A Dance of Shadows and Light

Twenty-nine:

Twenty-nine:

Alina woke to find herself in a bedroom that she did not recognize. The sheets were black, and overhead there was Aleksander's symbol.

"Alina!" she heard Aleksander's voice as her vision came into focus. He was sitting next to her, across from the bed, his head in his hands.

"Aleks," she murmured, "what happened?"

"The First Army shot you," he replied, "they were sent by the King to oversee the negotiations for Vasily's body. There was an attack and---"

"Nikolai?" she asked.

Aleksander shook his head. "He didn't make it. I tried to save him, we carried him all of the way here with our people working on him, but nothing worked. He needed a human doctor and there wasn't anyone."

Alina's face fell. "They'll think we did it, Aleks. They'll blame Nikolai's death and Vasily's on both of us. They'll use it to warp and twist our image. We'll become monsters, and we'll be hunted."

"We were always hunted, Alina," said Aleksander, "even with the first army...it was just a way to hunt us without being killed right way. They make us fight their wars and we march to our death slowly but it's still a march to our death."

"I knew them. We were children together....both Vasily and Aleksander. We weren't close, but they're wrapped up in my childhood. I had summers and holidays at the palace."

There was a long pause. "Did you love either of them?"

Alina shook her head. "I tried not to love anyone. I knew who I was meant for. Always. Even if there was no official arrangement until I was of age, I knew that my future was tied to yours. Our powers wouldn't allow us to be anything but together."

Aleksander reached out and stroked her forehead, brushing back a stray strand of her hair. "I am sorry. Truly."

Alina's fingers went to her stomach. "I was shot?"

"Yes."

"Where?"

"Shoulder," said Aleksander.

"Do you think---if I was pregnant-----would it affect the baby?"

"Ivan couldn't feel a heartbeat when he healed you," he said.

Alina's face fell. "Oh."

"But that doesn't mean anything," he said, "it might be too early yet. We've still got time."

"Is it foolish to still want a child when we're in the middle of a war?" Alina asked.

"Perhaps," he said, "but life is meant for fools. We wouldn't get anywhere without them."

She smiled softly at him. "Aleks, when the carriage stopped, I was so scared that I had lost you...."

"You won't ever lose me, Alina," he said, "even if they capture me. Grisha can be killed, but we are not easy to kill, especially by human methods." There was a dark look in his eyes that she didn't quite understand as if he were haunted by something.

"Perhaps if we went to the King now, he would offer us a different bargain," Alina suggested, "now that Vasily and Nikolai are dead."

"He's intent on having royal grisha from the most powerful woman grisha there is. I don't think his sons being dead will stop him. I think it will merely mean that he would want you to give him an heir, in exchange for the ones that he thinks that we took."

Alina shivered. "I won't do it."

"I know, my Sunlight. And I won't let him do that to you. For a long time, I thought The Little Palace was the best way to keep grisha protected. If we protected Ravka from the monsters that kept it locked in, perhaps we could keep ourselves safe. But I now realize that, even with the prestige that comes with being in The Second Army, we are still prisoners as much as anyone else in Ravka. We can't allow this to continue."

"Then, you want to keep fighting?" she asked.

He nodded. "I want to keep fighting."

Alina smiled. "I know it won't be easy, and I know it was foolish and rash to attack the King as I did, but I want a Ravka where grisha are treated as equals, not as lambs to the slaughter."

He reached out and took her hand in his. "It wasn't foolish, Alina. It was brave. It was something that I should have done long ago. But I.... I grew comfortable. I couldn't see another way to keep our people safe."

Alina shook her head. "You didn't grow comfortable, Aleks. You were doing what you thought was best. You didn't know there was another way until I came along. But that's why we're supposed to be together. The King has had his time to change Ravka. He has failed. Now, it's time for us to make it."

"A new dawn is going to rise," Aleksander said with a smirk, "with you at the center of it."

"With us at the center of it," said Alina, "after all, the sun and the moon work in tandem, do they not?"

"So it would seem," he said.

There was a long pause. "Aleks.... we're not at my father's estate, our we?" Alina said.

Aleksander heaved a sigh. "No. We're not."

"Where are we, then?" she asked.

"The Temple of The Starless Saint," he said, "one of them, anyway."

Alina frowned. "The Starless Saint? Which Saint is that?"

"Me," he replied.