#shadow and bone xr eader

[heliads]

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Based on this request: "male reader gets hurt and try to hide it, but nikolai sees it and is worried about him, so he tries to help the reader, and it ends with confession of their feelings"

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The wind whips cold and dark above the battlefield. This close to the Ravka-Fjerda border, the air is always gray and thin, cutting to the quick. The Fjerdans should be pleased to know that their climate will kill you even if their soldiers cannot.

You won’t be under attack for a while, though. You shouldn’t, at least. You’re still on the Ravkan side of the border. That doesn’t stop some of your fellow soldiers from stalking back and forth in the snow, all but daring the enemy to materialize and shoot you where you stand. They are blustering idiots in need of a scare, but you get the feeling they’ll get that soon enough.

After all, they’re not truly without fear, not really. You are soldiers drafted to protect your kingdom. There is no way you will leave this fight without shedding at least a little blood. If you do not die, then it will be one of your friends, and that is both better and worse depending on how strongly you let your heart speak for you.

A commotion of boots stalking through permafrost signals that you’re no longer alone. You don’t have to turn your head to recognize the pattern of footsteps nor the rhythm of the walk.

“My prince,” you remark by way of greeting.

Nikolai Lantsov rolls his eyes. “Always so formal, Y/N. Can’t we skip to the part where you’re threatening to steal my rations because I didn’t shine my boots to company standards? It’s what everyone else has done.”

You grin to yourself. “I’m not everyone, Nikolai.”

“Don’t I know it,” he says, although judging by his tone, he’s quite pleased with that.

So you managed to befriend a prince in your time serving in Ravka’s troops. It came as a shock to you as well, to be sure. You had already been in the 22nd Regiment for about three months before Nikolai came along. It wasn’t a whole lot of time, but it still gave you a bit of superiority in address that he didn’t have when he was still as green as the grass he left behind in Os Alta.

Nikolai rose up quickly through the ranks, though. He has this way of winning anyone over, even the most hardened of the captains and generals. You suppose that’s a sign that he would make a decent king, or at least be able to try his luck at politics if Vasily doesn’t die before Nikolai grows too old to ascend to the throne.

In all his time of regaining status, though, Nikolai only seems more determined to make you like him. Any advantage you had over him regarding leadership favoritism is long gone now, but that doesn’t seem to matter. Nikolai still chooses your company over that of any other soldier. Even now, when he could be off messing around with the other servicemen, he’s out standing in the cold with you.

He’s been like that since the beginning, actually. It’s as if Nikolai marked you out as a primary target the day he arrived at camp and won’t give up until he’s crossed some imaginary finish line of friendship in his head. 

He’s damn good at it, too. You were dead set on not letting him charm you as quickly as the others, but Nikolai found his way into your head regardless of what you decided. He did it slowly, carefully, a master bluffer playing his cards just right. He signed up for the bad watch times with you, so it wasn’t just one boy up at dawn watching empty fields but two. He always chose you as a partner for those awful training drills, even if it would have benefitted him more to keep switching out people to network as much as possible.

Maybe, if Nikolai were to have one political misstep, he would be content with letting it be you. He always seemed to have more fun that way, at least. And when is Nikolai ever pleased if he’s not going about things his way? Stupid boy, to enlist as infantry instead of letting his royal lineage rise him to an officer’s established and bloodless spot. Brave would-be king, to give his people one fewer reason to hate him.

No, you suppose you couldn’t ever hold him back. Not forever, at least. Nikolai seems to know this and appreciate it, too, so you gave up that battle long ago. Now it’s just the two of you against the world, or at least it will be until his tour of duty ends and you’re alone again.

That, at last, is what made you fear friendship with him the most. It’s one thing to become as close as brothers with another village craftsman or scholar, someone you have a decent chance of finding again once you’re done slinging guns in the name of Ravkan soil.

Nikolai, though? Prince Nikolai? He will leave you behind in the icy dust and never think of your name again. In your place, he will meet a thousand princesses and noblemen, and if he ever muses over past war memories, it will only be that of long-gone days and misplaced faces. He is yours for a very brief time now, and then never will be again.

Nikolai doesn’t have to know that’s what you’re thinking, though. He just has to entertain your friendship now while he’s got it, so both of you can pretend that it isn’t going to end just as abruptly as it started.

So you force yourself back into the present moment, the snow, him looking back at you. “Got any exciting plans for the day?” You joke to him.

Nikolai chuckles. “Oh, tons. I think I’m going to start out my morning with some light meditation, then maybe a few rounds of intellectual discussion with my fellow man. In all honesty, though, I’ll probably just be watching those idiots get in trouble.”

Nikolai jerks his chin towards the soldiers still goofing around near the border. Their shouts are loud, too loud for what is supposed to be a peaceful holding of the line. If they’re not careful, they’re going to get themselves killed.

Killed. The word echoes around your brain for a touch too long, and you stare around the snowy forests, wondering what’s suddenly got you feeling so uneasy. It’s not just Nikolai’s laughing comments getting to you, it’s something else. Something like the sensation that you might not be alone any longer.

