#Wylan would lay a trap like this

[jazzkrebber]

Wylan: kiss me if I'm wrong but-

Jesper: you're wrong

Wylan: I didn't-

Jesper: YOU'RE WRONG

[heartrender6]

most of the kuwei hate in this fandom is absolutely racially motivated and most of it is probably subconscious but i NEED to talk about this.

and not because i think people r thinking "i hate kuwei!! he's asian and i hate asians!!" tbh most anti asian racism on the internet goes way deeper than that.

basically, what i believe to be the most prominent type of racism against asians, especially on the internet, is stereotyping. specifically "uwu-ification." the east asian entertainment industry likes to paint asian people as cute, submissive and sweet because it markets disturbingly well to american audiences, and whether people mean to or not, they internalize it and it affects the way they think of asian people as a whole. This mostly happens to east and southeast asian women, but definitely a lot with men too, especially in more recent years with the whole yaoi culture thing (i fucking hated typing that) becoming more popular. simply put, it's fetishization.

so how does this relate to kuwei? well, when kuwei is introduced to us, and im not gonna dance around it— he is pretty stereotypically asian. he's shy, innocent, small, good at math/science and— you guessed it— no speaka engrish. leigh bardugo lays the perfect trap for fandom white girl weeaboos to gush over this guy. once i came across a modern au where kuwei's whole northern chinese-mongolian ass is a "shy japanese transfer student." i really wish i was making this up.

but then we find out that kuwei is actually a conniving little shit who is really quite terrible at science and spends all day making shitty drawings of his crush instead of doing math or wtv. The turning point where we are told this is the jesper kiss. This is the point where we find out kuwei is not the yaoi uwu baby we thought he was. and how does fuckin 2/3 of the fandom react?? hate. instant hate. If you search "i hate kuwei" on twitter there are tweets both defending and attacking him, but there is significantly more of the latter.

most of them claim to hate him for kissing jesper but like... jesper kissed him. He doesn't say anything because, in his own words, "we're all probably going to die anyway." does no one see how tragic that is?? he let his first (probably) kiss be taken by someone who he knew didn't even like him because he thought it would be the only one he'd ever get.

and yet the only thing people see is that he "got in the way" of wesper and he's evil. throughout the series kuwei is given no agency, and that's the point of his character. everyone on the planet treats him as a weapon or a bargaining chip. he gets tossed around like a rag doll and to white (or otherwise not asian) audiences, that makes him the perfect picture of a little asian cutie i almost vomited typing that holy shit. but the moments where he takes something for himself— insisting on going to ravka, kissing jesper back— that's what makes people hate him. and don't even get me started on the way people project their hatred onto the other crows, especially wylan. yall will act like wylan loathes kuwei with all his being. he doesn't!! wylan is not a hateful person and he always defends kuwei!! but nooo, kuwei sucks and he deserves it for daring to be a person instead of an idea.

and hey?? guess what?? kuwei was NEVER in the way of wesper. there was no love triangle. narratively speaking, there was never any threat that kuwei would end up with jesper instead of wylan. never ever. the kiss was literally only put there to create drama for wylan and jesper. we never even hear how kuwei feels about it. stop using that as an excuse to hate on kuwei when we can all see it's because you're subconsciously mad at an asian person not being nice.

also disliking kuwei does not automatically make you racist, im just saying a lot of hatred towards kuwei is rooted in racism.

tagging my fellow aapi moots (that i know of) because i wanna hear yalls thoughts on this! @hauntedacousticversiontv @dramaqueentruther

[baby-alien11]

hi!! i loved your tolya fic, and i was wondering if you could write some more about him?? maybe reader goes with tolya and the crows to fetch the sword and that scene where they're all hallucinating because of the poison and tolya is like trying to protect reader until they all pass out? just imagine the angst and comfort that comes with it and the aftermath </3 thank you so much!!

Hi anon, thanks for sending the request, and I'm glad you liked my previous Tolya fic

I hope you like this one, literally, this one of the first things I saw when I woke up the morning you send it

Of all the adventures that you had been in your time as a member of the Sturmhond crew, well prince Nikolai crew, this was the most important of all

While a part of the crew stayed to control the situation with the Darkling, his sidekicks and the shadow, you, Tolya and Zoya traveled to Ketterdam to recruit the crows to get help to get a sword that would help to destroy the creatures that lived at the shadow

During the trip, Zoya made sure to stay away from you and Tolya to give the both of you some space, but mostly was because she didn't want to hear all the poetry that the heartrender recite to you

Most people would found it annoying, but for you it was lovely because that was the way he made his way to your heart

Convincing the crows to join was easy the moment they knew there will be a economic compensation, so during big part of the day while Kaz and Nina investigate where they could find the sword, the rest of you were gattered around that part of the city, you and Tolya were trying food from the stalls while he explained the plate that both of you were eating

When the night arrived, you, Tolya, Kaz, Inej and Jesper entered the Ohval's house, while Wylan stayed outside, but soon the five of you realised that you were trapped and some orange smoke was entering the small space

But even with your Inferni powers and the efforts of all of you, the smoke was starting to make effect on you taking your breath away, leaving you laying on the floor along with the others, leaving no space to Tolya to try to slow down your heart as he did with his own

When you woke up, you weren't in the Ohval's house anymore, standing up you realised you were in some kind of medaow with a small house a few metters in front of you, so you decided to get closer noticing two figures, one big and one small, playing in the entrance of the house, making your curiosity to increase

Stopping three metters away from the scene, you soon noticed how the two people playing were Tolya and a little girl who was a mix between both of you making you shed a few tears of happinnes of thinking about a possible future with your lover

But almost inmediatly, the tears of joy turned into tears of desperation and screams of pain when the small house and his surroundings light on fire along with Tolya and the little girl getting caught in the fire

Even if you tried to help to stop it, it wouldn't work because you were an inferni, it could be worse

When the fire started to get to you, you suddenly woke up watching Tolya hovering over you with his hand covering your mouth

"It's okay, it's okay", Tolya said noticing your panicked look, "Just eat it, it help with the venom"

Trusting in his words, you started to chew the thing that was in your mouth noticing it was a weird feeling and flavor until you finally eat it all

Making sure that you already eat it, Tolya help you to sit in which almost inmediatly, you hug him thightly remembering the vision you just had

At first, he was a little surprised but he realised you must had a hard vision so he hugged you with almost the same force as you

"We are okay", Tolya said again in a recomforting tone, "I'm here"

"I thought I lost you", you sniffled against his shoulder

"You are not going to loose me", he assured you, "I promise"

[wylanslcve]

to the bone ━━━ a six of crows one-shot.

spoiler warning: this is not a safe space for fans who have only watched the show and do not want to have wylan's story spoiled for them in case we get the spin-off. this one-shot is based off a scene that is referenced in six of crows, and contains heavy spoilers for wylan's backstory which hasn't yet been explored in the showverse (I say "yet" because I'm holding onto hope that we'll get that spin-off asdfghjkl).

summary: ever since jan van eck had hired him for the mission at the ice court, kaz intended to use wylan as leverage against his father. but wylan had known from the start, from the moment that kaz had told him that he'd be excellent at hostage, that that wouldn't be effective. not when he'd been nothing but a disappointment to his father. not when van eck was hellbent on forgetting that he ever had a son. wylan couldn't keep it hidden anymore. kaz needed to know the truth. (or: the scene where wylan tells kaz about his disability.)

author's note: this work is a submission for grishaverse disability pride day by @gvdisabledpride that will also be available on ao3, so if you also see this work there... that's why :)

content warning: descriptions of ableism, mentions of past child abuse, ptsd

ABOARD THE FEROLIND after the battle at the Djerholm harbour, Wylan lay curled up in his cot below deck, waiting for the moment the sway of the ship would lull him to sleep.

Except he knew it probably wouldn't. He'd been lying in his cot for what felt like hours, tossing and turning, desperately trying to silence his racing thoughts and just fall asleep. He tried to focus on the sound of the sea muffled by the hull of the Ferolind, on the sway of the ship as it journeyed closer and closer to Ketterdam — but the freezing cold wasn't doing him any favours, and neither was that anxious gnawing in his gut.

The mission had been, considerably, a success: they'd escaped the Ice Court in one piece, with Kuwei Yul-Bo stashed away in one of the other cabins and the promise of thirty million kruge awaiting them back in Ketterdam. Wylan would get his share and leave this life behind. He'd journey somewhere far away, never having to speak the name Van Eck again.

Van Eck…

Wylan swallowed the bile rising up inside him. Kaz had intended to use him as leverage against his father, lest the plan go awry and Van Eck was suddenly uncooperative. “Wylan isn’t just good with the flint and fuss,” he'd announced that first day on the Ferolind, right before he'd revealed Wylan's true identity to the rest of the crew. “He's our insurance.” 

Wylan shut his eyes, curled up tighter in his cot. His heart was starting to beat a little faster, a hummingbird trapped inside a cage, and he forced his breath slowly through his chest — a deep breath through his nose, shattering the silence that had thickened around him. Kaz had kept him close to use him as leverage against Van Eck, but one thing the older boy wasn't aware of was that Wylan couldn't be their insurance. Not when his father wanted him to disappear. Not when he was attempting to forget he ever had a son. Not when his new wife, Alys, was bearing the heir of the Van Eck empire — a proper hier, not the defective one he’d received in Wylan. Not the one who’d turn the Van Eck name into a laughingstock.

I have to tell Kaz.

Instinctively, his fingers reached up to touch his neck. He could still feel Prior's meaty hands clasped tightly around it, his grip firm and relentless as Wylan grew dizzy and black spots slowly filled his vision. He sat up, hoping the feeling would subside if he got up and let more air fill his lungs — and yet, the feeling of his throat constricting persisted, and a suffocating, uncontrollable panic welled up in him.

He hugged his knees to his chest and slowly rocked himself back and forth with his head buried in his arms, horrified by how his breath was coming out in short, shallow whimpers as the memories came flooding back, by how the tears prickled the corners of his eyes as his father's voice echoed in his ears.

A child half your age can effortlessly do what you cannot.

I've tried everything I possibly could. I've tried tutors, specialists, I've tried forcing that stubbornness out of you and yet you refuse to be taught.

You can't be sent anywhere because your defect might be revealed.

“Get out of my head,” Wylan whimpered, grabbing fistfuls of his hair as he continued to rock himself back and forth. “Get out of my head.”

Once you reveal yourself to be defective, they'll turn your back on you. They'll leave you as you were: the wayward son of one of the richest men in Ketterdam.

“Get… Get out of my head.”

But the voice was persistent, unwelcome. You worthless fool. You soft-pated idiot.

He pressed the heels of his hands to his eyes, blinking back the tears that formed a painful lump in his throat. He swallowed, trying to force it down to no avail, and a fresh flare of panic swelled within him. Someone could walk into his cabin at any moment and see him in this state: rocking back and forth with his head in his hands, chest shuddering over and over as he gasped for air, begging the voice in his head to lapse into silence. And yet, there was nothing he could do about it. He felt detached from his own body, as though he were watching himself from the perspective of an outsider, helpless against the wave of shame overcoming him.

He stayed like that until the jittery feeling coursing through him had subsided enough for him to think rationally again. Above that irrefutable voice in the back of his mind, he once again thought about revealing his greatest shame to Kaz. What would happen if he just stayed there on his cot, if he never told Kaz that he couldn't be used as leverage against his father? And what would happen if Van Eck double-crossed them, and there wasn't any good enough insurance to ensure that the six of them would get their money? Their efforts would have been futile, and none of them would get what they'd initially sought — and it might as well be his fault.

His body starting to tremble, Wylan forced himself to stand up from his cot. Just do one thing at a time. Just like his tutor had taught him in order to stop him from getting overwhelmed by the page. Stand up. He slid off the edge of the cot, straightened as his feet touched the ground. Take a deep breath. He closed his eyes, took another deep breath through his nose. Open your eyes. He opened his eyes and forced himself to walk. Go find Kaz. He assumed Kaz would be in his own cabin, scheming away, concocting backup plans for their backup plans in case anything went wrong.

He quietly left his cabin, making his way down the Ferolind's lower deck to find Kaz. He found the older boy sitting on the cot in his own cabin, staring intently at the floor with one hand gripping the crow head of his cane.

“Kaz?” Wylan swallowed frantically, his skin burning hot as he fought the words to come through. “I… I won't be leverage enough against my father. I know I'm supposed to be your… insurance, but I can't be. It won't be enough.”

