#grishaverse.

the new grisha recruits seemed to get younger and smaller every year — or perhaps he was growing more decrepit by the year? it didn't matter, really; the little palace did not hide its intentions, and made very clear that protection for its grisha inhabitants came at the cost of a childhood spent learning to defend ravka, to serve ravka.

teddy made brief eye contact with one of the little ones, and watched with a carefully blank face as they waved and skittered away quickly. poor little bastard.

"we were never that small," he paused to pat his pockets down until he could locate a cigarette, "well. i wasn't that small. could you light this? i need one before we get sent down to that hideous little lab again. the fabrikators get so irritable about cigarettes — as if they don't spend all fucking day breathing in toxic clouds from their own hands."

❝ mhm. and you are going to stop being a prick, ❞ fionn hisses, ❝ and smile at them so they're not terrified. their lives are scary enough. ❞ unlike @stormbrained, fionn loves being around the kids, a feeling that seems to be mutual, save for when he's in the company of ravka's second-most intimidating squaller. seriously, what are they teaching them over there? his only regret, really, is that he can't protect all these children, that he has no power to keep them safe, instead of forced into a soldier's kefta and onto a battlefield before they've even finished growing.

he wishes someone had done that for him; every day that he's reminded that he's a soldier first is a day he gets closer to desertion. there has to be a better way—for the sake of these kids' childhoods, if nothing else. his own is already lost.

❝ i regret to inform you that you were. still are, in fact. ❞ alright, so fionn can be a bit of a prick too. he teases out of love. he rolls his eyes, huffing, ❝ i'm not a fucking cigarette lighter, you know, ❞ even as he snaps his fingers and makes a flame appear to, indeed, be a grisha cigarette lighter. he should probably put up more of a fight. ❝ or maybe they're worried a spark will set off an explosion that'd destroy the little palace. ❞

"Are you new to the Little Palace? I don't think I've seen you here before."

Birds flitted in the trees within the courtyard, Sypha and many other Grisha breaking for the midmorning respite. Upon a stone terrace overlooking manicured lawns, one could hear the Squallers busy with their training upon the lake as the lapping and receding waves sounded like a metronome. As one who had long since graduated from their training, Sypha had become something of a teacher among the Inferni, known for their unorthodox skillset that required a certain verve not often found among Grisha.

But, all the same. This younger entrant reminded Sypha of themselves when they'd first been taken from their nomadic lifestyle and spirited away to Os Alta, transforming their life forever.

welcome to the g.rishaverse (udyati rao edition) as inspired by @tiderider: don't even talk to g.risha!udyati if you think that being called a fantoom (phantom) means you're being called "a survivor". that's not what it means at all. you're being called a ghost. don't get it twisted!

g.risha!udyati speaks the mothertongue of kerch and the suli language fluently. she currently lives in alderesch, which is a small town in katendam, a port city that's about an hour away from ketterdam.

udyati is neither a g.risha nor a living amplifier. she's the opposite of an amplifier: she is an attenuator which means that she can render the muscles of other g.rishas useless with a jab and temporarily disable their abilities. she has been trained in ancient suli martial arts by ajamila narayan.