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ricardian-werewolf · 1 month

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Chapter 13: Every time I see you falling, I get down on my knees and pray.

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Summary:

The big battle to defeat the Darkling commences with quite the bang, and with it, Alina is tested in ways that she has never expected to be. Along with Dominik, Nikolai, the crows, her Soldat Sol, she is forced to bring down an evil that has existed for centuries. To survive the fall that it threatens to bring about, Alina must be the strength that she has searched for all throughout her life.

Notes:

Tws: The Darkling is his own warning, battlefield violence, and pain.

Wordcount: 6.4k

Chapter below the cut.

The Fold, that night.

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Alina had been waiting and ready for the Darkling since the morning, when she’d returned the sun to its rightful place amongst the heavens.

Now, she stood atop the place where the Darkling had created the Fold so many centuries ago, clad in her Kefta of gold and green. The matchbox in her hands was held steady. All it would take was a spark, and she’d set the whole place ablaze. At her side, Olga Krylova had plunged into the Fold, the only one of her Soldat Sol to flee the Darkling’s Merzost unscathed. She adjusted Alina’s collar, checking over her infected wounds as Morozova’s antlers continued to fuse to her collarbone.

Alina shrugged, let the pain pass. Flexing her free hand, she watched the shadows pour from it, grimacing with pain. Unlike the Small Science, which restored her health, the Darkling’s shadows, polluted with Merzost, stole what little she had left.

Ringing her, weapons of various kinds held aloft, were her crows, and beyond them, the few volcra who’d come flapping to her side. She’d taken them to be mere monsters, but their tattered First Army uniforms told otherwise. They plucked at the hem of her Kefta, squeaked and chattered, clapping their hooked wingtips together to offer salutations. One, a baby, settled at Alina’s shoulder and chirped with reckless abandon. It liked her. She, amazingly, adored it.

Dubbing the little thing Tselchki, little Star, Alina turned back to examining the matchbox. She needed to sense, however, when the Darkling was close. He’d come into the Fold, yes, but not to her.

At her elbow, Tamar unsheathed her axes and Tolya his sword. The twins, with their sun-tattoos and heartrender abilities, were her most valuable alarm system closest to her. Olga murmured a prayer to the Saints, while Alina watched Kaz and Inej pacing the perimeter. With Jesper and Wylan arranged for long-range combat at the mid-tier of the multi-leveled platform, they were valuable, but not as much as the twins.

Alina herself was the grand prize. She settled her shoulders, and noted Inej’s eyes on her. The volcra wings at her back flickered as the shadows shifted and changed to become larger or smaller in wingspan. She prayed to her fellow saints that the girl would not lose her way. The Wraith had to remain Inej Ghafa, or they would all be lost.

Kaz himself would most likely slaughter the Darkling with little more than the oyster knife and the cane in hand. He’d die, but the death would be glorious, a prayer to the altar of love that moved him more than greed or money. Nikolai had called him a true Kerchian.

Alina felt more suited to call him Hades, ever seeking of the sun that was Persephone, yet, unable to admit it to her. For what was love but a tide that required two to swim in its swell? Shaking her head, Alina sighed. She reached for the sword at her side, but stilled her hand. Nina’s hand had gone up in the dim gloom.

There was someone close. Alina popped the matchbox open, and struck. A spark, then the flame bloomed. Snapping her fingers, Alina let the light explode around her in a dome that covered the entire platform’s tiers. The tattered banners flapped in the breeze this explosion cast, and the shifting gray sand at her feet hissed.

A part of her wondered if this was home to more souls than just the Volcra, and she cocked her head. A shadow, darker than even the darkness itself, was moving toward her. Alina slid the matchbox away, and lifted the lantern of Lumiya Iorek passed her. He was here too, his armor glinting in the glow she cast.

“Be ready, Sol Koreleva.” The bear murmured, then yelled something that she couldn’t decipher. Isaak would know. Alina missed him. Shaking her head, she forced herself not to think about the particulars. She knew Nikolai was safe somewhere, not dead. Maybe in a church sanctuary, drinking wine and pouring over maps while having Dominik dictate his horrid love poetry.

The thought of him doing all of that shirtless made Alina smack herself in the face. Now was not the time to think of Nikolai Pytorevich Lantsov shirtless. She did, admit, the thought was extremely tempting. That green satin bedrobe had been with her even in her coffin. It’d been her burial shroud, for Saint’s sake. Alina groaned, and rubbed a hand over her face.

“Thinking of Nikolai?” Tamar asked, a cheeky grin on her face. Alina’s volcanic look had Tolya opening his mouth, which Tamar glared shut. “Your pulse-”

“Accelerates when I’m thinking of him. Yes-”

“No, actually. It calms.” Tamar rubbed her hands together. Alina blinked. She shook her head. However, she had no time to reflect on that thought, for the shadows parted to reveal the Darkling in the most ostentatious Kefta she’d seen him wear. Miles of silver embroidery detailed his symbol of the eclipse with the bolts of light. Atop his hair was a crown of black obsidian. A cloak of shadows with two snarling wolves as the mantle-pieces connected by a chain draped over his shoulders.

Alina resisted the urge to roll her eyes. Of course, the brooding eternal prince of darkness would wear such dark colors and be so ostentatious as to clad himself in mink fur. She sighed. Casting a gaze to her left and right, she indicated for Tamar and Olga to step aside.

Tapping her hands to her shoulders, Alina let the kefta of green and gold lengthen out behind her in a solid-gold train of three feet, dusted with sparkling jewels. The centerpiece of the train was a white stag under a Sunne in splendour, the very thing that crowned her braided updo. The train, unlike the Darkling’s, detached. Under it, she wore a gold gown edged in white fox fur. The collar of it was cut so that the antlers poked out in all their glory. Blood flecked the wounds, half dried and still oozing in spots.

Alina wanted him to see the pain he’d inflicted upon her in all its glory. The fetter at her wrist had dug into her skin and the blood caking the broken flesh was grisly, nearing infection. That was held at bay by the constant usage of her Grisha powers. Her upper arm bore the firebird’s feather.

While Mal had been the amplifier, the Darkling didn’t know that. For show’s sake, the feather served as a clever glamor act. Alina’s hands rose to her hair. She let the updo stay as it was. The gown she wore reformed once more into the armor she’d entered the Fold in. Fighting as a soldier was easier when in pants and the gold armor her powers seemed to manifest. But, the cape stayed.

It flowed down the steps as Alina marched towards the Darkling, casting a glow as she moved toward him. She stopped in front of him, and undid the sun clasps. The cape fell to the ground in a soft flutter. With a flick of her hand, it had disappeared like a mirage in the desert. Yet another trick of the light. The kefta was back, and she was glad for it.

Stretching her arms, Alina smirked.

“Good evening, Moi Sovereyeni.”

“Little Saint.” He spat back, his hand inching towards the sword he wore. “I find it most strange how you continuously survive what I throw at you.” He growled. “If I had had my way with all of this, you would have been brought to the Little Palace as a child, and stayed there to keep you from all this-” He threw his hand up.

“Rabble rousers? Fiendish princes? War?” Alina hissed. “Like it or not, Aleksander, I am who I am, in spite of you.”

The words Baghra had said to her all those months ago, in the Spinning Wheel the night of her breakdown, rang true. At long last, Alina understood. She had come forward from her own mental illness and fear in spite of what Aleksander expected of her, in spite of what Mal wanted, or what Nikolai desired.

