My Name Is Adela Kirigan (A Shadow and Bone Season 1 Fanfiction)

Chapter 36: The Heart of the Shadow Fold

The skiff travelled across a sand sea, surrounded by inky blackness, punctuated every few bursts by lightning that lit up the Fold in flashes of blue and the growls of hungry volcra. 

'Can you feel them?' General Kirigan asked, standing close to Alina. 

'No heartbeats yet, sir,' Ivan replied, holding out his hands, feeling for heartbeats with his Grisha power. 

'How many markers have we passed?' a woman said, leaning over to a young man. 

'Five, ma'am,' he replied. The growls got louder. 

'They're coming,' Alina said, the panic rising in her voice. 

'Yes,' Kirigan replied, stoic and calm, looking over to Adela, who was being held in the grip of another guard. 

'I should just tear this down now,' Alina said, impatient. 

'And what can you really do on your own? Besides,' he said, bringing the hand with the piece of bone up to his chest, 'it would be a monumental waste of power.' 

The three Crows vanished beneath the grate that led to the lower deck of the skiff. Jesper leaned against a set of barrels, cleaning his guns, while the other two prepared for the eventual fight to come. 

'This is a bad idea,' Jesper said, letting out a sniff. 

'I think it's rather practical,' Kaz replied. Jesper scoffed.

'What? Why?' 

'I don't see how we step off this boat without you pulling those guns.' Jesper chuckled. 'So, cleaning them is a good idea.' 

'I don't mean this,' he said, gesturing to his gun as he spun it in his fingers. 'I mean this.' He gestured to what was going on above, hungry, mean volcra moving around the skiff, waiting for some kind of slipup to attack and make a meal of the crew onboard, including the dignitaries. 'We are in the worst place in the world, on a ship full of people who want us dead, surrounded by monsters who want us in their gullets. I should have brought Milo.' Inej frowned. 

'Who is Milo?' 

'The goat,' he replied matter-of-factly. 

'How many bullets do you have?' Kaz asked Jesper as he finished cleaning his guns. 

'Not enough,' Jesper said, looking with worry at the ceiling of the lower deck. 

Zoya Nazyalensky was up on the crow's nest, directing the skiff, as one of the Heartrenders stood nearby. 

'I hate this place,' she commented, leaning slightly over the railing to see General Kirigan and Alina Starkov standing still, tall, like silent sentinels against the darkness of the Fold. 'Why isn't he giving Alina the go-ahead? She has one job. This.' 

'Soon,' the Heartrender replied. She looked over, frowning at the confusing reply. 

'Did the general tell you something?' The Heartrender looked over at her. 

'He told me to have you stop the skiff before we reach the western docks.' 

'Why?' she asked. 

'To make sure there's an audience.' 

The distinct shapes of the volcra were clear in the blackness as they swirled around the skiff, growling and screaming, inhumanely. 

'Do something,' Alina said, panicked. Kirigan grabbed her shoulder, hard. 

'No,' he said. 'Remember who's driving.' He used the piece of bone in his hand to manipulate her powers, making a tunnel of light through the Fold, paving the way. When he let go, she swayed slightly with the force that had been expelled out of her. 'Your power is mine now,' he added softly. There was a small light at the end of the light tunnel. 

'What is he doing?' a woman up the back of the skiff asked. 

'What's going on?' someone else asked. 

The three in the skiff looked up, no longer hearing the growling. 

'So?' Jesper asked Kaz. 'What's our play?' Mal, having been a stowaway on the skiff since the beginning, peered around the corner of the crates, holding his gun, listening to the Crows discuss their plan. 

'We wait,' he said. 

'For what?' 

'For whatever the general has planned.' 

'You figured him out?' 

'Not quite.' Kaz began to slightly move around the lower deck with his cane. 'Consider the scenario. The Sun Summoner and the general's sister fled from his palace, now she's tied to the deck and his sister is being restrained by a Heartrender. We're sailing for a city where another Ravkan general hired Arken to kill the Sun Summoner. And I saw his face as he boarded. I know that look.' Inej walked to the other side of the lower deck of the skiff, and Mal darted behind the barrels again to hide himself. 'He's a man consumed with vengeance.' 

'See it enough in the mirror, do you?' Jesper asked him. Kaz gave him a look. 'So? What kind of revenge is he planning, exactly?' Mal turned to look around the barrels, to listen to the conversation, but just then, one of Inej's blades steathily found their way at his neck, and he surrendered, handing her his gun, and making him stand. 

'We know it requires the Sun Summoner, which makes her valuable to us. She's the one keeping everyone safe in here. If we have control of her, then we call the shots. We need to threaten her life.' 

'What?!' Inej and Mal said in unison. Jesper and Kaz spun around to see Inej holding Mal at gunpoint with his hands raised in surrender. Jesper pulled out his gun in a flash. 

'Who's this?' Jesper asked. 'Who are you?' 

'A stowaway,' Inej replied. She pressed the gun tighter to his back. 'Why pick this of all skiffs?' 

'To kill the general and save Alina,' Mal replied. 

'I'll ask again,' Jesper said, cocking his gun. 'Who are you?' 

'Mal Oretsev,' he replied. Kaz stalked towards Mal. 

'You know Alina?'

'I do.' 

'Who's in control of her?' 

'The general I'm going to kill.' 

'Inej, give him his gun.' 

'Why?' she asked fiercely. 

'Because if he isn't with Kirigan's crew, he's with ours.' Inej reluctantly handed Mal his gun, and he checked it over, giving Kaz Brekker an appreciative nod. 

The skiff began to slow, scraping along the sand floor. 

'Why this half measure?' Alina asked Kirigan. 'Why just carve a tunnel? You have me. You have this.' Kirigan ignored her, walking over to the deck railing, watching the structures go by, a slow, sinister smile come over his face. 'Destroy the Fold. You said we could.' He turned, his eyes dark. 

'And why would we destroy the Fold?' he asked slowly. 'It's the greatest weapon that we've got.'