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She isn’t the sort of woman you get flowers for.
Ivan refuses to be in awe of her. He remembers her torn up and grubby, convinced she could never be Grisha. But for the Darkling’s assurance, he probably would have agreed. She had been a mousy thing, sickly and awkward-angled. Not fit for even a borrowed kefta.
She wears blue and gold now, and slices the tops off mountains. He followed her for the promise of that power, but Saints, he looks at her sometimes and wants–
And wants. There’s nothing mousy about her now, although her beauty drives terror more than longing. It draws a man in so far, and then demands he look away. She is not made for mortal consumption.
Ivan snorts at the drama of his own thoughts. Alina Starkov turns at the sound, raising an eyebrow at him.
“You didn’t think I could do it, did you?”
He folds his arms over his chest. “I wouldn’t be here if I thought you couldn’t.”
That sends the eyebrow crashing back down again. Some days, she wears the expectation that people will bow before her power like another kefta. And then there are moments when she’s almost human again.
Like he could reach out and touch her.
“So if it turns out the Darkling mastered mountain slicing three centuries ago, and I’m not the saint you were all waiting for?”
“I’ll be dead,” Ivan says. He’s seen Genya’s face; it seems like the better option. “And I wasn’t waiting for a saint, Starkov.”
“Then what were you waiting for?”
You. His thoughts are traitorous things; he strangles them before they reach his face. Your power. Your penchant for hooking it under the skin of men and dragging them in your wake. She has one promising her the world, another promising her the throne, a third promising her his soul, and all of them making demands in kind.
So he shrugs, lopsided, and turns away from her. Starts to walk. “An end. One way or another.”
Ivan is not the sort of man who gives flowers, either.