Kaz sat up straighter, his free hand curling over the head of his cane as he looked up at Wylan. “And why is that?”

Something about Kaz's cold glare, his rock-salt rasp as he asked the question, sent a chill rippling over every inch of Wylan's skin. He wanted to scream. He wanted to bolt back to his cabin, hide beneath the paper-thin covers until he vanished completely. He wanted the floor to open up beneath him, to be dragged by the rolling waves into the depths of the sea. He wanted to disappear, just like his father wanted him to.

I have to tell him.

“I…” The roar of blood in his ears was deafening, drowning out the murmur of the waves outside the Ferolind's hull. That shameful helplessness was taut in his belly, a knot incapable of coming unravelled.

You just have to say it. You just have to say you can't read.

His father's taunts reverberated in his mind. Defective. Imbecile. Worthless. Broken. Disgraceful. Idiot. Useless. He was choking on them. They pressed against his throat like Prior's iron grip closing around it all those months ago, dirty fingernails digging into the skin of his neck. His cheeks burnt with shame despite the cold sweat that had broken out over every part of his body. His heart was a war drum beneath his ribs, his chest too tight, his breath too short and shallow. Take a deep breath. He couldn't. His clothes felt tight around his body — too tight, as though they stuck to him.

“I… I have an affliction.” Uttering those words aloud was enough to send a violent roil through Wylan's stomach, and he had to stop himself from throwing up. This was it. There was no taking back those words: he was halfway there.

Kaz merely sat there, looking rather impatient with his gloved hands folded over the crow's head of his cane. Wylan couldn't imagine what he looked like in this moment: red-faced, a trembling hand near his lips as if he were about to bite his nails, his eyes not meeting Kaz's.

It felt like the walls of the cabin were closing in on him, Prior's hands tightening around his throat as the latter half of his confession choked him. The waters he'd leapt into all those months ago were rising around him, filling his lungs and numbing his limbs with its icy grasp. He tried to fight against it, but the water was weighing him down, his limbs useless against the tide as he drowned in the murky waters of the Ketterdam harbour.

He drew another deep, shuddering breath.

Spit it out.

“I… I can't read,” he finally gasped, and the water receded.

There. He'd said it. He'd revealed his shame to Kaz, his voice barely above a whisper lest the sea around them carry his shame across its rolling waves and let the whole world know about Jan Van Eck's defective child.

Kaz's piercing glare was still on him, as if expecting him to say more. His expression remained as cold and calculating as ever — had he known about this too, just as he'd known about Wylan's true identity? Did Wylan have any tells that gave away his shame — his face growing pale at the sight of the tangled scrawl of words across a page, staring at it for too long hoping that he'd recognise the shapes of the words? Or had Kaz been surprised? Had this been the one thing he hadn't seen coming? His gaze was piercing and unreadable, but Wylan sucked in another breath and continued, trying to keep his voice steady.

“It's not that no one tried to teach me, lots of people did. But I just can't do it. It's like something in me refuses to do it.” That was what his father used to drill into him throughout his childhood, and the memory filled him with a sickening dread.

“I'm…” Wylan moistened his lips thoughtfully, trying to phrase his next words carefully without having the entire shameful story out in the open. The story of his father sending him away, supposedly to study music in Belendt. Of his Miggson and Prior trying to kill him, of him leaping into the murky canal with nothing but his satchel, fake enrolment papers and a soaked-through stash of kruge. “To him, I'm not worth losing. You can't use me as leverage if I'm not good enough insurance. There has to be another way around this, because this won't work. I know it won't.”

Kaz averted his gaze thoughtfully, then shrugged before standing up, leaning on his cane. That was his only response — a shrug. Had Wylan not been so afraid, so shaken by that shameful helplessness, he would have burst out laughing: he'd just revealed his defect to Kaz Brekker — the Bastard of the Barrel, the boy they called Dirtyhands in the grimy streets of the Barrel — and he'd merely shrugged. Shouldn't he be concerned with what to do with Wylan, now that he'd found out that his demolitions expert was just a useless fool evicted from his father's home?

“We'll have to work around that, then,” Kaz responded in that low, raspy voice. His eyes met Wylan's, boring into him as though searching for some semblance of worth within him, something that would compensate for his other failings. A pinprick of discomfort shot up Wylan's spine at the prolonged eye contact, but Kaz's eyes left his as he scanned Wylan from the top of his head down to the tips of his toes and back up again.

Wylan just stood there, completely stunned. He'd expected Kaz to sneer at him, or laugh at his affliction and refuse to give him his share of their reward once they'd reached Ketterdam. He'd expected the knot in his stomach to tighten, the shame growing, but he felt it loosen ever so slightly with the odd sense of relief and liberation that came with revealing his condition to Kaz.

“And how do you suppose we do that?” Wylan asked, his voice a low croak. “What other leverage could we possibly use?” 

Kaz looked towards the door of his cabin, then back at Wylan. Kaz Brekker saw the world as though it were a puzzle, and he studied Wylan like he was a piece of that puzzle that didn't fit where he'd thought it would — but now, it seemed, he'd found another place he could slot that piece into without having to tear the entire project apart. “Lest Van Eck double-crosses us, we'll have to stop him from getting what he wants.”

Wylan's brow furrowed. “And how, exactly, would we do that?”

“Nina's a passable Tailor at best — but, under the influence of parem, she could achieve something that shouldn't be possible. Not even in the hands of the most gifted Tailor.” Wylan swallowed thickly as Kaz continued. “We'll have her tailor you to look like Kuwei, and hand you off to your father.”

Wylan's heart stuttered at that. He was no stranger to Kaz's elaborate and unbelievable schemes — after all, they'd stolen a tank from a high-security prison — but this was different. This was absurd. Wylan agreeing to be tailored to look like Kuwei was a death wish: the Shu boy was valuable, certainly with large bounties on his head. He held the secret to the world's greatest threat, one that could wreak havoc if it fell into the wrong hands. Wylan could have refused — he should have refused, if he wanted to make it back to Ketterdam alive. Instead, he cleared his throat and responded with an assertive, “I'll do it.”

For a split second, a surprised look flashed in Kaz's eyes, but disappeared as quickly as it came. He expected me to refuse, Wylan thought as his cheeks heated with embarrassment once again.

“It may be permanent,” Kaz warned him.

Wylan shook his head. “I need to know. Once and for all, I need to know what my father really thinks of me.”

Kaz cast him an almost pitying look. “Surely Van Eck would have some qualms about ending your life—”

“He wouldn't,” Wylan asserted, picking at the skin of his lip, that ill feeling returning as the reality dawned on him. Van Eck had tried to kill him once, what would stop him from trying again? “I'll bet you that.”

“How much?”

“Ten kruge.”

Kaz's lip curled in a grin. “Surely your father wouldn't be so callous.”

Wylan shrugged. “You'd be surprised.”

“Nothing surprises me, merchling. That's why I'm still alive.” Kaz walked past Wylan and made his way to the cabin's entrance. “I'm going to fill Nina in on the plan. Go to her cabin within the hour.”

Wylan nodded as Kaz left the cabin, leaving Wylan alone with nothing but his own racing thoughts. When he'd finally gotten himself to move, he walked back to his own cabin and propped himself down on his cot, his body still trembling with the aftermath of confessing his greatest shame to Kaz. His fingers itched the way they always did whenever he yearned to play his flute or the piano in the music room of his father's house. Ghezen and his works, he wanted nothing more than to snatch his satchel up from the foot of his cot and grab his flute. He wanted to close his eyes and bring the instrument to his lips, letting the world disappear around him as the notes wrapped him in his own story — one free of the shame and fear he'd carried for so long, one that made his heart flutter with joy as the music flooded a soothing warmth through him. But he couldn't bring himself to even glance in the direction of his satchel.

He thought back to Kaz's unchanged expression at his admission, the light, dismissive shrug of his shoulders. The shame still gnawed at Wylan, but there was also the strange relief of getting something off his chest despite it, as though telling Kaz had freed something in him — something that had been encased in the chains of his father's contempt for as long as he could remember.

It's not too late to decline, pressed that voice in the back of his mind.

He shook his head assertively — if this is what had to be done to ensure the crew got their money, then so be it. And yet… he was terrified and horribly anxious.

He looked down at his hands, his eyes tracing over the creases of his slender fingers, the little scars with no clear origin along his skin, the crescent outlines on his palms from digging his nails into them. Within the hour, they weren't going to be his hands anymore — they'd be Kuwei's. Slowly, he buried his face in his hands, sighing deeply as his fingers raked through the tufts of hair that brushed his forehead. The face in his hands wouldn't be his anymore, and neither would the hair between his fingers. With Nina's power, he'd soon become the most valuable person in the world. He was terrified, but that wouldn't stop him from doing what he needed to. From ensuring that he and the rest of this crew got their money.

From finally learning what his father truly thought of him.

Van Eck had made it clear as Wylan grew up that there was no space for his son in his household. He'd made it clear that he wanted Wylan disappear for as long as it took him to forget that he ever had a son. And yet, a part of him hoped that maybe he'd misunderstood everything. That his father did indeed love him unconditionally just as any father loved his child.

Wylan lifted his head from his hands and started gnawing at his thumbnail. He wouldn't know for certain until the rest of Kaz's plan was carried out, when his face and name were no longer his.

[sissytobitch10seconds]

Febuwhump 29: What I Say

Fandom: Grishaverse: Six of Crows and Shadow and Bone Summary: He's so sick, sicker than he could have ever remembered being. Wylan isn't going to let him succumb to it. Warnings: Terminal illness, blood, sickness, major character death, and implied human experimentation Word Count: 1,613 Ship(s): Wylan Van Eck/Kaz Brekker

Archive link!

Kaz hated being sick almost as much as he hated Sanatoriums. Despite how he liked to present himself when he was in polite society, he had actually more experience with them than most doctors did. He had been in one when his mother was dying, there to visit her as often as they were allowed given the contagious nature of the disease. He had been in one with his brother when they were both fighting off the same thing that had killed their mother. He had visited a mental institution when they had finally found where Wylan’s mother was being wrongfully held.

Now he was trapped in one again.

He didn’t know how long tuberculosis lived on inside the body, he just knew that it followed him like a shadowed figure. Kaz knew that the disease wasn’t really gone when he left the sanatorium after Jordie died. They were so overrun with cases at the time that they had assumed that Kaz had died and didn’t bother looking for him. He should have stayed in the nice, dry hospital for several months longer until the tubercles had left him entirely. He didn’t, he left for the wet streets of the city that Jordie had dragged them to months before. He found work and he clawed his way up into a position that would allow him to live somewhat comfortably. He had even found a partner that he enjoyed the time of, someone that he could help and cherish.

The symptoms had come back only three months after their wedding (which hadn’t been legal, but was official as it could be in their eyes). He had felt the tickling in the back of his throat. He had become so exhausted that he could barely even get a couple hours of work done before he had to go and lay down again. He had become pale and his appetite immediately vanished, but that happened every now and again anyway.

It was only when he pulled his handkerchief away to confirm what he had already been able to taste in his mouth that he knew for certain. He had kept it a secret for a while as he tried to wrap his mind around the fact that he was sick again. He had never heard of someone coming down with Tuberculosis twice, usually because they died the first time that they got it and then lived a very reclusive, sickly life afterwards. He knew that he had bested it once but he wasn’t going to be able to do it again.

Wylan had found out, of course. Wylan always found out when something was wrong with him. It was part of the reason he had ended up picking the lower level merchant over the woman that he had met from the circus, the one that held stars in her eyes and a drunken laugh in her mouth. She was too good for him, too good to chain down with his bad leg. Wylan was just as bad as him and understood him so deeply that they were almost the same person.

Which meant that it was only a matter of time before his husband deduced the fact that he had relapsed. Kaz was immediately examined by a doctor to confirm what they already knew and shipped away to a sanatorium.

He had spent his days there thinking about what Wylan was doing, reading the letters that the servants had written in the merchant’s stead over and over again. He had also been poked and prodded within an inch of his life as they tried every treatment that someone could reasonably think up and a few that they had unreasonably thought up. As if being sick with something that was eating his insides wasn’t bad enough, the exhaustion of being through the testing completely ran him through.

It had been months since he had been sent to the sanatorium. He had seen Wylan once or twice briefly, when the doctors had thought that it would help him get better or thought that he was improving. To Kaz, it was clear as day that he wasn’t going to get better. He would cough every time he so much as took in too big of a breath and the sputum that he spat into his handkerchiefs wasn’t pretty. He spent most of his days sleeping and was only able to sip on broth, even chewing was too tiring.

