I still haven't read all of King of Scars but I'm using some of the world-building from that book oops. So if anything seems a little off that's why. 🤪
The King was asleep again.
Rani considered waking him for a moment, but it turned out that the only thing more infuriating than the snoring was his unceasing attempt to try and charm information from her. At least asleep he didn't keep talking.
"How did you do it?"
The silence between them stretches.
"I'm assuming you were the assassin you warned me about?"
"I find it more interesting to use my own appearance as a diversion."
"I mean, really I'm impressed, it's not just anyone who could break into the Ravkan Palace."
"Actually your security is fairly lacking when it comes to the second army. Seems that you find Grisha infallible even after your civil war."
The King goes silent, looking at her for a long moment. His lips part, understanding slowly passing through his face.
"You're not even one of them, are you?" He whispers, "Toops have been disappearing for months up and down the Shu border, we thought it was the khergud but its not, it's you isn't it? "
Rani lists her head toward him, her eyes meeting Nikolai's for the first time since he began to speak.
"Surprise."
The train continues to rattle along, with each moment bringing them closer and closer to the Shu border. The rhythm soothes her mind the same way that it lolled the King to sleep. The tension wracking her muscles has slowly started to unwind. She's not relaxed, Rani hasn't relaxed in years, but the steading rock of the train has brought the beat of her heart into sync, the whole world seeming to slow with it.
As her eyesight starts to blur another soft sound begins to unveil itself. It's there, a second rhythm beneath the trains rocking, an inconsistent beat that's barely audible.
She's on her feet in seconds her back pressed to the wall, door at her side. How the King hasn't awoken she can't understand. Perhaps he has people to do that for him, why wake when you have guards to do the protecting?
With each step that approaches, her heartbeat rises.
Ravkans? Or perhaps simply thieves? Either way, it won't be a problem, the most difficult part of her assignment has passed, after all.
The door slides open and Rani is instantly in motion, the blade slicing up to meet the intruder. Instead, it meets the flat of another, familiar eyes glinting at her over the top of the blade.
"Really Rani? Who's going to pay you if I die?"
She lets the blade drop to her side, the ghost of a smile flickering over her face.
"Li."
Her contact in the Tavgharad, the Shu royal guard, and the one who gave her this assignment. She's never seen Li outside the borders of the Shu Han, she didn't know the Tavgharad traveled so far.
Li lowers her knife as well, her eyes flash over Rani's shoulder to the dark form slumped in the corner, snoring slightly.
"He's shorter than I'd imagined," Li wrinkles her nose.
He's sleeping. Rani has to bite back the retort. It's not her job to ensure that the King is what Li expected. It's her job to get him and here he is. It's time for her payment.
"If you don't want him, I'm sure that the Fjerdans will pay handsomely, maybe more than you."
A moment of tense silence slices through the train car. Rani rocks back on her heels, worried that for once she's pushed too far. Li has always seen her as something of an inescapable nuisance, an offense to the Shu Han only to be tolerated since she gets results.
But her results are as undeniable as the presence of the King on this train.
"Don't be absurd. Do you think you could get all the way across that country again without the Ravkans coming for their king? They may be incompetent, but even they can't be that stupid." Li steps forward until she's shoulder to shoulder with the other girl, "I'll take him off your hands, tall as he is."
Rani nods toward the king, not daring to take her eyes off the guard before her, "By all means."
It happens between the rocking of the car. One moment they are standing in silence and the next Li's blade has plunged into her side, tearing the world into slivers of bright pain.
"Now that we have the Ravkan the crown is no longer in need of your services." Li turns the blades, slipping in deeper as she sneers, "And I no longer have to deal with you."
Rani staggers back, collapsing to the floor. Everything is turning in on itself, a swirling, roiling mass of pain.
"Saints, you have no idea how long I've been waiting to get rid of you."
The gasp barely passes Rani's lips as she tries to drag the blade away. Her hands slip, coming away empty and slick with her own blood. Should she even remove it? It could just make everything so much worse. Either way, there's far too much red staining the sides of her shirt, far far too much.
She can barely hear Li moving behind her above the harsh buzzing in her ears.
The world is screaming with pain. Or someone is screaming, whether it's the King or Li or simply her mind, she can't say.
And then nothing. Nothing but darkness is closing in on all sides, clawing its way into her nerves. Hands are there reaching for her from the dark, shadows coiling through the veins. A demon come to drag her away for all the sins she's committed.
They've come for her, heartless as she is. Come to drag her into hell.
A wall of pain rises around her. Then nothing but darkness.
Favorite Nikolai ship OR thoughts on the Bi-Nikolai theory?
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heartless | nikolai lantsov
Fanfiction"You enjoy knowing someone in your palace would as soon have a knife to your throat as help you?" "Oh, I count on it, keeps my wits sharp." \\ Kidnapping the King of Ravka was easy. Until it wasn't. When her plan goes awry, Rani is given two choi...
