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Grishaverse 3
Leigh Bardugo
Summary is from SuperSummary
BEFORE
Alina Starkov, a girl who possesses the power to summon light, is confined underground by a religious leader of her country Ravka after she is weakened by a battle with her nemesis the Darkling. (The battle takes place in the previous book of the series, Siege and Storm.) In contrast to the first-person narration of the rest of the chapters, the prologue and epilogue use a third-person point of view to narrate Alina’s story. Led by a religious leader known as the Apparat, many of the oppressed people in Ravka revere Alina as a saint and are willing to create an army to challenge the military forces of their country. The Apparat has imprisoned Alina underground to try and control her, and Alina has discovered that she cannot summon light anymore, making her weak and frail. However, eventually Alina learns to use the weakness to disguise her growing strength as she recovers from confronting the Darkling.
1. Alina “performs” her light summoning in front of a crowd of worshipers at a service led by the Apparat. Due to her weakened state, the performance is a ruse created by other Grisha who help Alina appear to summon. Afterward, Alina tries to get the Apparat to agree to let her go aboveground, where she could use her power to heal herself. The Apparat refuses, citing Alina’s safety, and Alina knows that she does not have the ability to free herself. She observes the people who have flocked to her army training to fight, and she sees her childhood best friend, Mal, helping the non-magical soldiers fight the Grisha trainees. Alina has romantic feelings for Mal, and the two have a tumultuous relationship that swings between a close, intense bond and tension as Mal comes to distrust Alina’s magic over the previous two books of the series. Now, Mal has a curt interaction with Alina and the Apparat, and Alina proceeds on to the underground archives where she has been tasked with trying to find out where the third of three amplifiers that will enhance her summoning power is located. It’s a hopeless task, and she wastes time until she can see her friend Genya, a servant who once served the Darkling but now has been mutilated by him and is loyal to Alina. Genya is a minor Grisha who can alter people’s appearance, including her own, and the Apparat allows her to work on Alina’s sickly, pale appearance. Genya herself is using a salve made by David, one of the other Grisha and an ally to Alina. Alina and Genya discover a note from David in the tin of salve that reads Today, implying a rebellion against the Apparat. However, just as they discover the note, the Apparat appears with the other Grisha who are loyal to Alina and Mal, all of whom have been injured and bound.
2. Alina’s allies feign a plot against her so that Mal can throw explosive powder up one of the fireplace flues in the room. Meanwhile, her friends fight the Apparat and his guards. The explosion in the flue opens it up and allows sunlight from the surface to reach the room, which Alina uses to overpower the Apparat. No longer a prisoner, she prepares to greet the other inhabitants of the underground city. Realizing that Mal’s hostility in Chapter 2 was a ruse, Alina happily reunites with him.
3. Alina gathers the loyal Grisha and tells them that she’s leaving the underground city immediately after leading a prayer service with the Apparat in an hour. Most of the Grisha agree to go with her. Mal will also accompany her, and although he’s supportive of her, their relationship remains strained. While Alina waits for the service, she attempts to reach the Darkling through a psychic connection that was established between them in the previous book of the series. The Darkling has always been the one who controlled it, “visiting” Alina against her will, but with her regained power, Alina finds that she can now visit the Darkling as well. He reigns as the king of Ravka and invites her to reign alongside him as his equal. Alina, who knows that he would only end up manipulating and exploiting her, refuses. She leaves the Darkling, exhilarated and shaken by her ability to connect to him.
4. After severing her connection with the Darkling, Alina leaves the underground city with Mal and the other Grisha, warning the Apparat not to follow her. Alina and her companions wind their way through underground tunnels for four days, working their way toward the earth’s surface. A conversation with Mal reveals to Alina that he does have romantic feelings for her, but he is repressing them because he believes he’s not good enough for her. He rushes off before Alina can respond, and at that moment, an explosion goes off near the group.
