[She keeps pushing for the truth, as if anything was ever as simple as truth versus lies. As if an entire world didn't exist between those two extremes but it's a relief when she stops all the same. It's exhausting trying to live up to her naive ideals.
But she was not entirely wrong when she stated that he had moved too fast. The elation from finding her, the mythical Sun Summoner and sightings of the Stag, a creature not seen in living memory, all in the same year, had accelerated his plans and maybe he should have given her a little time. To learn what he already knew, that the Fold was their only chance for freedom. He had rushed her, and lost.
But now she was reaching out again.]
It will be better when I'm there with you.
[But if this is all she's willing to give at the moment, he will take it. The Darkling is willing to do ...a lot of things... for Alina.]
No. How could that be the only thing I think about, when I've already tasted your lips and I know just how you move when you want more. The cant of your hips pushing against my thigh, the tilt of your head when you want me to suck on your neck.
I wonder sometimes, it that was only because it was our first. If you might want me to be rougher. If you would have let me do more, that night, in my war room.
I think about pushing you down across the table, ignoring everything else. What you might have done, if I had slipping my hands up underneath your kefta. Would I find underwear or did you come prepared and left them back in your room. Would I be able to slip my fingers inside of you, unhindered, or would I have to push them aside before fucking you with my hand?
When the thought comes, I wish for you to be naked and ready for me underneath the uniform. That my hands find nothing but your skin and your damp folds. I think about how long might you allow me to fuck you like this, just my fingers in you and my mouth on yours? How long can I keep you on the brink, wet and squirming, before you'll beg me for release. Or order me to. I think about how patient you can be, Alina.
[ no — he makes it sound inevitable. when, not if, despite all of her reluctant resistance. a current of fear runs parallel to the low burn of her arousal. dizzying, uncertain of herself, until it's finally — foolishly — forgotten in the fantasies he summons to her mind. ]
you would be disappointed. i think we both know how patient i can be.
[ the answer is: not very. not as she suspects he is, biding his time in the shadows, ancient and endless. she's too young, too human, to wield immortality with even half the same control. still, that nudge of wryness from her feels even more unsettling than her desire; instead of examining it, she charges on. ]
would you still give it to me? my release around your fingers. or would you make me wait for it, patient or not? sometimes wanting things doesn't mean we get to have them.
A decade or two, and it gets better. After a century, it stops hurting quite as much.
[It never really stops. But it gets better, the grief and loss of humanity becomes bearable.]
Demanding. No, I wouldn't. Because I don't want you to come on my fingers. I want you to come, gasping for breath and crying my name, on my cock. I want to be so deep inside of you when it happens, that you can't remember a time when I wasn't a part of you.
I want to keep you hanging, right on the edge of coming, all night. Not just on the war table, but in my bed and when I feel like it, I want you close to coming when we walk to the stables. I want you to squeeze your thighs together and think of me, because all you need is just that little bit of stimulation.
But it won't ever be enough, Alina, because it wouldn't be me.
[ to be molded by the fingers of time until she's — unrecognizable, a stranger to herself. even if it grants her a reprieve from existing in-between: too eternal to belong with otkazat'sya, and yet too human to resist the waterfall of emotion that comes with possessing a heart not yet hardened. ]
i'm demanding? like you have any room to talk when your fantasies include things like that. if i was demanding, i'd say, "why can't i come on your fingers and your cock? give me everything."
besides, you invited me to use you. you should be expecting demands. if you didn't like it, you wouldn't still be answering me.
[ ... possibly. maybe. she's not so certain of that fact, but spouting it with confidence cloaks her bumbling inexperience. ]
if i'm demanding, you're arrogant. my fingers are doing the job just fine right now. jealous?
if i close my eyes, i can almost imagine it. letting you spread me open for your cock until i'm dripping for it. clenching around your fingers when you tell me that i can take it. that i can be good and wait, that this is what patience is. it's a good fantasy. it could have been real, if things were different.
[That's the curse about eternity, that no matter how much you rage at the unfairness of it all, you still have to suffer through it. And until now, he's had to suffer it alone. But not anymore. Now, there's Alina.
Asking for this. For his submission.]
