A/N: Be still my Lantsov heart, I have a new whumpee.

Set after season 2 except 1) David lives, 2) Alina did not use merzost to bring Mal back; Nina was able to heal him, 3) therefore Alina's power is not corrupted and she's still the Sun Summoner. Will update Wednesday and Saturday.

Chapter 1

Nikolai stood bowed over the table in the War Room, alone, poring over maps and reports. Ever since the mass slaughter and attempted assassination at his coronation, the war with Fjerda had reached a new level. Ravka was bankrupt, and since he was no longer Sturmhond, so was Nikolai. He was holding his country together by a thread.

A sharp stab of pain speared through his shoulder, and he doubled over with a gasp, his hand shooting up to clutch at the site. The wound the Darkling's nichevo'ya had given him was getting progressively worse. He knew such wounds couldn't be healed by Grisha power, but he'd expected it to slowly mend naturally, if not in a maladapted way. But it wasn't. Nikolai had the passing thought he may be dying. Which was the absolute worst thing to happen right now. He couldn't save his country if he was dead.

He rubbed at his shoulder, wincing at the raised, gnarled flesh he could feel beneath his shirt. He'd been keeping this hidden, which he knew was not wise, but secrecy was how he'd survived so long, and his current position was precarious at best.

A completely different pang hit his heart. He desperately missed Tolya and Tamar, the two people who knew him best for who and what he was, without the pretenses and demonstrative roles. They were the two people he never had to wear a facade around.

Of course, there was another, but Alina had just as much to deal with, and Nikolai didn't want to add to her burden. That was the justification he kept using, even as a part of his mind acknowledged it was a thin one at best. He'd wanted to reach out a hundred times, but every time he thought about actually doing so, something held him back. The words would form in his head. I need you. Help me. But he could never get them to come out of his mouth. Instead, he always found himself shaking off the noticeable lapse, giving that charming smile, and going on as though nothing was wrong.

But something was terribly wrong. The pain had not only gotten worse, but it had begun to spread. Nikolai knew he couldn't handle this alone. So he took a deep breath and straightened, pulled himself together, and walked out into the hall. He was surprised when he opened his mouth to tell the guard to send for Alina how his voice nearly failed him once again. As though something were actively trying to prevent him from speaking out.

That sent all new alarm bells ringing through him, and he finally managed to grit out an order that he wanted to see Alina Starkov in his private study. As soon as the words left him, his heart began hammering and his hands turned clammy. He didn't like this.

"Summon Genya, Zoya, and David as well," he added.

The internal turmoil intensified, making him nauseous. Nikolai was apprehensive about including those three, but Alina trusted them, and they might be able to help.

A voice inside him, though, like a wispy susurration, said this was a mistake. He bore the mark of the Darkling, and they would turn on him.

He tried to shake it off and hold onto his resolve.

He entered his study and went to stand by the window, fidgeting anxiously. The pain in his shoulder was screaming now, and he nearly choked on it. It felt like acid in his blood, and there was a burning stretch and pull beneath his skin that he felt the urge to claw out.

Stop, stop, stop, pleaded the voice in his head, but there was a strange echo, like it was partly him and partly something else…

The door opened and Alina and Zoya entered.

"What's going on?" Alina asked.

Nikolai's breath left him as he opened his mouth to answer. Don't speak, his instinct was telling him.

Alina quirked a brow at him. "Nikolai?"

Zoya regarded him with sharp scrutiny. "The king is speechless; this must be serious," she commented.

He coughed hoarsely to clear his throat. "We're waiting for Genya and David," he managed to say.

He should send them away now. No, he couldn't do that, it would arouse suspicion. What was there to be suspicious of?

He clenched his fists at his side, straining against this now very urgent, very powerful urge inside him to call this whole thing off. But Nikolai Lantsov never backed down from a fight; he would not start now.

The door creaked open again as Genya and David arrived, their expressions curious and questioning.

