Disclaimer: I don't own the Grisha Trilogy and its characters – it belongs to Leigh Bardugo. I do not own the Shadow & Bone TV series, which was developed by Eric Heisserer for Netflix and based on Leigh Bardugo's books. Any recognisable dialogue is from the books or TV show – some lines may be included verbatim, others in an amended form.
First Day
When Genya woke Alina this time, she didn't bother knocking, she simply entered the room with her kit in hand and shook Alina gently.
"Time to get up, it's your first day of lessons and you don't want to miss breakfast."
Alina felt like there were butterflies in her stomach, both nervous and excited about the day ahead.
Genya distracted her with a pile of new clothes. There were undergarments, three sets of fitted trousers and long shirts (all in black), two pairs of sturdy boots and two beautiful woolen keftas (black with delicate gold embroidery).
She wouldn't have the Tailor to help her from now on, unless it was a special occasion, so she was glad to see that the clothing was all simple.
"The trousers and shirts go under your kefta," Genya explained, "for the next few years you don't need to wear your kefta when you're with Botkin – it's only when you start combat training that you keep it on, since you have to learn how to fight while wearing it. Leave the trousers and shirt in the basket by your door each evening and they'll be cleaned for you. The keftas are made by the Fabrikators and you can wear the same one for weeks here without any issues. Someone will collect it every two weeks to get it washed, that's why you've got a spare. And they're working on a fancier kefta for you, for more formal occasions, but you don't have to worry about that at the moment."
It sounded simple enough. She was only thankful that she wouldn't have to wear anything as complicated as the outfits she knew were favoured by the royal family and the wealthy lords and ladies of the court.
"Now," Genya said, "we haven't got long but we need to talk about your hair."
"What about it?" Alina asked.
She glanced in the mirror. Her hair still retained the gloss and shine Genya's work had given it, and it seemed fine to her.
The Tailor sighed, "Alina, do you even own a brush?"
She flushed slightly. The combs and brushes at the orphanage had always been getting lost and Alina had long grown used to the tangles in her long hair.
Genya produced a brush from her kit and handed it over, "I thought you might need one."
She spent the next ten minutes giving Alina a brief lesson on how to quickly and easily braid her hair to keep it out of her face during lessons with Botkin.
"Believe me," she warned, "the last thing you want is to be running around with all your hair blowing into your face – the last time Marie left her hair loose in one of Botkin's sessions she accidentally ran into a tree."
For the moment, Genya braided the front of Alina's hair away from her face but left the rest down, telling her to put it into a braid just before she went to the training grounds.
Alina headed into the bathroom to wash her face and get dressed into her new kefta. When she emerged, Genya clapped her hands in excitement.
"Oh, you look wonderful."
Alina was starting to get nervous. When she looked in the mirror she saw a girl she barely recognised staring back at her. She was also reminded that her kefta was a colour no one but the Darkling had ever been permitted to wear – she hadn't really thought about it before, but now she wondered if it was a good idea to stick out so obviously.
"Maybe I should have asked for blue."
Genya's eyes widened, "why in the name of all the Saints would you do that, Alina? It's such an honour for the Darkling to allow you to wear his colour."
"I just … I'm a nobody orphan from Keramzin, Genya. I'm not what everyone thinks."
"You are Alina Starkov. You are the Sun Summoner," Genya declared, "you just need a little time to adjust."
She appreciated the Tailor's attempts at comfort, but it didn't entirely quash the part of her that wondered if this was all just a fluke and she would soon be exposed as a fraud.
"Come on," Genya tugged her towards the door, "you'll feel better once you've eaten."
Alina wasn't so sure about that, but she followed Genya through a maze of corridors anyway, hesitating only when they reached the double doors that lead to the dining room.
"Might as well get it over with," the older girl said softly, "just remember, you don't have to tell them anything if you don't want to."
The room, buzzing with chatter previously, went silent as they walked in.
Alina reached out to Genya, grateful when the other girl squeezed her hand reassuringly in return.
The room's occupants stared intently at Alina's black kefta, the obvious sign of her difference. Some of them were curious, others excited, a few seemed calculating. A pretty dark-haired girl in a blue kefta who was about Genya's age glared ferociously as if Alina's very existence offended her.