5. Alina and her companions weather several more explosions that make part of the tunnel they’re in collapse, separating them into three groups. After reuniting and making sure that no one is seriously hurt, they determine that the explosions were just random ones that the Darkling has been using on the tunnel system to try and force Alina to come to the surface. Shaken but unharmed, the companions reach the surface and sneak out of the town they find themselves in. They want to try and get to a city called Ryevost, where their friend and ally Nikolai Lantsov is rumored to be staying, using one of his old disguises as a smuggler. They make their way across the countryside to the outskirts of Ryevost. They’re trying to avoid discovery, since the Darkling has put a bounty on Alina and her allies. The group makes a camp outside Ryevost and send Tamar into the city to try and contact Nikolai. Tamar returns and reports that she didn’t see Nikolai, but that Ravka’s western neighbor—known as West Ravka—which lies on the other side of the permanent darkness known as “the Fold,” has declared its loyalty to Nikolai and not the Darkling. Encouraged by this news, Alina leaves the rest of her companions to go tell Mal, who is at a nearby creek filling water containers. Alina tells Mal the news, but she notices a tattoo on the shirtless Mal’s back. The tattoo is a giant sun, which is Alina’s symbol, and the phrase “I am become a blade” (113). Alina touches the tattoo and begins stroking Mal’s bare back, which increases the sexual tension between the two. They’re interrupted by soldiers who have deserted Ravka’s First Army (the non-magical division of the military). The soldiers capture the pair to get the Darkling’s bounty. As the soldiers take Alina and Mal back to their friends, who have ar
6. Nikolai rescues Alina, Mal, and their companions and takes them to an airship he has hidden in a nearby field. Mal and several Grisha kill the kidnappers who pursue them, and Alina uses her magic to kill a man, which makes her loathe herself. The group travels to a hidden fortress in the mountains of Ravka’s northern neighbor, Fjerda, which serves as a safe haven for Nikolai and his allies. The fortress is known as the Spinning Wheel. Nikolai evacuated his parents (the rightful King and Queen of Ravka) and Alina’s mentor Baghra (the Darkling’s mother) to the fortress, and when she arrives, Alina goes to visit Baghra. Baghra talks to Alina about the third amplifier, and Alina tells her mentor that during her last battle with the Darkling in the previous book, she created beings of darkness, just as the Darkling is able to do. Alina aspires to create soldiers of light with her newfound power, which could fight the Darkling’s forces. Baghra is in the midst of chastising Alina for overstepping the traditional bounds of Grisha magic when Mal appears to tell Alina that she needs to come defend her friend, Genya. In the previous books of the series, Genya was loyal to the Darkling and poisoned Ravka’s King, Nikolai’s father. However, the Darkling mutilated her, and she has returned to Alina as a loyal friend. Now, the King has discovered that Genya is at the Spinning Wheel, infuriating him.
7. While Mal is in Baghra’s presence, Baghra tries to tell Alina something about him, but Mal and Alina cut the older woman off to go advocate for Genya. Nikolai sternly questions his father, Genya, and Alina about the charges against Genya. It turns out that the King repeatedly raped Genya when she was a servant in the Little Palace—the King and Queen’s original fortress. When the Darkling asked her to poison the King, Genya saw it as a way to retaliate. Nikolai is horrified by what his father has done and orders him to abdicate. Nikolai promises to convict Genya of the poisoning when the war is over, but Alina thinks he will be lenient with her friend. Alina shares another moment of barely restrained passion with Mal on the first night in the Spinning Wheel when he admits his desire for her but urges her to tell him to get out of her room, still feeling that he is unworthy of Alina. She does so reluctantly. The next morning, Alina releases the traumatized Grisha who betrayed Genya from her service, having Nikolai find him a less dangerous position. Baghra resumes her training with Alina, forcing her to use her magic to slice the top of a huge mountain peak near the fortress. A crowd of spectators watches Alina, who is amazed and exhilarated by this new height of her power.
8. Alina and Mal make plans with Nikolai. They decide to go in search of the third amplifier, which is traditionally believed to be a firebird, in the area of Ravka where Alina and Mal were originally born. Mal and several of the Grisha will take an airship to the area, while Nikolai and Alina go to West Ravka to perform some diplomacy before Nikolai takes her to reunite with Mal and the others. Nikolai gives Alina a valuable family heirloom, an emerald ring, and implies that he would like to marry her one day and make her the Queen of Ravka. He also gives her a new wardrobe for the West Ravka trip, and Alina enjoys some camaraderie with the other women in her party while the others go through the items she doesn’t want. She is uneasy about Nikolai’s pseudo-proposal because of her feelings for Mal, even though she knows that Mal chafes under the life of finery and luxury she must lead as Ravka’s icon. That night, as Alina is reflecting on the upcoming mission, she slips into another psychic connection with the Darkling, related in the next chapter.