Nikolai moved past them to shut the door. "We are not to be disturbed, no matter what," he told the guards, his tone coming out a tad harsher than he'd intended. He then closed the door and locked it. His hands were trembling now, and the pain in his shoulder was spreading down his chest. He turned around and found the four Grisha looking at him with piqued expressions.

"What's going on?" Alina asked again, this time in concern.

Nikolai opened his mouth to answer, then stopped. He could still change his mind, it wasn't too late.

Genya's brows furrowed. "You're in pain."

He swallowed hard against the resistance churning inside him and nodded. He then began shrugging off his suspenders and unbuttoning his shirt. He could barely breathe now, and blood was roaring in his ears. Genya moved forward in alarm, only to freeze in her tracks when he let his shirt fall to the floor.

Alina's eyes widened and she shot a hand up over her mouth. "Saints, Nikolai."

Genya backed up, shaking her head. "No, it can't be. That's a device of- of him."

"The nichevo'ya wounded me in that battle," he said. "I was waiting for it to heal on its own, but it's not. It's- it's getting worse."

Alina took a step toward him. "How could you have let it get this bad before telling me?" she said angrily.

His brow furrowed a fraction in confusion before he realized the pain was now wrapping around his chest like barbed wire. He glanced down at himself, and horror zinged through him. The spidery black veins that had only this morning encased his shoulder had now forked down and branched all across his torso.

He looked up, blinking in shock. "It- it wasn't," he stammered before a burst of agony ripped through him, cutting him off. He gasped and dropped to his knees.

There were several exclamations, and Alina ran forward to drop down beside him.

"What's happening?" she yelled.

He shook his head, unable to draw breath.

"Genya!"

The Tailor looked horrified, yet she staggered over and reached out to try to heal him. But the shadow veins pulsed and surged, and Nikolai threw his head back as a scream tore from his throat. Genya scrambled away from him.

That burbling instinct that had simmered quietly all these weeks was now a primal screech in his head. It burst forth, swallowing his mind in an explosion of darkness and tearing through his body. His fingers split open and sprouted talons. His next scream turned into an animalistic shriek. His back ruptured. Nikolai cried out, but he was bombarded with a wave of thick, cloying shadow pouring down his throat into his lungs. He drowned in it.

A strange film covered his eyes then, and with one last explosion of shadow, he felt webbed wings snap taut behind him, and he slammed a hand down on the floor, talons gouging the hardwood. He rose to his feet and sniffed the air, taking in the scent of sweat and fear.

Prey.

Four bodies with frantically beating hearts cowered away from him. Blood pulsed just beneath the thin skin of those fragile necks. He narrowed in one of them with a growl, the red-hair that reeked of fright.

"Nikolai!" a voice shouted.

He took a step forward, but a blast of wind suddenly slammed him into the wall. He scrambled into a crouch with a vicious snarl at the dark-haired woman with arms crossed in front of her. Her eyes were both frightened yet hard as steel.

"Nikolai, no!"

He whirled toward the other dark-haired girl. Light was swirling in both her palms.

"Nikolai, don't do this," she pleaded. "Stay with me."

Alina.

Nikolai screamed against the force suffocating him. Pain shot through him, making his whole body flinch.

Alina's eyes widened. "Fight it, Nikolai!"

He tried, he tried with all his might. But the bloodlust was too strong. The demon wanted to rip and tear and devour, and he couldn't let it. So he did the only thing he could. He focused on flapping his monstrous black wings and hurled himself out the window in a shower of shattered glass. The demon howled at him, but Nikolai pushed on, flying away into the night as fast and far as he could.

Alina stared in shocked horror at the creature disappearing into the night. Saints, this couldn't be happening.

Urgent banging reverberated against the door. "Moi tsar! Is everything all right?"

Alina jolted out of her stupor and whirled toward it. "Everything is fine!" she yelled. "Stay at your post!"

Genya was on the floor, trembling violently as David held her.

"What just happened?" Zoya asked.

Alina shook her head dazedly. "Merzost," she muttered. "The Darkling used it to create the nichevo'ya, and it must have infected Nikolai when it…" She trailed off, feeling sick as his screams echoed freshly in her head. The sight of those shadows cracking beneath his skin, splitting out like blades to form razor sharp talons and wings, and when his eyes had gone completely black…Alina had thought he was gone, murdered right in front of her as this evil creature was born in his stead.