The short walk from the door to the empty seats on the far-left side of room seemed much longer than it should be, especially as the noise built up again, this time clearly about her.
As Genya had noted previously, most of the Grisha present were sat according to their Order. Only in the small group of adult Grisha, including Ivan, in one corner of the room was there a mix of red, blue and purple keftas.
"See," the Tailor said as they sat down, "not so bad."
"They're talking about me, aren't they?"
Genya shrugged, "they talk about me all the time. I've learnt to ignore them."
Alina felt a bit jealous of her friend's attitude. Alina had practice in ignoring the taunts she would sometimes be subject to at the orphanage, but they still hurt and they always bothered her.
Her stomach rumbled and she decided the best thing to do would be to distract herself with food.
She poured herself some tea and then looked around at the food on offer, poking one of the platters with a grimace.
"Not a fan of herring?" Genya laughed.
"What happened to the pastries we had before?" she asked mournfully.
"Special occasion. The Darkling likes us to have peasant food most of the time, to show solidarity with the Ravkan people and keep us humble."
It was understandable. Healthier too. Alina still wished for the pastries, though.
She sighed and ladled some buckwheat kasha into a bowl, adding a handful of berries on top.
Alina was about half-way through her food when she heard the sound of a chair scraping across the floor.
Fedyor sat down on her other side, a genial smile on his face, "good morning, Miss Starkov, Genya."
"You can call me Alina," she offered.
He nodded and smiled again. Ivan might be intimidating, but she was starting to think Fedyor was more of a ball of sunshine than she, the supposed Sun Summoner, was.
Alina turned back to her food as the other two began talking about a new invention the Fabrikators had created, something they called a greenhouse, which would apparently enable fruit and vegetables to be grown even during the long, cold Ravkan winter.
Once they were done with their breakfast, Genya stood and glanced at Alina apologetically, "sorry, I have to go now. The oprichniki have a copy of your schedule and they can show you where you need to be."
"Don't worry," Fedyor said, "I'll walk to her first class with her."
Alina smiled gratefully. She had no issues with her oprichniki, but their near-constant silence could be unnerving.
Fedyor chatted with her as they made their way to the History classroom.
He was from Poliznaya, he told her, a city to the south of Os Alta. He was ten years older than she was and had come to the Little Palace when he was six years old. When the time came for him to specialise, he had chosen to be a Heartrender rather than a Healer because he felt he would be more useful to Ravka as a soldier.
Fedyor and Ivan had been paired together since Fedyor had begun combat training six years previously and both of them were aides to the Darkling, sometimes travelling with him in the field and other times carrying out various missions on his behalf. It was hard to imagine cheerful Fedyor and stoic Ivan getting along, but there was genuine affection in Fedyor's voice when he spoke of the other Heartrender.
He delivered her safely to the classroom, giving her an affectionate pat on the shoulder when he left.
She entered the room with some trepidation and nearly jumped out of her skin when two girls about her age appeared on either side of her.
"So nice to meet you," said one.
"Really pleased you're here," the other added.
"I'm Nadia, I'm a Squaller."
"Marie, an Inferni."
They said all of this at top speed and with wide grins on their faces.
"I'm Alina," she replied, "err … nice to meet you."
For a moment they seemed slightly disappointed that she hadn't said more, hadn't given any hints about what her power might be. It didn't last, though, and they tugged her along to sit next to them, telling her all about the topics they had recently been studying.
Alina was thankful to realise that she did know some of what they had been learning. There was a focus on Grisha history at the Little Palace, but they also had to learn the general history of Ravka and the countries surrounding it.
When the teacher arrived, she set the class some reading and then beckoned Alina over to her desk. The woman's kefta was red with grey embroidery, signifying she was trained as a Healer and probably worked in the Little Palace infirmary when she wasn't teaching.
She gave Alina a list of the most recent topics they had studied, a pile of notes and a list of activities for her to complete.
"No need to worry," she reassured Alina after seeing her growing look of panic, "work through them at your own pace. You will have exams in other subjects, but for History we simply try to ensure every student has a working knowledge of relevant historical topics. We have children coming in at different ages and it isn't practical to be too structured in our lessons."
She nodded. History had always been a subject she enjoyed, although her education at Keramzin had been patchy at best.