Shots ring out seconds later. Nikolai grabs for you, pushing you down to the snow and behind cover. His breath is hot over you as he scans the white hills for any signs of the sudden attackers. “I take it back,” he whispers in gasps, “I shouldn’t have said a damn thing about trouble. We’ve certainly got it now.”

You nod, trying to keep your breathing steady. Your gun is in your hand seconds later, and one glance towards Nikolai confirms he’s done the same. You can make out three figures of Fjerdan soldiers moving through the snow. One of the Ravkan men is on the ground, but you think you see movement. The other is screaming for aid. You pop up quickly from behind the snowdrift and take a shot at one of the moving shapes. You see a spray of red, but he doesn’t go down. Not yet.

“Good shot,” Nikolai whistles after you come back down, “nailed him in the arm, I think.”

You shake your head, murmuring swears under your breath. “Would have been better if I could get him in the heart.”

“Let me do that for you,” he grins, cocky as ever even when you’re under imminent attack.

Nikolai stands up, taking careful aim. You peer over the top of the snowdrift and see the Fjerdan you’d hit go down in a flash. One of his comrades comes out from behind a stand of trees and you fire at him, too. This time, you don’t miss.

“We’re tied, then?” Nikolai challenges.

You grin even as you take aim at another enemy soldier. “That’s two,” you say, pulling the trigger. It isn’t a lie, and the Fjerdan collapses in an untidy heap of limbs.

Nikolai pivots slightly, chasing something to even the score, and while he targets a man to his right, you see someone else to his left. He’s already raising his gun, and you only have time to push Nikolai to the ground before the shots rattle out. Several strike the snow in front of you, but one hits you.

You don’t think Nikolai saw it, because he’s still firing even from his reduced vantage point, but you can feel the gunshot like a firebrand forced against your shoulder. Saints, it hurts like death itself. You try to clamp an arm over the wound to stop the bleeding, but you can tell that it will only do so much.

Nikolai notices you shift slightly and frowns. “Y/N, are you hurt?”

There is nothing he can do right now, so you shake your head. “Focus on the fight.”

Nikolai’s brow furrows, and he stares at you further. “No, you’re hurt, aren’t you? I can see blood in the snow. Y/N, show me.”

You hesitate a second longer, and his eyes grow wide with imagined fears of lungs shot out and hearts pierced. “Show me,” he repeats.

You relent at last. It’s not bad, just a wound to the shoulder, and the bullet only clipped you. So you tell him, at least, but Nikolai doesn’t seem all that inclined to let you go that easily.

“We have to get you back to camp,” he says, “come, you can lean on my arm. I’ll get you to the medic.”

You shake your head firmly. “We have to get rid of the threat first.”

Your fingers are still tight around your gun, and you move to straighten up and fire again, but Nikolai stops you, pulling you back down beside you once again.

He’s frustrated, one hand clawing through the pressed gold wire of his hair. “Why won’t you just let me help you?”

You let out a harsh breath. It ends up as a sigh. “Because–”

Because he’s a prince and you’re not. Because, at the end of the day, your entire damn regiment is there for one purpose and one purpose only. It’s not to defend Ravka, it’s to defend him. You’ve never had a problem with it before. In fact, the only one who seems to want to challenge that is the very Lantsov you’re meant to be saving.

You cannot say any of that, of course, but you think Nikolai gets it anyway. His jaw is set. “I’m not letting you get hurt again.”

“Then help me kill the rest of these soldiers,” you plead.

Nikolai still looks like he’d rather drag you back through the snow to base by himself, but you’re just as stubborn as he is, so he caves at last and joins you in taking out the rest of the Fjerdans in quick, efficient shots. The moment the last of them are gone, he grabs you around the waist and helps you to stand.

“Healer. Now,” he says. You don’t exactly have a lot of other options, so you let him help you out. You’ve lost a fair amount of blood by now, and the amount of scarlet staining the snow makes Nikolai’s first step almost as wobbly as yours. He manages to pull himself together in a second, though, and you’re at the camp medic before you know it.

Nikolai doesn’t leave the whole time they’re stitching you up. His brow is furrowed, and he denies every single soldier who tries to come up and talk to him. His attention will not be dragged from you until he knows that you’re going to be alright.

He waits until the last of them are gone to finally say what’s on his mind. You can tell that he’s been stewing over it for a while, what you didn’t say back there on the battlefield.

“Let me love you,” he says, “Please.”

Princes aren’t meant to ask for things. They demand and they are satisfied. Nikolai is not asking you this as a royal, though. At this moment, he is a boy, a bastard, and he wants to be loved. He will love you regardless of what you say back to him. All that he can gain from this is someone else’s opinion of him, and Saints know he gets enough of those already.

You exhale slowly. This isn’t going to last. Of course it won’t. Still, you have just enough time that you think you’d like to try.

“Alright,” you say, “I can do that.”

When he smiles, you think you can do just about anything. It’s a good thing that you’ll have Nikolai there with you to make sure of that.

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