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As soon as Nikolai wakes up, he knows it's going to be one of those days.
The days that have him wishing he could just put a pillow over his head and not emerge from his bed. The days that have him wound tight and resisting the urge to jump at shadows, that make him feel like he might just crawl out of his skin. The days that make him want to scream and scream and scream until his lungs simply give out on him. The days that, if he were a lesser man, would have him saying fuck everything and running for the hills.
(Nikolai is under no delusions about his character. He is not a perfect man. He thinks an argument could even be made as to whether or not he's even a good one. But he is not a coward, and he is never going to abandon his people. They are stuck with him, for better or worse.
And days like today are certainly for worse.)
He wants to cancel his schedule and take the day. No one would protest. Zoya might raise her eyebrows at him in that judgy-but-caring way of hers, and Alina would definitely ask him about it tonight, but it wouldn't be something that rose any eyebrows (...Zoya notwithstanding). So what, a king decided to take the day for himself. Nikolai thinks his father spent half the fucking year on 'days off'; what is one in the face of all that?
But Nikolai has never wanted to emulate his father, not in any way. And playing hooky today would just end up with him wallowing in his room, hating himself, hating the world. If he's going to wallow and hate anyway, he might as well get some work done while he does.
So, despite how desperately he wants to do the opposite, Nikolai gets out of bed and gets ready for the day. He ignores the itch under his skin, the clawing, twitching, burning thing in his chest, only accomplishing it so thoroughly after years of practice. He's old hand at suppression. But—
But that doesn't really make it any easier, despite what he tells himself.
He—he has a handle on it. He's been keeping this secret since he was six years old, has earned the perfect control he wears like a second skin. He knows how to control it. Nothing will be happening without his say-so, and he sure as fuck isn't saying so. He has a handle on it.
It's just that the itching, clawing, twitching, burning thing doesn't particularly appreciate him 'having a handle on it'.
During breakfast, he can feel some people giving him looks. He's not quite acting like himself, not fully. He's good at putting on a show, one of the best there is, but on days like today—there are cracks. There are fissures in his finely-crafted persona, ones he is just barely keeping from turning into gigantic tears. This is the best he can do. This is the best he can manage without screaming at everyone to leave him alone.
"...lai?"
Nikolai blinks, turns his head. Alina is looking at him with furrowed brows, her concern clear. He realizes she's been speaking to him, has said his name a few times. Her hand is even resting on his forearm. Genya is giving them worried glances.
Not allowing himself another moment, Nikolai pulls up a roguish grin, taking a bite of whatever it is that's on his plate, pretending it doesn't taste like ash in his mouth. "Yes, my soon-to-be Queen? I'm sorry, I was thinking about how ravishing you look in that kefta." He makes himself smirk. There's nothing wrong here. He's fine. "And how much more ravishing you'd look without it on."
Alina's cheeks flame red like they always do when he says things like that, but she still frowns at him, undeterred unlike everyone else. "Are you okay?"
"Of course," Nikolai lies, wondering if it sounds as horrifically false to her ears as it does to his. "Why wouldn't I be?"
The day is long and horrible and long and fucking horrible. It is meeting after meeting, discussion after discussion, ridiculous argument after ridiculous argument. The sun is still rising when his headache forms, and it only gets worse as the day goes on, pounding like a bass drum behind his eyes. His throat is perpetually dry, his joints are aching, and that stupid fucking itch under his skin doesn't abate for an instant.
The monotony of the day doesn't help, the fact that he isn't working on anything important today making it all the worse. At least if he was dealing with some real problems then he would have a real goal, instead of settling petty squabbles between lords who don't deserve their positions for shit. It makes him feel like complete and utter garbage, and by the time the day is done and he can call it quits, by the time he's free to go lie down and bury himself in pillows until the next morning, he's too wound up to move from his spot.
At least he's alone now. At least the council room is empty, leaving Nikolai by himself. The quiet helps a little, though not much. Maybe he should call for a Healer, just to abate his headache a little, to get rid of the nausea that has been churning in his gut the last hour or so.
