#sab netflix
Yinyang darklina because Ben Barnes said so
Yinyang darklina because Ben Barnes said so
By far the funniest and most in-character thing in sab was Inej urgently asking “Wait why would Heleen get the Crow Club?” and Kaz straight up just leaving
fuck the ship wars, genyalina supremacy
ೄྀ࿐ENOUGH
⎯ nikolai lantsov x fem!royalty!healer!reader
nikolai and y/n experience a freak event in the middle of an argument that has them not speaking.
⎯request:anon.
⎯warnings:angst; fluff; swearing; mentions of violence; mentions of gore.
⎯wc:3.9k
⎯a/n:i realized that i think it appears a little rushed as you get towards the end so i’m sorry if that’s the case!!
“Your Highness.”
Her tongue clicked. “Yes, Tolya.”
“You have a Triumvirate meeting in ten minutes … as you do every morning.”
“My husband has a meeting.”
Tolya went quiet, keeping his broad frame under the entranceway.
“You can stand there and sulk all you’d like,” said the Queen. “You’ll have to carry me out of here if you’d like me to go.”
His tone changed to that of a friend as he said, “You have to go, Y/N.”
She peered up from her task, “And give me a good reason as to why I should.” Her hands braced on the edge of the table. “I’m Queen Consort. I do not get to make decisions that matter and I have no involvement in things that need my input.”
“Then come as a Grisha.”
“I will come as myself,” she emphasized.
His brows creased.
“I was ‘Princess’ before I was ever ‘Grisha’,” she reinforced. “Grisha abilities may run through my blood, but the title I received before my existence was ever thought of.”
“Even if you can’t do what you want,” said Tolya, “your presence is still important to us. You’re our Queen and our friend.”
“Tell Nikolai,” she spoke the words like acid were on her tongue, “I am busy with my projects. And if he has anything he wishes to tell me, he can say the words himself.”
After a beat of silence, Tolya bowed and paid his respects. Y/N was left to her achingly quiet laboratory, alone, with the decomposing body on the table.
The king and queen never fought. Argued, disagreed, yes, but this time it felt near impossible to recoup as things veered off the path of maturity.
Nikolai was tired, so was Y/N. Y/N wanted to communicate with her husband the way she’d been feeling recently, and Nikolai wanted the world to go away for just a moment of silence. It was a spat of words which neither meant; misunderstanding and immaturity building an impenetrable wall between them.
Y/N took up occupancy in the Little Palace, giving the excuse of needing no distractions to begin Grisha projects that had been long brewing in her mind. Meanwhile, Nikolai drank himself to sleep most nights in his sitting room.
They were both tremendously stubborn. The exact reason Zoya teased she was a top choice among the women he had to choose from following his crowning. So, when Y/N was informed the king would be visiting Lazlayon, she scowled at her general.
“Don’t even think about playing ill.”
The queen scoffed. “I wouldn’t dare.”
Zoya arched a brow, “And I look good in Heartrender Red.”
“You’d look breath-taking in a straw hat and a potato sack.”
She pushed her hair behind her shoulder. “I know.”
Y/N’s guards kept a distance behind as they moved through the Grand Palace halls. Their shoes clicking on the tiles were like drum beats and the ruffling of clothing like scraping a fork over porcelain.
“I think I’m going to be sick.”
“You’re fine.”
“Thank you, I’m suddenly feeling much better.”
“Good,” replied the general, who put a hand on her upper back to steer her down another corridor. “You’ll have an audience. Arriving peaky will have the King suspected of domestic abuse.”
Y/N eyes rolled. “Like anyone would care, if that were the case.”
Zoya sighed.
“I always have an audience,” murmured Y/N. “I’m the goddamn Queen of Ravka.”
“That you are,” she nodded. “So go on and say a mildly affectionate farewell to the King.”
Before she could protest, the large doors swung open. Y/N descended the steps with her hands folded against her skirts and eyes locked on Nikolai, whose back was to her as he helped adjust the reins. The grip on her fingers was near painful. With her chin lifted and spine locked, she halted a few feet from the carriage door.
Y/N’s eyes locked on the gravel near the singular step as he appeared in front of her, hands behind his back. From the blurry corners of her vision, she saw him lean to look over her shoulder.
His chin lowered slightly. “You’ll have to look at me, Y/N.”
Her jaw shifted. “No.”
“It needs to appear real.”
“What does?”
“Our goodbye.”
“They can see we’re speaking.”
“Yes but you’re standing like someone pinned you to a tree.”
Y/N snapped her gaze to him, but the words died on her tongue. Nikolai stared at her.
“Stop it,” she snapped under a breath.
“Stop what?”
“Stop looking at me like that.”
He took a step closer.
“How am I looking at you, Y/N?” he spoke gently, his breath fanning her face.
A crease sat between his brows. Her eyes shifted between his, the breath coming and going heavily through her nose.
“Tell the count I send my regards, Your Grace.”
Nikolai didn’t have any other choice but to obey her dismissal. With hesitation, he rested his hand on her middle and kissed her cheek. Y/N pulled away from the burn, striding to the steps where Zoya waited with an emotionless expression.
The queen walked past her. When she got deep enough into the royal family’s quarters, she pressed the back of her hand to her lips as the tears welled. It was only when she reached their shared room that she let the sobs crawl up her throat and shake her shoulders.
While Nikolai attended a meeting with Count Kirigin, Y/N continued the perfection of her Grisha abilities. Being born royal, she was deprived of the opportunity. Everything she learned was through trial and error. Her legs were covered in the proof of her growth as a Healer.
Y/N had believed that, with Nikolai on a break from his duties, she’d be relieved of the anxiousness. As much as she hated worrying about seeing him around the grounds, those glances they threw each other’s way without either noticing was like curing dehydration. Without the king there, she’d never been so thirsty for the sight of him.