Her strength, all along, had been to be true to herself and to the fact that she had to continually put her foot forward when all she did was plunge into the dark. For she, Alina Starkov, was the light that not Ravka needed, but She needed. In order for the Fold to have come down at all, She’d needed the initiative and the strength to get back up when the world crushed her flat.

She’d done it, again, and again. Keramzin, Balakirev, two years of death at the hands of Aleksander. Even as little as getting out of bed in the morning, whether her own, or Nikolai’s, she’d kept onwards.

Now, she felt that old power within her build. The hunger was sated, the rage within her snuffed. The bubbling, roaring inferno within her heart now, was for hope. Destroying the Fold would kill Aleksander, and bring her peace. She’d never wanted a simple life on a farm, being kowtowed and at the mercy of some fat Duke.

No.

Her power belonged in helping others. After she helped herself first. Helping herself meant becoming Ravka’s queen, opening hospitals and sanctuaries to Grisha persecuted. It meant getting out of bed in the morning alive and to the sight of any children she would undoubtedly bear. It meant living in a world where Ravka would not be war torn, where she could see the True Sea from The Great Palace’s western windows.

Light bloomed inside her, except this time, it wasn’t filled with anger, or misery. The pain that had fueled her for so long, had finally run dry. In its place, glowing brighter and hotter with each moment, was hope.

“You are nothing without me, Little Saint. I will be endless. You will be a footnote.”

“You forget one thing, Aleksander.” Alina murmured, reaching up to cup his cheek in her scarred hands. She called on the light, and it came in a blinding, earth-shattering burst that flowed from her in a heatwave so strong, it would burn a man’s clothes clean off.

“I am the one who has been prophesied and honored for millennia, since you created this darkness. Saints become martyrs before they are canonized. You have already martyred me, twice over. I will be remembered, when you are long buried in this earth, not because I am a saint, but because all along, in all of this pain and war, I was kind.”

The light built hotter and brighter, and the Darkling began to panic visibly. His eyes blew wide, the obsidian black irises reflecting her in his gaze. Alina closed her eyes, and let that hope within her, like with pandora’s box, fly free.

The light rose up with the strength of a hurricane, and struck blindly. The volcra in her shield chittered nervously. Alina willed the light not to touch them. They would become like Nikolai. Human, but with the darkness still within. Her hand reached to touch Tselchki. It squirmed under her palm. The little beast would be safe, free from the sun’s blazing light. All around her, light filled the Fold. it reached with greedy fingers for the darkness, driving spears into where the shadow was at its heaviest.

It tore all of the shadows apart with heat, and hope. Alina closed her eyes, and let the amplifiers control the power for her. All around her, she felt the darkness receding. The Darkling was filled with such rage that it made Alina quake in her boots. She stepped back, and threw her arms wide. The light exploded out in a second shockwave.

Over the crackling, she heard a cry. Her eyes snapped open. The Darkling was pulling the Fold back up, drowning her light. The antlers were the first to submit to him. She felt her powers weaken, and Alina screamed. “No!”

“Yes!” Aleksander yelled back. “THIS is the price of punishment, Miss Starkov!” All around her, her light burned out like stars in the night sky, and Alina sank to her knees, weeping. She’d never felt this weak in her entire life. It was as if her very soul had been torn apart and scattered across a jagged floor. Glass dug into her, the darkness within her smothering who she really was.

Fighting did nothing, it only drew the bonds tighter. She closed her eyes, curling in on herself. Through half-lidded eyes, she watched her shield fall, and the volcra she commanded rushing to protect her friends from their brethren. The screeching of the monsters filled the air, and Alina could only watch as Nichevo’ya joined the fray. Their shadowy limbs and wings clawed hungrily for the flesh of those they could reach.

Alina searched inside herself for the hope that had just moments before been her guiding light. Through the small gap in the Fold, she spotted sight of the north star. Then, she brought her arms over her head, and snuffed out her sight. The tang of defeat poured into her mouth.

Help. She thought blindly. Someone, help me.

Off in the distance, Alina thought she heard a bugle call. But in the shadowy darkness, with Aleksander’s clammy hands at her wrist and throat, what good could she do? She cried out as his fingers dug under the fetter and into the wounds of the antlers.

“This is the price of resistance, Little Saint. What yours is mine also. Like calls to like, no?”

She nodded limply. She felt like a puppet on his strings. Always dancing to his tune. The thought of her dancing like this made her think of Nikolai, and a hoarse sob filled her throat. He would always be safe, always escaping any trap. Yet, she would be the one to stumble into them.

No, sunshine, don’t think like that. Hold on, just a little longer.

Alina felt Nikolai’s arms around her midsection, pulling her to him. His lips traced her neck, the collar. His kisses then had been reverent, filled with the adoration of a pilgrim before an altar. She clung to him blindly, sobbing hysterically.

You exist, in spite of him. Come on, Sunshine. Tighten your pauldrons. This will not be your grave.

Alina sniffled. How? He’s so strong.

He’s weak. He’s afraid. You said it yourself. You will be remembered for your kindness. Let that be your guiding light now. I’m coming for you. He kissed her neck again. Hold on, Alina the Righteous. Just a little longer.

Alina’s gaze turned back to the Darkling. With the last remnants of her strength, she gripped his hand in hers. She’d nearly died doing this back at the Little Palace. But now, she needed to do it. Drawing on the broken tether between them, she pushed Nikolai back, letting his tether with her fade into the back of her mind.

He let it go, knowing she needed to fight against the Darkling now.

Eya fyela chi, Moya Sol.

Tears bloomed in Alina’s eyes. Sniffling, she clamped her lips together, and tightened her grip on Aleksander’s hands. “Let me come back to you.”

The Darkling stilled. His eyes widened. Still, it seemed, faith and love to her, weakened him. Alina adjusted her grip on his hand so that it traced his scarred palm. She looked into his eyes, seeing his pain, and love for her. He loved her with the childish blindness that loneliness created. They were so alike, and yet so different.

She would be his little Saint always. A life in the Little Palace would lead to her being controlled by him. It was not something she wished on her worst enemies. So, she tightened her pauldrons, and let her mental shields drop. The tether between them strengthened. She allowed all of that childish love she’d held for them when she was 16 to flow between them. It would blind him, she would play to his weaknesses.

In the back of her mind, she reached for Nikolai. He came without a question from his lips, and gave her an anchorpoint for her powers. If the Darkling tried to kill her, this base reserve in him would keep her alive when all else failed.

Alina turned back to the Darkling once more, and watched him come closer. His powers spilled out in a wall of shadow, as he dimmed the Fold further. In the distance, she heard Tamar’s scream, and her eyes fluttered closed. Tears dripped down her cheeks.

Aleksander clicked his tongue. “Do not weep for the traitors. The volcra will be fattened from them. Doing so wastes what precious energy you have left.” Alina glared at him, what little fire left within her focusing in her eyes.

“Do not weep for the dead?” She murmured, thinking of the red names on the walls of churches along the Vy. He did this. Aleksander Morozova had the blood of millions upon his hands. Yet so did she. It was in that blood that her nightmares came, emerging from it in the forms of those she loved dearly.

But, she would weep for the dead. She would wail and rend the garments she wore, as her pilgrims had done. The Darkling had no cult of adoration. Alina had Ravka at her feet, their hands upturned in prayer. Young and old. They had borne her across this country in a golden litter, offering prayers unto her.