Genya's gasping distracted her from the thought, and Alina quickly hurried over to her friend.

"It's not the nichevo'ya," she said earnestly, clasping Genya's shaking hands.

Genya gave a jerky nod.

Alina swallowed hard. "Nikolai is still in there."

"Are you sure?" Zoya asked skeptically.

"Yes. I saw him. He stopped himself from attacking us. He was fighting it. We have to find him and figure out a way to reverse this."

"How?" David asked.

Alina already knew whom to ask for the first part, but there was a more urgent need at the moment. She looked at Zoya. "We cannot let anyone know what's happened."

Zoya nodded in agreement. "But how are we going to explain Nikolai's disappearance? Especially during a time like this."

Alina knew this was bad in so many ways. With the war, they couldn't exactly say Ravka's king and his betrothed decided to take a vacation.

"Can you tailor someone to look like Nikolai?" Zoya asked Genya.

Genya slowly collected herself and nodded stiffly, then got to her feet with Alina and David's help. "I need someone of similar height and appearance."

"Find someone we can trust with this," Alina said. "But don't give the details of why they're needed."

Genya nodded, and she and David exited the study, closing the door quickly so the guards couldn't get a peek inside.

Alina went to the desk and grabbed some parchment and a pen, then wrote out a quick message. She stuffed it in an envelope and sealed it, then went to the door to give it to the guard outside.

"Send this to the Volkvolny with all haste," she commanded, then shut the door again.

"You're calling him back?" Zoya said.

Alina exhaled heavily. "I trust no one else with this." And the crew of the Volkvolny were Nikolai's friends above all else. They were going to need that.

Genya and David returned with a young royal guard.

"This is Isaak Andreyev," she introduced.

Alina looked him up and down. She could see the resemblance they needed to capitalize on. "Are you aware of why we called you here?" she asked.

"No…" Isaak's eyes tracked the room, obviously noting the absence of the king—and the broken window. "Only that it is of the utmost importance to King Nikolai, but…where is he?" he asked warily.

"What I'm about to tell you cannot leave this room," Alina said with austere severity. "Nikolai has been taken."

The young man's eyes widened.

"Ravka is vulnerable," Alina barreled on before he could ask questions. "We cannot be shown to be weak. Therefore, we need you to stand in as Nikolai's double while a small group of us sets out to retrieve him. Genya will tailor you to look the part."

Isaak's mouth moved soundlessly, his expression flabbergasted. "But- I cannot rule a country," he spluttered.

"You won't be," Alina said. "Genya and Zoya are in charge until I bring Nikolai back. But the king needs to be seen so no one's suspicions are aroused. Do you understand the necessity of this?"

Isaak slowly nodded.

"Can you do it?"

He faltered nervously but then nodded. "Yes, Sankta Alina. I vow to do my best."

"Thank you."

Alina nodded to Genya, who stepped forward and began to shift the features on Isaak's face, morphing them into Nikolai's. Alina's stomach twisted at the familiar visage, the one that had so often smiled at her, before Kirigan's power had shattered everything once again.

Genya stepped back.

Isaak reached up to touch his face. "How do I look?"

"Passable," Zoya answered. "But your demeanor is all wrong."

"We will practice," Genya interjected.

She drew the young man aside, and Zoya turned to Alina.

"I should go with you."

Alina shook her head. "No, I need you here keeping everything together. David will come with me."

David straightened. "Ah, what? That's- uh, no, no."

"You know the most about merzost," she insisted.

"I barely know anything about it," he argued. "It's new. This whole situation is new."

Alina sighed patiently. "Yes, but you've studied Morozova's journals. And you're all we have."

David grimaced but gave a clipped nod. He glanced over at Genya, who flashed him a small, encouraging look from across the room.

"Be careful," Zoya said.

Alina nodded, shifting her gaze out into the dark night. Saints, don't take him from me too, she prayed.