You're right, I did agree to it.
I never claimed not to be arrogant. I have good reason to be, but yes. If you want the truth. Yes, I'm jealous. Of your fingers, of your hands on your body and I'm jealous of everyone who might hear you. The sounds I imagine you're making right now, I want to be the one to hear them. I want to be your reason for making them.
But a part of being used by you, means that I know what you want. That I know when to stop and make you beg me for it, when to give in and when to keep going until you're trembling.
And you would beg me so sweetly, Alina, with your mouth all pretty and pink. I like to imagine that your cunt looks just as pretty, just as perfect, opening to me when you lie on your back with your fingers in you. When you hold yourself open for me, legs shaking and eyes wide.
And should I give in? Fall on you like I'm starving for you. Until all I can think about is you, how you taste, how you feel. Until your skin remembers me by the marks I'll leave behind in my urgency. Should I take my pleasure and be uncaring about yours? Leave you longing as I slack my thirst on your willing body, and only allow you the release your own fingers can bring?
Can you almost feel me NOW, Alina? My hands locked around your wrists as I fuck you on your back? Or how about my teeth against your shoulder as I fuck you from behind, your knees slipping against the sheets, my finger on you clit as I drive in to you? Does that make you drip?
You want me to leave you unprotected. That's dangerous, Alina. All I can offer is that it's not a Heartrender, will that be enough?
Does it not reassure you, that none of them will tell? They will keep their mouths shut, because I want them to. Because the ramifications of their gossiping ways would be terrifying. You're safe. Always.
That's good. That you're not- regretting it. I don't. Not one minute of it, not even when they saw. How could I be ashamed of that? You're beautiful, and you look even more so with your hair sticky with sweat and clinging to my fingers.
It would have been impossible without Vasily and his generous invitation across the Fjerdan border, pulling the security back until it was possible to cross the border with his army and march on Os Alta like he had planned for months.
Months of preparations and stocking up on supplies, training his Grisha and drawing up plan after plan on how he was going to force the Grand Palace to its knees and the crown prince had done it all for him.
A grueling march across his beloved Ravka, through the muck and the mire, visiting Alina through the tether that linked them closer than anyone else had ever dreamed. Was it the amplifier pounding through her bones, or the shadows he had gifted her with? The initial anger that burned bright and hot under his skin had dispatched since that first visit on the Whaler, and dimmed to something simmering.
Waiting.
A bated breath caught in his throat as he had watched her sleep, keeping a careful watch on whom she talked to. Who she let in to his rooms.
First contact, and the palace was in ruins. His nichyevo‘ya, his creations torn from his very soul, stealing their breaths from his lungs as they took flight and tore through any resistance they encountered. The blood had run hard and hot through the pristine hallways.
All he needed now that both Palaces had fallen was Alina.
The bite from the Darkling's nichevo'ya was aching. He had arrived at Os Alta, all thanks to Prince Vasily Lantsov, who very well may have doomed them all. At least he would never make another foolish decision again...the prince was dead, along with so many others.
Alina was trying hard to control her terror. She had to focus on running, helping those around her find some kind of shelter. The nichevo'ya frightened her far more than the soldiers still loyal to the Darkling.
The visions she kept having of him...late at night, hearing his voice, and occasionally responding...had those been real? Was this attack partly her fault? Or was she simply going mad?
That didn't matter at the moment. Clutching Mal's hand, they followed Tolya and Tamar to the chapel. They claimed that there was a passage there -- a way to escape.
You won't ever escape, a voice in her head said. Her shoulder throbbed, and the amplifiers felt heavy.
Before the first person could make it into the passage, nichevo'ya burst into the chapel, along with him. Without thinking, she placed herself between the Darkling and the innocent people behind her.
Along with the antlers, she now had a fetter from the Sea Whip around her wrist. Long black hair was tangled, and there was blood on her from trying to help others. Alina had not seen him since the ship...or her last hallucination, depending on what was real or not real.
Mal protested, but she did not look away from her enemy, and put her arm out to keep him back.
"Call your shadows off! You've killed enough already!"
The nichevo'ya hissed with their inhuman voices as they swarmed the chapel, crawling over the walls to cling to the ceiling as he walked closer to where she was taking her stand.