For the rest of the hour their teacher taught them all about one of the earlier Ravkan Kings – Ivan the Golden – and how he had begun construction of what was now the Little Palace.
As everyone stood to leave the room, Nadia and Marie appeared again with smiles on their faces.
"What do you have next?" Marie asked.
Alina pulled out her schedule to consult it, "erm, Languages."
"We're going there too," Marie told her, "we can walk with you."
The two girls kept up a steady stream of chatter as they made their way to the Languages Classroom, barely letting Alina get a word in edgeways as they filled her in on what they considered to be all the important gossip.
Apparently, the pretty girl who had glared at her at breakfast was Zoya Nazyalensky, a talented Squaller who was, in Nadia's words, "dying of jealousy" because of Alina's black kefta. Marie warned her to watch out when she trained with Baghra, because the old woman liked to whack students on the legs with her cane when they didn't meet her exacting standards. Nadia added that Baghra didn't limit herself to using her cane – on two different occasions she had released a swarm of bees on both Marie and Nadia to 'encourage' them in learning to summon at will. The Heartrenders were almost all horrible snobs, especially Sergei Beznikov, although they'd seen her talking to Fedyor and they had to concede that he was surprisingly nice for a Heartrender. And there was talk that a teenage Inferni called Natalia had tried to flee the Little Palace because she didn't want to fight in the Second Army, but both Nadia and Marie were sure that couldn't be true because of course the safest place for Grisha was under the watchful eye of the Darkling.
"You don't have to sit with Genya Safin at meals, you know," Marie whispered as they took their seats in the Languages Classroom, "she's the Queen's pet, not even a real Grisha if you ask me."
Up until that moment Alina had considered Nadia and Marie as gossipy but friendly and ultimately harmless. It shocked her to hear Marie talking so rudely about Genya.
"I like sitting with Genya, she's my friend. The Darkling asked her specifically to give me a tour and help me."
Invoking the Darkling's name seemed like a good idea. Everyone at the Little Palace deferred to him and surely they wouldn't consider him to have made a mistake.
Marie looked a little abashed, "oh, well if the Darkling requested it then I'm sure it must be fine. He probably just wants to make sure you have someone to run any little errands for you."
Alina didn't bother to correct her, not wanting to cause too much fuss on her first day. She didn't entirely understand what set Genya apart from the other students but it seemed like something she should talk to the Tailor about herself.
Alina was soon distracted by the horror that was a Languages lesson.
The younger students all learnt the basics of Fjerdan and Shu, having two lessons in each language every week.
Today was Fjerdan and it was, unfortunately a disaster.
The only Fjerdan words Alina knew were Drüskelle, for the Grisha hunters, and ajor, which meant hello. By the end of the lesson, she knew three more words and not much else. Her attempt at an accent was atrocious – she just couldn't work out how to pronounce the words correctly, even with Marie trying to help.
"How long do we have to learn Fjerdan?" she asked gloomily as they exited the classroom.
"Everyone does it until they're fourteen," Nadia told her, "and some students carry it on if they've got a talent for languages or they're likely to be stationed near Fjerda."
Saints … six more years of this. Alina only hoped Shu was a little easier.
Alina parted ways with Marie and Nadia, who were heading to Geography, and her oprichniki showed her the way to the Grisha Theory classroom.
She spent an hour scribbling notes on concepts she barely understood, hoping they would become a little clearer once she'd learnt to summon her light without amplification from the Darkling.
It wasn't that she had expected her studies to be easy, but the lessons were far more complex than she expected. She had never been to an actual school, the orphans all being taught in a fairly haphazard way by whoever was available at Keramzin, but she was fairly sure that eight-year-olds didn't usually study topics like combustible materials, catalysts or the philosophical concepts of odinakovost and etovost.
She remembered the library she had seen and thought she would be spending a lot of time in there for the foreseeable future.
Alina couldn't see Genya at lunch, so she sat with Marie and Nadia, letting their idle chatter wash over her as she thought about the day so far.
The other children in her classes had been so focused. No one had ever paid much attention to the sporadic lessons they received at the orphanage and it was a little eerie to see children of eight and nine so quiet and attentive. Still, what they were learning was admittedly more interesting than normal schoolwork, and their teachers were certainly more engaged than the exhausted women who gave the orphans lessons at Keramzin.