The bugle call rang out, louder this time. With it, a steady chant swirled through the air.

Sankta Alina.

Alina the Righteous, hold on a little longer.

She had held on for long enough. Now, she grasped the Darkling’s hands tight, and yanked the shadows into herself in one strong and steady tide. The inky darkness nearly snuffed out her light completely, and she fell back onto the sandy ground.

Aleksander’s eyes widened as he searched within himself. The shadows within him did not obey him. They cried and writhed at his feet, yes, but streamed towards Alina’s crumpled form. She threw her hands over her head, curled inwards, and searched for the eye of the storm. The light within her writhed and snapped at the darkness, but she urged it to calm.

Be steady.

The bugle call grew closer, louder. Her pilgrims were at the gates of the city. The volcra circling above her head screeched to one another. They hungered for her orders, for her edicts. For was she not the Sol Koroleva? The sun queen who had defied death now thrice?

I am.

Raising her head, Alina got to her feet on unsteady legs. Her hand reached for the matchbox. With a strength rapidly fading, she undid the box, and pulled out a simple match. The Darkling was agog in horror as the shadows parted, and in rushed his volcra-fied First Army. Their helm was crested by Nikolai on horseback, claws gleaming, wings erect. In his hands was a banner emblazoned with the red fox and Sunne in Splendour. He looked every inch a king, in his emerald green kefta with the Durast stitching.

Let it burn. She thought, scratching the match to the box’s tinder. Flame erupted, and the light, this time, poured out of her in one scathing, burning burst. Throwing her arms over her face, all turned to white as the heat boiled the very earth.

Her light, borne from hope and pain, rose up to tear down the Fold.

Under her feet, the sand turned to glass, and the night sky bloomed in a blaze of gold, red, and white light the likes of which Ravka had never seen. The shadows within her settled, a part of her, as with everyone, but hers to command.

Alina the Righteous, destroyer of the Fold.

Sankta Alina, Sol Koroleva, former cartographer. An orphan girl, what do you make of yourself?

I make myself who I choose. Alina replied, feeling the shadowy beast within her settling at last. She raised her head to stare up at the north star, and dropped the matchbox onto the sheet of glass under her feet. The pilgrims waited with their simple knives drawn, her First Army with sabers and bayonets. Turning her head, Alina spotted the Darkling limping back, his side torn by the burst of light.

She smirked, and watched as his few volcra and nichevo’ya surged to his side. Hundreds would rise from him. She had not deprived him of all of his small science, but she had taken a lot of it.

Raising her hands, she let light and shadow pour from her fingertips. She too, bore the blackened tips of the volcra-fied First Army, and let her teeth lengthen. Being a monster felt rather nice, when one was dealing with the greatest monster of all.

The Darkling unsheathed his sword, and raised it high. Barking a command in ancient Ravkan, his Nichevo’ya moved to throw themselves into the fray. Behind Alina, amongst her troops of the First Army, her friends, and her darling Nikolai, soldiers of light bloomed into existence. Her Soldat Sol had become sun summoners themselves.

But Alina marched at their head, still powerful. Lowering her visor, Alina stopped as a slender white west-ravkan mare was drawn up beside her. Its reins were held by none other than Nikolai, who grinned down at her.

“Fancy seeing you here, Sankta. Need a ride?”

She rolled her eyes, and swiftly clambered onto the horse. “After this, there’s someone I’d like you to meet.” Nikolai murmured as he adjusted the holster of his pistols. Alina steadied herself on her steed and blinked.

“Who?”

“My half… well, twin sister, Linnea. She’s a Durast, like me.” He gestured to his ornate kefta. “Made me this.”

“It suits you.” Alina bumped his shoulder. “Is she here?”

Nikolai leaned over his shoulder and glanced back at the regiments. He stuck his thumb and first finger in his mouth and whistled a long, high note. From the back, one of his Drüskelle whistled back a warbling tone.

“She’s there. Wearing a Drüskelle uniform and their weapons.” He winked, and smiled.

“So. This bastard.” Nikolai waved his hand in the direction of the Darkling, who across the glass expanse that was once the Fold was raising his army of shadows. “How do we defeat him?”

Alina withdrew Mal’s old hunting knife and held it out. It was still caked in Mal’s blood. Nikolai gave a low, appreciative whistle. “Did you really keep that for this long?”

“I was buried with it. The pilgrims thought it was the knife that had killed me.” She sighed. “Little did they know…”

“It was the point of three Grisha amplifiers. Saints, it’s powerful.” Nikolai ran a hand through his hair distractedly. She could almost see the gears in his mind whirring at a triple pace. Whatever he was thinking, it was undoubtedly going to be absolutely insane. And, judging by Nikolai’s plans, those worked the most often with the most success.

“So, stab him and get it over with? Seems a bit anticlimactic.”

“Now you mention it,” Alina muttered grimly. “It does. Saints know why he’s still mortal.”

“Anyone else would be dead, but not him. He’s like a cockroach.” Nikolai swung his horse’s head forward as his stallion paced. He shifted his weight backwards and adjusted his booted foot in the left stirrup.

“The other issue is that with him dead is how Ravka recovers. The West could go with Fjerda.” Alina’s brows furrowed. “We’d have to send a delegation within hours of you reclaiming the throne, and what of Shu Han-” Shaking her head, Alina sighed.

“Focus on what matters now - saving Ravka.” Nikolai gripped her hand in his and turned it over to kiss her wrist. The feeling of his lips there calmed her, and she focused forwards. Her hand went to the hilt of her sword, and she let light bloom around her in a halo effect. withdrawing her sword, she flipped the visor of her helmet down. Nikolai tightened the strap of his kepi and withdrew his own sword, a blade of fine titanium. Raising it, he turned his head back towards the ready and waiting troops.

The Darkling had a whole wall of volcra and Nichevo’ya. They would tear them to pieces. Alina settled herself in the saddle and took the banner Isaak handed her. Her hand reached up to soothe Tselchki, and the little monster whined as she slipped it into her kefta’s breast pocket.

“For safekeeping.” She murmured, and grinned sidelong at Nikolai.

“First army, rifles forward!” Dominik growled, sitting astride them on his own steed, a destrier of a warhorse. He held a cavalry saber in one hand and the other clutched a vial of something noxious.

Behind him, Alina heard Kaz shout to Wylan for something. The boy reached into his pocket and brought out a fragile vial of some substance. Alina noted the goggles around many of the volcra soldiers' necks, and realized this was powdered Lumiya.

“Saints-”

“Flash bang.” Nikolai readied his horse, and reached out for the vial. Dominik handed it to him. Then, he threw it forwards. Up and down the line, spread three miles wide, the sound of shattering glass rang through the night air.

“On my signal, Alina.” Nikolai raised his sword and yelled a single phrase that Alina had heard from battlefield to mess tent to field hospital.

“Ne Ravka!”

Then, the calvary broke through the lines, and Alina could only watch in wide-eyed amazement as her Soldat Sol burst forward. The Lumiaya around their feet exploded in violent bursts of light that crackled like miniature fireworks. Grenades and mortars rained down on the Darkling’s shadow soldiers, and above it all, the roar of artillery tore through the glass floor the Fold had once been.

Alina was swept into the tide of men, horses, and guns. She raised the banner high in her hand. Her Soldat Sol gave a mighty cry of Sankta Alina! And swept forward in a tide of light that blinded volcra, many of whom lashed out wildly with clawed appendages to whatever they could reach.