A commotion from the front gates caught her attention. Y/N removed the apron and slipped off her gloves. She strode past the two guards posted on the other side of the laboratory doors. They struggled to keep up with her fast pace, following her until she shoved open the main doors of the Little Palace.
“What is going on here?” with her husband’s absence she was to take over his assertive tone. She kept her hands elegantly held against her stomach, countering the effect of her wearing a shirt and trousers rather than her usual attire.
As all present guards stood at-attention, two in particular struggled. With one slumped over and another keeping his comrade from face-planting in the gravel.
“Saints,” she bit out.
Y/N rushed down the short steps to assist the soldier, who nodded at her in gratitude. She lifted the injured one to see his eyes nearly rolling back in his head, jaw slack. Blood dripped from a wound somewhere along his scalp.
“Laboratories,” she commanded. “Now.”
They hauled him down the corridor and laid him atop one of the metal tables.
“What happened, Mason?” she said, focusing on the gash in the guard’s skull.
“I don’t quite know, Your Highness,” said the guard who originally kept him upright. “He came in on a horse. He about threw himself from the saddle.”
“Did he say anything?”
“No, Your Highness.”
“Make any sort of sign?”
“No. But …”
Y/N looked up at him. “‘But’ what, soldier?”
The young man hesitated. “There’s a possibility he was with the King.”
“Nikolai is at Count Kirigin’s. He couldn’t have survived that long of a ride.”
“Your Highness, we were told to expect him a few hours ago.”
Y/N’s hands froze. They shook slightly under the tension.
“Bataar twins. Now.”
The three guards in the room paid their respects and rushed out. Y/N fisted her fingers, trying to focus on her breathing.
She managed to close the wound and was in the middle of spreading a salve on it—the man, finally fully unconscious—when the twins burst through the door. No guards followed or took post outside.
“Where is my husband?” she demanded.
Tamar winced, “We don’t know.”
Y/N’s chin flexed. “When was he supposed to be back?”
“This morning,” she answered.
Suddenly, the guard atop the table gasped for breath like he’d been underwater and sprung up. The queen managed to keep him down with an arm across his shoulders. He let his head fall back again, eyes searching the ceiling frantically. They fell on hers, sending a chill across her skin.
“We were ambushed,” he forced out. “He—We didn’t know. I couldn’t—”
In the midst, Y/N’s head shot up to share a wide-eyed gaze with the twins. Tolya, though, couldn’t take his eyes off the soldier.
“Do you know who attacked?” he said.
The guard shook his head. “No. No. No, I don’t know.”
“Was it the Fjerdans?”
“No, I—No. Ravkans. They looked Ravkan—”
“Where’s the King?”
“He ran—A guard tried to make him run but he refused. We were all—His guard was shot down and then the King was, too, and I tried—wetried but there were so many of them.” His face screwed up. “He wasn’t moving and I couldn’t tell if he— … I must have passed out because I woke up and everyone was dead and they covered their tracks.”
“You’d been hit,” said the queen. “They didn’t take you because they wanted someone alive.”
With a tone on the edge of toppling, she said, “Tolya, take fifteen good men and ride hard the route they took. Send six of them to Lazlayon. If Emil or any of his people are unwell or their safety appears to be in jeopardy, they will stay in Os Alta, on the grounds. You notice anythingyou report back to me and General Nazyalensky. You suspectanything … Do you understand me?”
The broad-shouldered giant nodded. “I would give my life for the King, if the Saints demand it.”
Y/N’s chin lowered. “Well, I sure hope they don’t. Go on. I don’t want my men riding back through those woods at a dangerous hour.”
Tolya bowed and strode from the room.
Y/N hadn’t realized she’d been absent until Tamar was beside her, peeling back her fingers from the knife she’d used to cut away the soldier’s hair. Her guard didn’t let go of her shaking hand.
“Where do you want to go?” she asked.
The Queen’s head swayed. “He needs someone to watch him.”
“He will be taken care of. I’ll make sure of it.” After a moment’s pause, she repeated, “Where do you want to go?”
Y/N sat in the sitting room surrounded by her friends. They were quiet, the only sounds were Zoya occasionally turning a page in her book, the scratching of David’s pen, and Genya’s fingernail tapping her glass.
Y/N knew Tolya would disobey her orders to come back before too late. It wasn’t worth it to argue and if he decided to put his life on the line to find him. They all cared about Nikolai to some degree, no matter the title of their relationship. He had wound his way into all of their hearts and because of that, they’d do exactly as Tolya would, a million times over.
Y/N vowed to not sleep, seeing as the time was almost sunrise, but it took her without warning.
The room jolted awake as Tolya pushed through the doors. He closed it behind himself before regarding them.
It was infuriating how emotionless his face had become. Zoya was the first to snap.
“Well?”
The emotions had grown palpable, even through their terrible excuse of a few hour’s rest. It choked Y/N, most of all. Though, focusing on her breath meant a moment lost where she could be praying to all the Saints regarding her husband’s health.
Tolya steeled himself, eyes catching on his Queen slowly rising from her leather chair, one arm around her middle and a hand pressed to her collarbone. Oh, how many different expressions his mind had come up with upon his return, but with it finally in front of him … it carved out another piece of his heart. When Tolya cracked the splinters of what was left of the carriage under his boots and witnessed faces he once knew now pallor and peeled, a stubborn sphere of solid rock lodged in his throat.
“The people of Lazlayon were not targeted,” he started with.
What should he say? They couldn’t find the horses? The scene was a mess?
His nose burned thinking about it.
As always, he was grateful for his sister’s ability to save him. “Did you find any evidence to figure out who did this?” she said.
His chin swayed. “The bullets were locally-bought.”
Zoya had had enough. On her last rope, she took two steps forward from behind the Queen, and spoke through her teeth, “I swear…”
“Zoya,” hushed Genya, who grasped hard at David’s hand.