But with today being what it is—no, he doesn't want to have any Grisha messing around with his body. Too much possibility of something going disastrously wrong.
His skin feels like it's going to peel off. He stands at the council table and stares down at the map in front of him and tries to convince himself that he is fine, that he doesn't need to do what he thinks he needs to do, that he is a perfectly ordinary human having a bad day and that is it.
Unfortunately, Nikolai has never been too good at deluding himself. Everyone else, certainly, but self-awareness has been Nikolai's burden since he was six years old, and it's one he's never been able to shake.
It makes him a far better man than his father or brother ever were, but it also makes him far more miserable.
A fair trade off, he supposes.
Nikolai closes his eyes as the headache gets worse, and he resigns himself to the solution he's been denying himself all day, that he's been running from since the day he discovered it. He gives a quick glance around the room, just double checking that he really is alone, no one around to witness what he's about to do.
Then, with a slow breath in, Nikolai opens his palm and pushes from inside himself.
It's been a little over a year since the last time he was forced to cave and do this, so it takes a moment, that thing inside of him resisting. Stuck from disuse, like a bike you haven't ridden in years. The wheels rusted, the pedals stuck in place. It makes him grunt as he pushes at those pedals, and the air above his open palm begins to move.
And just like that, the pedals turn, and there's a sudden light inside of Nikolai as the air moves more and more, spinning, forming a small vortex. He stares at it, unable to help the deep, stuttering gasp he takes as his entire body floods with energy, filling him with a brightness he sorely wishes wasn't familiar.
The vortex spins and spins, turning into a small tornado held in the palm of his hand. He can feel his power, the thriving energy thrumming through his system, the desire to let loose. The desire to grow it and grow it until this tornado is leagues high, and fucking let it fly. Feel his power soar through the world, consume this stupid palace, wreck everything in his path. And then with barely a blink, let it all go, easy as pie.
Ultimate power, right there at his fingertips. Fucking addictive.
Fucking horrible.
"What the fuck."
Nikolai's head jerks up, eyes wide. His hand snaps shut, as if that could hide what's happened, and the vortex slows to nothingness, fading like it was never there in the first place. No evidence left behind by his crime.
No evidence except for the most damning evidence of all—what was already seen.
Alina is standing in the open doorway, hand still resting on the knob. Her mouth is agape, her eyes wide. She seems absolutely speechless; Nikolai can sympathize.
"Shut the door," he says, voice just slightly strangled.
Without a word of protest—and really, that is the biggest sign of how deep her shock is—Alina does as she's told, stepping inside and closing the door behind herself.
The pair of them stand in complete silence, staring at each other. Nikolai's headache and nausea are gone; he even feels less tired than he has the last month or so. It only makes him more pissed off at his powers—he'd like to feel okay by himself, thank you very fucking much. He doesn't need magic powers fixing his problems.
"You..." Alina starts, blinking rapidly, and then shakes herself. "Nikolai, you're Grisha?"
Alina was never supposed to see.
No one was ever supposed to see.
Nikolai's so damn good at keeping this secret, so damn good at making sure no one ever knows. He was six when he learned the truth of himself, when he fell out of a tree and caught himself with a burst of wind. It's been sixteen years since then, sixteen fucking years of locking this down as tight as it could go. Never letting anyone see, never letting anyone know. Sometimes even coming close to convincing himself that it was all just a bad dream. That there was no secret, nothing to keep hidden. That he was as normal as he was pretending to be.
Not that that's extremely normal, compared to, well, normal people. But still.
Sixteen years. A secret so well-kept it might as well have not existed at all. And then suddenly it unravels because Alina can't fucking knock.
(Suddenly it unravels because Nikolai can't fucking lock a door.)
Alina straightens, shoulders squaring, and Nikolai resists the urge to sigh. There's a fire in her eyes that is oh so familiar by now, a fire he's admired from the very first day. A fire he really wishes she could let go of right now.
