Mavka was a Corporalnik like no other, a theif like no other, and a little sparrow among a murder of crows.
Her safe haven was with the boy with the cane and the pretty eyes, despite the two seeming like opposite ends of a live wire, and now they h...
Nina's pupils dilated the second the addictive power touched her tongue.
They could all sense the change in the woman immediately.
But it was Mavka who made the next move.
She hopped down from the tank, landing in a half crouch.
"What are you doing?" Inej asked, worried.
She turned to meet Nina's eyes, then met all of the others eyes one by one. She made one signal, and raised her hands slowly to cover her ears.
"Mavka..."
She tilted her head, expression serious.
"Do it." Nina demanded gently, eyes fixed on the young girl as she climbed down beside her.
Warily they all complied, and she turned to look at the radiant woman who held her hand at her side.
With a nod, Mavka raised her finger and thumb to her lips and closed her eyes before blowing out a sharp, high pitched whistle. The long sound carried across the city, lifted by the sea wind, echoing through the narrow streets and buildings. Sharp, piercing, shattering, impossibly loud and drifting right into their minds - not like a bullet, but a needle - and as the whistle carried across the hollow harbour, the soldiers all fell to their knees like domino's clutching their heads, faces screwed up in pain.
Nina squeezed her hand.
Mavka stared out in wonder; she didn't even realise she had had it in her, she had just acted on instinct.
The heartrenders body crumpled to the floor with a clench of Nina's fist.
When the effect began to wear off and the soldiers fought against the hold over their minds, Nina's voice, calm, demanding, spoke.
"Stop."
Mavka watched in astonishment as they all froze, like little toys made of plastic to be moulded and placed.
"Lay down your arms."
Mavka stared at Nina, her heart hammering in her chest. This was her power amplified - Mavka's power. The use of her voice commanding an entire army but different, somehow.
They obeyed.
Nina nudged Mavka, prompting her - the girl shook her head, furrowing her eyebrows.
"Make them go to sleep." She whispered, eyes dancing with moonlight, seeing something within the small girl that no one ever had; something, a spark, deep down in her veins. Untapped potential, perhaps, a magic that was not natural.
Just like Nina now; unnatural.
It was true that her humming had lulled someone to sleep before, putting them under a spell of calm, but on this scale? She hesitated. It was too much. Too many.
She opened her mouth to speak. I can't danced on the tip of her tongue.
Nina's eyes gleamed with something, a knowing glimmer. She turned to face the soldiers and uttered one word.
"Sleep."
The command dropped the soldiers to the floor, one by one. They fell like dominos, row by row, toppling into a heavy slumber.
The air after was still and silent, the rushing wind louder than anything else.
Nina released a slow breath, then her hand. She began walking forwards, the first of them to move, and slowly the rest of them climbed down to follow.
Inej came to Mavka's side immediately, her hand finding her own in place of Nina's. When she stared into her eyes there was a slight glassy look to them, as though she was drunk on the energy thrumming in her veins. It fizzled and crackled, but at the touch of her hand it cooled.
Without a word, the group picked their way through, none of them willing to disperse the silence that settled over the land.
She could feel eyes on her back but did not have the courage to turn. She feared that at any moment a soldier would awaken and grab one of them. Raise their gun and fire.
When they made it to the ferolind the docks were deserted. Rotty and Specht were staring, jaws slack with fear.
"Matthias!"
They span to see Nina and Matthias facing off against a group of druskelle in dark hoods, staring right at the two.
"Traitor!" The man at the front snarled. "Betrayer of your country and your god. You will not leave this harbour alive. None of you will."
They all watched Nina raise her hands calmly. "For Matthias, I will give you one chance to leave us be."
"You cannot control us, witch," he smirked. "Our hoods, our mask, every stitch of clothing we wear is reinforced with grisha steel. Corecloth created to our specifications by grisha fabrikators under our control and designed for just this purpose. You cannot force us to your will. You cannot harm us. This game is at its end."
Mavka tilted her head slightly, curiously, wondering if those boundaries stretched to her own ability as well. She was not technically Grisha, no documented case had ever been written of her ability, only a heartrender on parem could replicate it - if she commanded them to walk into the sea and never stop, would they do it?
Matthias begged Nina to go and a round of bullets fired at once.
The bullet hit his chest, they all saw it, but something extraordinary happened. The bullet emerged from his chest, dropped to the floor like a wilted flower petal. He pulled his shirt open to reveal no wound.
Nina walked past him.
"No!" Matthias protested.
The druskelle opened fire on her. Every bullet wound made her flinch, but not a split second after the blood began to blossom, it melted away, the skin patching over itself seamlessly. Healed.
The druskelle gaped at her and she laughed.
And then, as if held by invisible strings, the soldiers put to sleep arose like marionettes. They tore at their hoods, their weapons, their whips, ripping them from their hold. At the flex of Nina's fingers their rifles dropped, hands shooting to their heads as they screamed in pain.
Mavka watched them scream and writhe in pain with surprising coldness.
She may not have agreed with the womans decision to let them live, she may not have done it herself, but she said nothing as they left them on the docks and boarded the ferolind.
Her mother and countless Grisha before her had never been counselled mercy.
An eye for an eye, her mother would tell her, brushing a strand of hair back behind her ear. And the whole world goes blind.
Mavka drifted away from the group ever so sligthly, out of anyones perception, her mind on the atrocities they had left behind.
But plenty of people are blind, she would say back, confused. Does that mean they were cruel in a past life?
No, just unfortunate in this one.
Mavka did not mind misfortune. She danced with it like a shadow, had done her whole life.
Her mother may have been disappointed looking at the girl she was today, but she knew that she would not have made the same decision as Nina.
It was a small mercy that she didn't have to.
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