“Justsay it,” she spat. “Don’t go being weak now, Soldier. If you’re as hardhearted as you make everyone believe thensay what is to be said. Stopholding back.”
But the words like a whip off the General’s tongue were enough for Y/N. The acceptance of her permanent reality saved her guard, her friend, from tearing himself apart to the core of his soul.
The great waves of the True Sea crashed down on her all at once. In the past, the water had enveloped her, kept her afloat and glittering like it did on the days she would skip rocks at her vacation home. Now, the reflected blue betrayed her, tied her last rope around her neck and refused to let up.
Her limbs fell to the mercy of gravity, now, to keep her standing, but as it always had, it failed her. She clawed at her throat where the invisible knot held firm. She screamed until she was out of breath and again, until her eardrums shook.
By the time Y/N was shoved from the arms of her royal upbringing and into the King of Ravka’s open ones, merely shards of shining bits of life were left inside her. Nikolai had made do with what he was given; stopped them from occasionally flickering out. Now, a new pair of arms held her spine tight against their chest, seated on the floor of the sitting room, desperately trying to keep them as they once were just days ago. Nadia embraced Y/N’s wilting and wailing figure with enough strength to suffocate a flake of the dark pain.
“How do you know?” Y/N wept. “How do you know? Where is he?”
Tolya looked down on his Queen with burning eyes and a deep crease between his brows.
“That’s not important, Y/N—” Tamar had tried to prevent more anguish, but Y/N only cried harder in Nadia’s arms.
“I need to know, please,” she begged. “Please, just tell me. I need to know where he is.”
Tolya shared a glance with his twin.
“A guard, who has witnessed many honorary deaths, found the place the King fell. He said …” The rock grew bigger. He swallowed hard. “He said he bled too much. Either they took him, thinking they could save him, or took him for their own means.”
As Y/N began calling out for him, Zoya, who’d been watching the nightmare unfold in cold silence with an even colder expression, stormed from the room in a harsh wind that scraped back furniture and the glass once in her hand shattering against the floor.
Zoya imagined Nikolai bleeding out in the middle of the forest, all alone. Or, maybe it was as he was dragged or carried away, the darkness taking him before he got to understand he’d never get to say goodbye or apologize.
Nikolai, who endured war, the unforeseen death of his best friend, countless pirate attacks, countless fists to the face, possession by an abomination, and the last war against the Black Heretic, finally met his fate in the most dishonouring way for a man of his magnificence.
Tamar bolted after the Squaller, knowing just how much justice and ugliness she’d bring to their King and Ravka’s name if not reminded.
Y/N would give up a life of security and sustenance if Nikolai so insisted. She’d forget who she was: change her name, cut her hair, replace her clothes, if he’d rather live life on water than on land. Her love for him went beyond comprehension.
It wasn’t known he fully understood that before leaving.
Just maybe, if she’d caved and told him she loved him, made sure he took care of himself on his journey, he would have demanded to postpone visiting Lazlayon.
Nikolai, who shotand manipulatedthe Black Heretic; who fought offnichevo’ya; who refused a life chained to him before his birth because he simply didn’t agree; who built flying ships and covered his bed chamber walls in maps and liked the smell of morning dew and read books on philosophy and could recount the colonization of Novyi Zem for no goddamn reason, was gone.
Y/N cursed the boy Nikolai loved so dearly. Cursed him for taking her best friend away from her; letting him lose the rest of his life; ripping out half of her soul.
Word had gotten around about the commotion the previous day. So, when the servants in the halls of the Grand Palace and the ones about the grounds heard heart-wrenching grief, they all froze, sharing looks of disbelief.
Nikolai Lantsov, the indestructible and effervescent king who did more than his father or any of his lineage ever attempted, was dead.
The next morning, Tolya and Tamar managed to help her outside. The latter was tasked with pushing her along in a wheelchair, for her legs didn’t work. Servants watched their Queen gaze mindlessly up at the sky, as if she were searching for something within the clouds.
The twins granted her silence the whole way.
They took Y/N near a corner of the back of the property. It was a wide patch of well-kept grass untouched by royal projects. The left was bordered by the tall, stone wall of the property line and the back by a shaded wood which had the children of the Grisha school’s imaginations concreting an anxiety that kept them within the boundaries of the field. The school was to the right, on the other side of the lake, but teachers were granted permission to occasionally allow the students to occupy it during recess.
The bell rang and all the children fled by the path leading back to their school.
Y/N finally looked away from the sky. It felt as if she were floating. Her mouth, sewn shut, and eyes, mechanical. Not a single thought formed in her head as she regarded her surroundings.
Y/N jerked like she’d been struck. Her gaze locked between the trees, hands grasping the arms of her chair so hard she felt it strain. Words appeared, formed, slammed against the cages of her mind like rabid animals.
Out from the shadows of the forest, he stumbled. One hand pressed to his lower abdomen and pale skin screaming against the light of the sun.
The urge to scream, run as fast as she could, hit something with all her strength, overcame her, but all that left her mouth was a whimpered breath of his name. As Tolya shouted to him and she heard his faint response, the air detoxified. His name repeated in a whisper as the ecstasy slowly rose in her system.
Tolya asked him to admit something only he would know. And at the words, “Y/N is a much better actor than myself,” she was off.
Y/N gulped down air as she ran for her life, the twins’ warning shouts unheard to her. Nikolai finally let his knees hit the ground; relief flooded his bones at the sight of her, forcing a sob to shake his shoulders. Uncoordinatedly, she removed all the weight from his one arm and put it onto her.
His face, sodden with tears, and eyes drinking in her own as he held on tight to the back of her neck, pieced Y/N together again.
In the royal family’s quarters of the Grand Palace, the King and Queen were left to themselves.
“I guess this is one of the benefits of asking a Healer to be my wife.”