The stench of blood and screams of the dying filled her ears as Alina urged forward the second line of troops. Dominik’s signal had the infantry moving forward under the feet of the first line calvary, leaping from trenches as the artillery bombardment stopped and men began to hold significant positions.

“Melt the glass! The horses and men will be cut to pieces!” Kaz yelled over the roar of the guns as he stabbed his cane-head into an advancing volcra. Alina complied, and with a yank on Nikolai’s wrist, had melted the glass down into sand once more. The sand packed together and solidified into sandstone, ensuring the dunes did not drown them.

Still, despite the screaming and dying, Alina rode onwards. Blood splattered her horse’s muzzle, its front, and yet, she continued. The banner held high in her hand rallied her troops time and again. Distinctly, Alina was reminded of Richard III’s last charge against Henry Tudor, and the words of the play came unbidden into her mind. She’d read it one morning in the Little Palace between her lessons and now could think of nothing but the opening stanza.

Now is the winter of our discontent made glorious by this sunne of york. And all the clouds that lour'd upon our house In the deep bosom of the ocean buried. Now are our brows bound with victorious wreaths; Our bruised arms hung up for monuments; Our stern alarums changed to merry meetings, Our dreadful marches to delightful measures. Grim-visaged war hath smooth'd his wrinkled front; And now, instead of mounting barbed steeds/To fright the souls of fearful adversaries, He capers nimbly in a lady's chamber/To the lascivious pleasing of a lute.

She would slaughter the darkling where he stood. She wouldn’t let him get inside her head anymore. Leaning low in the saddle, Alina let her mare carry her forwards. The banner in her hand was wrenched from her grasp by a greedy volcra who tore it in half. Alina’s rage exploded.

A blast of light rocked the earth as she sped past Nikolai, who was embroiled in fighting off a whole horde of Nichevo’ya, ignoring their fangs in his arms. His pistols were going off in a continous stream of bangs. At his back was Jesper and Kaz, who fought like Demjinns. Nikolai’s Drüskelle were pressing a good advantage in cutting off the western flank of volcra who were descending like a heavy artillery barrage.

The roar of the guns started up again and Alina watched in wide-eyed amazement as shells soaked in lumiaya sailed through the air and exploded in wide, star-bright bursts of light that burned Nichevo’ya to ash and cut through swathes of volcra with the hundreds of tiny fragments that whistled through the air.

Yet as each volcra fell, three came to replace it. The 28 regiments of the First army fought like a pack of wolves, yet even Alina was beginning to wonder if a strategic retreat was a good idea. Dominik had evidently thrown out the idea of bite and hold, which was a poor idea. She spun in the saddle and watched in horror as an officer was shot through the temple and the fellow bandaging him was ripped in two by a volcra.

Focus on what’s important!

Alina’s head snapped up as she watched Nikolai take down two volcra at once, then heard his scream as a Nichevo’ya tore into his left shoulder. He ripped the beast off him, and tore its head from its shoulders with his clawed hand, then hissed. His black eyes were fully in place, and his wings burst forth. Amongst all this bloodshed and misery, he looked like some dark angel cursed to reap the souls of the dead.

Alina reached for her banner, remembered its unsightly end, and cursed. She raised her hand and brought forth a beam of light that refracted off her helmet. The beam surged out in a burst of holy light that caused her Soldat Sol to look up. Amongst the bloodshed and horror, Alina was a saint who came to bring the victorious to paradise. She reined in her horse and stalked towards the Darkling, who was gutting First Army soldiers and rogue Grisha with no care for their allegiance. Briefly, Alina caught sight of a flash of ginger hair and cringed as Harshaw was torn in half by a volcra, and she spotted the flash of black hair.

Zoya.

Reaching down in the saddle, Alina scooped Zoya out of harm's way, even as the Grisha squaller hissed and spat like a wild cat.

“I had him!”

“No, you didn’t!” Alina shouted as an artillery shell careened off course and plowed into a farmhouse three miles east. The fire from it turned Alina’s hair orange. Glancing up, she let out a sharp whistle to Dominik.

“Aim the guns north! You’re off!”

He saluted her, and raised a series of detailed flags in swift succession. The bursts that followed were sharper in their targeting, and began to go after the Darkling’s command lines. Soon, screams filled the air once more, and Alina dropped Zoya with Isaak, who growled.

“Keep an eye on one another.”

He saluted her, and bowed. Alina nodded her head in acknowledgment and raced back into the fray. She cut down enemies left and right, offering prayers for those slain on either side, waiting with barely bated breath for the Darkling to come onto the field properly. Alina’s eyes narrowed and she sat forward in the saddle as he mounted his black horse and stepped onto the battlefield. Alina raised her hand and made sharp movements to Dominik, who raised a flag. The First Army fell into swift lines of men and checked their rifles, loading clips and handing each other cigarettes and extra grenades. The crows adjusted their weapons, and Nina finished killing a Volcra with Matthais’s rifle.

22nd regiments remained. An entire 6 lay on the battlefield under their feet. Alina glared at the Darkling. Her Soldat Sol fanned out, and she caught sight of Tamar and Tolya directing them. Good, let them command her army. Alina settled herself in the saddle once more and raised her visor.

Accepting the canteen of water from a blood-soaked Olga, Alina sipped it and handed the canteen back. She tore off her gloves and stuck them in her belt. The Darkling settled into his own saddle, a mere sword-thrust from her. A truce was beginning to take route, perhaps?

Behind her, Dominik ordered a pause in the firing. Nikolai repeated the snarl in Ravkan and his troops fell into line.

Aleksander grinned, showing teeth.

“Good to see the Little Prince and Little Saint fight like the demons they both command.” He cocked his head. “But I am shocked, you willingly threw your entire army against me. Why?”

“Because you’re a scourge!” Zoya yelled from where she stood at Isaak’s side.

“Zoya…” Aleksander purred.

“Shut up!” Genya yelled. “You’ve done nothing for this country, for us! You deserve this!”

At that moment, Alina could’ve hugged her old friend. Genya, with her eyepatch and wicked fabrikated bayonet, looked particularly fierce. David and Wylan were discussing something in hushed tones. Jesper had one arm around Inej, who clung to Kaz’s gloved hands. Kaz’s eyes were wild with bloodlust and he breathed sharply through his nostrils.

“I do not deserve this, Safin.” Aleksander snarled. “I was merely trying to bring Grisha safety and peace from persecution! You do not know the centuries in which I have lived!”

“We know enough!” Genya retorted, stepping forward. She parted her hair and revealed her scars in all their glory. “I am ruination, yes, but you are a cancer that has festered in this land’s earth for time immemorial. And it is high time we return you to the grave from which you never deserved to emerge.”

Aleksander jerked back, almost losing control of his steed in his fright. Something Genya had said had alarmed him. Alina decided to press the advantage, and rode closer, breaking the rank lines. She dismounted from her horse and paused, watching Aleksander do the same.

“Tell them, Alina. Tell them what good I bring.” He begged, hoping against hope that she would listen to him, that the tether’s taking hadn’t all been for naught. He prayed to the saints he had venerated in childhood to listen, just this once.

“It’s true. Some of your things bring merit.” Alina replied, signaling to Nikolai and Dominik to be ready. She heard the sharp gasps of air from those listening and did not cringe. “But it is how you went about delivering them that has made you a villain.”

