A summary of "The Road to Kitezh" by Boris Akunin

"The Road to Kitezh" is a historical novella by Boris Akunin, written in 2021. The text traces the ideological evolution of the Russian intelligentsia in the second half of the nineteenth century, illustrating the split in society between reformers and conservatives. The main characters journey from youthful liberal radicalism to extreme forms of state conservatism or terrorism.

The story was published as the eighth fictional part of the extensive cycle "History of the Russian State." It accompanies the historical volume devoted to the nineteenth-century era, complementing the stark facts with vivid depictions of everyday life and the fierce political struggle.

Prologue and the birth of the secret circle

The events begin in 1854, at the height of the Crimean War, a brutal war for the empire. Three young employees of the St. Petersburg Naval Ministry — Viktor Voronin, Mikhail Pitovranov, and Yevgeny Vorontsov — created a secret circle under the unofficial patronage of the progressive Grand Duke Konstantin Nikolayevich.

The young men passionately hate Nicholas I. Idealists give themselves musketeer nicknames: Athos, Porthos, and Aramis. Friends gather in the billiard room, heatedly discussing the country’s future. The agenda includes the liberation of the serfs, an independent judiciary, and popular representation. The young men dream of elevating their homeland to the shining stars.

They are soon joined by Adrian Lartsev, the son of an exiled Decembrist and a talented railway engineer. The Siberian possesses a rigorous, pragmatic mindset, devoid of any political illusions, and his thoughts are entirely occupied with large-scale railway projects. His friends happily nickname the engineer "D’Artagnan."

Voronin and Vorontsov are courting the Dorf sisters, Cornelia and Lydia. The imperious and extremely calculating Cornelia decides the matches herself: she takes the ambitious Voronin as her lawful husband, while the gentle Lydia is given to the idealistic Vorontsov.

Tired of empty political talk, Voronin suggests poisoning the autocrat rather than waiting for the emperor’s natural death. Lartsev coolly hands the conspirators a deadly Buryat poison capable of simulating a heart attack. Journalist Pitovranov sneaks into the kitchen of the imperial country residence and slips the potion into the teapot.

By tragic accident, the poisoned drink is sampled by the footman Fyodor Kazenkin, who immediately falls dead. The Tsar escapes death. Lartsev is detained by Cossack guards, but the engineer successfully escapes custody and goes overseas to build American transcontinental highways. Pitovranov experiences profound remorse over the senseless death of an innocent man.

An era of reforms and new disappointments

The story shifts to 1874. The paths of these former like-minded people diverge dramatically, reflecting the general fragmentation of the thinking class. Voronin defects to the staunch conservatives and serves in the secret police under the chief of the gendarmes, Count Shuvalov. The aristocrat Vorontsov works as a district justice of the peace in the Novgorod province, sincerely defending liberal values before the peasants. Pitovranov becomes an incredibly popular journalist, writing caustic feuilletons under the pseudonym "Trigeminus."

Lartsev returns from America as a renowned railway engineer. Voronin recruits his longtime comrade to audit the Caucasian railway concession. The official hopes the independent inspector will uncover a massive corruption scheme, the threads of which lead to Varvara Shileiko, a close friend of Princess Dolgoruky, the mistress of Alexander II.

The engineer quickly restores order at the construction site, tames the local abreks, and obtains irrefutable written evidence of theft. Shileiko unsuccessfully attempts to bribe the inspector, then offers to physically eliminate the intractable auditor. The incorruptible Lartsev rejects all deals.

Voronin passes the incriminating evidence he’s collected to Count Shuvalov, planning to deal a crushing blow to the court’s liberal party. However, the Emperor, defending the honor of his beloved Dolgoruky and her inner circle, unexpectedly dismisses the all-powerful head of the secret police. The plot collapses completely. Shileiko celebrates triumph, and the calculating Voronin enters the service of the Holy Synod’s Chief Prosecutor, Konstantin Pobedonostsev, the leading ideologist of the conservative wing.

Radicalization of society and underground terrorism

By 1880, public tension in the capital reached a dangerous point. Terrorists from the "People’s Will" organization carried out a powerful explosion in the Winter Palace. The police were completely baffled by the underground’s audacity.

Voronin unsuccessfully attempts to find a British connection to the crime, observing the secret spiritualistic séances of the Scottish mystic Hume. During one of these spiritualistic performances, a startling detail emerges: Pitovranov is leading a double life. The respected journalist conceals his affiliation with the revolutionary underground leadership. It turns out the journalist is actively assisting terrorists in organizing new assassinations, maintaining reliable connections with agents within the secret police.

