Chapter Text
You have no history. No heritage.
No colour, no smell, no sound.
You are invisible.
You are nobody.
The cane hits her again.
Alina wonders how Botkin manages to hit her in the same spot every single time.
“Concentrate.”
She grits her teeth. “I have no history, no heritage--“
“Saying it louder won’t make it more believable, girl.”
Every day at dawn, ever since she can remember, Botkin has dragged her on the hill to train. He draws emotion out of her, hits her with his cane until she glows with rage and then tells her to keep it in check, to keep it down. To keep it in.
I have no colour, no smell, no sound.
“Don’t just say it, you have to feel it.”
I am invisible.
She reins it, brings it back in. Pushes it down until the only thing glowing is the sweat on her body, glistening in the sunrise light.
I am nobody.
She smiles smugly and Botkin hits her again.
“It took you twenty seconds.” The small man in front of her checks his pocket watch, clearly unimpressed by her progress. “Tell me, how many seconds would the villagers need to realize you are grisha?”
Botkin never encouraged her. Never told her she did well. Never had a kind word for her. In the beginning she needed around eight, six minutes at best, to bring the light down. Today only twenty seconds. It is her best time yet.
But apparently it’s still not good enough. It never is.
She rolls her eyes. The cane hits her, on the shoulder this time.
“Answer me, girl!"
“A few seconds, probably.” She mutters.
Botkin stands in front of her and manages to tower over her, despite the fact they are nearly the same height.
“And then what?”
“Then they kill me.”
“Do you want to die, Alina?
She lowers her head. “No.”
The small man uses his cane to lift her chin up. “Look at me, girl.”
She clenches her jaw.
Botkin does this for her own good, she knows. Her parents trusted him with their very lives. Before the plague took them, they begged him to raise her, knowing he wouldn’t deny them. And he didn’t.
He is the closest thing to family she has.
Still… most of the times she just wants to stick his cane up his non grisha butt.
“Do you want to die?” He asks her again, looking her in the eyes.
“No, I don’t want to die.”
Botkin lowers his cane and leans on it.
“Then keep it contained.”