He wasn’t at all surprised when he opened his eyes and saw that Wylan was nervously sitting next to his bed, wringing his hands. As soon as his husband noticed that Kaz had awoken, his eyes wrinkled with that wonderful worried smile that Kaz had gotten so many times before. He was wearing one of the white hospital masks, likely one of the only reasons they had let him in. “How did you get in here?” he asked, the curiosity never leaving his tired brain despite his overall exhaustion.

“I flashed a lot of money at them and promised that I would be safe,” Wylan replied. “You hadn’t sent me a letter in a while, I was worried.”

“I got too tired to write, then I had someone writing them for me. But there were things that you deserved to hear that shouldn’t be told through someone else. They might change the words or decide not to write something they don’t like,” Kaz replied. One of his bare hands, he hadn’t been allowed to wear his gloves since his arrival, wormed its way out from underneath the quilts. He reached for Wylan’s and soon their palms were pressed lovingly together.

“Kaz,” Wylan whispered, his voice broken and scared.

“Yes?”

Wylan leaned over, pressing his forehead down into the soft white linen sheets. Their hands dropped, which allowed Kaz to slowly lift up his tired muscles and then drop his palm down onto Wylan’s curls. He threaded his lock picker’s fingers through them so that they were buried amongst the pale digits. It was something he had loved to do during the quiet nights that they had taken, away from the servants and Marya and the watchful eye of the people around them. It was private and meant only for them.

“You have to get better,” the other man eventually said. When he tilted his head up, his eyes were blotchy with tears and his face was red from trying to hold them in.

“I’m trying my best, treasure,” he said tiredly. He likely could have been doing more, but he was tired. He didn’t like the treatments that the doctors were giving him and he knew that they wouldn’t work. He had watched his brother suffer and die from the disease, and before then he had seen the same thing happen to his mother. They were trying new things but he was sure that they would have the same efficacy as the ones that had failed to save his family would.

“I can’t lose you,” Wylan sniffled. He wiped at his face with the side of his hand, shifting anxiously on his chair. “I just got to know what it was like to be loved. You have to be around to keep teaching me.”

“Are you trying to guilt trip me out of having tuberculosis?” Kaz asked, giving him an absolutely exhausted smile.

“Is it working?” Wylan asked. 

The laughter that sparkled between them lasted only a second before Kaz was overcome with another coughing fit. He had to sit up as he grasped for the hankie on his nightstand. When he pulled it away, the dark red blood was soaking almost all the way through the delicately embroidered linen. “You’re going to have to apologize to your mother for me. I’ve ruined her hard work,” he commented. Every single one of the handkerchiefs that he had been sent with when he was brought to the sanitorium was going to be burned, which was good because they were either flecked or soaked in blood.

“She doesn’t care about the hankies. She wants you home as much as I do,” Wylan whispered. He leaned over the edge of the bed and began to toy with Kaz’s hair, flicking it over his forehead to expose his skin. He then leaned down and pressed his cloth-covered lips to the spot he had cleared, something similar to what they had done when they were courting.

“You are my home, Wylan.”

“What?”

“You are my home. You are the family I was always promised but never got. You are my husband and the only one that is allowed to see my heart. I am yours as much as you are mine, but you are mine. Even when I am not around, you have to remember that you were always mine first,” Kaz rasped. He knew that he was being selfish. The other people in the rooms around him had made their lovers promise to move on after they were gone, had assured them a happy rest of their lives. Kaz didn’t want Wylan to be miserable, but he refused to be forgotten when he was the one that had taught Wylan to be loved and had cherished him first.

If Kaz had thought that Wylan was crying before, he had been wrong. The other man’s face completely crumbled and he collapsed down against the side of the bed. The sheets were already soaking through with his tears, which made the mask nearly disgusting, and his shoulders were shaking with the force of his cries. “You can’t die, Kaz.”

“I’m sorry,” he said. And for the first time since his mother had died, he really meant it.

[aphroditestummyrolls]

spare prayer or between hope and desperation (writer's choice!) for the wip game 💌

Hello! ❤️❤️❤️ spare prayer for you! I’ve got three other bhad snippets to get through. Here’s Colm having an absolute spiral 😂

He hadn’t smoked this much in a long while.

A room had been provided to him— a small, sparse thing with a single gas lamp and a window that could barely be called such— but Colm could barely bring himself to stay in it, let alone lay down to sleep.

Exhaustion tugged at his eyes. The stimulant in his pipe sent a fine tremor through his veins. Dawn had just barely broken over The Barrel, sending weak, smoggy streams of light down the emptying streets. It illuminated the last stragglers like vampires out past curfew, staggering in the daylight as if it burned.

Colm wondered morosely when the last time was that any of those drunkards wrote a letter home. Were they worrying their fathers? Disappointing their mothers?

Despite the parameters of his accommodations, the world outside felt unbearably large. It was a booby trapped labyrinth of vices and violence, and his son was out there in the thick of it with a man who all but owned him. He might not be an indenture, but that didn’t make him any less a slave. Brekker kept him docile and addicted, so he could use his power. There was even a tattoo on his arm— the crow and cup. Just the thought of it had his meagre dinner ready to rise in his throat.

Why else would Jesper live above a gambling club? Why else would he be volunteering his power to make bespoke lockpicks and remove bullets? Why else would he—Jesper Fahey, the most notorious flirt of their town; the least interested in anything even vaguely resembling being committed— be settling himself into a relationship with some sweet thing fallen from the rich part of town?

Maybe Wylan’s father is trying to kill him because he was draining his account to support Jesper’s gambling. To get him under his spell. To… it all sounded a bit ludicrous, even with no sleep and his most paranoid scenarios at the ready.

Colm simply couldn’t imagine a world in which he would try to kill his own son. Of course, he knew cruel men could father children and still be cruel— he knew it well. But, to send an assassin?

It made him wonder if it was all just another spun story to lead him off the path. To keep him penned up and unable to take his son away. Did Jesper know more than he told? Apparently he lied easier than breathing.

Saints, Jesper. Colm took a deep drag on his pipe, sitting on the edge of the thin, miserable little mattress until the sun rose high enough in the window to touch his booted toes. If you don’t get him out of here, he’ll give up his whole life to this bloody band of broken dolls. The voice was urgent, shaking him by the shoulders. It sounded like Aditi.

Grief crashed into him like he’d only just buried her. Suddenly, where his pipe had him buzzing and twitchy before, guilt replaced it. There was lead in his bones, and Colm couldn’t even tap his toe anymore. Everything had too much weight.

Oh, Addy, it was almost a prayer, a hot prickle of misery springing to his eyes, where did I go wrong?

He didn’t know who his wife would be more disappointed in: Jesper, for the lying, the stealing, the everything… or Colm, for letting him disappear.

And then again that very night, he’d only watched as he swept down the stairs and into the night. Colm had been struck dumb, even with his hand still reaching around empty air. Stupid.

His son slipped through his fingers all over again. And he still hadn’t come back.

Thanks for playing my little game! ❤️❤️❤️

[moonshine999]

“You’re my new pillow”

Day : 1

Ship : Helnik (Matthias Helvar x Nina Zenik)

AU : modern

Dividers by @cafekitsune

The stars shone brightly in the moonless night and yet, there was no sign of Nina anywhere. The amount of times he called her and the amount of times he called their friend group did nothing good to his self esteem. The 18 missed calls reflected in his eyes as he paced up the living room floor.

Where was she? Who was she with? Why was she out so late? Had something happened to her? 

His thoughts choked his head as his finger wavered over the call button once again. 

Before Matthias knew it, his feet ran him towards the door and in a swift movement unlocked it. 

A knock. 

And another. 

And there she stood. Gone since morning with her hair all over the place, cheeks flushed and carrying her heels in her hand. 

He swallowed his words as he saw her. Even if he said something to her now, she’ll forget it all come morning. But what a sight to behold she was. Leaning against the doorway with her eyes hooded yet their green still shining in the star light that snuck in through the window. If she wasn’t that drunk..he could’ve sworn that her red dress would be on the floor-

Damn it. He was supposed to be mad at her.

“Ay handsome..are you going to let me into my apartment or what?” 

He cleared his throat and stepped aside, eyeing her carefully to make sure she didn’t lose balance. 

She walked slowly towards their room and in a sudden moment, looked back at him - her hair falling in a cascade from its bun.

“You don’t have to stay up for me..you know?” 

Matthias glanced at her and then ducked his head, in perhaps embarrassment that he did this again. “No I don’t but I’m just…you know..worried.” he sighed. 

She let out a chuckle and turned to walk back. 

He followed her to the room and struggled through his words before finally asking. “Were you with anyone?” 

She sat on the bed and began taking off her stockings, so simply as if he just asked the most casual question in the world “Yeah..Jes and Wylan.” 

Nina threw her stockings to the side and looked at him with a soft smile. A surprisingly wholesome one for her. “Are you mad?” 

“Huh?” That wasn’t the response he expected. “Wylan drinks?” 

“More than you.” 

“Oh..interesting.” 

“Mhm.” 

He crossed his arms and lay down on the bed, causing her to look back at him. His eyes remained glued to the ceiling fan “No..why would you think that?” 

A blush spread across his face. Is he that transparent? 

That’s when she laughed. Properly. Breaking the whole silent, heavy atmosphere of their whole interaction.

“Sweetheart..your blood pressure was so high before you let me in. I didn’t even have to use my power..I could see it on your face.” 

With one last spurted laugh, she crawled next to him and lay her head on his chest. 

She pressed against his chest and kept her hand near his heart. 

“I’m sorry if you’re still mad.” 

“You don’t have to be.” 

“I know. But I am.” 

“You have a pretty heartbeat” 

He giggled at that. How drunk was this woman? 

“Why thank you.” He wrapped his arm around her. “I bet you don’t have a bad one yourself.” 

She closed her eyes and buried her face in the crook of his neck. Her warm breath on his neck spurted a deeper blush on his face as his eyes widened. 

“I’m sorry for calling you so much.” He whispered.

She smiled and pecked his neck. “It’s okay. I’m glad to know that a Fjerdan block of ice finally melted for me.” 

He rolled his eyes and pinched her arm. “Ow- rude. Ice still has its sharp edges hm?” 

“Go to sleep dear..you need it more than me.” 

“Tsk..alright.”

Matthias slightly got up as not to disturb her and pulled a blanket over them. If he could trap her in his memory like this, he would. How beautiful she looked in the dim light, all locks of hair falling behind her, skin glowing, fingers still tracing around where is heart is. 

Truth be told, his heart lay right there. Even if all his love was sucked out of him, there was no way his heart would leave him. She would stay and bring him back. 

Through their story of betrayal and hardship, his heart brought him back. His heart made every single action of his possible. His heart, her, she - is everything to him and he wouldn’t trade any amount of money, gold or desire for a night spent, sound asleep in each other’s arms. 

“Love, I promise I won’t stay up for you again.” 

“Mhm sure.” 

[retvenkos]

hope in the jar | k.b.

Six of Crows - Kaz Brekker x Reader, slight fluff, slight angst requested

tw: gunshot wound, medical stitches, mention of gun violence,  mentions of blood, slightly ooc kaz because have you tried to write him softly?

word count: 1.4k

prompt: “I don’t trust anyone… but you’re not just anyone.”

A/N: 1) this doesn’t seem to take place at any given point in canon but i want wylan and matthias to be there, sue me, and 2) do i know that there is no greek mythology is the grishaverse? yes. does that stop me from mentioning pandora’s box? no.

summary: Kaz Brekker is far from just being anyone. And maybe, so are you.

"You're quiet." Wylan bumped your shoulder, pulling you out of your thoughts. 

There was a particular kind of calm that descended after a shootout. When pistols stopped smoking and adrenaline had left the bloodstream, the cool weight of evening fell back on your shoulders and managed to settle differently. For Jesper, it meant more jokes than usual. For Inej, more prayer. For Nina, it meant more grumbling, and for Matthias, more smiles. You weren't always sure what it meant for you, but tonight, it meant pensivity.

The walk back to the Slat was victorious. The streets of Ketterdam were empty and unusually quiet, thanks to Wylan's affinity toward bombs and blowing half of the cobblestones right off the street. The tranquility wasn't typical, but somehow, it was comforting. Perhaps even invigorating. How often did Ketterdam fall silent? Especially for canal rats like you?