Y/N, closely sitting in a chair before him, quirked a brow. “Yes, as that’s all I’m good for.”
With a cheeky grin, Nikolai forced himself off the back of the chair to press a hard kiss to her cheek.
“Stop moving,” she reprimanded lightly. “You’re seconds from breaking your stitches.”
“Ah, but they’re already broken, my darling.” Nikolai lifted the corner of his shirt so he could get a good look at the hole in his lower abdomen. “Nasty little thing, isn’t it? All’s well, though. The scar is just another to add to the collection.”
Y/N tapped under his chin, “Lift.” He raised it enough to look at her through his eyelashes. “If anything, it’ll only increase your inflated ego.”
“Now, see, that’s what I have youfor.” He grinned broadly as she brushed her fingers over a cut under his jaw. “And you do a wonderful job at it, too.”
Nikolai granted her silence when she didn’t react. When she got to the bullet wound in his side, she froze. He took her fingers in his hands, squeezing once.
“I have not felt such pain in my life …” Her eyes caught his. “I’ll never be able to explain. Someone could tear me limb from limb and it still wouldn’t be as terrible as imagining you dying alone.”
“You don’t have to explain,” replied Nikolai, softly.
“Tell me what happened.”
He took in a breath.
“The attackers set off a bomb to spook the horses,” he said. “Two of the men got into a firefight with them while the third tried to have me run. I wanted to help, maybe look one of the dullards in the face so he knew just how much they failed at their attempt, but I was shot before I could even make up my mind.” Nikolai paused. “All that was going through my mind as I bled out was how I needed to get home to you. I needed to come back to you. I refused to let our last goodbye be so petty and dramatic. I woke up in a cottage. The person had fixed me up as best they could. I didn’t stay to thank them. Not just to keep my attempted assassination out of people’s mouths, but because I wasn’t going to waste another second in that damned bed when I didn’t know how long I’d been there already. I ran when they left the house and I was lucky I recognized the area from when I would visit Dominik’s family because I didn’t stop through the night.”
The pad of his thumb brushed a tear from her cheek.
“You shouldn’t have pushed yourself.”
“There were so many times I wanted to give up, Y/N.”
“Why didn’t you?”
“Because my love for you is enough.”
@honeymxlon@caaarstairs@jae-the-menace@tartheanmaid@staytrueblue@criesinlies@moon-enthusiast@gallysonegoodlung
There was a post going around with this dress and the words “Nina Zenik in this,” so I… drew Nina Zenik in this. That’s it.
And no Matthias literally did not survive this
Spoilers under the cut for Helnik fandom
my@grishaversebigbang piece for A Confectionary Tale, a fic written by @zemenipearls !!!
Corporalnik (beta reader): @darklesmychuckles
Materialki (artists): @phy-be [x],@sunlitangles [x],@ninaaswaffles [x],@kingdombrekker [x],@nai-nty-8 [x],@discountscoobyart [x]
image id below the cut
[Start ID:
A digital illustration of Nadia Zhabin and Tamar Kir-Bataar from the Grishaverse series by Leigh Bardugo. Nadia is a black woman with braids and Tamar is a tanned Asian woman with short hair. They’re wearing hiking clothes, exhausted, and sitting on a rock. Tamar leans over, arms on her knees. Nadia leans back onto Tamar and fans herself with a hand.
End ID.]
gurl help inej and jesper’s favorite white boy is making his stupid little plans again
I’m participating in @grishaversebigbang again, and this time ‘round I can participate in the minibang as well as the main event! This is my piece for @misterrimpossible ‘s fic, the wonderfully titled, its a terrible day in ravka and you are a disabled teenage mob boss
And go check out the other companion piece for this fic done by @fricklefracklefloof [x]!
Image ID below the cut
[Start ID:
A digital drawing (from left to right) of Inej Ghafa, Jesper Fahey, and Kaz Brekker from Six of Crows. Above them are speech bubbles. As Kaz paces to the right, and has a triumphant and smug look on his face. He has a speech bubble saying “*absolutely brilliant plan that will not get us killed*” Inej and Jesper are sitting at a table. Inej has an exasperated expression on her face and is saying “This is stupid.” Jesper has his head in his hands and is saying “We’re gonna die…”
End ID]
‘Shadow & Bone’: Six Of Crows Spin-off Series In The Works
Ummm, I’m sorry…. WHAT?!!! Like WHAT!!!!!! I NEED MORE INFORMATION RIGHT NOOWWWWW
Cuz like does that mean the Crows actually won’t be in season 2 of Shadow and Bone? Or they will, but they’ll also be getting their own thing? I - omg!
Bulldozing my way through Ruin and Rising and I get to THAT part where we discover A Major Thing™ about Mal, and because I really love Show Mal I’m like:
That’s gonna be actually pretty kewl . I would agree a little with the readers who didn’t like that revelation; for me, it was because I felt Book Mal didn’t deserve the importance of it. But Show Mal - well, I love that for him and Archie.
Yo, peeps. It’s Shadow and Bone Season 2 Speculation Time.
Now that we know season 2 is coming and the script is already written, I’m gonna speculate what that story might look like. This is more of an “overall events of season 2” speculation post with theories and thoughts rather than specific episode-by-episode summaries predictions.
So, settle in for some reading, kids. It’s all fun and games. Some spoilers if you’ve not read the books and you care about that kind of thing.
Preface
Firstly, I think there might need to be a time jump, maybe about a year. In Siege and Storm (S&S), it’s been a few months since events in Shadow & Bone. But a year’s time jump would also help the Crows. For example, in Six of Crows (SoC), Nina’s been in Ketterdam for almost that long trying to get Matthias out of Hellgate. It also gives the Crows time to develop offscreen kind of like Luke Skywalker between Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi.
