[ it's only now that he's sitting by a warm fire with a glass in his hand that the day's exhaustion decides to catch up with him. the honesty that wants to tumble out of his mouth β that alina looks especially lovely by the light of the fire β can easily be blamed on this. ]
Definitely the former. [ he tips brandy into her glass and offers it to her. ] I'm truly sorry I missed dinner. If it's any consolation, I was miserable the entire time we were apart.
[ he won't make promises he can't keep, so he doesn't say it'll never happen again knowing full well it most certainly will β to both of them, because alina will have her own engagements as both the queen and the sun summoner.
the cake melts on his tongue when he pops a piece into his mouth. he specifically asked for a dessert popular in keramzin as a show of good faith, but perhaps he'll have to inquire further if everything there tastes as good as this. ]
I know more about it than the average fellow, which quite frankly isn't saying much. You'll have to fill in the gaps for me. I prefer to learn about a place from someone who's lived in it rather than studied it on a map. [ he leans back on one hand, taking a generous drink. ] Or perhaps we should put on costumes and sneak away there ourselves. Pretend to be an old couple that makes hats. Genya could make us look eighty.
[ Her first sip scorches her throat on its way down, but the burn of it pales to the wildfire kindling beneath her skin. The warmth that blooms brighter, spreading to her collarbone like a flame, can easily be blamed on firelight and nothing else — but she knows better, knows it's a lie she tells herself.
I was miserable the entire time we were apart shouldn't be as pleasing to the ear as it is. She downs her next taste with the desperate need to distract them both from it, as if brandy can slaughter the sudden pounding in her chest.
In reality, it only manages to melt away the almond cake on her tongue, but never let it be said an attempt wasn't made. ]
Delighting in your misery does make me feel better. I'd say that more than makes up for it.
[ His company, truly, is all that's required to spread salve over that wound. Better, she wants to tell him, than any dramatic ploy he might scheme up. She draws her finger over the lip of her glass, instead, pensively circling its rim. ]
I don't think there would be much left to show you, after — [ After the Darkling's calculated attacks, a shadow feasting off of her worst fears in order to bring them to life. Her lips press tightly together. ] — everything. What I remembered is ruined, and even if it wasn't, Keramizin was a horrible place for children to grow up.
[ If she could grant Mal another life — if she could grant children as lost as them — greater than drafty orphanages and colder guardians, she would. But life had dealt them that hand, had brought them together in that way, had brought her here to this very moment; it's difficult to regret that. ]
I'll make a note that you enjoy that sort of thing. My misery, that is.
[ though it's hard to be miserable around alina. he finds himself giving attention to the smallest of details, the way a bit of her hair comes untucked from behind one ear, the glow of the fire warming her skin, her fingertip tracing the edges of her glass. tiny things that he's noticed since the start but pretended not to, especially when her smiles were reserved for mal.
he wonders, foolishly, if she's thinking of him now. ]
When this is over, then. When we rebuild. When we make it a place that isn't horrible for children to grow up. I think a statue in your likeness would improve things considerably. Or mine.
[ these are the sorts of promises that he can make, because he fully intends to keep them. the tension on her face is plain to see, so he shifts the conversation away from her home, but to a topic that is no less intimate. ]
I thought of you a dozen times today. [ a brief flash of a smile. ] For starters, every time I see the sun, I think of you. But I also thought of you while I was working on plans for the Kingfisher. I suddenly wondered what it would be like to see you like this. Now β I absolutely did not plan for things to go this way, but I have wanted to see you away from all the pomp and circumstance again. Like when I first met you and you first met Sturmhond. Before things became... more complicated, I suppose I should say.
[ he pauses to drain his glass, then reaches for the bottle again for something to do with his hands and somewhere to point his eyes that isn't at her. ]
Honestly, I don't know if I'm making sense. I'm rather tired. I know you're the same Alina you've always been, but sometimes I imagine you think I proposed just because of what you can offer Ravka. That's a part of it, certainly, but it's not just that. It's also just you.
[ When, when, when. Nikolai's head is filled with impossible, fantastical dreams — but the wildness of that will is dangerously, addictingly convincing. Sometimes, she thinks he's peril made man, a siren more than a sailor at sea, for how deeply he invokes that belief. Maybe foolishly, she lets herself drown in that fantasy until her lips pull upward in some wishful, wistful smile. Afraid, almost, to allow herself even that for fear of it being spirited away from her. ]
When this is all over, I'd like that. [ A beat, and then, rawly honest: ] More than anything.
[ To build the home she had never had. To provide safety that doesn't stem from a false image of sainthood. To welcome what Nikolai is willing to give, when many kings have only neglected and taken without a care. It's easy to give her focus over to that, rather than the racing rabbit-hearted rhythm in her chest, so ferocious she can't imagine that Nikolai is deaf to it. ]
You want to go back to when I wished you bodily harm?
[ That smile turns crooked, a dimpled thing that narrows her eyes to slits. It isn't what he said at all, but her mouth is so terribly dry from the swiftness of her pulse that it's the only sentence that loosens itself from her lips. ]
I think of you. Just so you know, since you seem to think I don't. [ Maybe that isn't enough. Maybe none of this is, but she offers it up as a piecemeal sacrifice, anyway, in return for what he's given her. ] But I wonder if you'll regret it, eventually. If you'll even be happy, choosing someone like me. That's what I think of the most. If it's going to become just duty to you, or if it's —
[ There are no words for it, truthfully, this tangled web they weave. In the end, she settles for: ]
Something else. You've always been very good at making it sound like a business arrangement.
[ and there β that smile he didn't know he was waiting to see. something loosens in his chest and he breathes a little easier. alina is so much like the sun herself that sometimes the irony of her being the sun summoner is too much to bear. she lights up any space she occupies by being unabashedly alina, and he thinks, perhaps, that mal would agree with him on that. it might be the only thing they'd ever agree upon. ]
There's something about a beautiful woman trying to maim me that is really quite enchanting. All of my favorite people have wished ill upon me at some point, I believe. It's almost like a rite of passage.
[ i think of you quickens his pulse, an unexpected combination of words. he wants to ask if she only thinks of him, but he's taken her previous sentiment to heart, that jealousy does not suit him, so he lets the words die on his tongue and washes their corpses down with a mouthful of brandy.
perhaps he has made all of this sound overly clinical, but there's such a fine line between fantasy and reality that sometimes he doesn't know which one he's toeing. ]
I wonder the same thing, Alina. Whether you'll regret this or not. Neither of us can know. [ that's part of the risk of an arrangement like this, when he doesn't have the luxury of waiting to fall in passionate love with a stranger.
but alina still could, in theory. it might cause a national spectacle even without her being queen, but she still has a better chance than he does. ]
I don't want you to feel like you've been led here under false pretenses. I'm being overly cautious, which quite frankly isn't an easy thing to get me to do. But I mean everything I say to you. [ a small pause here, before he plunges doggedly forward. ] I do believe I could be happy choosing someone like you. I think, with time, I could certainly fall in love with you.
[ Too many confessions rest on her tongue, waiting to leap as he has. But the danger of leaping without looking, without knowing what fate awaits them, traps them in her mouth. Truly, she wonders if they're even worth knowing — those darker parts of herself that eclipse what the world believes her to be. A sun, tainted by the sliver of shadow waiting to consume it.
There is no easy way to admit that sweet, honeyed words put her on edge. That his proposal reminds her of red coloring the snow beneath a stag, and a collar designed to be a chain. It isn't fair — to her, to Nikolai — that it flashes through her mind and seizes her lungs in its grasp with the ghostly fingers of the Darkling. She isn't that monster, and neither is he, but she cannot help that some shade of a familiar fear still lives within her.