Maybe if you still had a slow trickle of adrenaline, you would have commemorated the moment - maybe by getting waffles? But it was late, and after taking a bullet to the side after getting a little too close to the enemy, the only thing you wanted was to wash all of the grime off of your face and fall asleep. Maybe you'd celebrate after a good night's rest - Saints providing that such a thing existed in the Barrel.

"Am I quiet? Or are you slowly going deaf from all of your 'science experiments?'"

Wylan flushed a little. Even after all this time, he was so easy to tease. What made it even funnier was that he always managed some witty comeback or another, all while his cheeks were a shocking 'embarrassment pink.' Wylan opened his mouth to speak—

"Definitely quiet!" Jesper called from in front of you, one of his arms slung around Inej's shoulder, the other twirling a pistol.

Wylan let out a scoff of admiration, and you mumbled under your breath - something about Jesper being an irritating, smart mouthed idiot.

"What was that, (Y/n)?"

"You're annoying, Jesper!"

"Well, I'm glad something can make you lively again." Jesper turned his head to toss you a wink, and you rolled your eyes.

Wylan bumped your shoulders together, again, careful not to jostle you too much. "You're not quiet now. Just seething."

"Just tired," you corrected, passing the redhead a lazy smile.

"Admitting that is admitting weakness."

Kaz walked behind you and the rest of the group, but his voice was loud enough for everyone to hear. You turned around and walked backward so you could face him.

To anyone else walking the street, the Bastard of the Barrel was just more brooding than usual - his tone curter, his eyes sharper, the lines on his face deeper than they had the right to be. To you, though, Kaz was tired. His leg was stiff from the fight, giving him more trouble than usual, and his jaw was set in a rigid line as to not give away his weakness.

The Slat wasn't too far, now, but even after getting inside, there would be stairs to climb, and a hell of a lot of them were so worn down, they might buckle at any given weight. 

It would be a rough night; it already had been.

You just sighed. "Admitting that is trust."

Kaz held your gaze. For a long moment, you couldn't figure what he was thinking. Kaz Brekker was always considering something, and after a while, you had gotten good at knowing just what he was thinking, when. 

But not this time. Kaz was a sphinx to you during that baited moment - inexplicable, an enigma. What made it worse was that it was deliberate.

Kaz raised his eyebrows and looked down at his cane, hitting the ground with more force than before.

"We're all tired."

The night was filled with the quiet once more, but with every step you took toward the Slat, the low din of unruly jeers and shouts filled your brain like cotton on a wound.

✧ *:･ﾟ

You sat on the floor of your room, a bowl of water before you, a haphazard pile of medical supplies to your left. Nina had told you that she wasn't a Healer when she began to seal your wound earlier, and you had said you didn't want to waste time while still exposed on the streets - by all accounts, Nina did a decent job with the three or so minutes you allowed her. But Saints, someone should have told you to stuff your pride and let Nina work on you just a bit longer. Maybe then you wouldn't be sitting on the floor of your room, stitching up a wound with supplies you nicked from Muzzen.

You had just finished your stitches (you still needed to thank Inej for teaching you how) when you heard Kaz walking up the steps.

You wrapped up your wound as best you could. You were pushing down your shirt when you heard him speak.

"I wouldn't trust just anyone in the Dregs."

You washed your hands clean as best you could and sent Kaz a wayward glance, noting how he stood in your doorway - as though he wasn't quite sure if he belonged.

"I've been in Ketterdam too long—" You grabbed a towel and wiped your face, trying to rid yourself of the dirt and grime. You turned back to Kaz "—I don't trust anyone."

He nodded as though agreeing with your judgment. But it was too quick - too relenting. He turned to go.

"But you're not just anyone, Kaz."

The Bastard of the Barrel froze. It seemed to you that his grip on his cane tightened. Perhaps it was a side effect from the blood loss or maybe even a fast-acting infection from that suture needle, but it felt like something sucked all the air out of the room.

You turned to face him properly.

"C'mon, we've both known it for longer than we care to admit. I'm doing us a mercy - putting it to rest."

Silence, still. If the Slat were up in flames, you doubted you would have noticed. There was nothing else here - it was just you, Kaz, and the space that lay between.

You eased your legs out in front of you, putting your arms out behind you and leaning on your palms. The floor was cool - like the night had been, earlier, when you were talking away from a gunfight. The world was somehow smaller,  then - like you had held it in your grasp. 

Kaz was still half turned, but you could see his profile, and once again, his thoughts were under lock and key. 

"You can either take it or leave it, Kaz. But whatever you decide to choose, know that you chose it."

He spoke sooner than you expected. "You're not just anyone, either."

Your mouth went dry. You weren't sure what you had been expecting or even hoping. Hope was still trapped inside Pandora's jar, and even the barest inkling of it could have destroyed your whole world. Hope belonged to the innocent and the pious, and you hadn't been either in a long time. You weren't sure what you had been expecting, but it certainly wasn't that.

And for some reason, you could fathom how Kaz Brekker could have ever said such a thing and meant it.

Maybe Kaz didn't think you heard him, because he affirmed it, turning to you. "You're not just anyone, (Y/n)."

"Not just another soldier in your ranks?"

"Not anymore."

You wanted to laugh, but it came out as more of a breath. You settled for a lopsided smile instead. "That's practically a proposal, coming from you."

"If I could offer you more, I would."

You looked at Kaz as he stood in the doorway. He was exhausted and beaten at his own game, but there was nothing but sincerity and truth swimming in his eyes, nothing but honestly dripping from every syllable. Had you ever seen Kaz the way he was, now? To take his own words, he was admitting a weakness. Earnestness was a defect in the Barrel. Vulnerability was a sin.

"It's not much," you conceded. You moved your outstretched leg so that you could tap his shoe - toe to toe. Kaz watched the slow movement carefully, but never pulled away. "But for now, it's good enough."

-- taglist: @musicallisto​​, @catsbooksandmusic​ // message me if you want to be added!

[rubysunnday]

crashing down

Summary: When a heist goes horribly wrong, Jesper and Y/N are trapped underneath the rubble.

`A/N: looks like i’m writing for my murder children now. I have zero regrets

Jesper Fahey x platonic!reader

In hindsight, they probably shouldn’t have hung around to steal the brooch. And they probably shouldn’t have even decided to rob the place in the first instance but, hey, when someone brags about the treasures they own and tell you exactly where in their tiny, second house they were hidden, they were practically asking you to steal them.

And besides, Jesper loved a good old fashioned shoot out too much to simply run away from one. And Y/N loved her friend too much to leave him to fight on his own.

Jesper ducked behind the pillar as another bullet whizzed past his head, imbedding itself in the wall behind Y/N.

“I’m blaming you entirely, Jesper,” Y/N muttered, handing him a load pistol in exchange for his empty one. “It was your idea.”

“You’re the one who spotted the damn thing,” Jesper replied, leaning around the pillar and firing three shots, all hitting their targets. “You’re like a bloody magpie.”

“Just because I went ‘ooo, shiny item,’ doesn’t mean you have to steal it!” Y/N hissed. “Now, because of you, Kaz is probably wondering where we are and will likely murder both of us for ruining the plan.”

Something exploded from outside, the orange flames lighting up the corridor as they billowed into the sky. The men attacking them all yelled as they realised that Y/N and Jesper weren’t alone in the building. More footsteps echoed on the stairs in front of them as the rest of the guards ran outside to see what was happening. 

Jesper and Y/N shared a look. “Wylan.”

“Well, good to know that part of the plan is going to... well, plan,” Y/N replied. She looked down at the pouch of bullets she had and swore. It was empty. “Jesper,” Y/N said, hitting his leg to attract his attention, “Jesper, we’re out.”

“Ah.”

“Yes, ah.” Y/N threw the pouch and looked at him. “What do we do? There’s no way we’re getting out of here with them blocking the door.”

As if proving her point, the guards began shooting again. The hail of bullets pinged around them and Y/N dove into Jesper, both of them ducking down and shielding the other. The bullets stopped for a second and Jesper moved quickly, grabbing his pistols and putting them back in their holster and yanking Y/N to her feet, pulling her around the corner and towards the back of the building.

Y/N gripped Jesper’s hand tightly as they ran down the corridor and into a side room full of crates. Jesper slammed the door shut behind them and shoved a crate up against it to block anyone trying to break in.

There was a small window high up on the wall with metal bars running across it, far too small for either one of them to be able to squeeze through.

“What plan is this? Run and hide?” Y/N exclaimed as Jesper began ripping open crates.

“Yes but hiding in the room that, hopefully, has bullets,” He muttered, tossing the paper that was protecting the contents out the crate dramatically. “HA!”

Y/N turned around and saw Jesper brandishing an open box of bullets with a huge grin on his face. She felt herself smiling too, despite the life threatening situation they were currently in.

Jesper gently handed one of his treasured pistols to Y/N, his eyes staring at her intently. She gently took the handle of it and looked up at Jesper, looking into his eyes.

“I know,” she said, nodding as she moved the pistol to her other hand and grabbed his hand, squeezing it. “I know.”

It was likely the next few minutes would be their last. They were outnumbered and on their own with limited gunfire. Even if by some saintforsaken chance Inej or Nina or even Matthias turned up to rescue them, they’d probably both be riddled with bullet holes before they got to them.

“No mourners,” Jesper said softly as he let go of Y/N’s hand and spun his pistol around his finger.

“No funerals,” she replied, gripping the handle of her pistol tightly.

Jesper pushed the crate blocking the door out of the way and swung open the door, pistol drawn. 

No one was waiting for them.

Y/N matched Jesper’s frown and slowly stepped out into the corridor behind him suspicious. There was a good quiet and then there was a bad quiet.

And this was a bad quiet.

“Where -”

Y/N’s question was cut off as a large explosion rocked the entire building. She reached out and grabbed Jesper’s arm as she lost her balance and Jesper steadied her as best he could. Dust and chunks of plaster rained down around them and several paintings and expensive vases smashed onto the floor.

“That wasn’t Wylan!” Y/N exclaimed as the building stopped shaking for a moment.

“Come on!” Jesper yelled, grabbing Y/N’s hand and pulling her down the corridor towards their exit. 

Something was wrong, the entire building was empty and there was no one around. Jesper and Y/N skidded around the corner and spied the door that was their exit and put on a sudden burst of speed.

The door suddenly blew in, a cloud of dust following after it. The explosion threw Jesper and Y/N back into a wall. Y/N felt her head smack the wall and suddenly everything felt odd.

She opened her eyes and saw Jesper yelling at her but couldn’t hear him. Her eyes were ringing and everything felt distorted - like she’d had too many Kerch whiskeys. Jesper pulled her to her feet and she stumbled into him, her legs wobbling and shaking and unable to support her weight. Before either one of them could hobble out the door, another explosion occurred and the entire building began to crumble down around them.

Windows smashed, beams came crashing down and pipes burst as the building collapsed in on itself.

Y/N vaguely registered Jesper wrap his arms around her and pull her down to the ground as the building buried them alive.

Kaz checked his pocket watch again. “They’re late.”

“Yes, but Jesper’s always late,” Nina replied, trying to hide her nerves. She’d been frantically looking to the street near the house every second, waiting and hoping for Y/N’s figure to come running up to them, a flustered and excited Jesper chasing after her.

“Not when he’s with Y/N,” Inej muttered, looking behind her at the building they’d escaped from.

Kaz looked down at his watch and then up at the house again. He wasn’t about to betray just how nervous and concerned he was. But it wasn’t usual for Y/N to be running late - even if Jesper did his usual thing of causing complete and utter chaos. 

Wylan was sitting on the edge of a wall, fidgeting with a dummy bomb, his leg bouncing up and down nervously.

“They’ll be fine,” Nina said, looking at Matthias. “They’ll be fine.”

As she uttered the words, an almighty explosion rocked the alleyway they had convened in. Smoke billowed up from the building Jesper and Y/N were inside as bricks, beams and glass all crashed down on top of another in a messy symphony. The walls collapsed down like a house of cards and a nearby flock of pigeons flapped away from the chaos.

The five remaining Crows stared in silence.

Kaz felt as if he might keel over. He stared at the pile of rubble, gripping his cane tightly, the beak of the crow’s head digging into his hand through his gloves. Jesper. Y/N. Both of them were under the rubble that had once been a merchant’s second home. Someone had blown them up. 

Somehow, Matthias snapped into action first, grabbing Nina’s arm and pulling her with him, towards the pile of rubble. Wylan scrambled after them, determined to find his friends.

