Crowns From Driftwood

Summary:

They walk until they find what's left of the old oak. And it's there they plant a garden. Because when you can't go home again, you make a new one. Alina x Malyen, 50 sentences for after the war.

Notes: Originally written for/posted for flirtingwithtrackers on tumblr!

Comfort

Their first night in what was once Keramzin is spent in ruins and rubble—but their boots are muddied and they manage to share rebellious smiles as they walk over old, charred lengths of carpet.

Kiss

Whenever he sees her scowling—at the shelves that are uneven, at the step that still creaks, at the door she still can't manage to attach correctly—he presses his lips to her temple.

Soft

Her fingers hit the keys of the finally uncovered piano with light taps, as if she's still expecting Ana Kuya to come out with her cane.

Pain

He always catches her staring at the stump of the old oak tree, and wonders what it is she sees.

Potatoes

"I'm going to plant a garden," Mal announces, a spade in his hand.

Rain (on the parade)

"There's already enough dead grass outside," Alina replies, a smile on her lips.

Happiness

The next summer, there will be green sprouts where there was once burned wood.

Chocolate

They sit together on their half-finished porch, hands wrapped around mugs, and as Mal listens to her complain about an uneven table that is now joining the uneven door, he wonders if this is what it means to be whole.

Telephone

When he goes hunting in the woods there is only silence, and he knows if he tried to call out into it, there would only be echoes.

Ears

She tries to cut his hair—it seems like a wifely thing to do—and it ends with a bandage over his left ear, "How many times are you going to stab me?"

Name

Misha is quite adamant that they need to remain the Dumbrovs, which is unfortunate, because both of them have always had a soft spot for the demands of orphans.

Sensual

When he sees Alina with a hammer, he kisses her slowly until she forgets to keep mangling what's left of their furniture.

Death

Some nights she wakes up just to press her ear to his chest.

Sex

"Be gentle this time, I'm still recovering from the haircut."

Touch

She rests her head on his shoulder, and he rubs slow circles into her back at the end of every day.

Weakness

She's always had one for lost causes, like ruined mansions and stubborn husbands.

Tears

Alina watches the light shine through the chandelier one morning, and Mal has to look away when he notices her eyes water, just a bit.

Speed

The days are long and grueling, the furniture uneven and mangled, but when they're together none of that matters: the hours they put into restoring Keramzin pass in the seconds between their heartbeats.

Wind

Letters from Zoya are always addressed To the Nauseating Couple, Whatever Your Name is Now.

Freedom

The first thing Alina does when she finally gets the door fixed is paint it bright yellow—Ana Kuya hated the color most intensely.

Life

He still can't give her a crown, or an army, but he will never stop trying to give her his life, and maybe one day he can feel like that's enough.

Jealousy

Mal's welcomes are always a little less loud when Nikolai comes to visit.

Hands

Their rings are simple, matching gold—no emeralds, no bones.

Taste

He's not sure about the yellow door, but he's certain he doesn't want to suggest something else or she'll do something dangerous—like fix another chair leg or try to give him bangs in his sleep.

Devotion

The ruin becomes a house.

Forever

He always keeps a copy of his vows in his shirt pocket: I will always work to be better for you, I will always carry you, and I will never call you Sticks or insult how you cook rabbit (even if it actually kills me, which it one day might).

Blood

When they decide it is time to have children, to have a family, they open the doors of Keramzin to orphans once more.

Sickness

Alina doesn't consider herself a mother, until the week nine children come down with the flu at the same time—then she considers herself insane, which she imagines is a lot like being maternal.

Melody

Misha is learning how to play the old, uncovered piano, and Alina is happy that he carries a tune much better than Mal (the only pitches Mal hits are the ones that involve snoring right in her ear).

Star

She paints constellations on the ceiling, and supernovas on the walls—bright, happy splashes of color that are at odds against the dark backgrounds on which they rest.

Hair

When he hears the new tutors titter about Alina wearing her hair down, and how That Is Not How Married Women Ought To Behave, he makes sure to bury his hands in it and kiss her soundly in front of them (with tongue, because scandal is good for old women-it keeps their blood pressure high and their miserable, geriatric hearts beating).

Confusion

Some days—when he watches her swear at a pipe that's burst, or clean off muddy handprints from every surface of the house—he's still not sure how she can be so confident that flooded basements and ruined wallpaper are better than a throne and a crown.

Fear

He has been given the official job of ghost inspector, and every night he makes a big show of checking under beds and inside closets for the younger ones.

Lightning/Thunder

When she goes to sleep, her bed only has one other occupant; five flashes of lightning and six booms of thunder later, that number increases by seven and she tells Mal the next morning they will need to invest in a bigger bed.

Bonds

Once a year, they light candles for Mikhael and Dubrov, Alexei and Ruby, Harshaw and Stigg, Ana Kuya and Baghra, Botkin and Fedyor, Marie and Sergei…and even one, lit last and lit quietly, for Aleksander.

Market

He will gladly take on another army if it means he doesn't have to take the children out to buy groceries ever (ever) again.

Technology

Alina's hands go wide, fingers making soaring motions as a group of children pay her rapt attention, "-and he called it The Pelican, probably because the bird, like him, has a natural sort of arrogance to it-"

-at Alina's glare, Mal stops his snort, and instead dutifully makes the accompanying air ship sound effects.

Gift

She buys him a box of sweet rolls for their fourth anniversary—half of them are eaten before he opens it.

Smile

Every time he smiles, that one way, just at her, she knows she was never meant to have anything else other than him.

Innocence

Alina watches the new arrivals, a boy and a girl standing shyly behind him, and for the first time truly feels like war has not touched her life.

Bomb

"So…you knocked me up."

Clouds

They lie together on the ground after that less than graceful statement, bare toes curling in the grass and fingers making shapes out of the clouds.

Sky

While most of the rooms have constellations, Alina paints the nursery in bright blues and yellows, with the children of Keramzin offering critique as they watch her make lopsided clouds and uneven sunbursts.

Heaven

They—Alina, Mal, Misha, and their other twelve children—form a Naming Committee for the incoming baby; Misha is very intent on making sure the ballots are counted impartially.

Hell

She starts screaming in the middle of the night, hands around her abdomen and Mal is stuck, frozen in place, because he doesn't know what to do now, and fear fills every inch of his body for one horrible moment (until she screams at him to get a suitcase packed because she is otherwise occupied, you idiot )

Sun

Her name is Jelena, an old word for Bright (it was Misha's impartially-elected suggestion).

Moon

Alina doesn't know what sleep is anymore—rest has become a mythical creation, replaced instead by crying and changing diapers and playing squaller-inferni-tidemaker against Mal to decide whose turn it is to heat up a bottle.

Waves

Neither of them worry about the downsides of becoming parents, because the upside is so much better, and they have thirteen other, amazing children to help them perfect the art.

Home

Where there was once an old oak tree, there is now a garden.

Completion

Because when you can't go home again, you make a new one.