This time, she may be the one to trap another. This time, she may be the one to be corrupted by the promise of a crown. She blows out a breath, as if that alone will dispel that burst of anxiety. (Predictably, it doesn't; less predictably, Nikolai's sentiment anchors her back to the ground, too good to be true and yet agonizingly so.)
So she does — leap, in her own way, wondering if she will collide with the ground on her way down. But not without finishing her glass, first, setting it aside a little clumsily. ]
Do you know what I think? I think we've almost died a number of times, and being overly cautious is starting to sound ridiculous when we've already been lucky enough to survive through impossible things.
[ Testing out an arrangement is not, by far, the craziest idea their group of rebels has ever had — but gambling with hearts is an entirely different game, with different stakes. ]
I think — [ Her tongue sweeps over her dry lips, as if she might summon the right words to a mouth that feels too parched. ] — giving this a chance is worth it.
[ It isn't the yes he wants to hear, but it's — something. Slow progress is, after all, still progress. ]
[ he watches the shadows in her expression closely, not for the first time reminded about the sort of person she became intimately tangled with. the darkling, his words and promises a polished onyx. the man who could lead ravka to utter destruction, but the point remains that he has a gift β not dissimilar to nikolai β of making people follow him. alina wasn't the only one under his spell, and he wants to remind her of that, but it's nothing she hasn't heard before and likely is tired of it. he knows many under the palace roof still dream of the darkling, only they're nightmares now.
a gentle smile pulls at his mouth when she sets her glass down. ]
I do believe we're rather death-proof.
[ perhaps it's hubris, but it hasn't failed him yet.
his brow arches slightly at her answer β not a yes, but he wasn't expecting one. this one settles far more comfortably than a yes would have, in any case. chances are his lifeblood; he's known for taking every single one.
he reaches for this one wholeheartedly, glancing briefly at the crackling fire before he returns his gaze to alina, leaning in a little closer so that their knees are once again brushing. ]
Are you trying to forget him right now? [ his voice softens, and he takes another chance, reaching up to brush his fingers along damp strands of her hair. ] Because I'd quite like to kiss you, but I don't want to make a liar out of myself.
[ It isn't a simple question. It lands like a strike, dizzying and unexpected; it sickens her like the sway of a ship, unpredictable and erratic in its rocking. She should be thinking of Mal — the hardness of his expression whenever his jealousy arises and turns him to stone, as if it will somehow prevent pain from striking him. She shouldn't be thinking of Mal, when the brush of Nikolai's fingers is its own flickering flame.
There is no easy answer. Of all the impossible odds they've overcome, there is no defeating the truth: whether she is thinking of him or not, there is no forgetting Mal, not when such a large piece of him resides inside of her, bright enough to drive away the darkness that threatens to creep in. Not when he is the only family she has known, the only home she has lived inside for so long.
(Long enough that, sometimes, she wonders if she has overstayed her welcome.)
But he has said right now, and she clings to that — selfishly, maybe, for how tightly she wants to hold onto this moment. Her breath is a stuttered thing in her threat, held in that delicate balance between anticipation and anxiety. Like this, she can feel the whisper of his own, the traces of rum she wants to trace away. ]
If I wanted to forget, the bottle is right there.
[ It shakes just a little, that answer that tries so valiantly to be unaffected, as her throat bobs with a harsh swallow. There won't be repairing this dam, once they unleash it, but Nikolai has always exuded a sense of danger. A sea that can be as gentle and soothing as it is wildly turbulent.
It makes her want to be bolder, braver; her eyes flicker to the softness of his mouth and linger too long, wondrous. ]
I'm only thinking of you right now.
[ If there was any doubt that still needed to be wiped from the board. It's a chance she seizes, a chance she won't wait to come to her; the press of her lips to his is a little abrupt, a little clumsy, a little lacquered with almond and rum — but unburdened by any lie. She wonders if it's enough for him to feel it, to accept it — if the understanding will be in his eyes when she does break away from that fleeting, uncertain brush of her mouth only to find and gauge his gaze. ]
[ it turns out that he doesn't have to wait. alina comes to him, and it strikes him how right it all feels that it happens this way, that he doesn't have to wonder how much of this is going along with his motions, caught in the upward cycle that his life tends to be. nikolai is confident in many things, but when it comes down to it, he lacks experience in matters of the heart. the timing has never been right, not once in his life, but maybe β maybe this can be.
the promise that heβs the only one sheβs thinking of spurs him into action, meeting her gaze when she breaks the initial kiss. thereβs a smile in his eyes, one that he hopes is reassuring. he believes her and he wants this, so much that his hand grazes her jaw when he leans in and kisses her again, traveling gently into her hair and pushing against the nape of her neck, where he finds her skin warm and damp. his thumb slides against the delicate bones of her throat, and he wonders, briefly, what it would be like to wake up to this every morning.
it could be marvelous. it could be a nightmare. presently, it takes just a few seconds more to stop caring, too focused on the warmth of her mouth and the softness of her skin. something gives way in his chest, a yearning thatβs been there since the first time he felt her lips and wished that she wanted his the same. a soft breath pushes out of him, both hands now carefully cradling her jaw as he maps out the shape of her mouth, tasting the heavy sweetness of cake and brandy and wondering if heβll ever be able to drink this again without thinking of this moment. ]
Alina. [ he whispers it against her mouth, a slight tremor in his fingers as he curls his knuckles to her cheek. gently, he lowers his hand to find hers, something careful and slightly hesitant in the way he tangles their fingers together. ] I canβt promise you everything, but I do promise to always try to be what you need. Whatever that may be. And no matter how many times it might change.
[ His kiss kindles her like that first burning sip of rum, filling her with a molten heat that buzzes through her limbs and pools low in her stomach. For a fleeting moment, she wonders if it's enough to grow intoxicatingly addicted, with the way her head fogs and floats. With the way she is tempted to chase after the promises his mouth forms, a bumbling drunkard without any hope for recovery. But it is, nevertheless, simple. The only simple thing between them, that requires no careful thought or calls into question the conflicted nature of her heart.
Perhaps it was always inevitable that she would go to war with herself, once the dust of Ravka's own settled. She anchors herself to this moment, instead — to him, with the twist and twining of her fingers locked into his collar. As though she can keep herself from splintering apart, as though she can shackle him to her like the prisoner she had never wanted him to become. They relax and clench in time with every word that pours from his lips, just the close sweep of them against her own enough to test her restraint.
It would be easy, to fall back into it and leave questions of the future for another day. It would be easy, because this they inevitably know how to do, while the rest of it remains, as ever, a confounding riddle. ]
I won't ask you to change to my liking.
[ Like a sail catching wind, he adapts as needed according to where he must navigate. She has seen it for herself: Nikolai the negotiator, Nikolai the would-be King of Ravka, Nikolai the bastard. All sides of the same face, depending on what's asked of him. What role is required, to evoke the right reaction. It has left her questioning which glimpses of him are real, and which he has manufactured in order to appeal to an audience.
A marriage that demands a performance from him isn't a demand she could, she would, make of him. ]
I need you to be a real person. [ Around his hand, her fingers squeeze, a subconscious gesture. ] I need you to be you.
