Dear Natalie,

It’s a letter. It’s a letter from Mary Bolkonskaya, the sister of Natasha’s betrothed, and it almost seems like a confession of love – I cannot help loving you, it said, in that shaky, trembling handwriting, and it brings a twist of something to Natasha’s gut.

She doesn’t know if it’s affection, or fear, or something else, but she’s terrified at the utter foreignness of it.