Behind her, close to the altar, her little friends - his wayward Grisha and a few with a blazing sun tattooed to their faces stood grimfaced and scowling. Her tracker looks ready to try and kill him with his bare hands. As if he had wanted this.
The Darkling sighs, holding his hands out as his creations stop. There's the sound of their wings fluttering in the dark, the screams from outside as his army and the rest of them took care of any soldier who did not kneel before the new Tsar of Ravka.
Alina did know what he wanted. She was trembling from a mixture of adrenaline, fear, and pain. Now, the thought of 'what he wanted' was enough to make her feel ill, as well.
They were surrounded and outnumbered. Nichevo'ya crawled along the walls and ceiling, wings fluttering, waiting for the order to attack. The Darkling slowly advanced closer towards her, looking like a demon from a nightmare.
"Don't come any closer!" she cried out, desperate. Even Alina knew she sounded ridiculous. Why are you stalling? They stood no chance against him, and any attempt at stalling was only delaying the terrible inevitable.
A few extra minutes wouldn't help her come up with a brilliant plan to either save them all or stop him. No miracles were about to happen. The saints seemed to have forsaken them all.
Even as all those thoughts raced through her mind, Alina could feel her gift yearning to reach for his own. It sickened her, but it was beyond her control.
Like calls to like.
"...What will you do if I go with you?" Her friends and followers behind her gasped and protested, but she had to ignore them. "Will you stop this attack?"
"That is all I ever wanted, Alina," and her name is sweet as summer sunlight on his lips, as the Darkling takes another step closer to where she's looking back at him. Defiance and fear coloring her cheeks, and she has never looked more beautiful.
She has never looked more his.
He stops in front of her, looking down his nose at her pale face. The only real thing in this entire place, the only thing worth his attention.
Alina.
Her nearness leaves him almost breathless with elation, and he waves a hand out towards his creations. "Come with me, and I will let your friends go."
The Tracker is screaming, pleading with Alina, promising nonsense, as if the boy ever had any power here. "Please, Alina," Mal's voice is tinged with anger and anguish, "just come with us! He can't kill all of us."
"I assure you, I can and I will, if you do not come to me."
Not that Alina knows she was ever supposed to. Unaware of what wheels have been set in motion. That Mal lays in a cell unconscious or that Marie barely had her own face restored before she bled out or that her would-be assassin's lungs filled with suffocating shadows. It was not merciful.
No, Alina does not know these things. All she knows is the feeling of being high and giddy on power, attention, and affection. The warmth of a kiss, open-mouthed and wet. The dizzying, wonderful enchantment of not just no longer being invisible, but the intoxicating and addictive sense of being desired.
The door clicks, and Alina stirs from the warm cocoon of blankets she enveloped herself in while she waited for his return, a promise kept (The first of many, she hopes). The luxuriant sheets slide to her waist as she sits up from the center of his bed, fingers itching to grab them and cover herself fighting against the nervous excitement of letting him look, her cheeks warm and flush as the reality of this washes over her. ]
I hope you don't mind that I— [ Got undressed and laid down in your bed. ] —made myself comfortable.
[ The ornate slip, corset embroidered with gold, and layers of lace underclothes had seemed a bit excessive when Genya brought them to her, but suddenly she is very glad to still be wearing layers of black to peel off. ]
[He hurries back, because the assassin might have been caught. Trapped in the moist dungeon under the Little Palace, the Grisha all over stepping up to increase patrols and stand guard at all entrances, but he's still- feeling something.
Fear, distant and unfamiliar, burns in his blood. The real target was safe, in his room and nowhere close to where her double was being prepared for burial. A stroke of dumb luck that he doesn't believe in, that maybe this had been the will of fate reaching out to keep his Sun Summoner safe from harm.
Entering his rooms, he knocks on the war table, smile slowly slipping back on to his face. The horrors of the outside world cast aside for the moment, and the Darkling stops - mouth slightly open, in the doorway to his bedroom.]
Alina-
[He blinks, eyes sliding down from her beautiful face to the peek of her slip that sticks out from underneath his black sheets and back up, slowly- so slowly- to catch her eyes.] No, not at all.