[ Whatever he chooses to be. Ally, friend, lover, partner — she isn't certain where his own heart will lead him, but the point remains. ]
[ he's not so foolish to think that this will resolve anything or even to attach a weighty meaning to it. it's far too easy to get caught up in this feeling where everything is honeyed warmth and intoxication, where all he wants to do is kiss alina more deeply and drop his hands to trace the curve of her waist through her silken gown. it shakes him how much he wants this, and it's in that moment that he realizes that it will hurt if alina rejects this. he will wed and produce an heir no matter what her answer may be, but the thought of seeking out another political alliance with far less of a chance of love or even friendship thoroughly depresses him.
with a soft sound their lips slowly part, but even then nikolai doesn't move too far away, content in the hazy circle of β whatever this is.
a real person. you. it's more than a fair request, though alina doesn't know how hard it will be to give her that. if he acted exactly how he felt, if he voiced every worry and doubt, if he didn't push and push and push for relentless optimism in the face of countless improbable situations, then no one would believe in him and certainly no one would follow him. he reserves that honesty for exactly no one, only allowing it to creep in when he's alone.
doubt clouds his thoughts even now that alina would even like the raw version of himself. he doesn't even particularly like who he is in solitude. silence hangs for a moment too long before his glib manner comes inching back like a golden shield, lifting their laced hands to press a kiss to alina's knuckles. ]
I am me. [ from his cross-legged position on the floor, he exaggerates a bow. ] It would be terribly concerning if I wasn't. Although β I mirror your sentiment. I would never ask you to change for me, either. If you wanted to throw all of the forks away, then the palace would just have to be forkless.
[ She could let his charm sweep her away. Too many have been pulled into Nikolai's tide that way, but Alina knows too well what this is: another routine where one pushes and the other retreats, like the ebb and flow of water lapping at the shore. Perhaps that would be the wise move, if this were a war table demanding a strategy from her.
But she has asked for something real, something as genuine as those rare moments where she had been reminded that Nikolai was no different from her: just a boy burdened by the weight of duty pressing in on him, playing at being a prince. Just two people who have known what it means to be in over their heads and feeling as though they're drowning as a result. Santka Alina and the next ruler of Ravka, carrying an ancient and bone-deep tiredness no one should have to shoulder.
Without the titles, without the expectations, she's left to wonder if Nikolai even knows who he is beneath it all — and if she'll ever be allowed to carry that same secret, once the pretenses fall away like carefully removed armor. If the pretenses ever slip away. It's that bittersweet thought that wards off any of her amusement and provokes her to act. Her hand fists more tightly, a grip that proves unrelenting as Alina herself when she asks, like it's an accusatory blade she's pointed at his jugular: ]
Are you really you?
[ Those fingers loosen only so they can take themselves to the gilded hair near the nape of his neck, tugging — not sharply, not furiously, but firm enough to hold him there — to ensure he can't hide a lie by averting his eyes. Even if that action itself makes her pulse rush with the thought that he may very well want to escape her, after this. ]
You're not as convincing a liar as you think you are.
[ He had taught her his own tricks, after all — but for a terrifying moment, she thinks that perhaps the problem is that perhaps he is that perceptive. Perhaps she has never known him at all. ]
[ pinned by both her gaze and her grip, nikolai's sharp eyes never leave hers, and from here, the way the corner of his mouth twitches into something like a smile β it looks more like armor than amusement. her perception cuts deeply. he's highly impressed and simultaneously all too vulnerable for his tastes.
although he'll rarely admit to negative traits, stubbornness is one of them. the rest of his mouth curves around a smile that doesn't quite touch the barest hint of uncertainty in his eyes. ]
Do you think I'm putting on a performance for you? [ isn't his entire life a performance? ] I'm flattered that you think I'm apparently so interesting.
[ he lets go of her hand and reaches instead for the one currently gripping his hair, sliding his fingers along the inside of her arm and gently clasping her wrist. his thumb presses down against her hummingbird pulse. he is a convincing liar. he knows this to be factual. it's only alina with her biting sort of sweetness that penetrates his walls. ]
The firelight looks marvelous on you. [ pointedly not a lie. he draws her wrist to his mouth to brush one last kiss against her skin, then reaches for the bottle to take a generous swig. he grins, the spark back in his tired eyes, dangling the brandy like an offering before her. ] I wonder what the morning gossip will sound like if I walked out of your room before dawn wearing the same clothes as yesterday.
[ Slow progress is still progress, a mantra she must repeat to herself now — a reminder that every new step toward rebuilding is a victory, a testament to their stubborn survival and Ravka's shift toward a new era — but she wonders if they've taken too long of a stride forward, in this, only to return to the start.
When blustering and bluffing had been normal, expected.
Too many questions sit on her tongue, ready to launch themselves, but none as great as the one that haunts her now: if he expects her to fall in love with a performance, with a lie, with the mask he has designed. Perhaps she has already been lured by it, a facade intended to draw her in; perhaps she has a habit of being drawn to men who wish for her to see only what they'll allow her to see.
The line between reality and fantasy has become too thin, too murky, for her to navigate it. The distance he has put between himself and her touch doesn't clear her head, chilling her despite the heat that seeps into the threads of her nightgown, and neither will a drink — but her fingers still clasp around the neck of the bottle, anyway.
The next sip burns her, but so has he. So has this entire conversation. Unamused, her lips press together. ]
Now I know you're lying.
[ Droplets of copper rum spill toward her chin, but she wipes them away quickly with the back of her hand and an incredulous scoff. Marvelous. Not Alina Starkov, who can still recall scabby knees and a starved, sickly girl peering back in the mirror. Not Alina Starkov, who has grown out of that skin like a blossom nurtured by the sun, but still carries the old, scabbed over scars of those insecurities. ]
Stay and find out. [ He won't, she tells herself, and so she doesn't allow herself to feel any shame in extending the invitation. ] Make sure you tell them it's sacrilegious to talk about a saint the way I know they will.
[ he can tell they've taken a misstep here, a chill in the air that has nothing to do with the fire, and it serves as a reminder that this won't come easily to either of them. certainly not him, with his woeful lack of successful relationships. he forges bonds everywhere he goes and yet still to this day he can't say he has a true confidant.
it can't be everyone else. the common denominator, clearly, is him.
he keeps his hands still even when he wants to reach out to wipe the spilled drink from her chin. ]
Honestly, I think I could fall asleep right here on your floor. [ weariness creeps into his tone, the stresses of the day and the way he has so clearly fumbled this catching up to him. his lips still feel warm from kissing her. ] I vow to have anyone who speaks disrespectfully about your body, character, or morals tried for treason.
[ he reaches out to gently retrieve the bottle by its base, silent for a moment while he wrestles with his next words, his gaze shifting to the flames beside them. ]
I don't mean to lie. I don't see it as lying. [ a tiny crease appears between his brows. ] It's just the way that I taught myself to live. Everything you see is part of who I am. I'm afraid I don't quite know how to not be this way.
[ Your floor.Your. Nothing in this palace feels as though it should belong to her, nothing she can lay claim to — least of all him. It's another question to add to an endless list: whether she will always feel like an outsider in its walls, a guest in over her head, or if it could ever truly embody the spirit of home. (Would she even know home, if she were to find it, after the years without a place to belong? The thought digs into her like a burr, embedding deeper the more she fights to remove it.)
She says nothing of it to him. Maybe that's her own lie, kept close to the chest. Her own dose of pretending, if only to spare him the pain of her uncertainty. ]
It was only a matter of time before the power went to our heads.
[ Even the most well-meaning truths have a sliver of truth hidden within. There is no smile sparkling in her eyes when they turn to him, watching as the shadows cast themselves over his cheekbones, the firelight reflected like gold in his eyes. ]
You're a pirate. [ Pirate, she says, only to deliberately provoke a protest and slice through the tension hanging between them. She can already hear it: privateer, with feigned offense. ] Pirates are known liars and scoundrels.
