( the impish spark in her eyes dims and extinguishes, suddenly, a candlelight blown out. there's something ominous and prophetic in his words — to take their rightful place — that pings at her animal hindbrain, horsekicks her heart into an alarmed gallop — but it's a warning sign easily swept away, buried underneath the pained wave of his honesty. whatever lines had creased her face with mischief, they soften, now, rounded out by alina's unspoken understanding. )

Maybe.

( she relents, a concession, lips twisted together into a pensive pout. maybe he won't be alone. maybe it is better to be protected by power than stamped into the dirt like an ant hill. distantly, she thinks of grisha languishing in cages, conscripted to death or chains or service — of how lantsov kings and the darkling have used them all as fodder for their own means, turned them into the monsters in fairytales. thinks, too, that there might come a day where her feats in the fold could ever seen grisha exalted, accepted, free — forgiven for the crime of existing, for what aleksander has made them appear to be. )

But sometimes you can be surrounded by others like you, and still feel — ( she pauses, hunts for the word. ) Different from the rest.

( singular. unique. held at a distance, like watching the world from a throne above it all. her toes twitch where they slide back in the water, tentatively. it seems the right move to make, all things considered. with a shake of her head, she tucks a stray damp tendril of hair behind her ear, momentarily skirting her gaze away. )

Sorry. ( her lips twist, the faint glimmer of a rueful look. how does one civilly say sorry, i feel like a donkey's ass now. ) I didn't mean to touch on bad memories.