[ No one has ever looked at her like that. It's funny how many times she's had that exact thought tonight with Aleksander. Watching him stand their with his mouth just slightly agape, there's a warm sense of pride in realizing that he may have never looked at anyone else like this either. ]
You're going to catch a fly if you keep standing there with your mouth open.
[ Her eyes brighten with her teasing, her tongue rolling behind her teeth and wetting her lips — flirting without even realizing it. She is glad to see him. Glad that he is back to share some privacy with her.
Whatever was wrong, he must have dealt with it. And while curiosity itches at the back of her mind, she figures anything more serious would have kept him longer and wouldn't leave time for... well, time for him to stand there and look at her like she hung the sun.
Although... while she can watch his eyes and his expression, he isn't moving towards her and she wonders... ] Do you want me to get up..?
[He could tell her an approximation of the truth, the death of her double and the infiltration of the Little Palace. The night ending with her possible guilt and sadness. He could tell her all, the plans already in motion, like pieces on a chess board, ready to slot in to their right places.
Plans within plans, wheels within wheels, turning. The future he planned out so long ago finally in his reach and he grabs for it with greedy fingers. The stag sighted by a grubby soldier in First Army garb, evidence against Zlatan and the uprising in Novokribirsk that even the tsar cannot ignore.
And her.
Eyes flashing heat, he takes a small step closer.]
No! [A sudden exclamation that explodes out of his mouth, hand up to-] no. [Softer, moving closer and it was never fully his decision. The Making and the pull that draws him closer had seen to it. The resentment that lingers in the pit of his stomach at his own weakness as he takes a seat on the edge of his bed.]
No, I don't want you to get up. I want you- just like this.
[Carefully sliding his hand up to cover hers against the black sheets, his dark eyes catching on hers as warmth blooms across the palm of his hand.]
[ Alina can't help but grin. Perhaps she shouldn't be so endeared by a streak of possessiveness, but being so openly wanted is delightfully novel. She wants to luxuriate in it like a perfumed bath, like an indulgent meal. ]
Well, [ She leans in, her breath warm in the small spaces between them, her head bobbing flirtatiously side to side with each word. ] Lucky for you I don't want to get up.
[ She snorts a laugh, walking her fingers up his arm, teasing him fondly. ]
Are you going to at least tell me what took you away from me tonight?
[ Away from her, like he is something that she might own. The thought that he is makes her giddy. ]
[Eyes traveling from the top of her dark hair, down the pale skin of her throat and down to admire how well she wears the crimson of dried blood. The feathers are a little much, clinging to the dark strands of her hair and to the patches of maroon on her arms and stomach.
Eyebrow raised, his dark gaze snaps back to hers.]
You look lovely.
[Dressed in a black dressing gown, cinched at the waist, and she might be able to see the scratches on his chest and on his wrists. From beaks and talons, and the occasional miss-swing of the knife.]
[She counters with sarcastic amusement, though she supposes the truth isn't all that far off. There's many aspects of him that she accepts, the darkness and the parts that are jagged. There isn't any part of him, however, that she turns a blind eye to.
There is a part of her that wonders when his killing animals and letting her get covered in the blood is something that she accepts. It's not normal. But it's normal for him. And apparently, now it's normal for her.
Her eyes look him over, eyebrow arching as she takes in the sight of him covered in scratches. Her finger trails along a particularly red and deep scratch along his chest, before she starts to undo his dressing gown. They're alone, she isn't all that cross with him any longer. There's absolutely no need for him to be overdressed.]
[Letting her undo the dressing gown, the black fabric parting like the clouds for the sun on a summer's day, leaving him bared before her with only the dark panels of the gown hanging from his shoulder.
Almost equal, as he watches her. Noting the part of him that her eyes dart back to, and which parts she shies away from.
There's a sting from her finger on the small line, raised against her fingertip and angry-red.]
You're unharmed. A few ruffled feathers, a little- blood. It might be mine, you know. At least some of it.
[Unashamed in his near-nakedness, his own fingers brush against one of the dark stains against her skin. The blood flaking underneath his touch.]
