𝑺𝒎𝒐𝒌𝒆 | 𝑮𝒆𝒏𝒆𝒓𝒂𝒍 𝑲𝒊𝒓𝒊𝒈𝒂𝒏 𝒙 𝑶𝑪

Thirteen

Sorry for the late update but THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR 10,000 READS

It had been a grueling next couple of weeks, Baghra continued to push Alina and General Kirigan kept on trying to push Jolana.

Jolana let out a large groan as she walked into Alina's room,

"Kirigan again?"

"You'd understand if you had to train with him. You get a nice old lady," Jolana flopped onto Alina's bed

"You clearly have not met Baghra," Alina laid down beside her,  "Well Baghra drugged me today," she said simply

Jolana turned her head to look at Alina, "What?" she exclaimed

"She spiked the tea with some hallucinogen. She asked me what I saw,"

"What did you see?"

"Me and Mal, at the orphanage in Keramzin," Alina glanced looked straight up as she spoke, "The day I was tested. Mal was hurt so they couldn't test him. I cheated on the test,"

"You knew you were Grisha?"

"No, but if I was I didn't want to leave Mal,"

Jolana reached out and gave Alina's hand a little squeeze.

"Anyways, it's time for Jolana complains about General Kirigan for at least twenty minutes part 12,"

"Wow, part twelve! didn't know there was so much to talk about," Jolana recognized the voice

The pair of girls quickly sat up.

"Aleksander!" Alina exclaimed. Jolana grimaced at Alina.

"Hello, Alina," General Kirigan said

Jolana didn't meet his eye. 

"Hello, Jolana," he said intently

Jolana turned to Alina, "You know that one saying, "Talk of the devil and he's presently at your elbow," She then turned to him and gave him a sardonic smile

He raised an eyebrow, "Well I guess it's expected for the inferni to be a bit of a spit fire,"

"What do you need, General Kirigan?"

"I'm just here to let you know we will be having an additional training session after dinner tonight. You will leave your guards here and I will personally be escorting you," 

"Ok? Why did you need to come and deliver the message personally," Jolana asked pointedly

"Well, I thought it would be nice to see you glare at me when I give you the news, it's one of the few joys in life," he smirked

Alina started giggling a little and Jolana rolled her eyes.

"Have a nice day Alina, and I'll see you soon Jolana,"

He exited and Alina turned to Jolana, the biggest smirk on her face. 

"Not a word,"

Dinnertime came much quicker than Jolana would have preferred. As she ate her food, she eavesdropped on the conversations of those around her. She ended up hearing about one of Nadia's ex-girlfriends and how Marie almost set a guy she liked on fire. 

She had zoned out eating and listening to the general rumbling and mumbling in the room, she only zoned back in when she realized all that noise had stopped. She looked up and everyone was looking at her, or rather, behind her. 

"It's time to go, Miss Sokolov," he offered his hand but she chose to get up without it.

Once they had left the main dining room, Jolana muttered, "Quite the dramatic entrance and exit, General Kirigan,"

"Thought you'd appreciate the flair," he joked. He seemed to be a little disappointed at her lack of reaction. He cleared his throat, "Anyways we've got some work to do, just a little experiment based on what I've noticed,"

"And that is," 

"We're going to see how much you can burn down with some variables,"

"Wow from general to scientist,"

"Well, it's called the small sciences for a reason,"

They walked out of the building and went to the stables to get a horse to ride out into the woods. Jolana mounted the horse and realize it was the same horse she had ridden to the Little Palace on.

"Hey there," the horse neighed in response. They rode out as the sun set. 

"Wow..." Jolana whispered.

"It's beautiful isn't it," the uppermost part of the sky was blue, the clouds looked purple. That wasn't the most striking part, the horizon was bright orange. It was overwhelming.

"I just haven't seen one in a while," Jolana said quietly

Once they came to their normal practicing spot, they hopped off their horses and General Kirigan handed her a pair of gloves.

"You could've just told me to bring my own," she said as she pulled the gloves on.

"Now make a small fire and make it as big as you can,"

She did. She lit some kindling and then the fire became about three feet in diameter when she tried to expand it.

"Ok, not bad," he said, "Now take off the gloves,"

"But I'm supposed to wear the gloves? All the infernis do,"

"Humor me," 

She peeled the gloves off, "What's the next part of your experiment?"

"Now do your thing, make it bigger"

"Will do sir," she said sarcastically as she walked over and did the same thing. It got so much bigger, so much faster than she expected. She had to step back to avoid setting herself on fire.

"That is... excellent," the General said, trying to remain stoic but failing slightly. 

"Thank you very much," Jolana said with a little laugh. She focused for a second and the fire shrunk back down, and then when she focused on making it bigger, it grew. Jolana smiled to herself, "You're allowed to smile at how great I am," she said to him. He cracked a small smile.

"You can go now, enjoy the rest of your night,"

"Thank you, General Kirigan,"

"You're always so formal, considering I call you Jolana,"

"Calling you by your first name just feels wrong, you're supposed to like outrank me and everything. Soldier mentality and stuff,"

"Well if you must," he said as the two of them got back on their horses, "I hope you don't feel the need to run back to Miss Starkov for episode thirteen of your show about complaining about me is,"

"There won't be more episodes unless you give me material for more episodes,"

"I'll try not to," he chuckled, and they rode back to the Little Palace. He walked her back to her room. 

"Bye," she said quickly

"Goodbye Jolana," he said and turned around beginning to walk away.

"Goodbye... Aleksander," she said quietly. 

She thought he didn't hear her, but he did.