"Does Baghra teach you two?" Alina asked.
"Not anymore," Nadia explained, "she trains all the new Grisha for a few months, but then we go into classes with our own Order that some of the older Grisha teach."
She paused there, clearly hoping Alina would take the opportunity to explain who she would be training with once Baghra's lessons were over. Alina didn't take the bait, though, if only because she was too distracted by wondering whether she would have to stay with Baghra for the entirety of her studies – after all, there were no other Sun Summoners she could learn from.
She ate the rest of her food in silence and then stood to make her way to her lesson with Baghra.
"Watch out for her cane," Marie reminded her as one oprichnik led the way and the other fell into place behind her.
-x-x-x-
The windowless stone hut in front of Alina seemed oddly intimidating and she was apprehensive as she walked to the door while her oprichniki stationed themselves nearby.
She knocked but there was no answer. When she knocked again, loudly, and heard nothing, she steeled herself and pushed open the door.
A wave of heat hit her and Alina felt herself beginning to sweat profusely in her wool kefta. As her eyes began to adjust to the dark she managed to make out a narrow bed, basin and stove.
Two chairs sat in the middle of the room, next to a large oven that contained a roaring fire.
"Shut the door, girl. You're letting the heat out."
Alina jumped at the voice, unable to see anyone else in the room but herself. She hurried to close the door, though, and when she turned around she finally saw the owner of the voice.
She looked ancient and young all at once. Her face was sharp, skin taut and smooth. Her back was straight and her coal black hair was not marred by a single silver strand. Still, the firelight made her look eerie, almost skeletal, and she gripped her infamous cane, which seemed to be made of silvery petrified wood.
She beckoned Alina forward into the firelight, "so, you're the Sun Summoner. Let's have a look at you."
Alina didn't really want to get any closer to this intimidating old woman, but Baghra's tone brooked no refusal.
"Hmph," she said as she looked Alina up and down, "there's not much to you."
Alina didn't think Baghra should sound so surprised. She was an eight-year-old orphan who had been lucky enough to have a roof but had always suffered from ill-health and a lack of substantial meals.
"Well, girl, are you mute?" Baghra asked when Alina didn't speak.
"No," she replied.
Just intimidated, she thought to herself.
Baghra sighed, "let's see what you can do then."
She gripped Alina's wrist with one bony hand and the surety flooded through her as it had with the Darkling, if not at quite the same strength.
Sunlight erupted in the room, shimmering over the hut's stone walls.
It was gone the instant Baghra let go of her, the room dim once more.
"Now," said Baghra, "call it yourself."
It was not as easy as Baghra seemed to think it should be.
Alina strained and sweated and screwed her face up in concentration, but nothing seemed to come, not even when Baghra whacked her leg with her cane.
"What use is a Sun Summoner who can't summon?"
"I've only just found out I'm a Sun Summoner," she protested.
Baghra only sighed and made her try again … and again, and again.
When no light came, her teacher gestured her to come closer again.
"Remember how this feels," she told Alina as her hand closed around her wrist once more, "try and find where the light comes from."
Sunlight flooded the room once more and she did as she was told, trying to sense exactly how it felt to call the light.
Baghra let go a moment later, "now, try again."
Alina took a deep breath, cupped her hands together and tried to sense the light inside her.
A few seconds past, but then she felt something. She grasped for it and light flickered between her palms.
Her concentration was broken by her delight and the light vanished mere moments after it had appeared.
"Well, that's something," Baghra told her, "although what use it will be against the Fold is hard to imagine."
Alina smiled anyway. She had called the light all by herself – it wasn't a fluke or a mistake.
"I really am Grisha," she whispered.
"Well of course you are, girl," Baghra said, using her cane to give her another whack on her shins, "what else did you think you were, a mouse? Now, out you go, tomorrow I want you to hold that light for more than a few paltry seconds."
-x-x-x-
Alina made her way to the training grounds with a spring in her step. The light she had called hadn't been much, but it had been all hers, without any help from either the Darkling or Baghra.
She was a little bit early, so she braided her hair the way Genya had taught her and sat down on one of the benches to wait.