[ A pensive pause drags between them, before she quietly adds, an olive branch in its own right: ]
Tell me something true, then. Something you haven't told anyone else.
Privateer. [ he's glad to take the bait, because the question posed is just as daunting as the situations they wrestle with during his policy meetings. perhaps even more. wanting this to work is entirely different from actually making it work.
something you haven't told anyone else. there are quite a lot of somethings, secrets and fears and hurts that he doesn't let anyone else see. those things don't fit into all of the grand plans he has, so he keeps them hidden away and carries them alone. weakness is a guise. wear it when they need to know you're human, but never when you feel it.
unfortunately there are times when they overlap, and this is one such instant. it's clear that alina needs this from him β he doesn't owe her, but he wants to give it to her anyway. and yet there's something inside of him that feels like it's caving in, something that hasn't been properly fortified to keep alina starkov out. he feels weakness, and it's the thing that makes it difficult to voice.
after a deep drink, he sets the bottle down by her knee, then meets her eyes, his glib manner replaced with something more quietly sharp. ] I've been in love once before. The kind that felt real to me.
[ he looks away then, gaze moving to the fire as he exhales hollowly. ]
He died. We served in the infantry together but had been friends since childhood. I was with him, actually, when it happened. In battle, it doesn't matter if you're a prince or a king. Weapons see no difference. [ he looks back at alina, gently holding out a hand for her to take β for his own comfort, maybe, for his weakness. for how shaken he feels despite the faint smile he offers her. ] He believed in me. He believed in a better Ravka. Failing him in this is simply not an option.
[ Death never discriminates. She thinks of every broken body in the little palace, every spark of light erased from a too-young face, of every life she had failed to protect, of every night she has been left alone with the thoughts of those shortcomings. It's too much for one heart to bear without hardening, sometimes — to be so haunted by ghosts that had believed she could save them. To know the cost of winning had been a mother's child, someone's sibling, someone's lover.
Her hand doesn't hesitate to tangle around his fingers. Where Nikolai is gentle, Alina's grasp is a firm anchor, the only apology she can offer him. The only apology that would mean anything, when I'm sorry rings so terribly, terribly hollow. In it, she hides her own secret need for comfort, in light of the realization that — one day, if they see this through to the very end — they will trade places.
One day, she will be the one left with a handful of memories of him. One day, she will have to live up to his own vision of Ravka, to his belief that she might be the one to usher it into a better era at his side.
One day, she will outlive him. One day, she will outlive them all. ]
You make it easy to believe in you.
[ Her fingers are still sticky from cake and spilled brandy, but they slide across the skin of his cheek, illuminated by silver slips of moonlight filtering in. ]
Sometimes, you meet people who make you want to believe that impossible things can be possible. People who make you feel like you could be brave, so long as they're with you.
[ She squashes the temptation to lean in. It would be selfish, driven by her need to comfort him; instead, she brushes her thumb beneath his weary eye, and lets the warm weight of her palm slide soothingly along his skin. ]
With or without me, you're not going to fail him or Ravka.
[ it's a strange feeling to now have this quiet and intensely personal truth in the air between them β that nikolai lantsov had fallen in love once. that his heart has been broken. it isn't something he'll ever forget, but it was also something he never intended to share. he cried back then but he doesn't now, steadily lifting his eyes and drawing his thumb over her knuckles while she caresses his cheek. ]
Am I easy to believe in or is everyone else just much crazier than I am? [ it's a joke with the tiniest string of uncertainty attached, like everything he's done will come unraveled if anyone decides to pull. if only he could design a grand invention that manufactured courage, because he finds his reservoir despairingly low some days, even if he makes a point to never show it.
his mind lingers on her words, and maybe this whole conversation has made him insecure β perish the thought β but he saves her from giving into her own temptation by leaning in closer himself, close enough to smell whatever sweet scent was slipped into her bath. some sort of flower. then he looks down at their hands, weighing his next words even while he forces the tension out of his jaw. ]
Does Mal do that for you? Make you feel brave? [ there's no ire, no jealousy in his tone. just simple curiosity. it makes little sense to pretend that mal doesn't exist in her world when he's been the one with her all these years. he flashes a crooked smile. ] I already know I have that effect on people, which is why I didn't ask about myself.
[ The insecurity doesn't escape her notice, through no fault of his own. Even keener ears would miss the sting of uncertainty, but Alina is too practiced in her own, too used to poisoning herself with a dose of doubt. And so she doesn't submit to her urge to smile, only granting him a soft tilt of her mouth when she insists, ]
I think we're all just the right amount of crazy.
[ A ruler's followers are a reflection on them, she wants to reassure; he has Zoya's drive at his side, David's ingenuity, Genya's compassion — but what does that say of her and the Apparat's obsessive, stifling faith as he had propped her onto a pedestal? Nikolai's closeness is a distraction to that thought, bringing the warm notes of alcohol on his breath with it, the imagined sting of salt in the air; she leans into it too readily, propping her chin on their joined hands. ]
Everyone feels brave when they have people worth losing.
[ It's not truly an answer. In fact, it's an answer he has taught her to give, skirting around the heart of what troubles her. She is keenly aware of it, her jaw working as she searches for the words that struggle to come. As absent as his jealousy is now, one wrong word feels as though it could shatter the peace of an otherwise quiet moment.
What a pair they make, with a piece of his heart residing in a dead man's grip while a piece of her own rests in Mal's grasp. ]
He makes me feel real. Like I'm still just Alina, even if I know it's not true anymore. No one survives what we have without becoming something else.
[ Maybe clinging to him is her method of pretending: pretending that nothing has changed, pretending that they're still the same people. It doesn't change what is constantly, undeniably true: even after all these years, having Mal at her side makes her feel as if everything in the world will be alright, so long as they're together. ]
Sorry. [ When it comes, her smile is tight, but no less sincere. ] You can't actually want to hear any of this.
[ she's getting all too good at avoiding answers, he notices, and it brings another smile to his lips, this one rimmed with genuine mirth. what a pair, indeed. even when she talks about mal he doesn't find himself getting agitated, instead pricked with the barest hint of remorse. mal can't stay in the palace if the stars align and alina somehow does choose to become his queen, for the rumors would be too much. no one else in the court seems to worry as much as nikolai worries about his illegitimate birthright, but he's keenly aware that a calculated attack on his claim to the throne could undo everything.
part of marriage is securing an honest, legitimate heir. ravka won't survive petty squabbles on who should sit in a fancy chair. even knowing this, reassigning mal elsewhere won't bring him any of the joy he once thought it might. ]
Even if you are the Sun Summoner, and even if you do become a queen, you'll still remember who you are. I was born a royal β in theory β but I chose to live away from the palace as much as I could. Those are the times I recall the most, and I'd like to think it shaped me into a better man.
[ he leans back on his free hand, their shoulders comfortably pressed together, and he gives her a lazy look as he tilts his head. ]
This just Alina person... I think I'd quite like to know her. Is she very different from the Alina that punched me once? Does she make good tea?
[ Swallowing the doubts that want to spill out of her is like swallowing glass shards, slicing her insides on the journey down. Will I? Nikolai is as blind to the darkness slithering through her, an infection time hasn't purged, as the others — because she has left them that way, obscured their eyes with shadows, for fear they will turn away the instant she loses her shine.
The instant she's eclipsed by something else entirely, that plague inside of her that has gone too far. That side of her that will inevitably go too far again. The scarred wound across her shoulder blade throbs as if in agreement, now that she can think of nothing else but the shadows cast along the walls.
It's too much to add to their growing pile of shared secrets, when they've only just broached the topic of lost loves. ]
It shaped you into a pirate.