“Kaz, come on,” Inej said softly, hovering beside him. “We need to go look for them.”

Kaz nodded once, a muscle in his jaw jumping as he clenched it, swallowing his emotions down. He limped after the rest of his gang, his cane clicking loudly on the cobblestones, breaking the eerie, deathly silence that had descended upon the street.

Matthias and Wylan had begun removing beams and chunks of brick from the pile, trying to find a way to get inside. Kaz wanted to help, but couldn’t bring himself to be so close to anyone, so he resorted to stay out the way, watching out for any of the Stadwatch.

Nina was trying her best to locate Jesper and Y/N but the pile of rubble was muffling any sound of their heartbeats. Well, that’s what she was telling herself. She didn’t want to even think about the other reality.

Jesper groaned loudly as he suddenly awoke. His head was pounding and he was being crushed by something heavy and wide. He blinked and the world came into view again and he realised what had happened.

A large, wooden beam was lying across his chest and he was sprawled awkwardly across piles of bricks. He could move, however. The rubble had formed a small pocket around them, the beams that had supported the roof supporting a ton of rubble above them.

Jesper carefully slid out from underneath the beam, trying not to nudge it or move it incase he took the entire thing out and crushed himself to death. He somehow slid down the rubble and further into the pocket and let out a heavy exhale as he caught his breath.

He looked around and froze as he spotted the familiar sight of Y/N’s hair and jacket from underneath what was once a door.

“Y/N!” Jesper exclaimed, clambering over bricks, keeping his head down and folding in on himself as he squeezed through a gap to get to her. “Y/N?”

Y/N lay scarily still, blood trickling down the side of her head, a splintered, heavy oak door lying across her bottom half. Her arm was flung across the bricks and her skin was littered with cuts.

Jesper shoved the door off her with a grunt, his eyes running up and down her body to see if anything was broken. He couldn’t tell if she was breathing or not. He crawled closer and grabbed her hand, wrapping his fingers around her wrist and waiting.

For a moment, a long, painful moment, he felt nothing. His heart dropped and he genuinely felt as if he might be sick. She couldn’t be dead. She wasn’t allowed to die. She couldn’t die.

But then he felt a slight beat, followed by another and then another. It was slow, slower than it should be, but it was still going which meant Y/N was still alive.

Jesper forced himself to pause and breathe. They were trapped under a pile of rubble which could collapse at any moment. Y/N was unconscious and potentially dying which meant Jesper had to find a way out to safety and to the rest of the Crows. He glanced down at Y/N again, his fingers were still wrapped around her wrist, the feeling of her slow, sluggish pulse helping calm him down. She was still alive. 

Dust rained down on Jesper as he nudged a pile of bricks, seeking out the gap in the rubble that was letting the light in. There was a single ray of light shining through from somewhere - it was orange like the street lamps that dotted the streets of Ketterdam and its mere colour filled Jesper with a bizarre sense of hope. 

If the light could get in, then they could get out. 

He began by carefully moving bricks, stopping each time to make sure the beams keeping the worst of the rubble above them weren’t about to collapse. The broken glass cut into his hands and every movement sent sharp, searing pain through his head. 

But he kept going.

Jesper took a risk and moved a large piece of a door. Above him the beams groaned and buckled and a shower of dust rained down as bricks and rubble fell down. Jesper dove across Y/N, shielding her from the falling debris. 

Bricks and stones fell down but the beams stayed up, supporting the majority of the rubble and keeping their little pocket safe.

Jesper lifted himself of Y/N and grabbed her wrist, checking her pulse again and making sure her chest was still rising and falling. He reached out a hand and gently brushed off the dust and tiny pieces of debris on her face and sighed.

“Well, at least we’re both still alive,” Jesper muttered, trying to think of something positive. It’s what Y/N would do, she was always positive even if the situation was anything but positive. It drove Kaz insane.

“You could sound a little happier about that, Jes.”

Jesper jumped as Y/N’s voice, croaky and barely more than a whisper, broke his internal monologue of doom. She was looking up at him with the faintest hint of a smile on her pale, dust streaked face. 

“Thank the Saints,” Jesper muttered, dropping his head on to the top of Y/N’s head, his shoulders slumping. “I thought you were...”

Jesper trailed off, not wanting to finish his sentence. Y/N, who seemed capable of reading the minds of everyone, even Kaz, grabbed his hand and squeezed it weakly.

“I feel like shit but I’m alive, Jesper,” Y/N said quietly, coughing slightly. “Now, how do we get out of here?”

Jesper looked around again, hoping the new found relief he felt at Y/N having woken up would clear his head. All he could see were wooden beams, pipes, bricks and smashed glass and no exit.

“We’re stuck, then,” Y/N said softly, noticing her friends silence. She winced as she shifted on the floor, trying to move so that she could lean against the large piece of wall behind her. Jesper noticed and came back to her side, grabbing her hand and guiding her up until she felt the wall against her back. 

“You good?” Jesper asked, his eyes full of concern, his hands clinging on to Y/N.

She nodded, her eyes shut as she felt the overwhelming wave of pain. She opened her eyes again and looked up. “If the street light is getting in,” she began turning her head with a grunt, “then there has to be a way out.”

“That’s what I thought but I can’t find a way to shift anything without risking bringing the entire building down on us.”

Y/N exhaled softly, slowly turning her head to look at the other end of the pocket they were in. They were well and truly trapped.

“I’m sorry.”

Y/N frowned and turned back to face Jesper. “Why?”

“If we hadn’t gone back for that brooch and if I hadn’t -”

“Jesper.”

“ - been so determined to show off and -”

“Jesper.”

“ - we would have been at the rendezvous point in time and we wouldn’t -”

Y/N frowned as she heard the rubble shift above them. She tried to focus on the noise and her frown deepened as she realised that there were voices above them.

“Jesper, shut up a minute,” Y/N snapped, hitting him on the arm to cut off his rambling. “Listen.”

Jesper’s hurt expression at being told to be quiet quickly changed into a defensive one as he heard the rubble shifting and the indistinct sound of voices. He picked up his pistols from the ground and slowly clicked the safety off.

“Good or bad?” Y/N asked, wincing as she shifted herself onto her knees and moved behind Jesper.

“Either,” Jesper replied, his face hardening as the voices got closer. He aimed one pistol at the gap in the rubble where the sound was coming from, his other hand moving to rest on Y/N’s arm, reminding himself that she wasn’t dead, but alive.

Neither one spoke as they watched the rubble intently, bracing themselves for whoever appeared.

A head appeared in the gap and the person elegantly slid into their pocket, feet landing so silently that it could only be one person.

“Oh, Saints, Inej,” Jesper muttered, holstering his pistols and instantly relaxing. 

Y/N felt her energy and resolve disappear at the reassuring sight of Inej, all the pain and exhaustion she was feeling return. She fell to the side, barely catching herself before she smacked her head on the floor.

“Saints, Y/N,” Inej said, climbing over to her as Jesper sat Y/N up against a broken piece of concrete.

“I’m good,” she said softly, wincing. 

“And I’m a sun summoner,” Jesper replied sarcastically, disbelief written on his face at how much Y/N was playing off her injuries. 

“Can you move?” Inej asked. “It’s not far to go until you’re outside.”

Y/N nodded. “Yeah.”

She pushed herself up to her knees, gripping a wooden beam for support. The wooden beam held her weight for a moment before it collapsed to the side.

“Shit,” Jesper muttered as the entire building above them groaned loudly. 

“Go,” Inej exclaimed, guiding Y/N up and inside the gap and then shoving Jesper after her as the building came crashing down into what had been their pocket. 

Y/N kept crawling and began to panic as the darkness began to feel claustrophobic and tight and she was scared she was going to collapse in the tunnel, her vision coming and going in waves, her heart pounding.

But then someone grabbed her hand and gently pulled her out the rubble and into the open, catching her as her limbs decided to stop working, sending her crashing to the ground

“Hey, hey, you’re alright,” Matthias said, holding her up against him as she clung to his jacket, her entire body shaking.

“Thank Saints,” Y/N whispered, dropping her head onto Matthias shoulder, ignoring the way he stiffened at the sudden, unexpected close contact. He’d never admit it but he had a soft spot for the girl and, after a moment of surprise, gently wrapped an arm around her shoulders.

“Y/N!” Nina exclaimed, rushing over to her as Inej and Jesper emerged from within the tunnel. “Jesper, are you two alright?”

“Well, we’re alive,” Y/N replied, smiling tiredly. “Much to Jesper’s disappointment.”

“I’m not disappointed that we’re alive,” Jesper retorted.

“You sounded disappointed,” Y/N countered back. “We survive being crushed to death by an entire building and he’s disappointed.”

“Again, I wasn’t disappointed,” Jesper grumbled.

Wylan looked between Jesper and Y/N. “Are they concussed?” He asked, genuine concern for them clear on his face.

“No. Unfortunately, that’s normal Y/N and Jesper behaviour,” Kaz replied, his cane clicking on the cobbles as he walked up to them. He looked Jesper up and down and then Y/N, his eyes running over them both. 

“We’re fine, boss,” Jesper replied, sensing Kaz’s unspoken question.

“Good,” Kaz said, nodding. “Come on, we need to move we’re behind schedule.”

And with that he limped off down the street.

Y/N let out a scoff of laughter. She was still holding onto Matthias as Nina grabbed her hand softly and began healing her. “Jesper’s the reason we’re behind.”

Jesper gasped loudly, hand flying to his chest as his mouth opened in mock horror. “How dare you! I found that brooch for you!”

“Just because I see something sparkly and go ‘ooo’ doesn’t mean you have to pick it up!” Y/N exclaimed. “You’re not a magpie!”

“The gratitude I get, I swear,” Jesper muttered, stomping off purposefully after Kaz.

Y/N closed her eyes for a moment and sighed softly, Nina’s magic working its way through her system. They were a band of misfits and criminals, the dregs of society, but to her they were family.

[thedelusionreaderbitch]

Little did you know - Kaz Brekker/platonic! Crows x fem! reader

A/n: I don't know where this came from... It's a mess but its like- whatever I guess

Warnings: GORE, DEATH, TORTURE, questionable sanity, this could be disturbing to some people so don't say I didn't warn you!

I do not own six of crows or shadow and bone or it's characters

Summary: The Crows make a vital mistake when trying to get information not knowing that it would cost them everything...

(Gif not mine)

Her hair flows in the wind the only part of her moving the rest still as a serpent creeping up on its prey. Slowly, she starts to move forward as she spots her victims, some pretty little birdy's, just some unusually remarkable crows. If anything went right today the only thing that would be remarkable about them would be their downfall.

She almost yells out in excitement and joy when they wander right into her trap. They walk into her house - a dead merchant's house and go to loot what's left of it.

From her vantage point in the ceiling, she can see everything, from Nina's hands out ready to Matthias beside her. She sees Jesper's darting eyes and Wylan's uneasiness. Moreover, she can even see Inej Ghafa in the shadows high on alert ready to strike at any moment, just in case.

Then her eyes find Kaz and she almost kills him there and then.

He's in his normal attire and he hadn't changed his atrocious haircut either. Yet he's different still, it's the way he's holding himself. Like he feels accomplished.

And even though he has his neutral 'I'm bored' face on Y/n can see through him. She's always been able too and right now he's happy for an easy run. Not a trace of him is guilty or mourning and it's only been one week.

Now that she thinks about it there's not a trace of mourning in anyone.

Balling her hands into fits she nearly screams in agony, they thought she had died and they didn't even care. If she had any doubts before they're gone with just some simple observation.

Yet Y/n still waits and as soon as the Crows get into the trap completely she starts moving.

They had killed her loving parents who worked at a bakery, they had done nothing, nothing wrong. But now they were still six feet under, and she knew it was not just some casualties. Kaz was too precise for that.

She creeps up behind Inej and knocks her out cold before she can even cry out, Y/n catches her body before it can hit the floor and she carefully lays Inej to the said knowing she'll have to tie her up later.

Next is Jesper and Wylan.

For Jesper, she shoots him with a sleeping dart made out of a massively hard metal to control for fabricators and blinds Wylan before doing the same thing to him as well.

Taking out a bomb from Wylan's bag she sets it off. Running towards Nina and before she can use her heartrender abilities, Y/n headbutts her causing her figure to fall to the floor. Unconscious.

Matthias starts sprinting towards her but she simply grabs his shoulder and hits him on a pressure point on his neck and he's out with the rest of them.

It's funny because he taught her that manoeuvre.