[She questions him, voice low. She's rising up on her tiptoes as she does, leaning in to steal a kiss. It's far too chaste for two people who are standing pressed close together, discussing blood. But Clara does love teasing and getting a rise out of him, and he's so good at reacting.
Her hands work at that robe of his, fingers running along the soft material on his shoulders before she guides it off of his body. It hangs low on his arms, waiting for him to shrug out of the sleeves.
Shame is something that neither of them ever seem to have. Which is why she openly lets her eyes scan his body, hungrily drinking the sight of him in. Because he's right. She's unharmed, a little blood won't hurt her. And he's promised her a shower, something she starts to drag him toward as her lips occupy his with a series of languid kisses.]
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TFLN overflow, for @humansunbeam
For SunSummoner -TFLN overflow
But she was not entirely wrong when she stated that he had moved too fast. The elation from finding her, the mythical Sun Summoner and sightings of the Stag, a creature not seen in living memory, all in the same year, had accelerated his plans and maybe he should have given her a little time. To learn what he already knew, that the Fold was their only chance for freedom. He had rushed her, and lost.
But now she was reaching out again.]
It will be better when I'm there with you.
[But if this is all she's willing to give at the moment, he will take it. The Darkling is willing to do ...a lot of things... for Alina.]
No. How could that be the only thing I think about, when I've already tasted your lips and I know just how you move when you want more. The cant of your hips pushing against my thigh, the tilt of your head when you want me to suck on your neck.
I wonder sometimes, it that was only because it was our first. If you might want me to be rougher. If you would have let me do more, that night, in my war room.
I think about pushing you down across the table, ignoring everything else. What you might have done, if I had slipping my hands up underneath your kefta. Would I find underwear or did you come prepared and left them back in your room. Would I be able to slip my fingers inside of you, unhindered, or would I have to push them aside before fucking you with my hand?
When the thought comes, I wish for you to be naked and ready for me underneath the uniform. That my hands find nothing but your skin and your damp folds. I think about how long might you allow me to fuck you like this, just my fingers in you and my mouth on yours? How long can I keep you on the brink, wet and squirming, before you'll beg me for release. Or order me to. I think about how patient you can be, Alina.
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[ no — he makes it sound inevitable. when, not if, despite all of her reluctant resistance. a current of fear runs parallel to the low burn of her arousal. dizzying, uncertain of herself, until it's finally — foolishly — forgotten in the fantasies he summons to her mind. ]
you would be disappointed. i think we both know how patient i can be.
[ the answer is: not very. not as she suspects he is, biding his time in the shadows, ancient and endless. she's too young, too human, to wield immortality with even half the same control. still, that nudge of wryness from her feels even more unsettling than her desire; instead of examining it, she charges on. ]
would you still give it to me? my release around your fingers.
or would you make me wait for it, patient or not?
sometimes wanting things doesn't mean we get to have them.
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[It never really stops. But it gets better, the grief and loss of humanity becomes bearable.]
Demanding.
No, I wouldn't. Because I don't want you to come on my fingers. I want you to come, gasping for breath and crying my name, on my cock. I want to be so deep inside of you when it happens, that you can't remember a time when I wasn't a part of you.
I want to keep you hanging, right on the edge of coming, all night. Not just on the war table, but in my bed and when I feel like it, I want you close to coming when we walk to the stables. I want you to squeeze your thighs together and think of me, because all you need is just that little bit of stimulation.
But it won't ever be enough, Alina, because it wouldn't be me.
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[ to be molded by the fingers of time until she's — unrecognizable, a stranger to herself. even if it grants her a reprieve from existing in-between: too eternal to belong with otkazat'sya, and yet too human to resist the waterfall of emotion that comes with possessing a heart not yet hardened. ]
i'm demanding? like you have any room to talk when your fantasies include things like that.
if i was demanding, i'd say, "why can't i come on your fingers and your cock? give me everything."
besides, you invited me to use you. you should be expecting demands.
if you didn't like it, you wouldn't still be answering me.