9. Alina “sees” the Darkling having a wound tended by a magical healer. Once the two are alone, the Darkling asks her if she regrets not staying with him. Alina admits that he tempted her because she felt he understands her and her power. He taunts her about both Mal and Nikolai, and Alina finds herself in his arms, attracted despite herself. However, the Darkling turns hostile, telling Alina that he will be taking one of the Grisha, David, back from her and that he’s going to travel across the Fold to destroy West Ravka, using notes that David left that will help him use the Fold against West Ravka. Then, he warns her, he’ll come for her and Nikolai. Alina ends the connection and gathers her companions, questioning David as to what he might have left behind that the Darkling could be using to survive in the Fold. David admits that he had designs for a glass ship that could contain liquid fire—which requires sunlight to create—that would keep the Fold’s monsters at bay. Alina tells the others that the Darkling might have enough of her light-summoning power from their battle in the previous book to create the weapon. The group anxiously tries to think of a way to stop the Darkling before he can get to West Ravka.
10. Alina, Nikolai, Mal, and the Grisha strategize about meeting the threat of the Darkling in West Ravka. Nikolai decides to try and mobilize an army of soldiers who are loyal to him and any militia that have deserted the official Ravkan army. Reluctantly, Alina decides to reach out to the Apparat and the soldiers who were training for her underground. Nikolai sends an airship to warn the West Ravkans of the Darkling’s potential attack. Alina goes to visit Baghra to try and get any other information out of her about the Darkling and his power. Alina learns from Baghra that Morozova was Baghra’s father, making the Darkling Morozova’s grandson. When Baghra was young, she accidentally killed her non-magical sister in a fit of rage. Morozova resurrected his daughter, but his power angered and frightened the townspeople in the village where he lived. They restrained Morozova and his resurrected daughter in chains and threw them off a bridge. Baghra never saw her father or sister again—though she suspects they may have survived the attempted drowning—and she and her mother were thrown out of the village. Alina wonders if Morozova’s second daughter might also have been Grisha, and, if the child did survive, if she herself might be one of her descendants. Alina also realizes with disgust that this would mean she is related to the Darkling, making her attraction to him even more humiliating. Nikolai finds Alina and takes her up to the fortress’s upper floor, with a ceiling of glass, to watch a meteor shower with the others who are staying there. Mal, also excited about the shower and coming to find Alina, finds her arm-in-arm with Nikolai and quickly becomes somber. Heartbroken, Alina tries to rally her spirits for Nikolai and convince herself that she can’t be with Mal. Nikolai makes a more explicit offer of marriage if they survive the campaign against the Darkling, even though he knows of Alina’s feelings for Mal. He says that he would send Mal away to eliminate suspicions that any children he would have with Alina would be illegitimate, and he is hopeful that he and Alina could learn to love each other. Alina doesn’t make a definite promise to Nikolai, and the two continue watching the meteor shower.
11. As Mal’s party prepares to leave the Spinning Wheel, the Darkling and the monsters he has created attack them unexpectedly, led there by the Grisha who Alina arranged to have reassigned away from the action. The Darkling infects Nikolai with darkness that turns him into one of the shadow monsters, and distraught, Nikolai flies away from the fortress. The Darkling is in the process of having the monsters attack Alina and Mal, when Baghra, who has emerged from the Spinning Wheel, uses her own powers to stop them. Then, she jumps off the side of the mountain from the fortress, killing herself and the monsters who are attracted to her because of her magic. The Darkling dives after her, and in the confusion, Alina and Mal run to an airship, where they fly off with some of the Grisha.