"Kaz!" She yells in a shrill voice beckoning him downstairs, did he really leave his little itty bitty Crows alone? Ah, just like he did to her, what they all did to her.

The Crows and Y/n were on a mission and something went wrong, she was shot and they left her to die. She could have been easily saved but they left her and while they did that she remembers - the thing that she remembers most about that night. Kaz leaned down into her ear and said;

'Thanks for the information little snake.'

They had used her to get information, everything she had with them was fake. Everything with Kaz was fake. Every little touch, every little moment, their entire (established) relationship was fake.

"Come down Kazzy I helped you! Now you help me!" She runs up the stairs knowing that there's only one exit, the window. That was extremely high off the ground he would hopefully try to bargain with her first.

Even if he didn't Y/n had brought some rope because he would definitely break his legs at that height.

But Y/n wasn't a little snake now she was a majestic serpent that wielded the screeches of revenge in her venom.

She runs into the room with the window and there he was there in a chair in the shadows looking smug, but the serpent knew it was all just a facade - fake confidence.

Smiling at him she pulls out a second chair from a broken-down desk and places it right in front of him. 'Bang.' It's a simple sound but it echos throughout the room bouncing off the walls into the depths of madness.

"Oh Kazzy, have you come to help me?" She takes her lip in between her teeth and fake trembles.

"Have you come to save me?" Her voice is tiny and it's nothing like it used to be around him, yet he still flinches. He knows she's putting on an act but it still hurts him. And she wants to hurt him over, and over again.

"Y/n... We needed that information, lots of the Dregs' lives were on the line. There is so much more you wouldn't don't understand."

Laughing into the open she secretly pulls out a syringe from her back pocket readying it in her hand.

Instantly her voice changes from the scarce poor girl's voice to a very dark voice. Vengeance was held there and it was like burning your ears in the pits of hell listening to it. The sins and revenge sounded melodic but the torture that laid underneath was horrific.

"Really Rietveld? Did you think I would forgive so easily?"

Kaz's face morphs into surprise at hearing his real last name, Y/n jumps at the chance and she plunges the syringe deep into his neck.

"See you in hell."

___________________TIME SKIP A COUPLE OF HOURS__

All the Crows are tied up to some chairs in the secret basement of the house. The woman waits for what looks like patiently but really she's boiling with excitement.

This is going to be fun.

Finally, the last Crows wakes up and the Serpent takes out her playthings. Just a couple of knives and guns, but those were just her toys the real weapons are the emotional and mental pain she would cause everyone including herself.

"You know why you are here, don't you?" She walks around the room watching every one of The Crows' snarling faces but perhaps some of them held remorse.

Although Y/n was past their pity now. None of the damage could be undone, what's done is done. An eye for an eye.

"Nina darling, this may hurt a bit." Quicker than Jesper's sharpshooter's eye could catch she stabs Nina in the stomach as she yells out in pain Y/n twists the knife back and forth.

Matthias screams out for his lover and after what feels like an internity the serpent pulls the dagger out knowing that she'll just eventually die from blood loss.

Taking a quick look around the room she notices some of the terrified faces and how everyone is on edge. Good, just how she wants it.

"Mörd demjin," Matthias mutters under his breath and Y/n takes his throat in her hand and holds tight enough to choke him.

"Don't call me by the little nickname you gave Kazzy!" She yells furiously holding onto him tighter and tighter. His face starts to become purple and she can hear the yells and screams of the birdy's in the background.

'No! Let go! Matthias! Matthias! Let him go!'

"Any last words?" She jets out her lip before holding onto him tighter and she sees the fury of the ice in his eyes before there's nothing. His eyes roll back lifeless.

"No Matthias! Matthias!" Nina shrieks trying to desperately get out of her chair.

Rolling her eyes with a huff Y/n pulls out a gun and shoots Nina twice in the head.

"Now you're with your lover." She drawls on the word lover and turns to Inej. She didn't really want to do this but she had to cause him all the pain that she could. Even if Inej tried to stop them.

Swiftly she pulls out the knife Inej gave her and kindly kills her with a hard blow to the heart. She doesn't suffer, she just solely died, it's the only kindness the Serpent can afford to give her.

At this point, Jesper and Wylan are openly sobbing and screaming for their friends and for Y/n to please stop. But she doesn't, with blood all over her clothes she makes her path towards her next fool.

"If you were wondering why you couldn't control the bullets, Jesper." She drawls on in a monotone voice. She can see and hear Wylan screaming and it pains her but she doesn't let it show. She lets the Serpent take over or else this will never get done.

Fully becoming the Serpent Y/n places the barrel of her gun up to his heart and she just shoots, no emotion on her face whatsoever.

"A special venom of mine for Grisha. Had some fun testing it."

Going over to Wylan she quickly slits his throat not wanting the little merchling to suffer more than he already has.

She looks at Kaz blankly, he's shaking and he's beyond trying not to show any emotion. Tears are streaming down his face and he's gasping for air. Trembles roll off his body and the agony on his face pierces her hurt.

"Why?" Rietveld finally manages to rasp out. "WHY!" He screams ultimately reaching his breaking point.

"Because Kaz," She whispers in a sickeningly sweet voice lifting his chin with the tip of her pointer finger.

"Everything comes with a price." She pauses letting it sink in.

"And little did you know the price it would cost you."

And that's the story of Sankta Serpentina and Sankt Dirtyhands.

Words 1634

-thedelusionreaderbitch

Shadow and bone taglist: @kaqua @rika90 @thefandomplace @musical-theatre-obsessed-dumbass @gallysonegoodlung @navs-bhat @sumsebien @dontjudgeabookbythecover

(if you would like to be added leave a comment!)

[confused-as-all-hell]

i am thrilled to announce the second installment in my idle series, focusing solely on jesper and wylan. i would simply like to remind everyone, however, that these are meant to be poetic and full of prose, rather than serious and solid fics, that's all.

tag list was removed for bewildering reasons, but anyways

Wylan Van Eck hadn't always loved him.

Once upon a time, he had only been a quiet boy from the largest city in the world, lips smudged with paint, copper lashes low over eyes bluer than the fucking summer sky.

Once upon a time, he had spent his days sequestered in his favourite studio, head tilted just so slightly, dappling the canvas in shades of green and gold, a spare brush between his teeth.

Once upon a time, his evenings were spent alone at the piano, slim fingers hovering over the keys as if he could wring his childhood from the notes, copper curls damp with bathwater.

Once upon a time, artwork meant slender brushes and sticky gouache and glass jars of paint; now he could only define it as eyes like dusty sunlight, soft lips that tasted of forgiveness, a grin to light the world aflame.

And Wylan was fucking aflame.

He was burning.

When he was sketching sleepily at his desk, the sun a dying cinder at his back, sharp angles and vivid coats and pearl-handled revolvers sprawled from the tip of his charcoal pen.

When he was laying alone in the bath, water lapping over the hard planes of his body, the room aglow in soft shades of bronze and green, all he could do was dream.

When he was sitting in a lecture hall, information and dates and names pounding through his ears, all he could see was the elegant figure before him, scrawling down his notes, one leg kicked up against a girl's chair.

Wylan couldn't help but track the careful movements of his hand, the graceful loops and lines of his writing, one finger braced against the metal spiral of his notebook.

His name was Jesper, he knew. Jesper Fahey.

A soft name, the sound a rolling wave on his tongue, rising and falling. It tasted like whiskey, smooth and sweet, every note rich and unfettered.

He wanted to find out how it would feel in his mouth, during the final hours of the night, how it would sound.

He wanted to hear his own name on Jesper's lips, a breathless gasp, a quiet moan, a pleading whisper.

He wanted to hear Jesper say his name, so simply.

He wanted to hear his name.

The very first time Wylan painted him felt like taking a drug. He was sprawled in his bed, staring dazedly at a dark spider clinging to the leftmost wall, and he was losing his fucking mind.

He couldn't get the image of Jesper's hands out of his head. In the chamber of his mind, he had locked away the sight as if to keep it safe and sheltered; those fucking beautiful hands, broad and warm, lines etched into the calloused palm, nails squared off, three rings circling each finger.

He wanted to draw them in charcoal and graphite and ink.

He wanted to paint them in gouache and acrylics and watercolour.

He wanted to line them in silver and bronze and emerald.

He wanted to lift those hands to his mouth and kiss them.

And so at three in the morning, still in his pajamas and hair utterly bedraggled, eyes swollen with exhaustion and limbs sore, he was setting himself up before a blank canvas.

"Just one painting," he whispered, touching a slim finger to a brush.

He promised himself a quick sketch, just the soft shape of his hands, or the lilt to his smile, or maybe even the blazing hue of his eyes.

One painting.

He made quick work of locating his favourite paints, a set of vibrant gouache his mother had gifted him, bottled neatly into little glass jars.

And, so fucking tenderly, he selected every single colour that he had likened to Jesper.

Rich gold and heady crimson, molten copper and softest ivory, prussian blue and clinging silver, dreamy amethyst and clear chrysocolla.

They stained Wylan's hands as he dappled the bare canvas in every prismatic hue, smudging over his wrists and fingertips and the limber handle of his brush.

When the sun rose, fierce and proud against a backdrop of blue blue blue, he only wiped a droplet of copper from his lip and kept going.

There was something utterly consuming about being locked away in that room, the strong scent of paint and turpentine, the haze of shades and light and quiet piano music, the blur of being trapped in lands one never wanted to leave.

He spent hours kneeling there on the floor, head bowed over the canvas as if the painting was his altar, reveling in every last detail. And there were Jesper's hands, soft and gentle, and the sight nearly drove him mad.

He wanted to feel those hands tangled through his hair.

He wanted to feel them on his bare skin.

He wanted.

"Just one painting," he echoed, and set down his brush.

But when he glimpsed Jesper laughing in the fields, snow dripping down his cheek like tears, he wanted to capture that indomitable joy in acrylics, brilliant in their beauty.

But when he caught Jesper downing a mug of his friend's coffee, he never wanted to forget the way he winked, the way his hand wrapped carelessly around the cardboard cup.

But when he saw Jesper dancing against a curvy girl in red velvet, he couldn't tear his eyes from the sharp set of his jaw, the lowered lashes, the vulnerable angle of his bare wrists.

He wanted to trace them in charcoal, wanted to preserve the sight in paper, never to be lost or forgotten.

Jesper grinned lazily at the girl, one corner of his fucking beautiful mouth lifting, and then he was pressed up against a different boy, head thrown back in laughter.

He whirled past his partners, leaving them with only a whisper or a slow, deliberate kiss. They grabbed for his attention, for the gift of his smile, reaching out with greedy hands.

Then Jesper was scanning the club, honey eyes roaming over the floors and walls and bars. They locked on Wylan, and something in his gaze lit.

A blazing match.

A building on fire.

A city burning, burning, burning.

And Wylan never knew how he found the courage, but suddenly he was striding up between the writhing bodies, and the ocean was roaring in his ears, and he was saying lightly, "Would you favour me with a dance?"

It was not graceful and elegant and slow.

It was stumbling and gasping and and breathless laughter.

It was drowning within the cacophony of pulsing music.

It was drowning within the steady depth of Jesper's eyes.

The flashing strobe lights were pulsing blue and green and red and pink, and the sounds of laughter and shuffling steps filled the club, and there was music echoing up the walls and skittering up the vertebrae of his spine.

It felt like being trapped in a prism where time did not exist.

Wylan's eyes fluttered shut, and he thought, I will burn as those cities burned.

And when Jesper lowered his head and whispered, "What would you say to a kiss, Wylan Van Eck?" he was fucking gone.

Jesper had never looked more handsome, his lashes low, the curve of his jaw sharp, every glint of gold in his eyes sparkling.

Wylan wanted to draw him bare and asleep in his own tangled bedsheets, the elegant lines of his body extended, every single angle and plane etched deep.

He wanted to draw the way he looked in that very moment, beautiful and brash and bold.

And that was a terrible idea for so many reasons.

It was a terrible idea because Jesper was raucous and brazen as the sun, and Wylan was soft and elegant as the moon, and neither of them could read the stars, but surely it was fated somewhere that dark and light did not find peace within one another.

It was a terrible idea because they were two fucking stupid collage kids who could never, ever find a life together.

It was a terrible idea because it was Achilles and Patroclus all over again, the boy who thought he could save his heart, the fucking idiot who believed love was indomitable.

Love would not absolve Wylan of the quiet terror that had sunken into his bones. Love would not ease the addictions that had crept upon Jesper like hungry vines.

