Alina, Baghra, and Mal set off to find the Firebird. On the way, Baghra shares with the other two a few of her childhood stories. Just the usual sibling rivalry stuff, her cutting her sister in half out of uncontrollable rage, for instance, and then there was that one time when dad brought baby sister back from the dead. Yikes.

The Darkling destroys an army base near Keramzin, Alina’s orphanage. The aftermath is a confusing scene, at least for the Grisha.

FOLLOWERS: Sir, since we have victory, we hope to…

DARKLING: Hope is a lie.

Erm, they just hope to take the next strategic step, Darkling! Why do you keep throwing rhetoric at them?

Alina and Baghra arrive at Morozova’s secret cave where he stored all of his notes. But notes aren’t necessary anymore because Baghra has discovered something important: Mal is the Firebird! No need to keep looking.

I’ll try to keep this brief. Basically, Morozova (no it wasn’t a woman, despite the “-a” in the name) brought his second daughter back from the dead and turned her into an amplifier. She passed that down to her descendants, and Mal is one of them.

While Mal and Baghra have their relaxing conversation, the Darkling finds Alina using their bond. He pushed her up a wall in anger. Revenge for that little seduction scheme the other day, I guess.

Baghra rushes in and does what she does best: putting a stop to the Darkling’s dates. His date ideas are terrible, anyway. Baghra yanks Alina out, sets fire to Morozova’s notes, and tells Mal to remember what he has to do when the time comes and to take Alina away. Mal seals the door to the cave.

Baghra enters the vision and threatens to use the Cut on the Darkling. This causes his shadow monsters to materialize and attack her, which is what she wants. Baghra needs him to be emotionally compromised enough to come close to her, and only her dying can achieve that. Once the Darkling does get close to say that he didn’t mean it, she uses her shadow to cut off the his hand that has the stag’s horn piece — this family is obsessed with limb-chopping, I’m telling you.

The Darkling weeps like a normal boy for once when Baghra dies.

Now, if you’re afraid you will have to look at a single-handed Darkling for the rest of the show, worry not. He gets one of his Grisha to make a metal hand for him. The Cut is back on.

When they are back at Nikolai’s camp, Mal tells Alina the truth about him being a bird the Firebird. Alina’s response is nothing new: No, no, no.

MAL: Yes, yes, yes, you have to kill me. The country’s future depends on it.

ALINA: No, no, no.

They kiss and roll around on the bed.

Back to the Crows. They all pass out from the poison gas except for Wylan, who is having the best time of his life observing blue butterflies just outside the room. Inej is the first one to regain consciousness and call for help. Wylan bombs the room and gets them out. They set a trap for the Shu lady, but she is better. She fights all of them plus Zoya and Nina and WINS. Only when Kaz appears with her husband as a hostage does she stop.

This lady is actually a saint. She has a random sob story tragic history. Long story short, she has lived for too long, watched too many people die, and is sad and lonely. Nothing the Darkling hasn’t lectured us about already. The Shu saint then spills some inspirational lines and agrees to let them borrow the sword. Mission accomplished.

Jesper and Wylan make up. Kaz is disgusted by all the feeeeeelings around him.