12. Alina and the rest of her companions fly the airship south for several days to an abandoned mine near where the firebird might be. As they go, they tend to the wounds they’ve sustained during the battle. Alina tries not to answer too many questions about the Darkling, Baghra, or Nikolai, finding it too painful. When they land at the mine, the group gets some sleep. When she awakens and climbs out of the mine to collect firewood, Alina sees the transformed Nikolai in the forest. He looks at her and flies away, which makes Alina scream with heartbreak and fury. She feels the Darkling summoning a connection with her but rebuffs him. Later, the group makes plans for the following day and tell stories about Baghra, who trained all the Grisha back at the Little Palace. Alina feels a rush of connection to and gratitude for her companions.
13. Alina’s group splits up into two: she, Mal, and three Grisha will head south over the mountains that divide Ravka from its southern neighbor, Shu Han, to try and find the firebird. The rest of the group, four other Grisha, a little boy who accompanied them from the Spinning Wheel, and one of the soldiers, will go to a rendezvous place where they hope the Apparat will send troops to meet them. If Alina’s group doesn’t return from the mountains, they’ll carry on as best they can without Alina, Mal, or Nikolai to lead them. Mal leads the group through the mountains. They pass through the remains of burned settlements, a testament to the border disputes that have taken place in the mountains. Alina grows uneasy when they reach a blackened field with eerie trees and winds that bring up clouds of ash. The group camps at the base of a sheer cliff that they need to try to ascend.
14. The next day, the group climbs up the cliff to the top of a waterfall they’d seen from the valley below. Once there, they find nothing. One of the Grisha angrily demands of Mal where the firebird is. Mal wearily tells her that they need to keep going, but Alina senses that her companions are frustrated by their futile search. The group goes off to make camp while Alina stands at the edge of the cliff. Suddenly, she sees a huge bird with wings of fire swoop above her and then try to hunt her. She realizes that a pile of bones at the bottom of the cliff are the remains of the firebird’s prey. The bird starts to attack her, and Alina slips off the cliff just as Mal catches her in time. When he touches her wrist, the two feel a connection and increase in Alina’s power, similar to a feeling they had when Mal touched Alina’s wrist in the previous book. Mal hoists Alina back onto the cliff, and they realize simultaneously that Mal is the third amplifier, not the firebird. The bird leaves them alone when it realizes that they’re not hunting it, and Alina and Mal tell the others about their discovery. Alina realizes that Mal is the son of Baghra’s sister, who wasn’t magical after all—but Mal can affect and intensify Alina’s power. Upon reflection, she realizes that her power and all the other amplifiers connect to Mal in some way. Alina is troubled because she has had to kill the other two amplifiers (the stag in the first book and the sea whip in the second) to harness their power. Mal is willing to sacrifice himself to secure Alina’s victory. The group sets off on their return journey. Mal believes he is destined to die soon, so he lets Alina kiss him, and the two give in to their feelings for each other. They reunite with the rest of their companions. The others tell Alina that the Darkling has attacked both West Ravka, although the casualties were low because Nikolai’s warning allowed the residents time to evacuate away from the Fold, and Keramzin, where Alina and Mal grew up in an orphanage and where she had set up a new Grisha training school.
15. Alina races to an empty room and connects to the Darkling, enraged at what he has done. He shows her the blackened remains of the orphanage and the bodies of the adults there. He tells her that the children at the school are safe for now and that he will hold them hostage when he crosses the Fold again in five days. If Alina and Mal will give themselves up to him, he will release the children. Devastated and unable to see a way to save Mal, Alina despairs of finding a way out of their predicament. Genya, however, tells her that David has an idea. The group discusses David’s idea—to have Alina bend light around her soldiers and herself the way that she bent light around the airship to conceal it from passersby. The light bending makes the object invisible. The group agrees that they’ll try this plan, and if it doesn’t work Alina agrees to kill Mal to use his bones as the third amplifier. They travel to the rendezvous point with the Apparat and are disappointed to find that only 12 soldiers have come. However, they prepare as best they can for their fight with the Darkling in a few days.
