#grisha mal

Alina going to the Little Palace? Without him? No, that wasn't possible. It had always been the two of them against the world. It was always going to be the two of them against the world, in any capacity Alina wanted.

Still, deep down he knew this was the best thing for Alina. Her life as one of the Grisha in the Little Palace would be far better than anything she could have here in the First Army. Maybe for once she wouldn’t look so sick all the time - something that still bothered him all these years later (the amount of times he had held one hand on her pulse as kids to make sure she was still with him...). But it was still hard for the logical part of his brain to override his current emotional state - especially when he realized he wouldn’t get a chance to say goodbye. 

Ignoring the jarring pain from his injured leg and the shouts from the medic, he took off as best he could after the Black General’s carriage. Even without his injured leg, he knew he wouldn’t be fast enough. 

“ALINA!” 

Something had been building up in him as he run alongside the pain, something he didn’t even pay attention to, just assuming it was his emotional anguish. But with the shout, whatever was building up spilled over and burst out of him.

Literally.

A beam of light, similar to the one that lit up the camp not too long ago except it was far closer to moonlight than sunlight, suddenly shot towards the black carriage, narrowly missing one of the wheels. 

Mal froze in his tracks. What in the Saints? Did... did he do that? But... that was impossible. He wasn’t Grisha! You also thought Alina wasn’t, a tiny voice in the back of his mind whispered.

Horse hooves thundered behind him and then stopped right beside him. “Well,” a smooth, unfamiliar voice said. “Today is just full of surprises. I’m starting to think we need to find a better way to test if someone is Grisha if we’re missing so many.”

The person - Grisha - beside him wore all black and was astride a black horse. There was only one known Grisha who wore black: General Kirrigan, the Darkling, leader of the Second Army.

The Darkling extended one hand down to a still stunned Mal, who stared at it for a good few seconds. “You’ll ride with me for now,” the shadow summoner explained. Half hesitantly, the tracker grabbed the General’s outstretched hand and used it to help vault himself onto the black stallion. 

“What’s your name?” 

“Oretsev. Mal Oretsev... sir.”

“Well Mr. Oretsev it looks like you’ll be seeing Miss Starkov sooner rather than later.”

And with that, the Darkling spurred his stallion into a gallop, causing Mal to suddenly grasp onto the man’s black kefta or go falling off backwards. 

Mal Oretsev. Tracker. First Army. Grisha.

*spoilers for books*