Soon enough the other children arrived. She recognised Nadia, Marie and Sergei, but the rest were a blur of names and faces she felt sure she would soon forget.
Botkin sorted them all into two teams and began to explain the rules of Lapta. It was a familiar bat and ball game, one some of the children at the orphanage had played often, though Alina herself had never joined in.
A few minutes in and Alina remembered why she had never played Lapta – she didn't have nearly enough energy for it.
Botkin called her over when they were barely five minutes into the game. He had clearly noticed how slowly she was moving and how out of breath she was.
"Little girl is not strong."
"I was ill a lot," she muttered, slightly defensively, "I'm used to walking, not running."
"Regular use of your powers will help," he told her, "but for now you should do quieter exercise."
Alina didn't really want to be doing something different to the other students, but she supposed it was better than potentially fainting in the middle of a lesson. And at least now she knew that she'd hopefully get stronger soon.
To her surprise, Botkin sat down with her himself as the others continued their game, showing her a few stretches and less strenuous exercises she could do for the next few weeks until she built up some strength.
While she tried to copy his movements, he taught her a few basic words and phrases in Shu. She had been very young when her parents died and her mother had never had the opportunity to teach her any of the language, so it was nice to feel some sort of connection to the woman whose face she barely remembered.
She stumbled badly over the pronunciation, but by the time the lesson came to an end Alina could, in halting, Ravkan-accented Shu, ask for a drink, give her name and say good morning.
-x-x-x-
As she stumbled back to her room after Botkin's lesson, Alina failed to see the girl in her path and they collided with a thud.
Her oprichniki stepped forward but did not interfere. Alina thought they might have warned her what was about to happen, but maybe their duties extended simply to stopping would-be-assassins and not preventing her from being a victim of her own carelessness.
"Sorry, sorry," Alina stuttered out.
She nearly groaned when she looked up and realised she had walked into the dark-haired girl that Nadia hold told her was called Zoya.
"Sorry," she repeated, hoping that would be the end of it.
Zoya sneered and leaned in closer so only Alina could hear her words, "I suppose it was too much to hope that you would have any amount of grace. It doesn't matter what colour kefta you wear, it's clear you still stink of the orphanage."
The Squaller then tossed her perfectly styled, glossy curls over her shoulder and stormed off without another word.
Alina sighed as she walked the rest of the way to her room. It hurt a little bit that Zoya seemed to have an unreasonable dislike for her, but she was used to taunts from other children. She would simply do her best to avoid the older girl as much as possible.
Genya didn't turn up for dinner, but Fedyor sat down next to her to ask how her day had been.
She was glad to chat to the easy-going Heartrender, although a little put out that he had dragged Ivan with him.
Fedyor asked questions like he was genuinely interested, while Ivan only interrogated her intently.
"It's her first day, Ivan," Fedyor nudged the man next to him good-naturedly, "let her get used to things."
"She should be training hard to deal with the Fold," Ivan argued.
"She's eight years old," Fedyor said flatly with a roll of his eyes, "she won't be going near the Fold for years."
Alina's gaze went back and forth between them as they bickered. For a few minutes she thought they might be having an actual fight, but then Fedyor whispered something she couldn't hear and, though Ivan didn't smile, his expression softened slightly.
Fedyor must have a superpower, she thought, to be able to deal with serious, grumpy Ivan.
They finished the rest of their meal in peace and when Alina left with her oprichniki she managed to find it in her to be polite enough to wish Ivan a good evening after she had said a friendlier goodbye to Fedyor.
It was only after she had washed, put on her nightgown and climbed into the huge bed she still couldn't believe was hers, that she thought briefly of Mal back in Keramzin.
She could picture his face clearly – laughing, smiling … frowning at her coldly once he realised she was Grisha.
No, she didn't want to think about Mal, not now.
Her day had been exhausting, but it had been wonderful too. She remembered that moment in Baghra's hut, calling her power without amplification, seeing the light that she had brought forth. It had made her feel like she really belonged in the Little Palace.
What was so wrong, she thought, with being Grisha?
When she slept, she dreamt only of light dancing around her.
Thanks for reading. Hope you enjoyed it.
The next chapter, including snapshots from Alina's life at the Little Palace while she is eight and nine years old, should be out next Friday.