16. The group splits into two again, with Alina and most of her original companions crossing the Fold in the airship to set up a camp in West Ravka, to which Alina will then lead her soldiers using her light. They will meet the Darkling in the middle of the Fold on the day he traverses it. The rest of the group rides on horseback to meet them on the near side of the Fold when they return. After she and her companions make the trip and then return to wait for the others, Alina sees Nikolai, still trapped in his shadow monster form. His gestures and mannerisms reassure her that there is still some humanity in him, despite his transformation, and that he recognizes her. She offers him his ring back, but he puts it onto her finger instead. He gestures for her to try and use her summoned light to drive away the shadows inside him that the Darkling used to transform him. At first, it seems to be working, but then the darkness returns. Alina promises to keep trying to heal him. They embrace, but Nikolai’s new instincts lead him to try and attack Alina. Horrified with himself, he flies off into the Fold. Alina and her army travel through the Fold and find David and Genya busily preparing for the battle at the camp. They finish gathering their supplies and perfecting their plan. The night before the battle, Alina and Mal finish their preparations and then, when Mal leads Alina to the deserted conservatory of the abandoned house they’re staying in, the two have sex for the first time.
17. Alina and her soldiers enter the Fold and wait for the Darkling. He appears in his glass ship, and Alina is able to maintain the invisibility until she goes onto the ship to try and free the Grisha children, who she assumes are out of sight in the ship’s cabin. Rattled by the wounds of her friends, a few of whom are struck by bullets even though they’re invisible, Alina’s grip on the invisibility wavers long enough for the Darkling to find and restrain her. Nikolai joins the battle, striking down the shadow monsters. Alina realizes that the children aren’t actually on the ship and that the Darkling just used them as bait to lure her out. She uses her connection with the Darkling to feign attacking him so that the shadow monsters who restrain her let her go to protect the Darkling instead. Alina escapes into the darkness around the ship. Mal finds her and insists that she kill him with a Grisha dagger. Against her will and yet eager at the sense of power she feels, Alina does so, and Mal dies. For a moment, Alina is filled with incredible power: “I was a living star. I was combustion. I was a new sun born to shatter air and eat the earth” (377). Her friends rejoin her in the darkness, and Alina tries to summon light but finds that she can’t do so. In the distance, she sees that the non-magical soldiers have all become Sun Summoners instead. The Darkling finds her, and they both realize that Alina’s powers are gone. The physical amplifiers Alina wears have broken and come off, useless. When the Darkling touches Alina, the old connection between them is gone. Alina uses the last bit of her power—summoning darkness—to hide the Grisha dagger from the Darkling and then stab him with it, killing him. His monsters and the Fold begin to break apart. Two of Alina’s friends, who are magical healers, manage to resurrect Mal.
18. Alina wants her friends to fake her death in the battle with the Darkling, and so they sneak her and Mal onto one of the ships and hide them away at the abandoned house when they reach West Ravka. Nikolai, who survived the battle and is back to his former self after the Darkling’s death, takes the credit for defeating the Darkling and destroying the Fold. All across the country, every non-magical soldier has gained the ability to summon light. Alina and Mal recover and plan to take new names for themselves, circulating the story that they both died during the battle. Genya uses her magical powers to help temporarily disguise Alina, whose hair turned white at the end of the previous book. Alina and Mal, along with the boy who came with them from the mountain fortress, cross the area where the Fold used to be as people stream across it from both sides, triumphant at regaining their country again. Alina gets to the city where Nikolai has installed himself as King, and he again asks her to marry him, saying that he still has darkness inside him from his time as a shadow monster, and only Alina will understand that. Alina gently refuses him, however, and arranges for Genya’s pardon for poisoning the former King. She also chooses Genya, David, and another of the Grisha to lead the Second Army in the future. Using magic, the Grisha have made the body of a fallen soldier look like Alina’s, and hold a public cremation, along with the body of the Darkling, with the whole kingdom watching.
AFTER
Alina and Mal get married quietly, using their assumed names. They go back to Keramzin and rebuild their old orphanage into a school where children are educated, treated well, and cared for better than they were. They live an anonymous, ordinary life, although their Grisha friends and Nikolai stay in touch with and come to visit them occasionally. Alina, however, doesn’t mourn for her lost powers or the chance to continue being extraordinary—she is happy with Mal and her work at the school, which give her a sense of meaning and fulfillment.