[ ... possibly. maybe. she's not so certain of that fact, but spouting it with confidence cloaks her bumbling inexperience. ]
if i'm demanding, you're arrogant.
my fingers are doing the job just fine right now. jealous?
if i close my eyes, i can almost imagine it.
letting you spread me open for your cock until i'm dripping for it.
clenching around your fingers when you tell me that i can take it.
that i can be good and wait, that this is what patience is.
it's a good fantasy. it could have been real, if things were different.
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[That's the curse about eternity, that no matter how much you rage at the unfairness of it all, you still have to suffer through it. And until now, he's had to suffer it alone. But not anymore. Now, there's Alina.
Asking for this. For his submission.]
You're right, I did agree to it.
I never claimed not to be arrogant. I have good reason to be, but yes. If you want the truth. Yes, I'm jealous. Of your fingers, of your hands on your body and I'm jealous of everyone who might hear you. The sounds I imagine you're making right now, I want to be the one to hear them. I want to be your reason for making them.
But a part of being used by you, means that I know what you want. That I know when to stop and make you beg me for it, when to give in and when to keep going until you're trembling.
And you would beg me so sweetly, Alina, with your mouth all pretty and pink. I like to imagine that your cunt looks just as pretty, just as perfect, opening to me when you lie on your back with your fingers in you. When you hold yourself open for me, legs shaking and eyes wide.
And should I give in? Fall on you like I'm starving for you. Until all I can think about is you, how you taste, how you feel. Until your skin remembers me by the marks I'll leave behind in my urgency. Should I take my pleasure and be uncaring about yours? Leave you longing as I slack my thirst on your willing body, and only allow you the release your own fingers can bring?
Can you almost feel me NOW, Alina? My hands locked around your wrists as I fuck you on your back? Or how about my teeth against your shoulder as I fuck you from behind, your knees slipping against the sheets, my finger on you clit as I drive in to you? Does that make you drip?
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For sungrisha
Does it not reassure you, that none of them will tell? They will keep their mouths shut, because I want them to. Because the ramifications of their gossiping ways would be terrifying. You're safe. Always.
That's good. That you're not- regretting it. I don't. Not one minute of it, not even when they saw. How could I be ashamed of that? You're beautiful, and you look even more so with your hair sticky with sweat and clinging to my fingers.
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I don't believe that they all will keep their mouths shut. Someone will tell and it will get out.
Saints... Aleksander you are... I'm embarrassed and aroused at the same time.
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They won't. Because no one wants to be the reason I'm having a bad day. It has it's uses.
And you don't like it, Alina?
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I… really like it. And I didn’t just admit that.
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Why not? There's no reason for you to keep something like this a secret. Not from me.
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For Starkovs - Darkling takes the Grand Palace / forced marriage AU
Months of preparations and stocking up on supplies, training his Grisha and drawing up plan after plan on how he was going to force the Grand Palace to its knees and the crown prince had done it all for him.
A grueling march across his beloved Ravka, through the muck and the mire, visiting Alina through the tether that linked them closer than anyone else had ever dreamed. Was it the amplifier pounding through her bones, or the shadows he had gifted her with? The initial anger that burned bright and hot under his skin had dispatched since that first visit on the Whaler, and dimmed to something simmering.
Waiting.
A bated breath caught in his throat as he had watched her sleep, keeping a careful watch on whom she talked to. Who she let in to his rooms.
First contact, and the palace was in ruins. His nichyevo‘ya, his creations torn from his very soul, stealing their breaths from his lungs as they took flight and tore through any resistance they encountered. The blood had run hard and hot through the pristine hallways.
All he needed now that both Palaces had fallen was Alina.
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Alina was trying hard to control her terror. She had to focus on running, helping those around her find some kind of shelter. The nichevo'ya frightened her far more than the soldiers still loyal to the Darkling.
The visions she kept having of him...late at night, hearing his voice, and occasionally responding...had those been real? Was this attack partly her fault? Or was she simply going mad?
That didn't matter at the moment. Clutching Mal's hand, they followed Tolya and Tamar to the chapel. They claimed that there was a passage there -- a way to escape.
You won't ever escape, a voice in her head said. Her shoulder throbbed, and the amplifiers felt heavy.
Before the first person could make it into the passage, nichevo'ya burst into the chapel, along with him. Without thinking, she placed herself between the Darkling and the innocent people behind her.