Secondly, using the jurda parem drug as a plot device seems like a good way to keep the Crows and the Malina/Kirigan storylines tethered. The Iron Throne, for instance, was the connective tissue for all the different characters in Game of Thrones. Think about it: If Kirigan starts giving the Grisha in the Second Army the drug and half of them are not ok with that because it’s basically meth and while it makes them insanely powerful, it willkill them, then, it lends weight to Alina coming back to take command of the Second Army to liberate them and lead a rebellion against Kirigan. Also, as we know, the Crows’s Ice Court heist is centered around the same drug.
Alina/Mal/Nikolai/Kirigan Storyline
I think this storyline will follow S&S for the most part with a few changes here and there, of course. For instance, Kirigan will need something to do since he’s virtually absent throughout S&S except at the beginning, the end, and smatterings of weird, creepy visions throughout (please don’t go heavy with that shit, show people).
Alina and Mal are hiding out in Novyi Zem. They left Ravka on the same ship as the Crows, but I’m 100% sure that it was a boat service. They dropped the Crows off at Ketterdam before going onward. I think we’ll find them kind of settled into a tentative life there, possibly in a romantic relationship given all that epic development they did last season. But they also might keep the “hiding their feelings from each other” nonsense going for a little bit longer.
Meanwhile, Kirigan made it back to Os Alta with his shadow babies. He’s working in tandem (for now) with the Apparat, who took power last season. In S&S, the Apparat didn’t take power after the King mysteriously fell ill and had to go into hiding, so that’s an interesting change…
Kirigan discovers the benefits of jurda parem, and hebeing the one to champion the drug doesn’t seem like a far reach to me. He persuades the Grisha that it’s a good thing because, you know, he’s like that. But he only has a limited supply from Shu Han. In SoC, it was Jan Van Eck (Wylan’s dad) who had possession of the drug from the Shu Han government, but it makes much more sense for Kirigan to have that connection because in the show they made him so involved with politics and the running of the Ravkan kingdom. And although we know he killed all those diplomats from other countries, no one else knows that except for Malina and the Crows. So, it won’t be hard for him to just go back and do what he does best. But he does need to get his hands on the original fabrikator of the drug in order to keep giving it to the Grisha. Enter Yul BoBo (I can never remember his exact name) and the Ice Heist.
“But, wait,” you say, “Kirigan loves his Grisha. Everything he’s done has been to protect the Grisha. Why would he give them a drug that eventually kills them and is harmful to them?” Like many complex villains, he started out with good intentions, but they’ve become twisted over the centuries. He’s become blinded by his own bullshit and can’t see that he’s actually doing harm to those he intended to/meant to protect and elevate.
Kirigan also needs to find Alina because he still needs her power. It’s an obsession now. He teams up with the privateer Sturmhond (who shall be revealed as a Prince of Ravka a little later) to find her and goes on a sea voyage to Novyi Zem. Before going, he sets in motion plans to acquire Yul Boy by recruiting a team in Ketterdam via Van Eck. Kirigan will be hoping Kaz takes this job so that he can eventually get revenge on him for blowing a bomb in his face and escaping him (petty, I know. It’s not my favorite theory, but it could be another way to keep it all connected).
Back in Novyi Zem, Malina are captured by Kirigan and taken aboard Sturmhond’s ship. Kirigan decides to force Mal to track the second amplifier, Rusalye, and is being all horrible and awful to both Mal and Alina, etc. Unlike in the book, they don’t find the sea whip beforeSturmhond betrays Kirigan and rescues (rescues, not kidnaps) Malina.
Ok, I have some winded THOUGHTS about Book Nikolai:
I know he’s a fan favorite, and maybe Book Nikolai gets better, I don’t know yet. I haven’t moved on to Ruin and Rising (R&R) or his duology. But I had issues with him in S&S. If you liked him in that book, that’s cool. To me, though, he came off as a bit of a creep and douchy dickhole, especially at the beginning, which colored my opinion of him for the rest of the book.
I felt his motives were a bit weak, too. Book Nikolai teamed up with the Darkling to re-capture Alina, but he throws one over on the Darkling and abducts Alina himself to use her for hisown purposes. These purposes are:
1) Usurp the throne from his LEGITIMATE, older half-brother, Vasily. Nikolai thinks his brother can be persuaded to just step aside, which is silly to me. My impression before actually meeting him in the book was that Vasily is a spoiled bitch and he’s been raised to believe with all his heart that he WILL be king someday. He probably believes that it’s his God-given right like many monarchs in our world did (especially the Russian ones, for far too long I might add, and that arrogance is what got their monarchy destroyed). Vasily also believes the rumors that Nikolai is a bastard. So unless there’s a gun pointed in his face or another life-threatening reason to motivate him, it’s just not believable for Nikolai, a prince himself, to think Vasily would give up the throne just because he’s lazy. This whole plan makes Nikolai look like a massively naïve dumbass.
2) Marry Alina for political reasons to help cement Nikolai’s own claim. Firstly, I don’t know how marrying a Sun Summoner would support someone’s claim to a throne unless you were intending for her to blast everyone’s ass who opposed you, but that wasn’t Nikolai’s plan with this proposal. He explains the marriage would be purely a political arrangement –and then immediately takes it to hardcore Creep Town by saying they can maintain sexual partners outside the marriage until it’s time to make babies *wink, wink*. Like what is this Handmaid’s Fucking Tale shit? Now, I don’ think this would be that weird if he and Alina knew each other before this. Yes, they spent some time on the boat before getting back to Ravka, but this whack proposal hit the wrong key on a piano for me. ***And after Alina says no that first time, Nikolai continuously brings up the proposal plus Vasily proposes to her and they think she’ll change her mind. It made me insane. She fucking said “no”. No means no, ya boners! It really chaps my ass because neither one of them needs to marry her for anything they want to accomplish and she doesn’t need to marry either one of them in order to help Grisha. She’s the fucking Sun Summoner, she can do what she wants***
Now, this Nikolina thing is clearly in the book to create angsty tension for Book Alina and Book Mal because they suck. But they don’t suck in the show, so do we need another triangle as their conflict? The show eliminated Book Mal’s Toxic Man Mode and even made a point of Kirigan asking consent for sex (that ended up not happening, but that’s not the point). Nikolai’s proposal in the book is just weird, grossly outdated sauce. I also just think there won’t be justifiable time or space for another triangle; remember, we’ve got the Crows to cover.
