Beautiful and Broken

12.

It was a rare sight to catch Genya alone in the mess hall. She seemed to be even busier than Ivan, or maybe she simply didn't like crowds. I've been looking for a chance to talk to her for a while now, but all I got was an elusive glimpse of her ginger locks in the distance. I was told she's the first Grisha with her abilities, just like the Sun Summoner, even though she wasn't as famous as Alina.

"Tell me your story", I plopped down next to her.

"Hello, new girl." I smirked at someone less then a quarter of my age calling me girl. "What would you like to know?" she asked.

"You're the first Tailor."

"I can make people prettier. Or change their appearance. No big deal."

"It could be at the right place, at the right time. I imagine you must be hell of a useful spy, for example. Would you show me? I haven't seen anything like this before."

She sighed – unusual, as so far any Grisha seamed eager to give me a demonstration of their abilities. "All right, so what do you want? A change of hair colour? Blue eyes? Or should I simply make you prettier?"

"Let's do something more interesting. Make me ugly, just for a change." This seemed to work, at least it elicited a hint of a smile.

She reached out towards my face, moving her fingers close to my skin, but never touching me. All I've felt was a weird tingle, as if someone was tickling me from the inside. It didn't take long, and she announced she was ready. We headed for the nearest mirror, only for me to realise that she didn't honour my request to the letter. She did change me, but not for the worse – she only made me different. My face had sharp angles instead of round outlines, my jawbones were much more pronounced, my eyebrows darker and unrulier, which somehow gave me a fiercer look.

"Wow" was all I could utter. The thing was, she only modified a detail here and there, but even my mother wouldn't have recognised the result.

"You must be very popular with the girls here at the base," I guessed.

"Actually I was rather unpopular most of my life."

I assumed she grew up surrounded by regular people. "Weren't you raised with other Grisha kids?"

"I was." I assumed wrong. "But Grisha are just as hostile to outsiders as any other clique. I was the Queen's maid, that always granted me the bottom spot in the pecking order."

And now that she was a soldier of the Second Army, she wanted nothing to do with them except the strictly necessary. I liked her instantly.

"What about you?", she inquired. I told her about my field assignment, and how Aleksander was helping me with my research.

"Doesn't it get lonely sometimes?", she surprised me. "I mean, I see you hanging out with the boys sometimes, but I guess you still spend the better part of the day alone in the library."

"By the time we finish the Academy in Atlantis, libraries are our second home. We would probably get withdrawal symptoms if we couldn't visit one for a month."

Still, Genya made it her goal to keep me company. Spending time with her was not just a welcome distraction, but it turned out that she was the Grisha who knew most about the Sun Summoner. In fact, they became friends, and it was clear that Genya still regarded Alina as her friend, even though she wasn't sure the feeling was mutual after Alina learned that Genya was reporting her actions to Aleksander.

"There was nothing you could do about it. But it doesn't make your friendship towards her any less valuable", I offered.

"She said she understands. But I don't think she would want to have much to do with me."

"Not everything is black and white. In fact, very few things are. Most of us are simply somewhere on the gray spectrum. Or is Alina a black and white type of person?"

"Yes, pretty much", she answered with sad eyes. It figured: Genya told me that Alina was even younger than Genya, which put her at seventeen. At seventeen, I was preoccupied with losing my virginity without getting pregnant, and learning how to hold my liquor. She was expected to deal with her power, the amplifier, a bunch of jealous Grisha, people calling her a saint, a boyfriend who wasn't a Grisha and of course the Darkling on top of it all. Seeing things in black and white was self-explanatory.  

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 Knowing about Alina's age, it made it even more admirable how she had the guts to stand against this guy, it crossed my mind during our evening practice session with Aleksander. He was trying to make a pebble hover in the air, one of our favourite exercises as a child. It was clear that it won't be his favourite, as he was failing at it miserably.

"There, I did it," he said, pointing at a handful of shadows, which where indeed lifting the pebble up from the ground.

"Nice try. But you get no points for this one."

"Then what on hell's breath do you do to lift it?"

This gave me an idea.

"Give me your hand." I placed his palm on the pebble, with my hand over his. I've reached out to it through our touching fingers, feeling its pebbleness, and slowly, gently teaching it the lightness of a feather. And in the moment the matter realised that it might as well become a feather, it started wriggling in Aleksander's palm, and as he lifted his hand, it revealed a pebble floating in the air.

He started laughing. "This is crazy," he pointed at the pebble, still levitating. "But why can't I communicate with it without your help?"

"No idea. Magic is in everything, even this pebble. As long as you can use magic, you should be able to reach out through it to everything. I wish I was wiser to understand what is stopping you."

"You're making it look so easy. And when I try, it's as if I was banging on a locked door."

Locked door? Something blocking him? Some sort of barrier between him and the magic itself?

"I want to try this with another Grisha, anyone really, because..."

"General, Sir, sorry for interrupting, you've told us to come to you immediately." A flustered young Grisha was interrupting us.

"Speak, Boris."

"They've found her. Or, actually, they've found her trace, they know where she's headed, they are following her right now."

"Send Genya and Ivan to the council room. Tell Ivan to give the order for mobilisation. We're leaving in the morning. Dismissed."

There was only one person Boris could have been talking about, only one who warranted such orders. Aleksander left without a word, leaving me alone with the floating pebble. I've reminded it that it was a only a pebble after all.