He would not be the boy waiting, dishonored and broken, in the war tent.

He would not be the boy who watched as the world's cruelty took all that was dear to him.

He wouldn't.

But there was Jesper, with his lilting smile and the fierce look in his eyes, the scent of brandy clinging to him like smoke, and all Wylan could do was croak, "Yes."

And when Wylan staggered home at four in the morning, his hair a tangled copper halo, he couldn't help but think even Achilles and Patroclus might have hoped once.

They might have made out like teenagers and laughed in between kisses.

They might have been doomed, fated to die within the stars, but perhaps Wylan and Jesper would defy the odds. Perhaps Wylan could bear the magnanimity of his father's terrors, and perhaps Jesper could set down the playing cards and walk away from a bad hand.

They didn't have to be the heroes made history, legends turned legacies.

They could just be Wylan Van Eck and Jesper Fahey.

And in his paintings, they were.

In his paintings, they were very simply two boys kissing in the dark, all roaming hands and breathless gasps, shirts unbuttoned and sleeves rucked to their elbows, lips that tasted of redemption.

But as the days whirled past, and spring blossomed, Wylan came to realize life was so much more than soft, secret paintings. Life might even have been better.

Because life was Jesper asleep in his bed, one hand tucked beneath his cheek, limbs sprawled out across the silk sheets, sunlight gilding his bare body.

Life was standing at the stove with Jesper beside him, bickering over who got the first waffle, nearly doubled up in their laughter, exchanging sleepy kisses that tasted of sugar.

Life was laying in the fields with Jesper, leaning against him ever so slightly, their shoulders pressed together, the quiet brush of the wind lulling them to sleep, sweet as any melody.

Life was Wylan playing the piano in the midst of the night, cold moonlight easing through the blinds and slanting across the elegant notes, and Jesper's head was pillowed on his lap, and he was whispering, "I love you, I love you, I love you."

Wylan hadn't known love could be so simple.

He hadn't known.

And sometimes Jesper would read to him, the low cadence of his voice a melody sweet as sunlight, and Wylan would listen with his eyes fluttering shut, and he would think, If this is burning, I will spend the rest of my life with my hands in the fire.

There was the fierce freedom of open roads and summer air and vibrant artwork and daring kisses.

There was the quiet freedom of elegant piano music and large windows and scalding coffee and history books.

There was the unfettered freedom of them, of leaping across the broad rim of a water fountain, Wylan turning his face to the sun, warmth and light and the soft glitter of water, and Jesper's eyes were the colour of hope in the haze of dusk, and he whispered, "You look like a fucking prince, Wy."

Ice cream on his hands and seawater dampening his curls and blinding sunshine everywhere, and Jesper thought he looked like a prince.

What do I see, when I look at him?

Starlight slanting through their windows, grazing the idle curve of Jesper's lips.

Chocolate ice cream dripping down the cone, catching on Jesper's tongue.

Glittering rings of silver and amethyst and veined gold, looped around Jesper's fingers.

What do I find beautiful about him?

Was it his laughter or his smile or the way he buttoned up his shirt in the morning?

Was it the soft cadence of his voice as he read aloud, or the way he stroked Wylan's curling hair idly?

Was it the clever lilt of his smile or the quick wink of his lashes or the mocking shrug of his shoulders?

Was it the very simple fact that when the morning sunlight swept through the windows and slanted over the bed, Jesper looked as though he'd been crowned by the gods, a vision in bronze and gilt and amber? With his hair rumpled and his lashes low and the hard planes of his bare body clear as he knelt, Wylan had never seen anything so fucking wonderous.

What do I want to remember?

Their mornings, a sleepy haze of pancake batter and orange juice and tangled bedsheets, of rambling stories and dazed kisses?

Their afternoons, a blissful tangle of shared smiles and iced coffee and inside jokes, of hurried texts and chocolate bars?

Their nights, a frenzied blur of pulsing music and strobe lights and bedraggled hair, of breathless moans and fizzing champagne?

All of it. I want to remember all of it.

So what do you see, when you look at him?

Wylan saw love.

He saw salvation.

He saw soft lips and blazing eyes and broad hands.

He saw cities burning, burning, burning.

He saw Jesper Fahey.

[themangolorian]

ketterdam unsolved

For @kanejweek Day 3: Adventure (robbery & piracy, outer space)

Pairing: Kaz x Inej

Warnings: for some explicit language

Summary: (modern au) ketterdam’s version of buzzfeed unsolved (not what i expected when i started out) but you don’t have to watch bfu to get it, it’s just a modern ghost hunting au with a twist

“If this is going to work, then Kaz needs to be the skeptic and Inej the believer.” Wylan kept saying in various reiterations without ever explaining why.

“This isn’t going to work.” Jasper repeated.

“Shouldn’t that be Kaz’s line?” Inej smiled dazzlingly his way.

“Wylan is right.” Kaz finally spoke, his voice unwavering rough stone.

Silence fell over the room. They’d been bickering over the roles for several minutes and Kaz had kept his peace until now.

“Even if he doesn’t know why.” Kaz continued, effectively erasing the satisfied smile from Wylan’s face.

Jesper stuck his tongue out at Wylan in retaliation, but Wylan actively ignored him.

“Jesper, you’ll be manning the camera.” Kaz said, then, a moment later: “What was that?”

“Nothing, boss,” Jesper shot back enthusiastically, though they’d all clearly heard him mutter a second ago: “You’ll regret that when you see the footage.”

Kaz nodded in satisfaction. It wasn’t that they didn’t all rile him up intentionally once in awhile; it was that you didn’t do it during a job.

After all, if they were going to steal the Lantsov Emerald from a high tech security vault inside of an allegedly haunted castle while playing at being amateur television personality ghost hunters, they were going to need full concentration throttles ahead.

“What about me?” Nina pouted.

“You, my dear,” replied Kaz liltingly, holding up a skimpy yet utterly expensive looking gown, “are tonight’s distraction.”

Nina grinned devilishly, but Matthias only groaned.

“Let’s get to work.” Kaz murmured.

*******

Later, on the set Wylan and Jesper had constructed to look like some old timey investigator’s office, Inej studied the hastily thrown together script with wrinkled nose.

“This dialogue is terrible.”

“Oi.” Wylan feigned hurt surprisingly well.

“It’ll have to do,” Kaz agreed without actually agreeing from where he sat behind the desk at her side.

“This week on Ketterdam Unsolved, we dive deep into the mystery of the Haunted Castle of Ravka,” Inej tried but failed to say without cringing.

Kaz’s lips twitched. “The most awful part about it all is that they’re going to fall for it.”

Inej glanced his way slyly. “Oh yes, truly horrible.”

Kaz focused for just a second too long on that smile before forcing his gaze back to the script.

Jesper zoomed out of the shot. Oh yes, this was going to be fun.

********

The castle’s wide open hallways were cold and foreboding, and Inej found herself shivering from more than just the temperature. For all her skepticism about the script, she might be the only one of them other than Matthias who truly believed the castle was haunted.

Glancing past where Matthias stood guard (she didn’t know how Kaz had managed to accomplish that one - stand in security guard for a nationally recognized security company seemed even beyond his capabilities), the thought did little to comfort her.

Knowing she was being stupid, she still felt like eyes were watching her. Kaz, of course, noticed instantly and used it decidedly for their sham of a show.

“Don’t mind my friend here,” Kaz said in that awful voice she barely recognized, “she’s just positive we’re going to be murdered here tonight.” Kaz laughed into the camera Jesper was pointing at them. He sounded like a total idiot.

Inej stared at Kaz, hoping she was conveying the proper amount of derision.

“Everyone loves to taunt ghosts, until they’re being haunted by them.” Inej said as much for Kaz’s benefit as for the camera’s and that of the bemused tour guide showing them around before leaving them to their antics for the night. If only he would just leave already...

Kaz only laughed mockingly back, which riled Inej up even more. But she knew her lines.

“Keep it up, big guy, and see what tonight has in store for you.” She managed to say, this time without wincing.

The tour guide began leading them to the rooms where they had been instructed to keep to during their overnight ghostly vigil but failed to notice the way their eyes were memorizing every layout, every window, every door.

*******

When they had finally been left alone, charmed out of the castle as the tour guide had been by Nina’s wiles, Inej let out a deep frustrated breath.

What had seemed to be an interminable smile fell from Kaz’s face.

“Jesper, you take the east wing. Wylan will be waiting at the gate. Don’t alert the guards, but Matthias is on stand by if you do.”

Kaz didn’t have to say a word. Inej knew to follow him just by the look in his eye.

“Did you see the way the guide kept glancing at the door to the main study?” But Inej knew she didn’t have to ask.

“I’m betting that’s our target.” Kaz agreed, leaning lightly on the walking stick he had swapped out for his usually more dramatic cane. For the “aesthetic,” Jesper had said.

Inej didn’t bother to ask why Kaz had sent Jesper and Wylan in another direction. Kaz always had his reasons.

“It’s likely a pressurized vault.” Inej muttered, thinking carefully on what they had learned on their tour.

Kaz fished something out of his pocket and Inej’s eyes went wide. Then she smiled, taking the hefty false emerald out of his palm. “Our friend, Mark.” She laughed.

“Exactly.” Kaz didn’t smile but the twist of his lips was unmistakable. He was pleased with her reaction.

He was not so pleased when they reached the outer chamber of the vault. Inej had never seen such high tech locking mechanisms. There was no way they were getting in.

“What now, big guy?” Inej tried for levity but Kaz’s face wad screwed up tight. He was-

“Scheming face.” Jesper let out a low whistle, sidling through the door behind them.

“Definitely.” Inej shot back, watching Kaz take apart the puzzle that was invisible to the rest of them.

*****

The break-in to the vault had taken them the better part of the night. Finally, just before dawn, they had retired back to the window lined room and their sleeping bags to await the arrival of the tour guide who would check them out of the castle.

Wylan had fallen immediately into a deep slumber and was snoring across the room next to Jesper who was fiddling with the video camera, but Kaz was still too pumped full of adrenaline with their success. He could feel the hefty weight of the emerald in the inner lining of his jacket where it could not be detected even if they were searched.

He gazed fondly, if with a blank expression, over the room full of his crew. Then- his eyes found Inej.

****

“It’s a murder well.” Kaz was crowing enthusiastically to the camera, his voice an overexacting exaggeration.

Kaz raised one eyebrow at the TV as he walked into their crowded headquarters. Jesper, Wylan, Inej, Nina and Matthias were laying haphazardly across the too small sofa watching the footage Jesper had captured just a few nights ago.

“Holy shit, dude, this is how they murked traitors back then.” The on-screen Inej babbled while the in-person Inej groaned and covered her face.

“Shh, this is my favorite part,” Jesper exclaimed, tossing a handful of popcorn kernels her way.

“Oi.” Inej barked, beginning to tussle over the popcorn bowl as on-screen Kaz and Inej laughed a little too hysterically at some scripted joke.

“What business?” Kaz leaned on his cane as they call came slightly to attention before relaxing again.

“Just enjoying the fruits of our labor, Dirtyhands,” Nina laughed joyously as she popped what Kaz knew to be very expensive gourmet chocolates between her lips while ignoring Matthias’ longing glance.

Inej extricated herself from the pile of limbs of their friends to join Kaz behind the sofa. She was grinning wildly and bouncing on the toes of her feet. “So?” She seemed even more excited at the prospect of CEO Rollins’ downfall than Kaz was.

Kaz nodded his head curtly and Inej beamed. Kaz got the distinct sense that Inej wanted to launch herself at him and was disconcerted to realize he quite hoped she would follow through when-

“Awwww,” Nina was exclaiming in a loud sweet voice.

Both Kaz and Inej looked up at the same moment at the TV screen to see Inej as she had been the morning after their heist, in the castle, sitting on a window ledge with her eyes closed letting the sun bathe her in warmth and light.

Something was wrong. There had been no filming... There shouldn’t have been any filming then. The camera began to pan out and Kaz took a stilting step forward, though by then he knew it was too late to stop what was about to happen.

The room went still. Even Jesper had stopped his constant squirming. That early morning, Kaz had been sitting on the floor just diagonally to Inej. He remembered the exact second his eyes had landed on Inej then, the way his breath had quite literally trapped itself in his throat. He remembered possibly even better now as he watched himself on screen, past him watching past her with something akin to absolute enthrallment on his face.