Along with the antlers, she now had a fetter from the Sea Whip around her wrist. Long black hair was tangled, and there was blood on her from trying to help others. Alina had not seen him since the ship...or her last hallucination, depending on what was real or not real.
Mal protested, but she did not look away from her enemy, and put her arm out to keep him back.
"Call your shadows off! You've killed enough already!"
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The nichevo'ya hissed with their inhuman voices as they swarmed the chapel, crawling over the walls to cling to the ceiling as he walked closer to where she was taking her stand.
Behind her, close to the altar, her little friends - his wayward Grisha and a few with a blazing sun tattooed to their faces stood grimfaced and scowling. Her tracker looks ready to try and kill him with his bare hands. As if he had wanted this.
The Darkling sighs, holding his hands out as his creations stop. There's the sound of their wings fluttering in the dark, the screams from outside as his army and the rest of them took care of any soldier who did not kneel before the new Tsar of Ravka.
"You know what I want."
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They were surrounded and outnumbered. Nichevo'ya crawled along the walls and ceiling, wings fluttering, waiting for the order to attack. The Darkling slowly advanced closer towards her, looking like a demon from a nightmare.
"Don't come any closer!" she cried out, desperate. Even Alina knew she sounded ridiculous. Why are you stalling? They stood no chance against him, and any attempt at stalling was only delaying the terrible inevitable.
A few extra minutes wouldn't help her come up with a brilliant plan to either save them all or stop him. No miracles were about to happen. The saints seemed to have forsaken them all.
Even as all those thoughts raced through her mind, Alina could feel her gift yearning to reach for his own. It sickened her, but it was beyond her control.
Like calls to like.
"...What will you do if I go with you?" Her friends and followers behind her gasped and protested, but she had to ignore them. "Will you stop this attack?"
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She has never looked more his.
He stops in front of her, looking down his nose at her pale face. The only real thing in this entire place, the only thing worth his attention.
Alina.
Her nearness leaves him almost breathless with elation, and he waves a hand out towards his creations. "Come with me, and I will let your friends go."
The Tracker is screaming, pleading with Alina, promising nonsense, as if the boy ever had any power here. "Please, Alina," Mal's voice is tinged with anger and anguish, "just come with us! He can't kill all of us."
"I assure you, I can and I will, if you do not come to me."
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drops a self indulgent starter
Not that Alina knows she was ever supposed to. Unaware of what wheels have been set in motion. That Mal lays in a cell unconscious or that Marie barely had her own face restored before she bled out or that her would-be assassin's lungs filled with suffocating shadows. It was not merciful.
No, Alina does not know these things. All she knows is the feeling of being high and giddy on power, attention, and affection. The warmth of a kiss, open-mouthed and wet. The dizzying, wonderful enchantment of not just no longer being invisible, but the intoxicating and addictive sense of being desired.
The door clicks, and Alina stirs from the warm cocoon of blankets she enveloped herself in while she waited for his return, a promise kept (The first of many, she hopes). The luxuriant sheets slide to her waist as she sits up from the center of his bed, fingers itching to grab them and cover herself fighting against the nervous excitement of letting him look, her cheeks warm and flush as the reality of this washes over her. ]
I hope you don't mind that I— [ Got undressed and laid down in your bed. ] —made myself comfortable.
[ The ornate slip, corset embroidered with gold, and layers of lace underclothes had seemed a bit excessive when Genya brought them to her, but suddenly she is very glad to still be wearing layers of black to peel off. ]
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Fear, distant and unfamiliar, burns in his blood. The real target was safe, in his room and nowhere close to where her double was being prepared for burial. A stroke of dumb luck that he doesn't believe in, that maybe this had been the will of fate reaching out to keep his Sun Summoner safe from harm.
Entering his rooms, he knocks on the war table, smile slowly slipping back on to his face. The horrors of the outside world cast aside for the moment, and the Darkling stops - mouth slightly open, in the doorway to his bedroom.]
Alina-
[He blinks, eyes sliding down from her beautiful face to the peek of her slip that sticks out from underneath his black sheets and back up, slowly- so slowly- to catch her eyes.] No, not at all.
