Zoya was waiting on the deck of the Volkvolny. She had dressed as a common sailor in trousers and a roughspun shirt, and braided her hair, but she looked completely ill at ease out of her kefta. Nikolai had seen the way Nina disappeared into a role, changed the way she walked, the way she spoke, seemingly without effort. Zoya did not have this gift. Her posture remained razor sharp, her chin lifted slightly, less like a rough-and-tumble sailor than a beautiful aristocrat who had taken it into her head to spend the day among commoners.
Her eyes scanned him from the crown of his head to the toes of his boots. “You look absurd in that outfit.”
“Absurdly dashing? I agree.”
She rolled her eyes as the ship surged forward to find its berth in the Ketterdam harbor. “You like playing the pirate too much.”
“Privateer. And yes, I do. There’s freedom in it. When I wear this coat, my responsibility is the people on this ship. Not an entire nation.”
“It’s a game of pretend,” she said.
“A welcome illusion. One might be anything or anyone aboard a ship.”
They leaned on the rail, watching as the sprawl of the city and its busy port came into view.
“You miss it, don’t you?” she asked.
“I do. Maybe if this all goes to hell and Vadik Demidov takes my crown, I’ll simply return to being Sturmhond. I can serve my country without wearing a crown.”
He was unnerved by how much the idea appealed to him. It wasn’t the work of being a king he minded. Problems were meant to be solved. Obstacles defeated. Allies won through charm or the occasional bribe. He was happy to pick up a sword or a pen on Ravka’s behalf, to go without sleep or comfort in order to see a mission through. But kings didn’t take action—not the way that a privateer or even a general could. Being a king meant second-guessing every move, considering countless variables before making a decision, knowing that each choice might have consequences that others would pay for. We need a king, not an adventurer. Zoya was right, but that didn’t mean he had to be happy about it.
She cast him a curious glance. “Could you do it? Give up the throne?”
“I don’t know. When you’ve wanted something so long, it’s hard to imagine a life without it.” He supposed he wasn’t just talking about Ravka.
Zoya stood a little straighter, all propriety. “Growing up means learning to go without.”
“What a depressing thought.”
“It’s not so bad. Starve long enough, you forget your hunger.”
He leaned closer. “If it’s so easy to lose your appetite, maybe you were never truly hungry at all.” She looked away, but not before he saw the faintest blush tinge her cheeks. “You could come with me, you know,” he said idly. “A Squaller is always welcome on a ship’s crew.”
Zoya wrinkled her nose. “Live on salt cod and pray to the Saint of Oranges that I don’t get scurvy? I think not.”
“No small part of you wishes for this kind of freedom?” Because, all Saints, he did.
She laughed, tilting her face to the salt breeze. “I long for boredom. I would gladly sit in a drawing room at the Little Palace and sip my tea and maybe fall asleep in the middle of a tedious meeting. I’d like to linger over a meal without thinking of all the work yet to be done. I’d like to get through one night without…”
She trailed off, but Nikolai understood too well how to finish her thought. “Without a nightmare. Without waking in a cold sweat. I know.”
Zoya rested her chin in her hands and looked out at the water. “We’ve been promised a future for so long. A day when the Grisha would be safe, when Ravka would be at peace. Every time we try to grab for it, it slips through our fingers.”
Nikolai had sometimes wondered if it was in his nature to be restless, in Zoya’s nature to be ruthless, and in Ravka’s nature to be forever at war beneath the Lantsov banner. Was that part of what drew him to this life as king? He longed for peace for his country, but did some part of him fear it as well? Who was he without someone to oppose him? Without a problem to solve?
“I promised you that future.” He wished he’d been able to make that dream come true for both of them. “I didn’t deliver.”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” she clipped out, haughty and imperious as a queen. But she didn’t look at him when she said, “You gave Ravka a chance. You gave me a country I could fight for. I’ll always be grateful for that.”