[ If there was any question of whether she was going to let him have the last word in that particular volley. The curve of her smile grows against her will, a glint that's too telling; for all that she's mastered the art of pretenses, there are too many tics that threaten to give her away. Glimmering eyes are, certainly, one of them — shining with mirth that reveals how deliberately annoying she's trying to be.
Maybe it has something to do with the shadows that have lifted from his expression; maybe it's the sudden lightness in her own, as though he's removed a veil, simply by proclaiming he wants to know her when it would be so easy to dress her up as a queen to meet his expectations. Nothing less, nothing more. ]
If you touched anything I made, you would die. Not even a stray would drink or eat anything that's been in my hands. Then again — [ The tilt of her head subconsciously mimics his, considering. ] I think you're starting to enjoy the thought of me causing bodily harm, if you're asking questions like that.
[ the heaviness from moments before seems to have passed, something nikolai is grateful for, because he's far too weary to continue looking deeper inside of himself. he'd rather just look at alina, her eyes sparkling like bits of stardust while she tries and fails to keep a smile at bay. she's pretty all the time, but especially so in this moment, a temporary reprieve from the darkness they're running from. she isn't dressed like a saint, with golden pins in her hair and genya's handiwork brushed across her cheeks, but nikolai finds her perhaps even more radiant this way.
a quick laugh escapes him. ] Well, I suppose queens don't need to know things like that, but I'll certainly keep it in mind for the next time I want someone to innocuously die of poisoning at the dinner table.
[ he reaches for the bottle again, taking a drink while the effects finally settle in his bones, pleasantly warm, loosening knots of tension. his chest rises as he draws in a long breath, gently pushing the bottle at alina and closing his eyes. ]
Take it. Or you really might not be rid of me tonight. [ straightening, he sets one elbow on his knee and plops his cheek into the palm of his hand, gazing at her even in their close proximity. ] I'd be quite all right with a bit of bodily harm. Does that count as foreplay? Is that the sort of foreplay you enjoy?
[ It wouldn't be so terrible, she tells herself, to never be rid of him. It's a dangerous thought to entertain, but no more perilous than the inevitable silence that consumes her chambers at night. Each day, she eagerly imagines returning to it, and each night she regrets the emptiness that greets her. Freed from her duties until the morning sun rises, but never free from the thoughts that follow her, waiting until she's alone to strike.
But it shouldn't be the allure of losing themselves in a bottle that convinces him to stay as her good luck charm, emptying her thoughts of doubts and deaths and devastation. So much of it lives on in her memories alongside the ghosts of all they've lost, but this — this is a moment she would prefer to remember without a haze of alcohol clouding its edges. The bottle scrapes along stone as she pushes it aside, a temptation hidden from view, and shakes her head with a quiet, hoarse laugh. ]
Your love for danger might be your downfall one day.
[ In another life, in another time, she would fumble and fluster and flush. Here and now, she lets herself be swept away by his own courage, the boldness she sometimes envies and covets in equal measure — even if there is a rush of blood to her face, still, that she can't shake. Even if her teeth worry at her lip, wondering how much of this is Nikolai's teasing versus sincere curiosity.
But she had claimed he made others brave, and it's time to make good on that claim — and to surprise him by refusing to submit to embarrassment, if nothing else, no matter how inexperienced she may be. ]
I think I could enjoy it, with the right person. [ It's impossible not to feel self-conscious, pinned as she is by his attentive eyes, but she slowly brings herself to meet his gaze. ] I don't know. I'd have to try it to find out, wouldn't I? Not all of us are enlightened and worldly privateers.
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Definitely the former. [ he tips brandy into her glass and offers it to her. ] I'm truly sorry I missed dinner. If it's any consolation, I was miserable the entire time we were apart.
[ he won't make promises he can't keep, so he doesn't say it'll never happen again knowing full well it most certainly will β to both of them, because alina will have her own engagements as both the queen and the sun summoner.
the cake melts on his tongue when he pops a piece into his mouth. he specifically asked for a dessert popular in keramzin as a show of good faith, but perhaps he'll have to inquire further if everything there tastes as good as this. ]
I know more about it than the average fellow, which quite frankly isn't saying much. You'll have to fill in the gaps for me. I prefer to learn about a place from someone who's lived in it rather than studied it on a map. [ he leans back on one hand, taking a generous drink. ] Or perhaps we should put on costumes and sneak away there ourselves. Pretend to be an old couple that makes hats. Genya could make us look eighty.
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I was miserable the entire time we were apart shouldn't be as pleasing to the ear as it is. She downs her next taste with the desperate need to distract them both from it, as if brandy can slaughter the sudden pounding in her chest.
In reality, it only manages to melt away the almond cake on her tongue, but never let it be said an attempt wasn't made. ]
Delighting in your misery does make me feel better. I'd say that more than makes up for it.
[ His company, truly, is all that's required to spread salve over that wound. Better, she wants to tell him, than any dramatic ploy he might scheme up. She draws her finger over the lip of her glass, instead, pensively circling its rim. ]
I don't think there would be much left to show you, after — [ After the Darkling's calculated attacks, a shadow feasting off of her worst fears in order to bring them to life. Her lips press tightly together. ] — everything. What I remembered is ruined, and even if it wasn't, Keramizin was a horrible place for children to grow up.
[ If she could grant Mal another life — if she could grant children as lost as them — greater than drafty orphanages and colder guardians, she would. But life had dealt them that hand, had brought them together in that way, had brought her here to this very moment; it's difficult to regret that. ]
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[ though it's hard to be miserable around alina. he finds himself giving attention to the smallest of details, the way a bit of her hair comes untucked from behind one ear, the glow of the fire warming her skin, her fingertip tracing the edges of her glass. tiny things that he's noticed since the start but pretended not to, especially when her smiles were reserved for mal.
he wonders, foolishly, if she's thinking of him now. ]
When this is over, then. When we rebuild. When we make it a place that isn't horrible for children to grow up. I think a statue in your likeness would improve things considerably. Or mine.
[ these are the sorts of promises that he can make, because he fully intends to keep them. the tension on her face is plain to see, so he shifts the conversation away from her home, but to a topic that is no less intimate. ]
I thought of you a dozen times today. [ a brief flash of a smile. ] For starters, every time I see the sun, I think of you. But I also thought of you while I was working on plans for the Kingfisher. I suddenly wondered what it would be like to see you like this. Now β I absolutely did not plan for things to go this way, but I have wanted to see you away from all the pomp and circumstance again. Like when I first met you and you first met Sturmhond. Before things became... more complicated, I suppose I should say.
[ he pauses to drain his glass, then reaches for the bottle again for something to do with his hands and somewhere to point his eyes that isn't at her. ]
Honestly, I don't know if I'm making sense. I'm rather tired. I know you're the same Alina you've always been, but sometimes I imagine you think I proposed just because of what you can offer Ravka. That's a part of it, certainly, but it's not just that. It's also just you.
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When this is all over, I'd like that. [ A beat, and then, rawly honest: ] More than anything.
[ To build the home she had never had. To provide safety that doesn't stem from a false image of sainthood. To welcome what Nikolai is willing to give, when many kings have only neglected and taken without a care. It's easy to give her focus over to that, rather than the racing rabbit-hearted rhythm in her chest, so ferocious she can't imagine that Nikolai is deaf to it. ]
You want to go back to when I wished you bodily harm?