And I’m not really saying that Nikolai proposing political matrimony, or falling in love with Alina a smidge are necessarily bad things. I’m just saying none of it belongs at the very beginning and it needs to make more sense. Work towards that shit. Leave out the “you can have as many sex partners as you want until it’s time to make babies” talk because it makes Nikolai seem like a creep. Keep Nikolai’s crush one-sided or leave it out completely and save it for Zoya.
But the biggest issue I had with Nikolai the way he is at the start of S&S is that his storyline as it involves Alina strongly repeats the “Alina-is-a-prisoner-pawn” bit. Do we really need/want to see her taken as a prisoner-pawn TWICE in the opening episodes of season 2? Kirigan capturing her is a given, I think, but come on – Nikolai, too?! We literally just came off an entire season 1 arc where Alina was a prisoner-pawn to Kirigan for almost the whole time, but in the end she said, “Fuck this shit!” and got herself out of it like a badass. She even says to the Crows, “I’m not being anyone’s captive ever again!” (Book Alina was never so direct). It is literally stupid.
And I don’t want to see a marriage proposal up front because it paints the picture, again, of becoming a PAWN in someone else’s scheme. Yes, I know she rejects the proposal, but do we need to see Alina repeatedly refusing to be the star puppet in a puppet show? Do we, I ask you?!!!
***But for reals, I am fully prepared for the writers to have kept all of this nonsense in because “it’s the story told in the book”, and I’m fully prepared to be disappointed by it. It wouldn’t be the first time a show or movie did that to me and it won’t be the last.***
End Book Nikolai THOUGHTS.
Speaking of Zoya: There’s no way she went back to Kirigan after he obliterated her family in Novokribriks, so wouldn’t it be cool if it’s revealed she teamed up with Nikolai? Being a Squaller, she’d have a use for being among his crew. If we have a time jump, the idea that Zoya joined Sturmhond’s crew wouldn’t be unbelievable. Can’t you just see her being the one to swerve in on the boat they escape on after Nikolai stages the revolt? It would be good for setting Zoya and Nikolai up as a couple and there’s a reason for notmaking him horny for Alina.
Malina and Sturmhond decide they need to find Rusalye before Kirigan. Meanwhile, Kirigan is like, “Well, Plan B is that I’ll just let them find it and bring it to me”. So, he goes back to Ravka and launches bait: Slaughters the royal family and takes control using Grisha under the influence of jurda purem. That’ll get their attention.
Because Book Nikolai wants to essentially steal the throne from his lazy, dumb brother, it makes him seem like any other greedy ass with good intentions who thinks they can do better (*cough* KIRIGAN!) It may be a bit predictable, but I think there would be more room for character development if Show Nikolai is more of a reluctant/indifferent prince at the beginning because of his questionable parentage. In the book, he does mention not feeling like he belonged at court because of how the rumors made living there kind of suck. But it feels like a footnote tacked onto the bigger goal in the scene, which is wanting to kiss Alina. I say show me more of that prince who’s had to struggle all his life with rumors about his paternity, was treated lesser for it by the entire court and so is bitter towards the institution; a prince who doesn’t want the throne and needs convincing. Kirigan slaughtering his family gives Nikolai motive. Book Nikolai didn’t seem very close to any of his family, but it would add depth to his character if, for example, he did have a bond with his mother and Kirigan kills her. Who else would have been able to pass Nikolai’s bastard ass as a Prince of Ravka except the Queen? She is the only one who knows the truth for sure, and if she hadn’t passed Nikolai off as the king’s son, she would have lost him.
Malina and co. find the macguffin sea whip about the same time the Queen and Vasily are slaughtered. At some point, maybe through some connection Alina has to Kirigan as a result of that heinous binding ritual David did, Alina and Mal figure out Kirigan took over in Os Alta. Nikolai reveals his true identity at this point, and they convince him to return and take back the throne, and/or Nikolai decides to do that on his own. Let’s give him agency, why not? Zoya and Nikolai can also bond over losing their families to Kirigan’s insane ambitions and the Zoyalai ship is launched!
Alina agrees to support Nikolai’s claim to the throne (without a marriage proposal!) and, fully embracing her identity as the Sun Summoner, decides she will take command of the Second Army, which will be BADASS AF.
Edit: Baghra meets up with Alina in secret when they get back to Ravka. After literally 1 minute of reluctance, she agrees to teach Alina how to use her Sun Cut and be badass. I know in R&R she eventually teaches Alina to use the Cut, but that logically correlates to season 3 unless they start cutting some books in half. So I say either have Baghra teach her the Cut in season 2 (because somehow Book Alina just knows how to do that so I don’t know what she even wants Baghra to teach her), or leave Baghra out of it entirely until for season 3.
Mal takes command of the First Army, which doesn’t happen in the book, but would be pretty cool. Because what else is Mal gonna do? He doesn’t do much in S&S except trail along as Alina’s personal bodyguard (boring) bitching and whining at her for doing her own thing; practically fucks Zoya; gets mad constantly at Alina for hanging out with Nikolai, not to mention RESENTING her for her burgeoning powers. Nobody wants to see that shit. They can come up with a better conflict if they need one. Personally, I think it would be refreshing to NOT see a main couple having a major conflict between themselves for once, but that’s just me.