Aleksander scoffed, nervously. She’d called his bluff. He moved to form the Cut, but Alina watched his wavering hands. He was too weak too. Are we not all things? She thought, and gripped Mal’s knife tighter in her hand, hidden under the fold of her Kefta’s sleeve.

“If I am a villain, yes, what has kept you from killing me, little Saint? All of these years, and I have been here. Able to be destroyed.”

“No.” Alina shook her head. Let him dupe us into thinking himself mortal. But he is a god. As long as he lives, he will have followers.

I must be the one to end this.

She stepped forward, crossing to him. Then, she knelt and bowed her head in supplication. Nikolai’s eyes widened and he gripped Dominik’s hand in a lock grip so tight the other man’s hand turned white.

He was terrified. All of them were. Not a noise broke the stifling silence. Alina rose her head at last, and tugged the Darkling down to his knees with a well-timed yank on his Kefta’s lapels. He crashed to his knees.

“What are you playing at, Little Saint?” He growled as she brushed back his inky curls and pressed a hand to his stone-cold cheek. She’d never noted in all this time how cold he was. She gave him a hint of a smile. Anything to keep him from running.

“Kiss me.”

The First Army strained at the bit, an outcry pouring from their lips. The Soldat Sol shifted uneasily. The grisha growled low in their throats and exchanged frightened glances with one another. But, Alina did not waver. Hope had not escaped Pandora’s box yet.

She watched the Darkling’s eyes widen, and smiled to herself as he leaned forward and captured her lips in a dark, seductive kiss. However, where she had once swooned against him with the same hunger, she remained cold and still. The blade in her hand glittered.

“Oh, Little Saint, how good it is to kiss you-”

He never finished the sentence, for Alina drove the blade that had killed three amplifiers into the Darkling’s heart. He gasped, groaned, and blood poured from his mouth. Alina jerked her head back as the blood splashed onto her face, and she collapsed back. The knife went with the Darkling, and she could only watch in shock and wide-eyed horror as his body began to decompose before her very eyes.

Soon, he turned to rot, and then turned from there to dust. Eight centuries of borrowed time had come to pay their debts with interest. For the knife too went with him, as did the kefta. Suddenly, all around them, screams filled the air.

“Light!” Alina shouted. Lanterns burst into light to chase back the darkness, and with these tiny wavering suns, the First and Second Armies watched as the Darkling’s creations died and withered, screaming. The shadows within the volcra-fied First army faded too, with nary a cry from any man. The chaos of the battle had stilled already, but the silence that followed was strangely eerie.

Off in the east, Alina could see dawn beginning to break on the horizon, and smiled faintly. A new day, a new millennia. She wavered on her feet for a moment, and then felt the darkness of a fainting spell come over her. The darkness swooped in, and once more, all faded to black.

But they had won. The Darkling was dead, and now the work of rebuilding could begin in earnest.

_____________________________________________________________

End of chapter 13.

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ricardian-werewolf · 2 months

Text

Chapter 10: I am a world's forgotten boy

Ao3 Link.

Summary:

The morning after, Nikolai and co begin to grapple with the fact that the Lantsov Pretender means to move against them in open combat. The fallout of that takes everyone by surprise, and the stage is set for a proper conflict.

Notes:

This chapter is all nearly 5k words of dialogue and worldbuilding with very little major, plot rending action. However it does end with quite the bang! Song title taken from Search and Destroy by Florence + Machine.

Wordcount: 4,984.

Cw/Tws: Violence towards the end of the chapter; explicit reference to assault and trauma.

Chapter below cut.

Balakirev, the following morning.

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Alina woke with a start, her hand reaching for Nikolai’s. His side of the bed was stone cold. Instantly, she was awake properly, the fog of sleeve gone. Her eyes focused in on the sight of his kepi on the rack by the door, and his coat next to it. He hadn’t gone far. Maybe with Dominik?

Cocking her head to one side, Alina heard the muffled noises of men conversing below her, and shook her head. She reached across the bed to the table for Nikolai’s watch, and she regarded it. A few minutes after the dawn bell. Sighing, she rolled out of bed and crossed to the washbasin. Summer at this time of year made for a few true hours of darkness, but with the Darkling’s eclipse, darkness was all there was.

Sighing once more, Alina reached for the sponge and set to washing herself down. She tugged off her soaked shift and reached for a fresh one, then began dressing herself in a clean blouse and skirt. Her army boots went on next, buttoned up tight. Over it went the old olive coat she wore as General of the Second army, though she neglected to button it up. The manor house’s upstairs hall was wide, decked in blue wall paint edged in gaudy gold and a long running carpet of deeper blue. As Alina moved down its expanse, the sound of arguing voices grew louder.

Two white double doors with gold stag-antler handles came into her line of sight. With sharp movements, the guards on each side of the door saluted her and pushed the doors in.

Alina stepped hesitantly from the world of secluded minor nobility to a war room in full swing. Nikolai stood at its center, a map behind his head of the western reaches of East Ravka bordering the Fold. In one hand was a pointer stick, in the other a cup of coffee. Clenched between his ring and pinky finger was a fat telegram - something Nikolai himself had brought to Ravka’s First army to speed up communications. He looked furious.

“Tell me what you mean by the fact Raevsky’s reporting that bastard pretender as having claimed my right to the Ravkan throne is null and void because my mother fucked an ambassador! Saints forbid her bloody husband give her a lick of affection, which he DIDN’T!” Nikolai’s snarl sent a junior telegraph operator fishing about her handkerchief to wipe her streaming eyes.

“Nikolai?” Alina called.

Nikolai’s head snapped to her, and he sighed. “Morning, Moya Sol,”

“Good morning to you too,” Picking up a cup of coffee from a white-faced Isaak, Alina stepped to him, and looked up. She hadn’t even realized he was standing on a chair and still he yelled. “I thought you were supposed to be the calm one,” She noted with a smirk.

“I was calm, until Raevsky’s report came in.” He tossed the telegram at her without looking at her, and sipped more coffee. The fact he was wide awake at just after four bells barely surprised Alina these days. She sipped another mouthful of coffee and snapped her fingers. “Get me a chair.” She growled to a hapless cipher. The woman nodded, carrying over one of the mayor’s wingback velvet chairs. Alina stepped atop it, and surveyed over the heads of telegraph operators, machinery; the flickering gas lamps. She rolled out Raevsky’s report and read it.

Vadik Demidov, the Lantsov Pretender, released an edict today removing Nikolai Lantsov from the right of succession based on letters between Tatiana, Tsarista of Ravka, Duchess of Djerholm, and Magnus Opjer, Head of North Star Shipping Co, and Ambassador to Ravka under the Grimjer Standard, of a romantic nature. He waits for a response.

“Can I kill him?” Alina blurted, handing the telegram back to Nikolai, who dropped it on the desk at his feet. She watched him step effortlessly onto said desk and bend down to examine the incoming message of a young cartographer. The woman pushed around blocks on the massive land map with terrain that Nikolai had rolled out across four desks. He effortlessly maneuvered between boxes of graphite pencils and little flag positions as women with headsets and long sweeping tools moved around him. His years of skating and ballet dancing paid off, and Alina noted with a jolt that he was not only barefoot, but his talons and claws were on full display.

Either everyone was too afraid to say anything, or too tired. Judging by the dark circles under the eyes of the women moving around him, the latter was true. Shadows cloaked Nikolai’s shoulders as he effortlessly danced across the desk, thinking things over.