[ That smile turns crooked, a dimpled thing that narrows her eyes to slits. It isn't what he said at all, but her mouth is so terribly dry from the swiftness of her pulse that it's the only sentence that loosens itself from her lips. ]
I think of you. Just so you know, since you seem to think I don't. [ Maybe that isn't enough. Maybe none of this is, but she offers it up as a piecemeal sacrifice, anyway, in return for what he's given her. ] But I wonder if you'll regret it, eventually. If you'll even be happy, choosing someone like me. That's what I think of the most. If it's going to become just duty to you, or if it's —
[ There are no words for it, truthfully, this tangled web they weave. In the end, she settles for: ]
Something else. You've always been very good at making it sound like a business arrangement.
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There's something about a beautiful woman trying to maim me that is really quite enchanting. All of my favorite people have wished ill upon me at some point, I believe. It's almost like a rite of passage.
[ i think of you quickens his pulse, an unexpected combination of words. he wants to ask if she only thinks of him, but he's taken her previous sentiment to heart, that jealousy does not suit him, so he lets the words die on his tongue and washes their corpses down with a mouthful of brandy.
perhaps he has made all of this sound overly clinical, but there's such a fine line between fantasy and reality that sometimes he doesn't know which one he's toeing. ]
I wonder the same thing, Alina. Whether you'll regret this or not. Neither of us can know. [ that's part of the risk of an arrangement like this, when he doesn't have the luxury of waiting to fall in passionate love with a stranger.
but alina still could, in theory. it might cause a national spectacle even without her being queen, but she still has a better chance than he does. ]
I don't want you to feel like you've been led here under false pretenses. I'm being overly cautious, which quite frankly isn't an easy thing to get me to do. But I mean everything I say to you. [ a small pause here, before he plunges doggedly forward. ] I do believe I could be happy choosing someone like you. I think, with time, I could certainly fall in love with you.
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There is no easy way to admit that sweet, honeyed words put her on edge. That his proposal reminds her of red coloring the snow beneath a stag, and a collar designed to be a chain. It isn't fair — to her, to Nikolai — that it flashes through her mind and seizes her lungs in its grasp with the ghostly fingers of the Darkling. She isn't that monster, and neither is he, but she cannot help that some shade of a familiar fear still lives within her.
This time, she may be the one to trap another. This time, she may be the one to be corrupted by the promise of a crown. She blows out a breath, as if that alone will dispel that burst of anxiety. (Predictably, it doesn't; less predictably, Nikolai's sentiment anchors her back to the ground, too good to be true and yet agonizingly so.)
So she does — leap, in her own way, wondering if she will collide with the ground on her way down. But not without finishing her glass, first, setting it aside a little clumsily. ]
Do you know what I think? I think we've almost died a number of times, and being overly cautious is starting to sound ridiculous when we've already been lucky enough to survive through impossible things.
[ Testing out an arrangement is not, by far, the craziest idea their group of rebels has ever had — but gambling with hearts is an entirely different game, with different stakes. ]
I think — [ Her tongue sweeps over her dry lips, as if she might summon the right words to a mouth that feels too parched. ] — giving this a chance is worth it.
[ It isn't the yes he wants to hear, but it's — something. Slow progress is, after all, still progress. ]
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a gentle smile pulls at his mouth when she sets her glass down. ]
I do believe we're rather death-proof.
[ perhaps it's hubris, but it hasn't failed him yet.
his brow arches slightly at her answer β not a yes, but he wasn't expecting one. this one settles far more comfortably than a yes would have, in any case. chances are his lifeblood; he's known for taking every single one.
he reaches for this one wholeheartedly, glancing briefly at the crackling fire before he returns his gaze to alina, leaning in a little closer so that their knees are once again brushing. ]
Are you trying to forget him right now? [ his voice softens, and he takes another chance, reaching up to brush his fingers along damp strands of her hair. ] Because I'd quite like to kiss you, but I don't want to make a liar out of myself.
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There is no easy answer. Of all the impossible odds they've overcome, there is no defeating the truth: whether she is thinking of him or not, there is no forgetting Mal, not when such a large piece of him resides inside of her, bright enough to drive away the darkness that threatens to creep in. Not when he is the only family she has known, the only home she has lived inside for so long.
(Long enough that, sometimes, she wonders if she has overstayed her welcome.)
But he has said right now, and she clings to that — selfishly, maybe, for how tightly she wants to hold onto this moment. Her breath is a stuttered thing in her threat, held in that delicate balance between anticipation and anxiety. Like this, she can feel the whisper of his own, the traces of rum she wants to trace away. ]
If I wanted to forget, the bottle is right there.
[ It shakes just a little, that answer that tries so valiantly to be unaffected, as her throat bobs with a harsh swallow. There won't be repairing this dam, once they unleash it, but Nikolai has always exuded a sense of danger. A sea that can be as gentle and soothing as it is wildly turbulent.
It makes her want to be bolder, braver; her eyes flicker to the softness of his mouth and linger too long, wondrous. ]
I'm only thinking of you right now.
[ If there was any doubt that still needed to be wiped from the board. It's a chance she seizes, a chance she won't wait to come to her; the press of her lips to his is a little abrupt, a little clumsy, a little lacquered with almond and rum — but unburdened by any lie. She wonders if it's enough for him to feel it, to accept it — if the understanding will be in his eyes when she does break away from that fleeting, uncertain brush of her mouth only to find and gauge his gaze. ]
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the promise that heβs the only one sheβs thinking of spurs him into action, meeting her gaze when she breaks the initial kiss. thereβs a smile in his eyes, one that he hopes is reassuring. he believes her and he wants this, so much that his hand grazes her jaw when he leans in and kisses her again, traveling gently into her hair and pushing against the nape of her neck, where he finds her skin warm and damp. his thumb slides against the delicate bones of her throat, and he wonders, briefly, what it would be like to wake up to this every morning.
it could be marvelous. it could be a nightmare. presently, it takes just a few seconds more to stop caring, too focused on the warmth of her mouth and the softness of her skin. something gives way in his chest, a yearning thatβs been there since the first time he felt her lips and wished that she wanted his the same. a soft breath pushes out of him, both hands now carefully cradling her jaw as he maps out the shape of her mouth, tasting the heavy sweetness of cake and brandy and wondering if heβll ever be able to drink this again without thinking of this moment. ]
Alina. [ he whispers it against her mouth, a slight tremor in his fingers as he curls his knuckles to her cheek. gently, he lowers his hand to find hers, something careful and slightly hesitant in the way he tangles their fingers together. ] I canβt promise you everything, but I do promise to always try to be what you need. Whatever that may be. And no matter how many times it might change.
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Perhaps it was always inevitable that she would go to war with herself, once the dust of Ravka's own settled. She anchors herself to this moment, instead — to him, with the twist and twining of her fingers locked into his collar. As though she can keep herself from splintering apart, as though she can shackle him to her like the prisoner she had never wanted him to become. They relax and clench in time with every word that pours from his lips, just the close sweep of them against her own enough to test her restraint.
It would be easy, to fall back into it and leave questions of the future for another day. It would be easy, because this they inevitably know how to do, while the rest of it remains, as ever, a confounding riddle. ]
I won't ask you to change to my liking.
[ Like a sail catching wind, he adapts as needed according to where he must navigate. She has seen it for herself: Nikolai the negotiator, Nikolai the would-be King of Ravka, Nikolai the bastard. All sides of the same face, depending on what's asked of him. What role is required, to evoke the right reaction. It has left her questioning which glimpses of him are real, and which he has manufactured in order to appeal to an audience.
A marriage that demands a performance from him isn't a demand she could, she would, make of him. ]
I need you to be a real person. [ Around his hand, her fingers squeeze, a subconscious gesture. ] I need you to be you.
