ACT ONE SHATTER LIKE GLASS CHAPTER FOUR BY THE LOTUSES
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KRYIA SOKOLOV DID NOT CARE SO MUCH FOR CAUTIONARY TALES. After all, in the chilling hills of Fjerda, she had become one herself. A villain, phantom and pariah; she was what most citizens of the country called a 'holy terror.' A creature crafted by Djel destined to remind them that their Grisha were deserving of iron chains. And they weren't rather fond of a Durast like her; a Durast that flayed steel like the skin of an apple.
She was a warning to young Fjerdan children and a prize a Drüskelle wished to possess, and sometimes they truly did possess her. Not in ownership of her abilities but in the workings of her mind. She dreamt of them on the nights where she was most lonely. They were not nightmares because the Drüskelle did not frighten her. Kryia dreamt of a place where she was known as something not tethered to Sinika's name. Even in Kerch that was the only weight her name carried, because that was all the weight her mentor would allow.
She hoped for the day she was no longer simply Sinika's thieving Grisha and have a name reared and mothered by her own hand, and not the callous fist of another. She would make a start with Kaz Brekker, and maybe that goat too.
Kryia barely uttered, "I'll meet you back at the skiff," Before gently breezing past a confused Oriel. If what she saw was just a figment of her imagination, what harm would it bring to approach it?
The rally crowd was larger than she assumed, among them dozens of First Army soldiers with a lot more guns than she liked. You're in West Ravka, she remembered. Uttering Sinika's name would grant her some privilege, well, in theory. Kryia could see him clearly now, standing practically in front of her with the same goat tucked under his arm.
And as her hand reached out to touch its fur, a part of her didn't expect her mind to create an illusion so tangible. The goat quietly squealed at the unfamiliar hand that prodded on the white fluff of its back. It felt as if softness itself caressed the skin of her fingers and even the whiteness of it made her eyes narrow in slight discomfort.