“Killing him at the hands of the saints would be too…” Nikolai gestured, sucking at his teeth for a word or ten to fulfill what his mind was leagues ahead.

Onerous? She reached through the tether.

Extraordinary. It needs to be a subtle killing.

“We’ll need the wraith.” Alina murmured, folding the telegram. “Only she could do a covert killing with no blood on her hands. Are they back in Ketterdam yet?”

Nikolai shrugged, spinning on one foot. He effortlessly picked up a flag representing the 22nd and moved it a few degrees east, then winked at the annoyed plotter, who crossed herself in shock.

“Appreciate the devotion, love, but putting my beloved 22nd mightily close to the Fold means I’ll be quite the Volcra palate cleanser.” Bowing low, he tipped the woman’s chin up and smirked.

“And do we want that?”

“No, Moi Tsar.” She murmured, eyes wide with the kind of devotion reserved for saints.

He winked again and moved back, grumbling as they rearranged the First and Second regiments to be in line with whatever the Darkling was doing in his surprise movement out of Os Alta. “He’s coming for Balakariev with how many men?” He asked Dominik, who held up a piece of paper with 1,000 written across it.

“Pitiful. That’s the palace guard alone. Did we really secure all of the First Army?” Shaking his head, Nikolai bent over to peer down at his feet, which were currently standing on both branches of the Vy. He sipped his coffee, added a slug of brandy to it, then hummed a scrap from the Threepenny Opera.

“If this gets worse, I’m breaking into Jekyll and Hyde.” He grumbled, taking Dominik’s hand to kiss it. Alina navigated her way across the table to them, and accepted Dominik’s offered headset. Bending down, she heard the familiar beeps of morse-code and grimaced.

“What’s Raevsky saying?” She, Nikolai and Dominik barked in unison. Dominik snorted while Nikolai threw his head back , laughing. Alina swore. The hapless telegrapher held up his notebook. Written in capital Ravkayash was three words:

Pretender Arrives Soon.

“The Saints and their ugly mothers!” Nikolai snarled. He leapt off the table, stormed up to the side table at the end of the room. Slugging back a glass of tea, he slammed his fist into the oaken table and rubbed a hand over his face.

“What am I going to do?” He hissed to Dominik, who fused with his mussed hair. Alina examined his hand and tsked at the bruises. Casting her gaze to Dominik, he sighed. “Go out there and confront him. With the full might of the First Army with you.”

“Damn the saints for giving you the brains of this operation, Vertov,” Nikolai growled, then he sighed, and dropped his head to rest on Dominik’s shoulder. His hand Alina was fussing over entwined with her fingers and she was yanked into a tight hug.

“If he kills you…” Nikolai’s eyes darkened. “I’ll burn Ravka to ash. It’ll be your funeral pyre - both of you.” He sucked on his teeth and both his brows shot to his hairline. “Maybe I’ll join you, slain on the field of battle and die heroically.”

“What, like Wolfe at the Plains of Abraham?” Dominik teased. Nikolai hissed. “Don’t jest. Let me wallow in the fear of losing you.”

“Not a chance.” Alina chimed in, grinning. “He can’t die, and I’m a saint. You’ll be stuck with us a lot longer than you think.”

A ghost of a smile traced Nikolai’s lips, and he fluttered his lashes at Alina. “If things go poorly, will you destroy the Fold regardless?”

“Of course.” She answered immediately. That had been her driving force all through this. Kill the Darkling and the monsters that made him the Black Heretic.

“And I much prefer to go the way of Richard III.” Nikolai smoothed his hair back.

“What, calling for a kingdom for your horse?” Alina teased.

“No, leading a cavalry charge that struck fear into Henry Tudor’s black heart until his death.”

Dominik and Alina exchanged mischievous glances. She shrugged.

“Anyways, no Tsar, bastard or not, is going out to meet the Lantsov Pretender with his tunic open and shirt half-buttoned.” Alina snapped her fingers. “Isaak, get Moi Tsar’s-” She looked at Dominik, who stepped in. “His dress uniform.”

Isaak’s mouth fell open. No one had seen Nikolai in his full dress uniform, not since the night of his birthday party. It was probably still soaked with blood. The color would be ruined. Alina doubted it.

“I’ll meet you in front of the mayor’s house in 20 minutes.” She picked up Nikolai’s half finished glass of tea, watched Dominik frog-march Nikolai out of the war room. She then turned back to regard the plotters, telegraphers and ciphers.

“Get me a map.” She barked. “And a bloody cup of coffee that doesn’t taste like shit.”

___________________________________________________________

Nikolai’s uniform glittered in the torch-light of the flickering fires lit around his steed as he sat in the saddle at full attention. Pure sapphire core-cloth draped down from his neck, and flowed across his broad shoulders. It sat snug at his waist, hemmed in with a belt of black leather and a gold buckle emblazoned with the double eagle. His hair was curled at the edges, and his fingers were hidden under white kid-leather gloves. The front of the tunic was emblazoned with miles of hussar braiding in goldwork, though through Dominik’s clever fingers, the insignia at his shoulder had been reworked to be his fox crowned with his gold and pearl coronet.

Atop his curled hair, rested his officer’s kepi. Thanks to Jesper’s careful fingers, the olive green had bled blue, and the gold double-headed eagle gleamed in the firelight. He locked his reins in tighter, and waited with barely baited breath for the arrival of the man who had wrestled the throne from under him.

Tsar Vadik Demidov. The name burned the flesh of Nikolai’s tongue to say such a sinful set of words. Certainly, an offshoot of his family, this boy was a blonde-haired fop, a boy who’d never tasted the blood of battle or the grit of the trenches under his fingernails. Vladik had been raised in salons and on champagne. Nikolai was going to slice his throat open with his saber and stick Vladik’s head on a pike. He’d let the revolution sweeping across Ravka take the sniveling nobility by storm and not care if they were murdered in their beds.

The procession of palace guards, wearing his father’s powder blue and gold came into the town slowly, heralded and hemmed in by the Darkling’s Oprichniki. Their black and red uniforms melted from the shadows with a disturbing level of sudden clarity. Nikolai’s fingers tensed around his saber. He hungered for his cutlass, or even better, Sturmhond’s pistols. His horse whinnied nervously.

“Attention!” Nikolai’s voice did not crack. It did not dip, or waver. This was a command he’d spoken countless times, and it soothed him now as it did then. Reaching up to his neck, he fiddled with the compass chain around his neck and pressed it to his cracked lips.

He needed the mental fortitude Alina was evidently in possession of, with her being sequestered deep inside the mayor’s house. The Darkling had no idea his beloved Little Saint had returned from the dead. The presses had stopped, and spies of the Darkling were mercilessly clubbed to death or burned violently for treason. Nikolai was inclined to agree with the barbarity, though a return to a civil court under his reign would be a saint’s-forsaken delight. Long buried would be his father’s useless edicts and proclamations. Nikolai would drag Ravka, kicking and screaming, into the modern age.

Adjusting himself in the saddle, he raised a hand and the gas lamps of the town were lit at once, bringing the circle of light out from where he stood, seemingly alone. All at once, the light and heavy cavalry brigades were illuminated. Rifles gleamed, bayonets flashed, and the uniforms of all twenty eight regiments of First Army became at once apparent. Nikolai was pleased to see that Vladik did not bolt. He expected the wolf with its pup-teeth to turn tail at the sight of so many soldiers.