Kirigan slaughters the Apparat and finally takes complete control. Cue Alina’s epic showdown with Kirigan. Maybe they fight over Rusalye’s amplifier if she hasn’t absorbed that into herself yet, maybe Alina uses merzost to merge it in and it fucks Kirigan up. Cue using the Sun Cut, cue controlling his Shadows against him, cue BADASS MOTHAFUCKING BITCH SHIT!!! End of season! Roll credits! Season 3 renewal, please and thank you!
Some last thoughts for this storyline:
- Because I don’t want the Nikolina triangle for no other reason than it would just be too fucking much, I’d prefer them to stick with the Darklina thing. Yeah, I know, it’s wrong, it’s bad, it’s whatever. But it makes more sense. It’s been established that they’re connected on more levels than one, it’s an interesting dynamic because of that, and because they did make Kirigan more sympathetic it helped lower his toxicity a bit. Obviously, I don’t think Darklina is endgame though.
- As with the first book, there needs to be some story changes to make it more exciting and continue giving agency to Alina. S&S was extremely boring especially when they got back to Os Alta. It was like meetings, meetings, meetings, Alina is in meetings all day. Like… why? And also I don’t wanna fucking watch that. The fact that we have so much to do with the Crows and the fact that you could sum up the plot of S&S with maybe 5 bullet points makes me hope that more time will be given to the Crows. But we’ll see, I guess.
- And maybe that stupidest of book characters, Vasily, will still be there to play the part of making that completely stupid deal with the Fjerdans that allowed the Darkling to attack the palace. But it’s weak sauce. I don’t believe Kirigan needs any kind of political cover to sneak in anywhere. The show made it obvious that he can just come smashing in and do whatever the fuck he wants. Doesn’t need the cover of some flimsy trade deal with a useless prince. So off with Vasily’s head. He didn’t matter the first time, why the hell would he matter the second time? WE’VE ONLY GOT 8 EPISODES!
- How cool would it be if Nikolai gets turned into the hybrid nichevo'ya at the end? Like maybe Kirigan is fighting Alina with merzost and it hits Nikolai? That would be a great cliffhanger, just like Kirigan emerging with the nichevo'ya at the end of season 1. But it might fuck a bit with R&R events since it happens in that book. Still, sometimes things need to be rearranged like that because it’s more exciting or serves the movement of the story better
or is motive for renewal. Take Kaz’s explanation to Inej about why he named them “Crows”, for instance. It was put into season 1 to further their development, but it happens in their very last scene together of the last book in their duology.
Speaking of Crows…
The Crows Storyline
I feel strongly they’ll re-introduce us to the Crows with SoC’s truly masterfully epic Chapter 2 where Kaz obliterates the rival Black Tips gang, simultaneously exposing a traitor in his crew – which I guess will be that older guy who was always running up to Kaz in season 1 at the Crow Club with info. According to IMDb, that guy was Big Bolliger.(I thought Bolliger was supposed to be a young guy, but whatever).
Not sure if we’ll see how they deal with Dreesen and Pekka upon coming back to Ketterdam without Alina. It’s something I think they could allude to without having to show it in order to get going on the Ice Heist. I guess it will depend on if there’s a time jump. If there is a time jump, I think we’ll just get an off-hand reference to what went down, which I would prefer in favor of getting the massive Ice Heist going because who gives a shit about a guy we saw for not even 10 minutes and who we never saw again? *whispers**8 episodes!*
As I posited in the other storyline, Kirigan’s contact in Ketterdam for extracting Yul Burbur, the fabrikator responsible for jurda purem’s creation, is Jan Van Eck. Van Eck is in league with Kirigan for the distribution of jurda purem once they get hold of Yul Booboo. He approaches Kaz to do this job, as he does in the book, saying, “I’ll pay you an insane amount of money to do this heist so we can prevent this horrible drug getting out into the world”. But, really, Van Eck wants to be able to control the manufacturing and selling of this drug himself for financial gain, and part of the deal he has with Kirigan is to become his supplier. That would be a pretty powerful position for a greedy ass like Van Eck.
So, Kaz begins assembling the team including Wylan, who he needs to fulfill Jesper’s dream of having a demo guy on the team. But, really, Kaz needs Wylan for insurance against Van Eck as Wylan is his son, but that shan’t be revealed till the end. Kaz approaches Nina about finally breaking Matthias out of Hellgate because they need him to tell them about the Ice Court. She’s probably pissed at him that he’s like, “Oh, yeah, now I’ll break him out because I need him for a job.”
So they break Matthias out of Hellgate. He’s pissed, Nina’s sad and angry, but it all works out. We’re in for lots of fun stuff with the Hellgate prison break, I think.
Jesper will inadvertently betray the Crows by accidentally revealing the job to Pekka and the Dime Lions, but we won’t necessarily see that. Jesper’s betrayal will probably play like a massive surprise at the end of the season as it does in the book. Like there’s no scene, book or show, where you go, “Hey, I think Jesper just fucked up.” It’s something they could play out like they did with Arken, but I think it would be better if it plays out the way it does in the book given that Jesper is one of our beloved characters and not some rando created for the purpose of being expendable later.
Pekka hopes to steal the job as revenge for Kaz stealing (and failing) the Alina job. They sabotage the Crows, leading to the confrontation at the docks, Inej’s stabbing, and the eye-ripping of a lifetime!!!
Kaz’s backstory, I hope, will be told in flashbacks that parallel present events much like they did with Malina’s flashbacks in season 1. I love the use of showing brief scenes in the past to enhance the present-day situation. These flashbacks probably include Kaz leaving his childhood home after his dad’s death; his and Jordie’s close relationship; the revelation that Pekka wined and dined them before fucking them over, which inevitably led to Jordie’s death and Kaz’s haphephobia, thus finally explaining why Kaz hates that goddamn guy so much and wears gloves – all that good stuff. I think that’s all we’ll have time for as far as people’s backstories. Inej and Jesper will have to be saved for later. It’s possible (dare I say even probable?) that they will include Kaz’s first meeting with Inej and in so doing maybe show a little of Inej’s awful life at the Menagerie. We can only hope.
