The name Siren followed Freya Helvar around like a curse from the moment her powers first manifested in a raid on her village. With the image of her father's charred corpse and her brother's disgusted face on her mind, she is hauled to the Little Pa...
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
THE HALLS OF the Mayor's manor were empty by the time Nikolai finally got away. He had wanted to be asleep by now, but the Mayor of Ulensk had pulled him into tediously long conversations. Despite how shaken he was by the whole ordeal with the General's son earlier that evening, he had forced himself to pay attention and take part.
Now, he was finally allowed to retire. He had drunk just enough wine to make every step slightly difficult. He was coherent enough. Nikolai prided himself on not being like his father and older brother. The sight of them so drunk that they couldn't even walk on their own had always been disturbing, and at a young age, Nikolai vowed to never end up like them.
Tonight, however, he couldn't help himself. It was the way that the General's son jerked away from him. As if Nikolai might hurt him. As if Nikolai had already hurt him. He did not understand, but he was starting to. Or, maybe, he was just imagining things. He was drunk, after all.
He would apologize tomorrow when his mind cleared and the General's son had calmed down. He did not want to make the boy look any more like a cornered and wounded animal than he already did. Nikolai knew fear. Understood it in the very marrow of his bones. Had inhaled it for so long that he no longer knew what real air felt like. He'd never thought he would be the cause of such terror, though.
You're more like your family than you realize, the thought surfaced faster than he could force it away. The first time Nikolai had felt real fear was when he was seven and Vasily and his friends had ganged up on him in the stables and left him bruised. Nikolai had just wanted to spend time with his brother, but Vasily had never really wanted him around. It was the first time the word bastard was thrown at him, followed quickly by sobachka. Puppy. As if Nikolai was not Vasily's brother, but another thing for him to torment.
At that age, Nikolai had rebelled against the nickname. He was too young to understand that the insults were rooted deeply in truth, that he actually was a bastard. The nickname sobachka was Vasily's way of reminding him of his lower standing. I am above you, it screamed, in every way that matters in this world.
It had taken years, but Nikolai learned to revel in his nickname. He took it for what it was and transformed it into his weapon. Yes, he was a puppy, closer to a commoner than a prince. And if Vasily was the blueprint for what a Prince of Ravka was supposed to be, then Nikolai would be the opposite. And so he'd befriended Dominik, had excelled in everything that Vasily didn't – from his studies to diplomacy and military tactics –, and joined the army as a foot soldier. He worked exceedingly hard to get to the position he had today. Vasily had spent his mandatory service in an honourable position, sitting in a heated room with wine and sugared fruits, far away from the front.
Nikolai felt his brother's annoyance every time he one-upped him. Every time he proved him wrong in front of an ambassador or proposed a better plan to their father's councillors. When they were children, Vasily would've found ways to punish him. But now, Nikolai was bigger, faster and far more clever than him. The only thing left was the snide remarks. The insults that Nikolai had tempered his armour against. They did not hold the same weight for him, even if they still hurt.