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You're going to catch a fly if you keep standing there with your mouth open.
[ Her eyes brighten with her teasing, her tongue rolling behind her teeth and wetting her lips — flirting without even realizing it. She is glad to see him. Glad that he is back to share some privacy with her.
Whatever was wrong, he must have dealt with it. And while curiosity itches at the back of her mind, she figures anything more serious would have kept him longer and wouldn't leave time for... well, time for him to stand there and look at her like she hung the sun.
Although... while she can watch his eyes and his expression, he isn't moving towards her and she wonders... ] Do you want me to get up..?
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Plans within plans, wheels within wheels, turning. The future he planned out so long ago finally in his reach and he grabs for it with greedy fingers. The stag sighted by a grubby soldier in First Army garb, evidence against Zlatan and the uprising in Novokribirsk that even the tsar cannot ignore.
And her.
Eyes flashing heat, he takes a small step closer.]
No! [A sudden exclamation that explodes out of his mouth, hand up to-] no. [Softer, moving closer and it was never fully his decision. The Making and the pull that draws him closer had seen to it. The resentment that lingers in the pit of his stomach at his own weakness as he takes a seat on the edge of his bed.]
No, I don't want you to get up. I want you- just like this.
[Carefully sliding his hand up to cover hers against the black sheets, his dark eyes catching on hers as warmth blooms across the palm of his hand.]
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Well, [ She leans in, her breath warm in the small spaces between them, her head bobbing flirtatiously side to side with each word. ] Lucky for you I don't want to get up.
[ She snorts a laugh, walking her fingers up his arm, teasing him fondly. ]
Are you going to at least tell me what took you away from me tonight?
[ Away from her, like he is something that she might own. The thought that he is makes her giddy. ]
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tfln, overflow - bossily
[Eyes traveling from the top of her dark hair, down the pale skin of her throat and down to admire how well she wears the crimson of dried blood. The feathers are a little much, clinging to the dark strands of her hair and to the patches of maroon on her arms and stomach.
Eyebrow raised, his dark gaze snaps back to hers.]
You look lovely.
[Dressed in a black dressing gown, cinched at the waist, and she might be able to see the scratches on his chest and on his wrists. From beaks and talons, and the occasional miss-swing of the knife.]
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[She counters with sarcastic amusement, though she supposes the truth isn't all that far off. There's many aspects of him that she accepts, the darkness and the parts that are jagged. There isn't any part of him, however, that she turns a blind eye to.
There is a part of her that wonders when his killing animals and letting her get covered in the blood is something that she accepts. It's not normal. But it's normal for him. And apparently, now it's normal for her.
Her eyes look him over, eyebrow arching as she takes in the sight of him covered in scratches. Her finger trails along a particularly red and deep scratch along his chest, before she starts to undo his dressing gown. They're alone, she isn't all that cross with him any longer. There's absolutely no need for him to be overdressed.]
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[Letting her undo the dressing gown, the black fabric parting like the clouds for the sun on a summer's day, leaving him bared before her with only the dark panels of the gown hanging from his shoulder.
Almost equal, as he watches her. Noting the part of him that her eyes dart back to, and which parts she shies away from.
There's a sting from her finger on the small line, raised against her fingertip and angry-red.]
You're unharmed. A few ruffled feathers, a little- blood. It might be mine, you know. At least some of it.
[Unashamed in his near-nakedness, his own fingers brush against one of the dark stains against her skin. The blood flaking underneath his touch.]
Sadistic children leave far worse marks behind.
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[She questions him, voice low. She's rising up on her tiptoes as she does, leaning in to steal a kiss. It's far too chaste for two people who are standing pressed close together, discussing blood. But Clara does love teasing and getting a rise out of him, and he's so good at reacting.
Her hands work at that robe of his, fingers running along the soft material on his shoulders before she guides it off of his body. It hangs low on his arms, waiting for him to shrug out of the sleeves.
Shame is something that neither of them ever seem to have. Which is why she openly lets her eyes scan his body, hungrily drinking the sight of him in. Because he's right. She's unharmed, a little blood won't hurt her. And he's promised her a shower, something she starts to drag him toward as her lips occupy his with a series of languid kisses.]
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