Commence Ice Heist stuff! I don’t remember everything that happens during that, but I imagine the events are going to have to be pretty heavily pared down to its bare bones. For instance, I doubt there will be those scenes with Tante Heleen and Brum. Maybe one or the other, but not both. If I had to say which one they’d include, it would probably be Heleen for Inej’s story development. Nina and Matthias are lower on the rung in terms of character importance at this point in time. Plus, they’d have to introduce Brum whereas we already know Heleen, and if we’re given a prior flashback scene where she’s mistreating Inej, it will be just desserts. But, again, I don’t know that there’s time for any of that.
Oh, shit! Yul Boogo is dead! But wait. His son, Kuwei, is here, and he knows how to make the drug. Grab him!
There’s a lot that happens with the Crows escaping the Ice Court, but operating on the assumption that they did fit all of SoC into season 2: Jesper, Wylan, and Inej steal a fucking tank; Kaz frees Pekka (who is locked up in the Ice Court after his own attempt to break Yul Boyardee out failed) to help intensify the flavor of their beef; Nina’s big, sacrificial jurda purem moment that helps them escape Fjerdan soldiers and get back to their ship.
Before Nina starts struggling with jurda purem withdrawals, she has the conversation on the ship home with Inej about breathing and Inej and Kaz have a convo about armor. You know what I’m talking about, ya book readers.
And then we’re on the Ketterdam beach getting fucked over by Van Eck, Kaz fucking him right back with fake Kuwei (secretly Wylan); Inej being captured and flown off into the sky because Kaz looked at her when they were threatened, giving away that he loves her she’s important to him; Jesper’s betrayal revealed, Kirigan’s involvement revealed; Kaz’s “Gonna get my money, gonna get my girl!” line, and END OF SEASON! ROLL CREDITS!! SEASON 3 RENEWAL, PLEASE AND FUCKING THANK YOU!!!
***I love that I don’t feel the need to figure out justification for any of the characters’ actions in SoC; I can just say what happens and it makes sense, because it was written that much better than Shadow and Bone trilogy lol.***
Some last thoughts for this storyline:
- I feel like there’s a lot of SoC to cram into the second season when the Crows aren’t the sole focus of the show. However, like I said before not much happens in the S&S book, so that may allow more time to devote to the Crows and sort of shift the story so it focuses on them a little more this time around. I have complete faith the writers pulled it off, though. They pulled off Crows being in the first season, so I’m really not terribly worried about the Crows in season 2 because I know it’ll be good. I’m just more curious – ironically – about the S&S side since I had real, raging struggles with that book.
- Sweet baby Wylan is heeeere! I would love it if they credited Wylan in a callback to the bomb Kaz used to get away from Kirigan. I mean, I think it’s been confirmed that Kaz got it from Wylan for the trip to Ravka, that the bomb was a nod to him. My only thing is: Are they REALLY going to keep Wylan looking like Kuwei for god knows how long? Are they really going to do that? Great twist for SoC ending, but that was probably the most major thing I didn’t like about Crooked Kingdom – that Wylan spent all of that book stuck looking like Kuwei. I just don’t think it’ll translate well onscreen and wonder if they’ll keep that for season 3, if there is one. But that’s season 3 speculation.
- More Nina and Matthias and Wylan and Jesper is a given. It won’t be hard to start repairing Helnik’s relationship and lay the breadcrumbs for Wesper. If they could shove Helnik’s origin story into the first season (and I have thoughts on how successful that was, but it’s not important), then they can damn well fit in more Helnik and set up Wesper.
- We got a lotta ships here and a lotta characters, and – I'ma say it again – only 8 goddamn episodes. So I won’t be surprised if some characters like Tolya, Tamar, Genya, David, Fedyor, Nadia, and Zoya don’t get much time, or even any time. But I’m fine with that. At this point in the show, those characters – with the possible exception of Zoya, maybe Genya – are not 100% crucial to the forward momentum of Alina or the Crows, so to devote precious minutes to them is really not a good idea unless they are going to forward the main characters in some way.
Well, those are my thoughts and theories. What are yours?
Ok, they taking so fucking long to announce renewal of Shadow and Bone…
I feel like I need to start the grieving process in case:
If it gets cancelled:
And getting revenge:
Just to clarify: Have no idea what the status is of a season 2. This is just me being an obsessed possessed nut job.
When Kaz says:
He means:
I gotta protec…
and I gonna attac…
Because I need to keep my family intac!
Awwww
Subtext: 1) the implicit or metaphorical meaning, 2) a message which is not stated directly but can be inferred…
Where’s my multi-season announcement, ya bitches!
I’M ABOUT TO SMASH SOMETHING.
She’d laughed, and if he could have bottled the sound and gotten drunk on it every night, he would have. It terrified him.
Six of Crows, Ch. 38
“That’s the laugh,” he murmured.
Crooked Kingdom, Ch. 44
(Oh, us, too, Kaz, now that Amita exists as Inej. Us, too ❤️)
My drugs of choice for about 2 weeks straight now:
And no end in sight. Unless it gets cancelled. In which case I'ma be like a Grisha on a jurda parem withdrawal: Fucking PISSED and struggling - and then dead.
Also, good gawwd, Ben Barnes…
Fantasy King, indeed.
“His eyes scanned her face as they always had, closely, hungrily, snatching at the details of her like the thief he was - the even set of her dark brows, the rich brown of her eyes, the upward tilt of her lips. He didn’t deserve peace and he didn’t deserve forgiveness, but if he was going to die today, maybe theone thing he’d earned was the memory of her - brighter than anything he would ever have a right to - to take with him to the other side.”
Crooked Kingdom, Ch. 26