The government is temporarily headed by the liberal-minded General Loris-Melikov. The new dictator recruits Lartsev to develop the large-scale Trans-Siberian Railway project. In order to secure enormous funds for the first ice tests, the engineer travels to Moscow, where he uses brutal force to extract a large debt from a corrupt contractor for the Christ the Savior Cathedral.

Varvara Shileiko, Lartsev’s companion, proposes a secret political alliance to the railway worker. The influential woman asks him to orchestrate the derailment of the imperial train to eliminate the legitimate heirs to the throne and ensure full power for the children of Princess Dolgoruky. Lartsev avoids political assassinations, preferring to devote himself exclusively to drawings and ice testing in Bologoye.

Lartsev has a daughter, Marusya, who suffers from psychogenic muteness. On the advice of a friend, the engineer agrees to take the girl to the famous spiritualist Blavatsky, hoping for a miraculous cure. A hypnotic session unexpectedly helps — the child begins to speak.

Meanwhile, Pitovranov, tired of the constant bloodshed and violence, is experiencing a severe emotional crisis. The journalist is secretly raising Maria, the daughter of a footman he poisoned almost thirty years ago. Pitovranov unsuccessfully tries to marry his ward off to a promising entomologist, but the marriage proves deeply unhappy. Suddenly, Maria openly declares her love for her former guardian. Pitovranov decides to immediately abandon the bloody underground, transfer all his personal savings to a London bank, and flee abroad with the woman he loves forever. But Voronin’s experienced agents are already tracking his Moscow apartment.

The tragic ending of the stories

On March 1, 1881, the Narodnaya Volya (People’s Will) successfully assassinated Alexander II on the embankment of the Catherine Canal. Vorontsov’s daughter, Ariadna, who had fled her family home to join the revolutionary movement with her former student, Listvitsky, played an active role in the meticulous organization of the assassination attempt.

Yevgeny Nikolayevich Vorontsov himself slowly loses his mind from the grief he has befallen him: his wife falls into severe catatonia, and his son, wounded in the war, commits suicide with an army revolver. The judge becomes a bystander to the Tsar’s death, spotting an old acquaintance of his daughter at the crime scene.

Vorontsov finds Ariadna’s safe house in the Pargolovo forest. The grief-stricken father goes to see his daughter, hoping to see her at least one more time. However, a magistrate arrives there with armed gendarmes. Vorontsov witnesses Ariadna and her terrorist lover blow themselves up with a huge charge of dynamite during an attempt to arrest the police. A powerful explosion wipes the house off the face of the earth. Vorontsov, unable to withstand the horrific shock, suddenly dies of a heart attack on a forest path.

The detective police are on Pitovranov’s trail. Voronin personally travels to Bologoye, where the fugitive journalist is temporarily hiding with Lartsev. The official takes a team of detectives with him, intending to arrest his old friend. Lartsev flatly refuses to hand over his comrade to the police agents. The Siberian engineer covers Pitovranov’s escape with accurate rifle fire and deliberately dies under the detectives’ bullets on the lake dock. Pitovranov, realizing the utter hopelessness of the situation and the impossibility of escape, shoots himself in the log cabin.

Victory of the State Party

Voronin masterfully plays a double political game between Loris-Melikov and Pobedonostsev. The official dutifully supplies both superiors with classified information, waiting to see whose apparatus will prevail. Convinced of the Chief Prosecutor’s unstoppable power, Voronin betrays Loris-Melikov.

Viktor Voronin became the first confidant of Konstantin Pobedonostsev, the chief ideologist of Alexander III’s new reign. The Chief Prosecutor drafted a harshly anti-monarchist manifesto. Voronin, an official, through complex maneuvers and psychological pressure on the young tsar, helped the conservatives achieve a final victory over the reformers. Liberal ministers, led by Mikhail Loris-Melikov and Minister of War Milyutin, resigned. The planned constitutional concessions were completely revoked.

Viktor Voronin is finally convinced of the historical correctness of the harsh state dictatorship. All his former friends are dead, destroyed by their own destructive passions and political maximalism.

The narrative ends with Konstantin Pobedonostsev’s solemn monologue about the invisible soul of the state — the mystical city of Kitezh, the true path to which lies solely through the suppression of any unrest and unconditional service to the autocracy. Voronin, tears in his eyes, silently agrees with his stern mentor.