( it is the darkling's idea, and no one says no to the darkling. not ivan, not genya, and certainly not alina starkov, who wears his collar around her neck like a fist.
late at night, on one of the nights she can't sleep and wanders the little palace, she drifts like a spirit towards his quarters — for comfort, as if he had ever learned how to give it. within, she hears a muffled growl. it's the closest anyone ever gets to shouting at the darkling. that's how she knows it's ivan. no one else in ravka but the king would dare — and with the king, she's not sure it's so much daring as stupidity.
but ivan is furious that the darkling continues to allow her to live here, call her grisha, after what she has done. alina deserves that much, she knows that. no, what surprises her is the darkling's reply: a grisha king is good, he says, but a grisha lantsov is better. impossible to depose. and the boy's father will only survive so long.
another piece of her to be made a tool. she can't find surprise. just anger.
the next time she sees nikolai, they're sitting together for dinner. the arrangements have already been made, and she can't even bring herself to miss sturmhond anymore. she resents that he exists at all, that he'd somehow been crazy or stupid enough to agree to all of this, evne if he thought it might save his throne and his country.
she could stick her fork in him and be done with him now. the grip she holds on it certainly suggests she's considering it. instead, she just asks the one question she can't let go of, so quietly that it could be missed with the scurrying of mice. ground out between teeth. ]
These days, there is much time to think on what had gone wrong. To think on the ambush. The moments of hope that had preceded it, and the violence with which it had all been snuffed out.
Nikolai keeps the embers of it clutched close. They are caught in a trap, but he will see his way out of it.
There is much time to think on the future too.
Genya had healed him, after. That had been at the Darkling's request, Nikolai knows, or else they might have killed him rather than dragged his beaten body all the way back to the palace. The beloved Re'b Ravka, returned to his court, shining golden and unmarked, gleaming upon the blood-stained throne. There is not mirroring collar upon his throat, but he is on a leash as sure as Alina is.
There is a reason so many of his people were spared. The threat never had to be made. Nikolai knew already how purposeful the Darkling is. He knows too that carelessness will be met with instruction, the kind punctuated in blood and death.
And now he knows that once Alina bears a son, he will die. Perhaps he will die like his father, poisoned and sickly. Or like his brother, torn apart suddenly. Regardless, there is a deadline now. He had been turning that over in his mind when Alina had been escorted into the room.
"You know why," Nikolai answers, solemn.
For Ravka. For their people.
He looks past her, to the guards at the door. Back to Alina, with her vise grip around her fork.
"It seems you'll wear the ring after all," has the lightness of humor, but it doesn't reach Nikolai's eyes. This isn't what he'd wanted.
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☇ for nikolai
late at night, on one of the nights she can't sleep and wanders the little palace, she drifts like a spirit towards his quarters — for comfort, as if he had ever learned how to give it. within, she hears a muffled growl. it's the closest anyone ever gets to shouting at the darkling. that's how she knows it's ivan. no one else in ravka but the king would dare — and with the king, she's not sure it's so much daring as stupidity.
but ivan is furious that the darkling continues to allow her to live here, call her grisha, after what she has done. alina deserves that much, she knows that. no, what surprises her is the darkling's reply: a grisha king is good, he says, but a grisha lantsov is better. impossible to depose. and the boy's father will only survive so long.
another piece of her to be made a tool. she can't find surprise. just anger.
the next time she sees nikolai, they're sitting together for dinner. the arrangements have already been made, and she can't even bring herself to miss sturmhond anymore. she resents that he exists at all, that he'd somehow been crazy or stupid enough to agree to all of this, evne if he thought it might save his throne and his country.
she could stick her fork in him and be done with him now. the grip she holds on it certainly suggests she's considering it. instead, she just asks the one question she can't let go of, so quietly that it could be missed with the scurrying of mice. ground out between teeth. ]
Why?
arrives late, peer pressures you into prose
Nikolai keeps the embers of it clutched close. They are caught in a trap, but he will see his way out of it.
There is much time to think on the future too.
Genya had healed him, after. That had been at the Darkling's request, Nikolai knows, or else they might have killed him rather than dragged his beaten body all the way back to the palace. The beloved Re'b Ravka, returned to his court, shining golden and unmarked, gleaming upon the blood-stained throne. There is not mirroring collar upon his throat, but he is on a leash as sure as Alina is.
There is a reason so many of his people were spared. The threat never had to be made. Nikolai knew already how purposeful the Darkling is. He knows too that carelessness will be met with instruction, the kind punctuated in blood and death.
And now he knows that once Alina bears a son, he will die. Perhaps he will die like his father, poisoned and sickly. Or like his brother, torn apart suddenly. Regardless, there is a deadline now. He had been turning that over in his mind when Alina had been escorted into the room.
"You know why," Nikolai answers, solemn.
For Ravka. For their people.
He looks past her, to the guards at the door. Back to Alina, with her vise grip around her fork.
"It seems you'll wear the ring after all," has the lightness of humor, but it doesn't reach Nikolai's eyes. This isn't what he'd wanted.
☇ a wishlist
game of thrones-style political intrigue in ravka
post-season 2 corruption arc
fleshing out alina's agency/identity
canon-verse shipping & smut (ordered by character & preference) —
aleksander
genya
nikolai
cross-canon
mal
au; gen and shipping (by type) —
canon au
a/b/o
high fantasy
gothic horror
modern