayak, Viktor explained, was twofold.  

First was the nigh impossibility of acquiring an education befitting the proud heir to a noble family while remaining in the rural hinterlands of South Central Russia.  Years at university in an urban center would educate Tyoma in essential fields of academics, sciences, arts and world affairs.  More importantly, extended exposure to the city-dwellers of the Capitol would provide a supplementary education in the erudition and etiquette of New Russia, knowledge and modernity with which Tyoma could reform the rustic ways of Otlichnyy Mayak. 

The second and far more imperative motive, Viktor continued, was for the opportunities that a seat within the Imperial Moscow University may provide to possibly befriend the kin and acquittances of the denizens of the Royal Court and, in doing so, perchance ingratiate himself into the bosom of one of the greater families.  If Tyoma was able to maneuver himself through marriage into the upper ranks of a family of high station, Otlichnyy Mayak may be able to survive through a profitable symbiosis with such other house.  Indeed, if the boy’s conduct was wise and his luck great, he may well find himself commanding a combined house with relevance to western traders or even royalty.  Viktor expounded extensively on the plan and its merits, concluding with an emphatic declaration that this mission to Moscow was imperative to the very future of the family.  

Tyoma immediately objected, pleading that he be afforded the opportunity to prove himself as master of the estate without the formality of a university education, an entreaty Viktor curtly rebuffed before proclaiming the matter closed and taking his leave.  Despite the finality of the decision asserted by Viktor, Tyoma continued to beseech his father with scores of similar pleas throughout the summer, the daily assaults proving no more successful.  With his departure imminent, Tyoma collected his piecemeal objections into a unified written summary to be made immediately prior to his planned departure.  To present his case, Tyoma insisted on an official appointment with Viktor in his father’s study, imagining a business-like meeting in which two adults spoke as equals in pursuit of the mutually satisfactory resolution of a shared concern such as two merchants brokering a commercial transaction.  Surely, the young man concluded, his father wouldn’t reject such a sophisticated articulation of the rationales to cancel, or at least indefinitely delay, his impending departure.

“Father,” Tyoma began.  “As you know, you have commanded that I depart for Moscow three days hence.  I have throughout the summer brought to you my personal, familial, and commercial objections to this plan and my views of the grave consequences of my displacement from Otlichnyy Mayak.  Despite my hesitations and concerns, I have heeded your command and have considered with honor and respect your wise and valued counsel on the matter.  However, I have asked to meet this final time to avail to you as the master of Otlichnyy Mayak the reasons for my insistence on this matter and to avail to you as my father for your mercies in not sending me on what I have concluded to be a fool’s errand.”

“Have you?”  Viktor’s cold and businesslike response gave Tyoma hope that his father indeed considered this a meeting of equals, two generations of Yahontov heirs negotiating the future of the family and the estate.

“Son, you have brought this entreaty to me many times prior and I shall answer you now as I have before.  The future and fortune of this family, indeed the name Yahontov itself, lays solely with you.  Olga and Svetlana have both married and taken the names of their adopted houses; the dowry price of their unions has been great; however, neither marriage has resulted in the influence or reversal of fortune sought in their arrangement.  As the sole surviving heir to our legacy, I have no option but to entrust to you the future of our house and that future lies in Moscow.”

Tymoa readied his rehearsed reply.  

“Father, I have no talent for affairs in Muscovite society, nor does our family have connections necessary for me to be admitted to court.  I fear greatly that this journey is destined to be a fruitless endeavor and a great expense to our family’s dwindling coffers.  I fear, as well, it shall prove to be a injurious diversion of my attentions from the matters of the estate of which I will be expected to be expert in scant years.  I need these years to better acquaint myself with the business and undertakings of Otlichnyy Mayak, to become practiced at the command of the serfs, and to develop relations in commercial, martial and governmental affairs that will refill our coffers.”

“Tyoma, you have had sixteen years to build your knowledge of the estate’s business, to create relations with the serfs and the heads of their families and villages, to understand the markets and nations in which Otlichnyy Mayak operates and the parties with which it engages. My judgment in this matter is that a delay of your studies will not provide you in years what you have failed to obtain over your lifetime on the estate.”

Tyoma persisted despite his father’s denial, believing his failure to break Viktor’s recalcitrance to be simply a failure of articulation.

“But, father, even if I were to learn a great deal on matters of vast importance at university, I continue to hold an unwavering fear that I shall be regarded as an as zhitel' Vostoka, an Easterner, and never be accepted into society in Moscow.”

Tyoma was, in fact correct on this point.  Otlichnyy Mayak’s location in the southeastern reaches of Russia’s empire has ensured the creep of dark skin and Asiatic features into Yahontov bloodlines, resulting in undisguisable foreign characteristics. Desperate and conniving sovereigns of yore may have suppressed their racial and provincialist bigotry to grant title to some faraway warlord cousins in exchange for continued protection from the East.  However, in modern Moscow, it would be commensurate to an act of suicide to sup in public with an acquaintance as dark and exotic as Tyoma or to admit such as he into one’s sitting room, except perhaps to serve as a fascinating oddity with which to entertain other callers.  

