#can i petition for more overprotective zoya?

[dregstrash]

Hi I don’t know if you’re still doing non-fluff requests but if you feel like it could you please write a Zoyalai hurt/comfort where Nikolai is the one hurt?

Thanks for sending this in anon! I’m sorry it’s been really slow on the fic writing. I have so many planned fics, and requests and it’s the end of the semester for me. So I’ll try to get these out as soon as I can!

Zoya’s world used to consist of two things: power and her aunt. 

One of those things increased while the other….was taken from her.

But in the years after the war, her world had somehow expanded to include…Nikolai.

For as long as she could, she kept telling herself that it was because he was her king. Shouldn’t a general worry about the well-being of her king after all? But somehow that loyalty warped in on itself. The clear lines she’s drawn over her loyalties had blurred like words written on sand– washed away with an uncertain tide. And she tried to ignore it. To pretend that her feelings hadn’t become a jumble inside her. Saints, she tried so hard to ignore the extra skip in her heart when Nikolai’s eyes stayed on hers for a second too long. Or when they spent hours in the war room discussing logistics, strategies, and they became one person going around and around the same issues. There were times when they went to visit their battlements that she forgot about his engagement or the fact that she had other things to worry about then serious relationships. 

Then reality came crushing back in and she bottled those thoughts back up. Pretending they had never escaped in the first place. Because it wasn’t going to do him (or her) any good. 

But like always, her plans were thwarted. They were thwarted by a stray bullet and a handful of very incompetent Corporalkis. 

“Out of my way!” She didn’t realize she was yelling until Tamar raised her eyebrow at her. Still, the group surrounding Nikolai’s prone form took a step back. Zoya knew he shouldn’t have been up on that line. She told him time and time and again kings do not fight with the infantry. But no he had to be a saintsdamned hero who has no care for his own life.

Zoya saw the bullet wound in his stomach and reached under him. She breathed a small sigh of relief as she felt the exit wound that had been at least plugged by some moss the soldiers had on hand. 

“Zoya,” Tamar said beside her, “Let me do this. Your powers are too new–”

“Shut up, Tamar.” Zoya growled as she closed her eyes.

This is beyond you, Little Dragon, Juris said from inside her mind. But her reaction to Tamar remained the same for the aged saint.

Either help me or be quiet. She snapped in her mind. Zoya felt the dragon grumble within her, but felt the siphoning of his knowledge.

Zoya opened her eyes, and knew that slits of silver replaced the clear blue. Tamar hissed out a breath, but she ignored the other woman. 

The other Grisha had already stripped away his coat and the ruined undershirt. Leaving his bloody mess of a torso on full display. With the dragon’s eyes and Juris’s power, Zoya could feel the slowed heart of her king. She could sense the tear of muscle and blood vessels and the missed organs. All she had to do was knit it back together. She could just knit it back together and he’d be okay– he had to be okay.

She felt sweat break out on her brow as she knit back the muscle, tried her best to renew the blood cells that were lost, and stitch the skin back together. But she would do this. Nikolai wasn’t going to get away from her. Not that easily.

After what felt like hours, Zoya heaved a huge sigh of exhaustion as she stepped away from the Medik table. The pallor that came over Nikolai was gone, and replaced with a healthy color. She placed a hand on top of his chest and felt the steady beat of his heart. His skin a warm comfort against hers. The place where the bullet had entered him was gone and all was left was the dried blood crusting on his skin.

“It looks like you’ve got everything handled here.” Tamar said, but Zoya heard her distantly. She heard the tent flap shut and before she even realized it she had reached across his body for a wet rag, and started to systematically clean the blood off his stomach. 

“Are you being nice to me, Nazyalensky?” Nikolai’s voice interrupted her ministrations, and her eyes snapped to his. He peered at her from slightly open eyes, and she supposed that the quirk in his mouth would have been a smirk if it didn’t so much resemble a grimace. 

“It’s not very kingly to have blood splattered all over you like a gutted pig.” She avoided his gaze and going back to cleaning the last of the blood. 

“Your bedside manner could use some work, General.” He laughed under his breath. Zoya was just about to say something when he started to move.

“What are you doing?” She snapped again. Forcibly pushing him back down to rest on the small pillow under his head.

“I thought that was fairly obvious.” He said trying again to raise himself by his arms. In which he failed as Zoya glared harder. “Am I going to have to order you to release me?”

“You are in no condition to be moving, Lantsov. I may have done most of the work, but I couldn’t replace all the blood you lost. So you need to rest. Your body needs to adjust, and you also knocked your fat head when you fell from the bullet wound. So you’re going to rest for the night.”

Nikolai’s perfect hazel eyes regarded her curiously. 

“Did I hit my head too hard then? When did you become a Medik?”

“When idiot kings don’t listen to me. I told you not to go out there. And I told you that–”

“I’m sorry, Zoya.” He interrupted her suddenly. He grabbed the hand that was clutching the bloodied rag. His hand fully encompassed hers, and when he tightened his grip it felt like her heart was the one that felt it. “I should have listened to you.”

“Yes, you should have.” She was staring now. She could feel herself staring. Staring at the pulse at his neck. Staring at the swallow of his throat. Staring into his eyes. He was alive. And maybe that’s what gave her enough excuse to be upset with him for getting hurt. 

“Next time,” Nikolai pulled her closer and she let her feet get dragged towards him. He laced their fingers intertwine ever so briefly, “I won’t worry you.”

Zoya opened her mouth to protest that she wasn’t worried, but she felt the damp rag in her hand. He’d see through that protestation in a heartbeat. So instead she just leaned forward and was looking right at him when she said.

“I’m holding you to that, Nikolai.”

#zoyalai #zoya nazyalensky #nikolai lantsov #nikolai x zoya #king of scars #kos #can i petition for more overprotective zoya? #because we have jealous nikolai #and we need a counterpart #so im petitioning for overprotective zoya