[ Whatever he chooses to be. Ally, friend, lover, partner — she isn't certain where his own heart will lead him, but the point remains. ]
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with a soft sound their lips slowly part, but even then nikolai doesn't move too far away, content in the hazy circle of β whatever this is.
a real person. you. it's more than a fair request, though alina doesn't know how hard it will be to give her that. if he acted exactly how he felt, if he voiced every worry and doubt, if he didn't push and push and push for relentless optimism in the face of countless improbable situations, then no one would believe in him and certainly no one would follow him. he reserves that honesty for exactly no one, only allowing it to creep in when he's alone.
doubt clouds his thoughts even now that alina would even like the raw version of himself. he doesn't even particularly like who he is in solitude. silence hangs for a moment too long before his glib manner comes inching back like a golden shield, lifting their laced hands to press a kiss to alina's knuckles. ]
I am me. [ from his cross-legged position on the floor, he exaggerates a bow. ] It would be terribly concerning if I wasn't. Although β I mirror your sentiment. I would never ask you to change for me, either. If you wanted to throw all of the forks away, then the palace would just have to be forkless.
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But she has asked for something real, something as genuine as those rare moments where she had been reminded that Nikolai was no different from her: just a boy burdened by the weight of duty pressing in on him, playing at being a prince. Just two people who have known what it means to be in over their heads and feeling as though they're drowning as a result. Santka Alina and the next ruler of Ravka, carrying an ancient and bone-deep tiredness no one should have to shoulder.
Without the titles, without the expectations, she's left to wonder if Nikolai even knows who he is beneath it all — and if she'll ever be allowed to carry that same secret, once the pretenses fall away like carefully removed armor. If the pretenses ever slip away. It's that bittersweet thought that wards off any of her amusement and provokes her to act. Her hand fists more tightly, a grip that proves unrelenting as Alina herself when she asks, like it's an accusatory blade she's pointed at his jugular: ]
Are you really you?
[ Those fingers loosen only so they can take themselves to the gilded hair near the nape of his neck, tugging — not sharply, not furiously, but firm enough to hold him there — to ensure he can't hide a lie by averting his eyes. Even if that action itself makes her pulse rush with the thought that he may very well want to escape her, after this. ]
You're not as convincing a liar as you think you are.
[ He had taught her his own tricks, after all — but for a terrifying moment, she thinks that perhaps the problem is that perhaps he is that perceptive. Perhaps she has never known him at all. ]
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although he'll rarely admit to negative traits, stubbornness is one of them. the rest of his mouth curves around a smile that doesn't quite touch the barest hint of uncertainty in his eyes. ]
Do you think I'm putting on a performance for you? [ isn't his entire life a performance? ] I'm flattered that you think I'm apparently so interesting.
[ he lets go of her hand and reaches instead for the one currently gripping his hair, sliding his fingers along the inside of her arm and gently clasping her wrist. his thumb presses down against her hummingbird pulse. he is a convincing liar. he knows this to be factual. it's only alina with her biting sort of sweetness that penetrates his walls. ]
The firelight looks marvelous on you. [ pointedly not a lie. he draws her wrist to his mouth to brush one last kiss against her skin, then reaches for the bottle to take a generous swig. he grins, the spark back in his tired eyes, dangling the brandy like an offering before her. ] I wonder what the morning gossip will sound like if I walked out of your room before dawn wearing the same clothes as yesterday.
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When blustering and bluffing had been normal, expected.
Too many questions sit on her tongue, ready to launch themselves, but none as great as the one that haunts her now: if he expects her to fall in love with a performance, with a lie, with the mask he has designed. Perhaps she has already been lured by it, a facade intended to draw her in; perhaps she has a habit of being drawn to men who wish for her to see only what they'll allow her to see.
The line between reality and fantasy has become too thin, too murky, for her to navigate it. The distance he has put between himself and her touch doesn't clear her head, chilling her despite the heat that seeps into the threads of her nightgown, and neither will a drink — but her fingers still clasp around the neck of the bottle, anyway.
The next sip burns her, but so has he. So has this entire conversation. Unamused, her lips press together. ]
Now I know you're lying.
[ Droplets of copper rum spill toward her chin, but she wipes them away quickly with the back of her hand and an incredulous scoff. Marvelous. Not Alina Starkov, who can still recall scabby knees and a starved, sickly girl peering back in the mirror. Not Alina Starkov, who has grown out of that skin like a blossom nurtured by the sun, but still carries the old, scabbed over scars of those insecurities. ]
Stay and find out. [ He won't, she tells herself, and so she doesn't allow herself to feel any shame in extending the invitation. ] Make sure you tell them it's sacrilegious to talk about a saint the way I know they will.
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it can't be everyone else. the common denominator, clearly, is him.
he keeps his hands still even when he wants to reach out to wipe the spilled drink from her chin. ]
Honestly, I think I could fall asleep right here on your floor. [ weariness creeps into his tone, the stresses of the day and the way he has so clearly fumbled this catching up to him. his lips still feel warm from kissing her. ] I vow to have anyone who speaks disrespectfully about your body, character, or morals tried for treason.
[ he reaches out to gently retrieve the bottle by its base, silent for a moment while he wrestles with his next words, his gaze shifting to the flames beside them. ]
I don't mean to lie. I don't see it as lying. [ a tiny crease appears between his brows. ] It's just the way that I taught myself to live. Everything you see is part of who I am. I'm afraid I don't quite know how to not be this way.
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She says nothing of it to him. Maybe that's her own lie, kept close to the chest. Her own dose of pretending, if only to spare him the pain of her uncertainty. ]
It was only a matter of time before the power went to our heads.
[ Even the most well-meaning truths have a sliver of truth hidden within. There is no smile sparkling in her eyes when they turn to him, watching as the shadows cast themselves over his cheekbones, the firelight reflected like gold in his eyes. ]
You're a pirate. [ Pirate, she says, only to deliberately provoke a protest and slice through the tension hanging between them. She can already hear it: privateer, with feigned offense. ] Pirates are known liars and scoundrels.
[ A pensive pause drags between them, before she quietly adds, an olive branch in its own right: ]
Tell me something true, then. Something you haven't told anyone else.
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something you haven't told anyone else. there are quite a lot of somethings, secrets and fears and hurts that he doesn't let anyone else see. those things don't fit into all of the grand plans he has, so he keeps them hidden away and carries them alone. weakness is a guise. wear it when they need to know you're human, but never when you feel it.
unfortunately there are times when they overlap, and this is one such instant. it's clear that alina needs this from him β he doesn't owe her, but he wants to give it to her anyway. and yet there's something inside of him that feels like it's caving in, something that hasn't been properly fortified to keep alina starkov out. he feels weakness, and it's the thing that makes it difficult to voice.
after a deep drink, he sets the bottle down by her knee, then meets her eyes, his glib manner replaced with something more quietly sharp. ] I've been in love once before. The kind that felt real to me.
[ he looks away then, gaze moving to the fire as he exhales hollowly. ]
He died. We served in the infantry together but had been friends since childhood. I was with him, actually, when it happened. In battle, it doesn't matter if you're a prince or a king. Weapons see no difference. [ he looks back at alina, gently holding out a hand for her to take β for his own comfort, maybe, for his weakness. for how shaken he feels despite the faint smile he offers her. ] He believed in me. He believed in a better Ravka. Failing him in this is simply not an option.
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Her hand doesn't hesitate to tangle around his fingers. Where Nikolai is gentle, Alina's grasp is a firm anchor, the only apology she can offer him. The only apology that would mean anything, when I'm sorry rings so terribly, terribly hollow. In it, she hides her own secret need for comfort, in light of the realization that — one day, if they see this through to the very end — they will trade places.