Yet even had the palace doors been thrown open to him, Tyoma would find few friends within and fewer yet willing to stake their own opportunities at court to provide introduction for a virtual foreigner with provincial manners and low standing.  The opportunists and connivers of the court would quickly discover Tyoma, as future heir to minor title and a poor estate, had nothing to offer in exchange for their endorsement. Even if the kindlier and more generous within the court were of a mind to offer Tyoma their voucher, they would soon find themselves repulsed by his natural condescension and arrogant boorishness.

Tyoma, continued his argument in an organized, business-like manner, citing point after point of why his station in Moscow was destined to fail and presenting in methodical detail alternative plans that would allow him to stay at Otlichnyy Mayak. Vicktor remained silent and virtually motionless through the presentation, only breaking his cold stare to briefly scan the various writings presented to him.

After the majority of the hour had passed, Tyoma finally concluded with a final plea.  “Please, father. I know that the course of actions that I have developed for myself and for the estate will succeed.  As the future heir to the Yahontov Dynasty, I am committed to these plans, to our House, to the name of Yahontov and to a prosperous future for Otlichnyy Mayak.”

Viktor maintained his motionless silence long after Tyoma yielded, waiting as Tyoma breathlessly searched for a gesture revealing his father’s assessment.  After minutes of still consideration, Viktor broke a slight smirk and began his reply.

“Very well, Tyoma.  I have endeavored mightily to spare you the wounds of the truth.  But as you have so unsparingly questioned the wisdom of the decision that I have informed you is final, I shall now spare you nothing.  I am sending you to Moscow for two equally important reasons and you shall stay there for these two reasons.” 

“The first reason, Tyoma, is that this is a dying family and you are to be the last of our name.  Within the decade, a railroad will connect Moscow to the Caspian Sea. Once completed, Otlichnyy Mayak will be an irrelevant oasis in the middle of a desert crossed by none.  It is as clear to me today as it was when you were a child still suckling at the teat, you will never command anything, never hold meaningful power, and never lord over an estate sufficient to raise an army or pay minimal tribute.  The only reason that Otlichnyy Mayak has not already been sacked for our insulting and insulting patronage is our distance from civilization and the expense and bother of marching a battalion to raze the estate and slaughter the family.”

“Even if you were to succeed in Moscow beyond any fool’s wildest fantasies, you would simply be absorbed into the most trivial margins of a larger, more influential family.  But you will not succeed in Moscow and there is no house willing to offer to you a daughter that would put you within plausible reach of actual power. The very best you may do is to degradingly flatter some middling family of low title and, in doing do, perhaps connive your way into marriage with a four or fifth daughter, some unfortunate creature with whom you may be permitted to inhabit a remote and minor estate where you will be tolerated to beggar off the family’s scraps so long as you remain remote and minor.  Of course, the price of such union, which they shall no doubt see as alms to a broken and pitiful mendicant, shall be the remainder of Otlichnyy Mayak.”

“You see, Tyoma, I am sending you to Moscow to fail. At least this laughable fiasco will occur far from Otlichnyy Mayak such that history will record you as the failed heir of the Yahontov Dynasty, the blundering stooge with whom our name died…. Sufficiently removed from your family and your father that none will blame me for whatever humiliating and surely treacherous debacle does you in.”

Tyoma was made dumb by his father’s candor.  He sat slack-jawed and unmoving.

“No words, Tyoma?  I see.  Therefore, I shall endow upon you the second reason that you are being sent to Moscow.  A reason that I am sure will surely render you quite as mute and stupid as the first.”  

“The second reason that you are being sent to Moscow is simply that I dislike you and do not wish to spend my final years with your presence polluting the remaining days of my being.  You are a boorish and friendless cur and a relentless embarrassment to your family.  You act with unending cruelty and arrogance to those below your station and torment any and all with the misfortune to look to this family and our estate for their bread.  Worse, you are a schemer and a transparently self-interested sycophant to me and to any person of station of which you believe your flattery may avail benefit.  I detest every minute in which I must repel your constant demands for unwarranted esteem and unearned affection and see in you naught but all that I despise within myself and hated in your mother.” 

“But, know this. Even beyond my own contempt for you and for all of your shameful weaknesses, the people’s loathing for you is tenfold.  If I truly hated you enough, I would grant your wish to stay at Otlichnyy Mayak secure in the knowledge that someday soon the peasants will rise against you and, mark these words Tyoma, on that day they will murder you.  My only hesitation in delivering to you this most deserved fate is my uncertainty as to whether they will delay their uprising until after I have passed or if I shall be tossed into the same beggar’s ditch into which they toss your mutilated remains.” 

“Tyoma, You have come to me in the manner of a businessman and a peer and have presented your case as an equal negotiating matters of estate and commerce, so I shall respond to you with the honor and dignity merited by your entreaty, by your relation as my son and by your title as the last successor of the Yahonov Dynasty.

“Poshyel k chyertu, mal'chik!  Next time you come to me deigning to, as you say, ‘consider my wise and valued counsel’ I shall see to it that your head is removed and it is I who will be the final heir to the Yahontov name.”