[ oh. that. that little issue of hers. it comes flooding back — and the embarrassment with it, deepening that flush to a blooming rose. if the servants will gossip, it's only time before the world will. but alina, for all that she loathes the simple idea of the entire world knowing her intimate business, finds her mind wandering to their friends.
no, that isn't fair to claim. the sudden descent of her stomach, threatening to drop out from beneath her, is too leaden with guilt for it to be as simple as wondering what their friends and allies will say. briefly, she wonders if she's broken nikolai's request by thinking of mal, of thinking of how he will inevitably hear of it long before she wants to disclose it, even in the aftermath of moaning out for nikolai in his bed. in the aftermath of knowing how she tastes on his tongue, her lips shining from the both of them when he pulls away.
she shoots him a scowl, but it's a half-hearted attempt at best. her limbs, liquified and drained as they are now, are useless in reprimanding him with a harmless kick to the shin. silently, she reasons with herself that he has likely earned a reprieve from her threats of bodily harm. ]
Well, at least they'll be speaking truths now.
[ until those, too, are inevitably exaggerated. she purses her lips in some grim attempt at a smile — a reassurance she wants to give, but can't quite bring herself to provide him — as the rest of what he says finally sinks in. it's understandable, she thinks, why so many of the soldiers had tumbled peasant girls they would never have to speak to again. they would hardly have to form the same excuses as nikolai crafts.
that afterglow, that feeling of free-falling without a care — it ends abruptly. nothing on his face speaks to her of regrets, but then nikolai has always been well-versed in displaying only what he wants the world to see. she props herself up on an elbow, adjusting the slipping strap on her shoulder. ]
You're already up. [ dry jokes that fall flat aside: ] You don't have to make excuses, you know. It's less insulting if you tell me that you want me to leave.
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no, that isn't fair to claim. the sudden descent of her stomach, threatening to drop out from beneath her, is too leaden with guilt for it to be as simple as wondering what their friends and allies will say. briefly, she wonders if she's broken nikolai's request by thinking of mal, of thinking of how he will inevitably hear of it long before she wants to disclose it, even in the aftermath of moaning out for nikolai in his bed. in the aftermath of knowing how she tastes on his tongue, her lips shining from the both of them when he pulls away.
she shoots him a scowl, but it's a half-hearted attempt at best. her limbs, liquified and drained as they are now, are useless in reprimanding him with a harmless kick to the shin. silently, she reasons with herself that he has likely earned a reprieve from her threats of bodily harm. ]
Well, at least they'll be speaking truths now.
[ until those, too, are inevitably exaggerated. she purses her lips in some grim attempt at a smile — a reassurance she wants to give, but can't quite bring herself to provide him — as the rest of what he says finally sinks in. it's understandable, she thinks, why so many of the soldiers had tumbled peasant girls they would never have to speak to again. they would hardly have to form the same excuses as nikolai crafts.
that afterglow, that feeling of free-falling without a care — it ends abruptly. nothing on his face speaks to her of regrets, but then nikolai has always been well-versed in displaying only what he wants the world to see. she props herself up on an elbow, adjusting the slipping strap on her shoulder. ]
You're already up. [ dry jokes that fall flat aside: ] You don't have to make excuses, you know. It's less insulting if you tell me that you want me to leave.