One day, she will be the one left with a handful of memories of him. One day, she will have to live up to his own vision of Ravka, to his belief that she might be the one to usher it into a better era at his side.
One day, she will outlive him. One day, she will outlive them all. ]
You make it easy to believe in you.
[ Her fingers are still sticky from cake and spilled brandy, but they slide across the skin of his cheek, illuminated by silver slips of moonlight filtering in. ]
Sometimes, you meet people who make you want to believe that impossible things can be possible. People who make you feel like you could be brave, so long as they're with you.
[ She squashes the temptation to lean in. It would be selfish, driven by her need to comfort him; instead, she brushes her thumb beneath his weary eye, and lets the warm weight of her palm slide soothingly along his skin. ]
With or without me, you're not going to fail him or Ravka.
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Am I easy to believe in or is everyone else just much crazier than I am? [ it's a joke with the tiniest string of uncertainty attached, like everything he's done will come unraveled if anyone decides to pull. if only he could design a grand invention that manufactured courage, because he finds his reservoir despairingly low some days, even if he makes a point to never show it.
his mind lingers on her words, and maybe this whole conversation has made him insecure β perish the thought β but he saves her from giving into her own temptation by leaning in closer himself, close enough to smell whatever sweet scent was slipped into her bath. some sort of flower. then he looks down at their hands, weighing his next words even while he forces the tension out of his jaw. ]
Does Mal do that for you? Make you feel brave? [ there's no ire, no jealousy in his tone. just simple curiosity. it makes little sense to pretend that mal doesn't exist in her world when he's been the one with her all these years. he flashes a crooked smile. ] I already know I have that effect on people, which is why I didn't ask about myself.
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I think we're all just the right amount of crazy.
[ A ruler's followers are a reflection on them, she wants to reassure; he has Zoya's drive at his side, David's ingenuity, Genya's compassion — but what does that say of her and the Apparat's obsessive, stifling faith as he had propped her onto a pedestal? Nikolai's closeness is a distraction to that thought, bringing the warm notes of alcohol on his breath with it, the imagined sting of salt in the air; she leans into it too readily, propping her chin on their joined hands. ]
Everyone feels brave when they have people worth losing.
[ It's not truly an answer. In fact, it's an answer he has taught her to give, skirting around the heart of what troubles her. She is keenly aware of it, her jaw working as she searches for the words that struggle to come. As absent as his jealousy is now, one wrong word feels as though it could shatter the peace of an otherwise quiet moment.
What a pair they make, with a piece of his heart residing in a dead man's grip while a piece of her own rests in Mal's grasp. ]
He makes me feel real. Like I'm still just Alina, even if I know it's not true anymore. No one survives what we have without becoming something else.
[ Maybe clinging to him is her method of pretending: pretending that nothing has changed, pretending that they're still the same people. It doesn't change what is constantly, undeniably true: even after all these years, having Mal at her side makes her feel as if everything in the world will be alright, so long as they're together. ]
Sorry. [ When it comes, her smile is tight, but no less sincere. ] You can't actually want to hear any of this.
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[ she's getting all too good at avoiding answers, he notices, and it brings another smile to his lips, this one rimmed with genuine mirth. what a pair, indeed. even when she talks about mal he doesn't find himself getting agitated, instead pricked with the barest hint of remorse. mal can't stay in the palace if the stars align and alina somehow does choose to become his queen, for the rumors would be too much. no one else in the court seems to worry as much as nikolai worries about his illegitimate birthright, but he's keenly aware that a calculated attack on his claim to the throne could undo everything.
part of marriage is securing an honest, legitimate heir. ravka won't survive petty squabbles on who should sit in a fancy chair. even knowing this, reassigning mal elsewhere won't bring him any of the joy he once thought it might. ]
Even if you are the Sun Summoner, and even if you do become a queen, you'll still remember who you are. I was born a royal β in theory β but I chose to live away from the palace as much as I could. Those are the times I recall the most, and I'd like to think it shaped me into a better man.
[ he leans back on his free hand, their shoulders comfortably pressed together, and he gives her a lazy look as he tilts his head. ]
This just Alina person... I think I'd quite like to know her. Is she very different from the Alina that punched me once? Does she make good tea?
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The instant she's eclipsed by something else entirely, that plague inside of her that has gone too far. That side of her that will inevitably go too far again. The scarred wound across her shoulder blade throbs as if in agreement, now that she can think of nothing else but the shadows cast along the walls.
It's too much to add to their growing pile of shared secrets, when they've only just broached the topic of lost loves. ]
It shaped you into a pirate.
[ If there was any question of whether she was going to let him have the last word in that particular volley. The curve of her smile grows against her will, a glint that's too telling; for all that she's mastered the art of pretenses, there are too many tics that threaten to give her away. Glimmering eyes are, certainly, one of them — shining with mirth that reveals how deliberately annoying she's trying to be.
Maybe it has something to do with the shadows that have lifted from his expression; maybe it's the sudden lightness in her own, as though he's removed a veil, simply by proclaiming he wants to know her when it would be so easy to dress her up as a queen to meet his expectations. Nothing less, nothing more. ]
If you touched anything I made, you would die. Not even a stray would drink or eat anything that's been in my hands. Then again — [ The tilt of her head subconsciously mimics his, considering. ] I think you're starting to enjoy the thought of me causing bodily harm, if you're asking questions like that.
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[ the heaviness from moments before seems to have passed, something nikolai is grateful for, because he's far too weary to continue looking deeper inside of himself. he'd rather just look at alina, her eyes sparkling like bits of stardust while she tries and fails to keep a smile at bay. she's pretty all the time, but especially so in this moment, a temporary reprieve from the darkness they're running from. she isn't dressed like a saint, with golden pins in her hair and genya's handiwork brushed across her cheeks, but nikolai finds her perhaps even more radiant this way.
a quick laugh escapes him. ] Well, I suppose queens don't need to know things like that, but I'll certainly keep it in mind for the next time I want someone to innocuously die of poisoning at the dinner table.
[ he reaches for the bottle again, taking a drink while the effects finally settle in his bones, pleasantly warm, loosening knots of tension. his chest rises as he draws in a long breath, gently pushing the bottle at alina and closing his eyes. ]
Take it. Or you really might not be rid of me tonight. [ straightening, he sets one elbow on his knee and plops his cheek into the palm of his hand, gazing at her even in their close proximity. ] I'd be quite all right with a bit of bodily harm. Does that count as foreplay? Is that the sort of foreplay you enjoy?
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But it shouldn't be the allure of losing themselves in a bottle that convinces him to stay as her good luck charm, emptying her thoughts of doubts and deaths and devastation. So much of it lives on in her memories alongside the ghosts of all they've lost, but this — this is a moment she would prefer to remember without a haze of alcohol clouding its edges. The bottle scrapes along stone as she pushes it aside, a temptation hidden from view, and shakes her head with a quiet, hoarse laugh. ]
Your love for danger might be your downfall one day.
[ In another life, in another time, she would fumble and fluster and flush. Here and now, she lets herself be swept away by his own courage, the boldness she sometimes envies and covets in equal measure — even if there is a rush of blood to her face, still, that she can't shake. Even if her teeth worry at her lip, wondering how much of this is Nikolai's teasing versus sincere curiosity.
But she had claimed he made others brave, and it's time to make good on that claim — and to surprise him by refusing to submit to embarrassment, if nothing else, no matter how inexperienced she may be. ]
I think I could enjoy it, with the right person. [ It's impossible not to feel self-conscious, pinned as she is by his attentive eyes, but she slowly brings herself to meet his gaze. ] I don't know. I'd have to try it to find out, wouldn't I? Not all of us are enlightened and worldly privateers.