I N B O X

[reznikolai]

@volkvolny NIKOLAI LANTSOV

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Comments

[reznikolai]

Perhaps not. I too am but a man. I'm not impervious to making mistakes.

But at least I learned something from the mistakes of my forbearers.

[morozova]

You would not be the first to think so.

( and that's the problem, ultimately. not that nikolai is different -- perhaps he is, perhaps not — but that the darkling has lived too long, heard the same thing too often to take it at face value. )

[reznikolai]

Well, I do so hate being unoriginal.

[morozova]

Then you'll have little difficulty in surprising me, I'm sure.

( he's off to such a good start, after all, with that sturmhond nonsense. he will just die bitter and mad about not seeing that one coming. and, really, challenging someone who has caught him off-guard once already is probably borrowing trouble he neither needs nor wants, but there is something ... not quite cathartic in needling this princeling. )

[reznikolai]

I'll take that as a compliment.

[The Darkling's presence here is unsettling, to say in the least. Nikolai wants to know what he knows. The last thing Alina knew from their world was the Darkling's siege of Os Alta. Would he know more? Or even less?

Most pressingly, would he know how he had infected Nikolai with his darkness and turned him into a monster?]

What do you plan to do here?

[morozova]

I haven't decided yet.

( this much, at least, is true. it's been such a long time since he'd had to start from the ground up, and despite his attempt to project a sense composure and casual menace, he's actually furious. )

[reznikolai]

And I don't suppose you intend to keep me in the loop.

[morozova]

Is this you asking nicely?

[reznikolai]

Well I can't quite bring myself to say "please."

There is no reason for us to be enemies here. There is no country for us to fight over.

[morozova]

How pragmatic of you.
But leaving aside that that must have cost you greatly, I have no intention of causing you harm.

[reznikolai]

Pragmatic. Magnanimous. Eminently wise. Those are just some of the words that have been used to describe me.

Then we have a truce.

[morozova]

Humble and retiring, too, I'm sure.
For the moment.

[reznikolai]

We can review your best qualities next, if you like.

I'm aware that no truce is permanent. That would require one of us conceding, and neither of us has a talent for it.

[morozova]

I'm afraid that will be a short list.

( great men typically don't get to where they are by making friends. )

You're learning.

[reznikolai]

[Nikolai would beg to differ, of course.]

I'm a quick study.

[morozova]

I suspect you'll find plenty to occupy that silver tongue, here.

[reznikolai]

[He really ought to stop replying. But he wants to have the last word. And when has he ever known that it was time to quit?]

Was the double entendre intended?

[morozova]

I think the better question to ask is whether or not you wanted it to.

[reznikolai]

[...He has no good riposte for that.]

Well, I hardly think you want to be bored with the details of my personal affairs.

[morozova]

And here you'd been assuring me the oppsite.
Now I'm just disappointed.

[reznikolai]

Then in disappointment I shall leave you.