"You could've used that to help—" Alina starts.
“I know, Alina,” Nikolai says quietly.
He fixes his gaze on the map on the table to avoid looking at her, but he can still see where she stands out of the corner of his eye. Can see the incredulous look on her face, that rising fire in her eyes. On a better day, he could meet that look head-on with a smirk and witty comment. Could meet her with just as much confidence as she carries, with a calm unflappability that always drives her mad. On a better day, he wouldn’t need to avoid her passion, her beautiful fire.
But today is not a better day. Today is not a good day at all.
And so, he hides.
"How could you have something like this at your disposal and not use it to help?" Alina continues, sounding utterly mystified. Sounding angry. "There were so many times we—so many dangers—so many lives lost—and you could’ve—"
"I know," Nikolai snaps, his voice raising. His nerves are already frayed from today, and Saints this conversation isn't helping. "I know, Alina. I know. But I can't. What you just saw—that is the extent I have for my abilities. I have never used them outside of absolutely necessary situations."
Necessary like the training he forced himself through as a child, so he wouldn't get angry and accidentally rip the roof off the Grand Palace. Necessary like long days and isolation, secrets he was forced to keep, a deep self-loathing that no one could ever understand. Necessary like something he's never allowed to happen if he can help it.
Days like today are the days he can't help it.
(The Small Science does not appreciate being ignored.)
"You're a Squaller," Alina says stubbornly. "You're—Saints, how can you be a Squaller? And why the fuck would you keep that a secret?"
It feels odd to hear her curse; she doesn't do it often, and that's twice in one conversation now. He must really be special.
For a long moment, Nikolai doesn't say anything. He doesn't know how to explain this to her, to the Sun Summoner, to Sankta Alina. He doesn't know how to tell the leader of the Grisha, one of the most powerful to ever exist, the destroyer of the Shadow Fold, the wearer of Morozova's Amplifiers, why he would choose to not be Grisha.
But...she wasn't always Sankta Alina. She was a map maker in the First Army.
"Before you discovered what you were," Nikolai says, and even though his voice is quiet, it rings startlingly loud through the silence that had fallen, "what did you think of the Grisha?"
The way Alina grimaces is answer enough. Nikolai's lips twist into a bitter smile. He continues to stare at the map.
"Despite the ever-present rumors about my parentage," Nikolai begins haltingly, "I was raised a prince of Ravka. And that carries with it—so many responsibilities, more than I could explain. Part of that, a large part of that, is representing the regular human population. The royal family is supposed to be completely separate from the Second Army. We command the Grisha, we are not them. We are not other. We rule, and in my parents' view we are better, but we are not something that alienates our people. We are not the thing that makes our soldiers grimace at the thought of us."
Alina watches him silently, something he can’t quite read in her expression. It's almost unsettling; usually she's so—open, so expressive. Never one for masking, always one to speak her mind. And whenever she has to put up a mask, he likes to think he’s rather good at seeing through it, knowing her well enough to pick out her true feelings. But right now—no, he doesn’t know what she’s thinking.
(But maybe that has more to do with his own mental state than any attempt on her part to hide from him.)
"We aren’t even tested," Nikolai confesses. “We—all children of Ravka are tested for Grisha power, but not the royal family. Because it is just known that we aren't that. So I—I learned what I am on my own."
Saints, what a day that was. Terrifying and horrifying and he was sick to his stomach—
"I taught myself control, because I had to. I never told another person." Not even Dominik, no matter how many times he thought about doing it. How many times the words were on the tip of his fucking tongue... "And then I—shoved it all deep, deep down. I had control, no chance of accidentally letting loose. And I hated myself for what I was, so I was never going to use them on purpose.
"And so I became what I am now, and I did it without special powers or a kefta that proclaimed my powers to the world. I built everything with my own two hands. I defended my crew and my people as one of them. And it was just—habit. You learned to have your power at your fingertips, to instinctively call it to serve you at a moment's notice. You learned to wield it and to have it ready, the same way I learned with my pistol or my sword. I never kept my powers at the ready. I never wanted them. So they faded into the background of my self."