Perhaps cowardice kept him moving forward. Or blind idiocy. He couldn’t call the Fjerdans on side, and West Ravka’s threats of secession were a mere gadfly in Nikolai’s mental map of what to do about Ravka. He examined his pocket watch. Just after ten bells and still darker than proverbial sin.

“Ah, the Little Prince.” The Darkling purred. “What a welcome surprise.”

“General.” Nikolai did not incline his head. Dominik’s gaze sharpened. He wore the full dress of a First Army general, kepi included, and kept his steed on a tight rein. Nikolai’s fingers instinctively reached to stall him. Shielding him from the bullets no doubt loaded into the chambers of the Oprichinik and Darkling’s Oprinchiniki’s rifles.

“I hope defeating you is as easy as it was your mother.” The Darkling growled, his gaze cutting to Dominik, who stilled dead. Nikolai stiffened. Killing his mother? He was just using this to off-balance him, right? He couldn’t have…

“She cried for you, you know? Begged on her hands and knees to spare her little malenchki.”

Nikolai’s throat bobbed with bile. His fingers, clawed and sharp, wanted to rip the General’s throat out. With a smirk painting his face, the Darkling closed his fingers into a fist. All of Nikolai’s work restraining his inner monster went to waste as the beast within him rose up greedily. It was going to kill his inner child once and for all.

BACK! Nikolai screamed helplessly. Go back!

Kolya?! What’s happening?! His inner child cried out, his blonde hair a flash in the darkness. Nikolai whined, an edge of hysteria creeping into his voice. Breaking him here, in front of his soldiers? They’d never trust him again. Nikolai fisted his fingers into his thigh and dug hard enough to draw blood. The stench of it, as always, created a shift within the monster. It hated self flagellation, and amazingly, calmed.

“How are you resisting me?” The Darkling hissed, panic creeping into his voice. “I made you into this!”

“You forgot, Moi Soverenyi,” Nikolai sneered. “ Second sons are well used to the dark. Some of us-” He stared at Vladik’s sickly face with eyes as black as tar, and watched the false king stiffen with fear. “-Like it. I prefer this house guest you inflicted on me more when it’s not about to eat my inner child.”

“Oh, you don’t have a soul.”

“I do.” Nikolai straightened in the saddle. He raised a hand to his mouth, and tugged off his gloves with his black fangs. He spat them into the gutter, and flexed his claws. The light casting his shadow quivered under the sight of his wings emerging from behind him. He flicked a finger out to scratch Dominik’s cheek, and instead lightly traced it, a ghost of a coo slipping from his lips.

“The Apparat was wrong.” He raised a finger and pointed it amongst the motley crowd of guards. It parted to reveal the cassock-clad, sniveling form of the Apparat. The man stiffened in genuine fear and opened his mouth to proclaim him a heretic of the throne. Nikolai leaned forward in the saddle and pressed a finger to his lips.

“Not a word from your holy mouth, Apparat.” He purred. “I’m not much in need of your prayers or words.” He fished around in his pockets and with a grimace, pulled out a rosary chain. “But I think you’re missing these.”

The Apparat’s eyes bulged in their sockets as he set his eyes onto the rosary chain that had bound Nikolai’s wrists for ten years straight, until he’d snapped the chain at sixteen and not looked back. The sins of the Apparat went with him and Dominik to their graves.

The prince is cloaked in sin.

Nikolai smirked, and dangled out the chain. Opening his hand, Dominik watched with wide eyes as Nikolai tossed the chain onto the ground. From here, he could see the blood-stains of holy Lantsov blood marring the beads. The blood of kings had been spilled for worse, but this had been the blood of a boy. He watched Nikolai carefully as he settled back in the saddle. He prayed to any saint listening that the darkness crowded in on Nikolai’s soul would be cleansed from him before he was anointed with the holy oil and crowned Tsar.

But in order to do that, they had to kill Vladik and the Darkling. Dominik looked to Nikolai, whose hand rested on his sabre, and steadied his own shaking hands. Nikolai, gripping the reins tight in his fingers, nodded to Isaak.

Get Alina out, and flee to the Fold. We’ll cut them off here.

Isaak saluted, and slipped into the darkness. The Darkling either didn’t notice or refused to as he rode back and forth on his steed, proclaiming of how he’d be Ravka’s savior. Nikolai rolled his eyes, and made a discreet motion that Dominik didn’t recognize. A line drawn horizontally. It barely even registered in his field of vision, and he shrugged, believing it to be a mischievous tic. He saw through the circle of firelight, Iorek Brynison, corralling the heavy artillery into proper lines.

Just what was Nikolai planning?

“What’re you doing?” He murmured to Nikolai, whose brow rose in query. He shrugged. “Just the men being shifty. They didn’t expect to be brought out in full dress this morning.”

Full Dress.

Dominik’s gaze whipped to the left, and amongst the burning braziers, he spotted the colors of each regiment in full splendor. This wasn’t some simple presentation of arms. The pipers and drummers were ready and waiting for some secretive signal. Nikolai had done something by responding to Vladik’s telegram to get him here.

Isaak appeared at Nikolai’s shoulder mounted on a simple white mare - a west Ravkan steed. He and Nikolai shared a glance and Nikolai clapped the younger man on the shoulder. Dominik could only watch as Nikolai tightened the band of his kepi under his chin, and his free hand moved towards his sword. They were waiting for something to happen, and it unnerved Dominik, but he held himself steady.

Before them, the Darkling continued pacing on his steed. He raised a hand, and his horse stilled. “Where is the Little Saint? You bear her symbol, yet I don’t see her amongst your forces. Isn’t she a general?”

“She is still dead, Moi Soverenyi,” Nikolai replied, reaching to the flank of his horse. He tapped a simple two finger tap that Dominik caught. He hated being left out of whatever Nikolai was planning, and his eyes widened as Tolya brought before the General of Second Army a singed and scarred Kefta of emerald green with fox-fur.

“This was found after the heretical followers of the Apparat burned her body on a pyre in Dva Stolba. It was all they could find of her.”

The Darkling’s throat bobbed, pain flooding his face. He crumpled the expanse of Kefta in his fingers and dipped his head. Nikolai leaned forward in the saddle, a soft grimace painting his face.

Saints, how is he-

Dominik’s eyes widened as the Darkling tore the Kefta’s fabric at the hem and shadows poured off him in waves. The horses startled, shying from the cruel darkness rolling across the square and climbing the walls. If Nikolai hadn’t done this right, they were all about to become volcra or a late breakfast for said marauders. Those shadows congealed, and Dominik’s face whitened as they became Nichevo’ya, but larger. Their insect-like hum became an overwhelming screech of metal on metal noises and they leapt for one regiment - the 14th? - but suddenly, a flash grenade sent a burst of light exploding outwards. In the chaos and the smoke, Dominik distinctly heard the sound of a thud, and caught the eye of a hooded figure scaling down a wall by rope. A small figure clad in a tight cape and pant-set with fabrikated shoes.

The Wraith had counseled mercy in the form of a knife to someone’s neck. But who? He wheeled his gaze, expecting Nikolai’s mouth to be spurting blood. But, as the smoke cleared, Dominik’s jaw dropped. Lying flush across his horse, amidst the bristling blades and rifles of his guards, was Vladik Demidov. A tiny dart protruded from his neck, and before chaos erupted, it tipped from his flesh and fell to the cobblestones with nary a sound.

