When is it Enough

Chapter 1 - A Pull?

Alina needed peace after the war. She was tired. In less than two years, she had been an orphan, a mapmaker, a Grisha, a saint, a general, a future queen, a savior, and finally a casualty of the Fold.

She added three more titles to that list in the same number of years. The first was wife. Her and Mal's wedding in the chapel by the seaside was unattended by their living friends, lest the dead ones make their presence known and the monsters of their past return. The ceremony was simple and perfect, if a little sad, too.

As Misha laid the driftwood crown on her head, a symbol of her bond to Mal, Alina was briefly reminded of a parallel world, one in which that crown was made of gold and set with precious jewels. One where her wedding was attended by thousands and the day would be marked every year with festivities, banquets, and grand balls. One where she had accepted Nicholai's proposal to become queen and would never be free of crushing duty, responsibility, and heartache.

She smiled wanly to herself, and when she kissed Mal to seal her vows, she held him so tightly, and he kissed her back so deeply, that her simple circlet tipped off her head and toppled to the floor. Laughing, she untangled herself from his embrace, never letting go of his hand. She bent to pick it up the fallen headpiece and a chill crept down her spine as a third crown came unbidden to her mind.

The one the Darkling had promised her.

The second title Alina chose for herself was matron. She and Mal spent the better part of their first year of marriage building the orphanage from the ashes of the duke's estate. Word spread of the wealthy but strange couple and their new project. The war had left too many children and not enough parents, and soon they came flocking in from across southwestern Ravka. Alina and Mal nearly couldn't keep up with demand- as soon as they'd furnished a section of dorms, they were overcrowded. The kitchens needed more ovens after only a week of use. The piano was so often used that fights started breaking out amongst the children, eager to practice their craft.

So they kept on building. One dorm became four. One kitchen became its own building with a dining hall attached. One piano became three pianos, six violins, nine wooden flutes, a balalaika, and a set of drums that Alina occasionally threatened to throw into Trivka's pond when they were practiced too early in the morning.

The kids were loud and full of energy. The younger ones were unruly and were always inexplicably sticky. The older ones were demanding and hungry for life. Alina loved them all desperately.

She had never wanted to teach Grisha at the Little Palace- it was haunted in a way that she would never be able to shake- but three years after they'd established the orphanage, the examiners came and four of her Grisha children didn't want to leave for Os Alta. Thus, her third title, teacher, came to be.

She soon took on students from outside the orphanage. Those who needed to know how to control their power and use it for something greater than a party trick but didn't want to leave home joined her academy too. Alina taught all forms of Grisha power using what she had learned from her time at the Little Palace. Just as she had done there too, she integrated the different Gisha orders- etherialki, materialki, and corporalki, though some lessons she reserved for teaching each individual type. Her favorite of these were with the sun summoners- otkazat'sya who had been blessed with power at the fall of the Fold. It was, after all, the craft she knew best.

She had created her simple peace at Keramzin- her sanctuary, her home. This was what she had fought so hard for. Her tracker, laughing as he danced around the parlor to the abrasive tones of a budding yet untrained maestro, pulling her into a clumsy waltz, spinning her until she couldn't tell left from right, kissing her until she no longer cared. Her students, growing confident in their power, feeling the heady rush of success when they mastered a new skill, eagerly showing her what they could do. Her children, safe from the cruel world, warm in their beds, tucked in with stories of brave pirate princes and ancient monsters vanquished.