Silence falls once more. Nikolai stares hard at the table, refusing to look at her, to so much as glance. He doesn't think he wants to know what's going through her head. What could she possibly think of all this? The bastard Lantsov king, a Grisha to top it all off. A Grisha who hates his own powers, like it isn't akin to hating your own fucking arm. A coward and a weakling.
"Why use them today?" Alina asks eventually, her voice almost painfully neutral.
Nikolai rolls his shoulders, trying to shake off some of his tension. "Every once in a while I...need to let them out, at least a little. I need to release it, or it'll start to be like an itch under my skin. Painful, if I ignore that feeling for too long. Makes me sick, even. So I do enough to settle it, and then I box it back up."
Alina hums, acknowledging, and silence once more falls over them. Then there are footsteps, and he can't stop himself from looking over out of the corner of his eye, watching her steadily approach him until she stands at his side. She's facing the table, eyes on it as well, and he's almost pathetically grateful for it.
"I get it," Alina says softly. "I didn't want to be Grisha in the beginning, Saints I even suppressed my power so deep I failed the test. So, I get it, Nikolai." Silence for a few beats. "I don't think you have to hide, though. I think...it might be nice, actually, to have a Grisha ruler for the first time, instead of another 'normal' human. You're right that Grisha are seen as other by most—maybe having a Grisha king might help them feel more at home in Ravka."
"Isn't that what you are?" Nikolai shoots back, and can't help the way his lips twitch in a small smile at the reminder of their impending nuptials. "You're going to be Queen, going to be ruling right by my side—isn't that part of the point? Bringing the two sides together, combining two worlds. It defeats the purpose a bit if we're both Grisha. Then it's just a takeover." He chuckles, a noise with quite the bitter edge to it. "Plus then I'm the liar king as well. I think it's better if no one ever knows."
Alina doesn't say anything in response, and anxiety is tight in Nikolai's chest. Maybe this is where he loses her—not literally, she'd never back out of an agreement to this magnitude. But emotionally, mentally; maybe this is where she pulls away from him. Maybe this is where their growing affection ends, because she can't respect him any longer.
He is, after all, a liar king, whether or not the world knows it.
And then Nikolai has to take a long, shaky breath through his nose when Alina's hand lifts and settles on top of his, squeezing gently.
"I get it," she says again, and she really sounds like she means it. It makes Nikolai feel a little weak-legged, and he locks his knees resolutely. "I won't tell anyone."
And, well, Nikolai knew that, he did. He knows Alina well enough to know she wouldn't just go blabbing something as gigantic as this. But apparently he also didn't know, because her words fill him with a level of relief that nearly shakes him to his core.
"But," Alina adds, and Nikolai eyes her warily out of the corner of his eye, "I'd really love to see you use your abilities someday, if you'd let me. And I mean really use them." She looks at him then, catching his gaze, and the smile tugging at her lips is the most beautiful thing in the fucking world.
(She is the most beautiful thing in the fucking world.)
"I bet you're glorious with them, Nik," she says, smile growing. "Just like you are with every other ridiculous weapon in your repertoire."
It makes Nikolai grin, winking as he says, "I certainly have quite a few glorious weapons at my disposal, it's true. A few I've yet to be able to show you in full."
He feels a little bit more like himself when the comment makes Alina huff and roll her eyes, makes him feel a little bit better when her smile doesn't fade at all.
With all the care he can muster, Nikolai lifts their clasped hands and presses a gentle kiss to the back of her hand, looking up to hold her gaze as he does. Her brown eyes are nearly glowing, the rest of her much the same, and Nikolai is struck for the millionth time by how lucky he is to get to have this. Have her. Their history might be fraught with tension and death and trauma, but they made it through, formed a partnership that could never be broken. And now they're here together.
For the first time since Nikolai was six years old, he feels like he might not actually be alone in the world.