“Saints!” Nikolai gasped, feigning shock. The Darkling’s head snapped up, and then, pandemonium erupted. The pretender king’s guard rushed to examine the king’s body and the Darkling’s guards raised their rifles. Nikolai tightened the reins in his fingers once more, and pulled out his sabre.

Holding the tip level, he pointed it at the Darkling’s chest, who stared at Nikolai with such unfiltered rage, even the fox-king cringed. “What say you? We were meant to discuss peace under this banner, but you insulted my honor.”

“You killed my king.” The Darkling hissed. “You killed the Little Saint!”

“The King was backed by you. And besides, you’ve not killed my parents.”

Silence reigned as soon as the words left Nikolai’s mouth. Dissent began to erupt shortly after, and Nikolai raised his hand. “In order for the letters to be found, then you would have had to not kill my mother.”

“Oh, yes, I didn’t.” The Darkling clapped his hands and from the shadows, across the expanse of lamp-light, came Tsarina Tatiana, clad in her coral pink and silver gown she always wore to bed. Her silver hair was tussled, and hung limply. Months of sanctuary had softened her face, given her wrinkled hands purpose. He wondered if she’d been gardening.

But, what filled him now, was rage. Rage that his mother had so evidently been coerced into this, she’d not denied it. The Tsar had been a monster, deserved to be put down like some mangy dog, but the Tsarina was supposed to be maternal, kind. Instead, she was vapid and vain, intent on only protecting Vasily. She may have loved him, but Nikolai would always be her earthly sin, her mistake.

Nikolai removed his kepi.

“Madraya.”

“Nikolai!” Tatiana’s lower lip wobbled, and she fell to her knees before his horse. “Please, forgive me!”

“For what exactly? Allowing Genya to be willingly raped by your husband? Denying me of my true parentage until I had to find it myself? Living with your head in the sand for so long that you forgot what true leadership meant?”

Tatiana flinched, scrambled back. Opening and closing her mouth, she gaped up at her son like a petulant child delivered its first blow. “Malenchki!”

“Don’t deny this, mother. It grows tiresome.” Nikolai fiddled with his cuffs. “Admit your sins.”

“I did what I had to do to protect you!”

“Hmm.” Nikolai looked to Dominik, who was apparently wishing to be elsewhere. “Let us see. Protecting me. Shutting me off from the outside world, denying me true affection. Allowing Vasily to poison me at twelve… oh, and of course.” He pointed to the rosary beads resting in the gutter.

“That.”

Tatiana’s whole face turned green at the sight of those beads resting in the gutter.

“Allowing me to be violently…” He rolled the word around in his mouth. “Assaulted. By a man of severe religious power and position.”

“It…” She expelled a breath, her chest heaving. “You never told us.”

Nikolai’s jaw crunched audibly. The joking facade he normally wore when with his mother evaporated. In fact, so did all of his walls. Suddenly, he looked very much like the little boy who had been forced into this horrific situation week after week. He looked no more than six years old.

“I did.” He murmured, his voice the coldest Dominik had ever heard. “I screamed and cried inside my room for hours, and you refused to listen. You said it was penance for my earthly sins. A carryover of my father’s infidelity with you.”

“It was.” Tatiana replied, and then her face whitened as Nikolai dismounted from his steed and came towards her. He moved effortlessly through his guards and soldiers. He was too vulnerable. If an assassin was in the crowd now, he’d be downed without a cry from his lips. Dominik strained in the saddle, Isaak’s fingers fishing for his pistol.

Nikolai raised his hand and cut a glance over his shoulder. Stay your hand.

“Madraya, do you have any idea of the impact of your words?” He murmured, his fingers calmly reaching for his pistol. He opened the barrel and slid a bullet into the chamber. She sobbed weakly and reached for the grotty rosary chain. The toe of his boot stopped her, and he snatched the chain from the gutter.

“I do not make war against women often, but I feel as though this is a most certain case.”

“Have you no love for me!” Tatiana cried. “I am your mother!”

“You sold me out to a boy who has never once wielded a sabre in battle or sat in a place of council!”

“You had the Fjerdan throne well in hand, what with your being a bloody byproduct of my tryst with your gormless father!”

“Magnus Opjer is not gormless. He is a good man, a wonderful husband and father. A part of me wishes I was raised in his household and not yours. Then maybe I could have received better care.” He flipped the barrel back into place and raised the pistol.

“Please, Malenchki,”

“No one ever told you what that word means, Madraya.” He murmured. “It means little ghost.”

Then, he fired.

The bullet was a mercy shoot, an instant kill. He stared down at the corpse of his own mother and raised his eyes to regard the Darkling dead in the face. He threw his pistol away with a clatter of the metal on the cobblestone.

“It’s done. Now, there are no longer any claimants to the Lantsov throne.”

“I’m shocked, Little Prince.” The Darkling snarled. “I vaguely Alina mentioning to me once how you and I were not that different. Now, it seems, she was right.”. Nikolai pulled off his lucky compass and Tolya, who held Alina’s burned kefta still, came over. Without a word between them, Nikolai handed his old friend the compass and Tolya murmured something in Nikolai’s ear.

Nikolai closed his eyes, and nodded, then let Tolya step back.

“So.” He spread his arms wide. “You have it all, Darkling. Kill me, and there remains no pitiful rebellion. This is a trap that the too-clever fox cannot escape any longer. The watch has wound down long enough.”

“How do I know you won’t just come back like some infestation?” The Darkling dismounted from his steed and passed off his reins. The shadows around him bloomed at his feet and Nikolai refused to let his fear show as he saw the Cut form once more in the Darkling’s hands. The infection within his body writhed, thrashing vainly to be free. He pushed it forward, sending it to just under the surface of his skin.

When push came to shove, demon, you always ran. Now is your chance. Nikolai murmured, inwardly searching for the familiar flicker of his inner child. Finding him, he walled his younger self off from this gruesome sight, and awaited his fate.

The cut tore Nikolai’s stomach open along the lines of the first wound, and he groaned, staggering back. But, unknown to anyone else, the corecloth of his uniform had been infused with Alina’s powers. It absorbed the darkness, strengthening the core cloth. However, the wound the Cut still made sent him sprawling into the dirt. He looked up weakly, grasping at his chest, to make eye contact with Dominik, and then he fainted.

In the background Tolya lowered the king’s pulse to a near death-state, and slipped away into the darkness, Tamar with him. Around them, First Army stirred, and then, with a cry of war from Dominik’s lips, fell onto the King’s guard with the fury of demons from the underworld. All around them, Nikolai lay sprawled next to the form of his mother.

Inside him, a little boy rose from a slumber of 16 years and set off on a trek to free the darkness that had polluted his body and to come out of the blasted shell he lived in. As The Darkling beat a hasty retreat with the remnants of his Oprichiniki, his howling pursuers chased him. For he and his Steed ran for one place, where it all began.

The Making at the Heart of the World. But, as he neared it, a blinding white light filled the sky, and the Darkling’s years-long eclipse broke with a shattering finality. Amongst that blast, he saw through the blinding glow, the Fold being crushed under the weight of its own brightness.

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The Saints had come to collect their debts, and with interest.

End of Chapter 10, and Act II: The Sunne in Splendour.

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#wyn rambles #fic: I will follow you into the dark #Nikolina #the Darkling #Alina Starkov #ruin and rising au #nikolai lantsov #shadow and bone #inej ghafa #Six of Crows #kaz brekker #Dominik Vertov #Isaak Andreyev #King of Scars #Rule of Wolves #wyn writes

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