No one moved except for Inej who Kaz could see, from the corner of his eye, looking from the screen to him. He could almost make out the disbelief and - was that joy? He wanted to believe that was joy - on her face.

Suddenly the camera on screen was being whipped around and Jesper’s face was filling up the entire screen.

“Told ya you would regret putting me on camera, boss.”

The screen went black.

[adxmparriish]

and now I see daylight - read on ao3

writer: lizziebxnnet / godgavemelou  word count: 2.1k rating: general

Matthias only sees Nina.

Her head is thrown back, exposing the milky skin of her throat as she laughs. To Matthias, it’s like the sound of bells ringing, a bird singing. It’s the sound of magic, the music he refused to listen to before; before he’d met her.

OR four times Matthias thinks about how much he loves Nina, and the one time he tells her.

They’re sitting around a table in Wylan’s house.

It’s fairly quiet. The room is lit low, a yellow tint that comes from the candles on the table. Everyone is there tonight for once. Even Kaz sits among them, taking time away from the Crow Club. Wylan is telling a wayward story about a bomb he’s testing, arms flailing as he describes the explosion. Nina is leaned back in her chair, a sweet bun in her hands as she listens. Her hair is down, curls falling around her shoulders. She’s wearing a deep red dress that brings out the pink in her cheeks that appears when she’s happy.

Wylan gets to the climax of his story, his hands smacking the table, his voice taking up all the space in the room. Everyone has managed a laugh, aside from Kaz who’s lips have quirked into the smallest of grins. It doesn’t matter though. Matthias only sees Nina.

Her head is thrown back, exposing the milky skin of her throat as she laughs. To Matthias, it’s like the sound of bells ringing, a bird singing. It’s the sound of magic, the music he refused to listen to before; before he’d met her. Her giggles grasp his heart in an iron-clad grip, squeezing so hard it’s difficult to breathe. He knows he’s staring but he can’t look away from her, can’t imagine ever seeing something so beautiful. When she’s finally calmed down, her bright green eyes meet his. They glisten and shine, twinkling in the firelight as she smiles at him. Matthias knows he should smile back but he can’t. He’s too entranced by her to do anything but look back at her. Looking into her face is like looking directly into the sun, the brightness of daylight.

Her hand meets his leg under the table, squeezing his thigh gently. Her affection used to scare him, rattle him, shake him. Now he welcomes her. 

Matthias can hear conversion around him but it doesn’t matter. Nina is looking at him like he hung the moon, and the thing is, he’d do it for her. 

“Want to share the last of my sticky bun?” she asks, raising her brow, a smile still playing at her mouth.

Instead of an answer, he leans in and snatches it from her fingers with his teeth, nipping at her as he does. Nina laughs again, giggles overtaking her. He knew she would, knew that him acting out of turn would please her, and frankly, it’s the only reason he did it. He’d do anything to see her this way; eyes dancing, nose crinkled, cheeks red. She’s ethereal, breathtaking, a vision, and he loves her.

--

They’re huddled around a table at the Crow Club.

Matthias is watching from the side as Nina plays a card game with Jesper. There are a few other patrons as well. Neither of his friends is doing well, a fair bit of kruge lost between them. As they continue to play, Nina grows more frustrated. 

Her face grows redder as the cards are dealt, another hand is lost, another bit of kruge out of her hands. She gets lazy in her efforts, anger making her sloppy with her decisions. She loses another hand and grinds her teeth. Matthias thinks of stepping in, telling her they should go to their room, try again tomorrow.

Before he can get that far, Nina is standing up from the table, throwing down her cards in fury. A rough man at the table reaches up and grabs her by the waist, attempting to pull her back down.

“Now now gorgeous, let’s just calm down,” he grins cruelly.

Matthias is moving, his fits already curled and poised to hit, to beat this man senseless, break his hands so he can never touch Nina again. He’s too late. Nina’s hands are raised, her fingers curling, and then the man falls. His head crashes against the table, his cards falling to the floor. Her eyes are aflame, a burning behind them that halts Matthias in his tracks. Her chest heaves, breaths coming in ragged. Even as she lifts her eyes, meeting his gaze and simmering down, she is a fire burning brightly in the dimly lit room. A sort of silence has drifted over them as he watches her, wondering if he should approach.

Jesper stands from the table, abandoning the game.

“We’re done for tonight, Nina.” He sounds like he’s terrified, while also fighting off a laugh. 

Matthias moves closer but doesn’t touch, just waits for her to come down. Nina isn’t difficult to rouse, her anger never coming over a simmer even at the worst of times. But when it boils over, fiery red flames catching and burning, she’s a sight to behold. She’s an explosion, an earthquake, violent and powerful, and he loves her.

--

They’re standing in a small field outside of Ketterdam.

Nina is kneeling down in the grass, her hands shaking as she sets down their dog, cradling his head as she does.

They hadn’t had Gestinge long. Matthias and Nina found him as a small puppy, roaming the streets alone, barely alive. Nina loved him immediately, begging Matthias to let her have him, for them to raise him. They weren’t technically allowed a dog where they were staying, but when Nina looked up at him, the green of her eyes wet with tears as she held the puppy close, he couldn’t say no. He was perfect for them.

They named him after the Fjerdan word for paradise because that’s what he was. He brought them peace on easy days, happiness on the hard ones, and laughter in all the times in between. Matthias was stuck trying to train him, while Nina fed him treats and cuddled with him in her favorite chair. He would watch them together, walking down the streets of the city, and feel a warmth in his chest that was unmatched by anything else. In a way, they were his family, and it was perfect. It was all he’d ever wanted.

Today was a crack in their paradise.

Matthias found him in an alley behind the Crow Club, bleeding from a wound that they’re sure came from another animal. He carried him home carefully, tears threatening to spill over. He worried for Gestinge, wanted him to be okay more than anything. But he worried for Nina, too. He worried she’d take it too hard, worried that she might find a way to blame herself. She’d been the one to let the dog out to wander, as they typically did during the day. Now Gestinge was hurt, and Matthias knew he wouldn’t make it. 

Now, he digs a hole in the soft grass as Nina kneels beside him, too upset to help. Her eyes leak tears as she watches him. When he’s finished, they lower their puppy into the makeshift grave. The sun shines down on them as they stand over the hole in the ground, Matthias gripping Nina’s hand in his own. He gives it a squeeze and looks at her, unsure what he should say.

Her eyes are red-rimmed and swollen. Her hair is a mess, tangled where she can’t stop running her hands through it. Her lip quivers, and when she finally looks back at him, the hurt in her face breaks Matthias’ heart. She’s tragedy and unease, sadness in a way he’s never seen before, and he vows to keep that look off of her forever. The trembling of her hands, the slouching of her shoulders, causes a deep hurt in Matthias that he hates. 

As she says a final goodbye, he lifts their intertwined hands, kisses her knuckles, and tries his best to give her a reassuring smile. Like the sun breaking through the clouds after days of rain, she slowly smiles back and she’s radiant. Even through the hurt, through the pain of losing something she loves, she is gorgeous, as bright as the sunshine beaming down on them, and he loves her.

--

They’re standing intertwined in the darkness of Kaz’s office.

Nina’s arms are looped around Matthias’ neck. She’s on her tiptoes as she leans into him, their bodies so close there’s no air between them. Her back is arched, her head thrown back, as Matthias kisses her neck. She practically purrs when he lowers his hands, gripping her thighs so he can lift and hold her against the door.

Their only soundtrack is the little noises Nina makes in the back of her throat, Matthias’s groans as he kisses her, the creak of the door, the crowd in the Club growing restless around their games. He can feel her pulse pounding under her skin as they kiss in the dark.

Then, the knob shakes and the door tries to move.

“I know you’re in there,” Kaz mutters through the door, shaking the handle again. “Don’t make me get Inej to force you both out.”

Nina giggles from under Matthias, red blossoming on her cheeks at them getting caught.

“Five minutes,” she replies.

Nina looks up, deep green meeting bright blue. Her lip is trapped between her teeth as she smiles. She’s flushed from her hair to her neck. Everything about her is messy and lewd. Her pupils are blown wide beneath the darkness of her lashes as she looks up at him. Her lips are shiny and red from their kisses, from Matthias’ teeth, and her own nipping at them. Matthias’s heart flutters in his chest at the sight of her like this. She is desire reincarnate, a rose blooming in the warmth of summer, a burst of light in a dark world. 

He leans down and captures her mouth with his own, pouring every feeling he holds close into the kiss. He can feel her lips curving into a smile against his own. He holds her impossibly closer, gripping her so tight in his hands he’s sure he’ll leave bruises. She breathes his name into his mouth, so much passion in the word that he’s sure he’ll break apart. Nina is perfect and beautiful, and everything alluring in the world, and he loves her.

--

They’re laying in their bed.

Their limbs are tangled under a heavy blanket. Nina is sleeping soundly, her curls fanning across the pillow. Her chest rises and falls slowly, a tiny snore escaping her every once in a while. The golden light of sunrise is coming through their window. It touches her face gently, the warmth making her glow. Matthias’s chest aches as he lays there watching her.

He runs his fingers through her messy hair as the sun continues to rise. Part of him wants to go back to sleep, to get the rest he really needs, but he can’t look away. He only sees her, her beauty radiating through their room like the light streaming through their curtains. 

When he can no longer just look at her, he leans down and kisses her forehead. 

At this, she stirs. Her forehead creases, her eyelids flutter, and the green of her eyes are hazy as she wakes up. She looks at him through the fog of early morning and he’s breathless. He lifts his hand and cradles her cheek, his thumb caressing the skin of her cheek. Nina’s eyes begin to adjust but she simply looks back at him, her eyelids threatening to close again. Not from sleep, but from pleasure, from desire.

She is beautiful. She is his everything. She is the sun that rises and sets. She’s the stars in the night sky, lightning and thunder exploding in the sky during a storm, the grass that grows in the cracks of the sidewalks. She’s the stillness of the morning, the excitement of the night, the ease of midday. Nina is the breath in his lungs, the warmth in his heart, and everything else in between. Matthias loves her. So he tells her.

He whispers it against her mouth as he kisses her. He breathes it against the skin of her throat. He sighs the words as he holds her close, his arms pulling her against him. He gasps it when Nina is finally fully awake and pushes him against the bed, kissing him with all the fierceness inside her. He recants it over and over, like an enchantment, like a prayer, like a curse. Matthias loves her. 

And like a miracle, Nina loves him in return. 

She says it in the way she grabs his hand when she’s happy. She says it in the way she shares her food with him, even when she doesn’t want to. She shows him when she laughs at him, or with him, depending on the circumstance. She tells him when she crawls in their bed at night, when she leans into his embrace, and when she lays her head on his shoulder.

But now, she says it with her words.

“I love you,” she whispers. 

The sun has fully risen, the sunlight of a new day beaming on her, and she glows like a lighthouse, guiding Matthias home.

“I love you, my little red bird.”

[emmaannaelisabeth]

I’m horrible. I know. here’s deaf wylan.

wylan lies next to jesper, squeezed tight to him, his red golden head on jesper's chest, his arm flung over jesper’s stomach.

wylan loves this. or that’s at least what he tells himself, what he wants himself to think. I love laying here, he reminds himself, more than anything in the world. and usually, he believes it, remembers that yes, I do.

In those moments, he takes it all in, tries to remember what it feels like right now, to have jesper here, to have his warmth transfer over to wylan. to have the person he loves the most right beside him.

but, sometimes, it makes him want to cry. and he shoves his feelings away from his heart, into a dark spot right next to his spine. sometimes he doesn’t want to feel. anything.

more times than he would like, wylan shuts everything out, tries not to think about how amazing it is to have jesper right here. (because it is, it truly is, and that’s the worst part)

lying here makes him want to tear himself apart; because he knows he loves it, and that he never wants to stop laying with his head on jesper's shoulder. not really. not the wylan he was, at least.

but the wylan he is now can’t help but hate it, too. without him agreeing to it, jesper has become the awful reminder of what he can no longer have.

wylan misses what was, there's no denying it. and jesper constantly reminds him of all of that. wylan misses it more than anything, and his only company in his mind is the phantom echoes of long lost moments.

he misses hearing so bad.

when he truly tries to listen, all wylan can hear is silence. he has often had to force himself to the thin line of I can’t do it anymore, of I can’t try harder, please, this is my best, but this is different.

this time, wylan physically can’t. sometimes he’d thought that if he collected his mind well enough, he might be able to read, some day. but this is not that, this… wylan can’t do anything about it. he’s just broken. literally. if he were a toy, someone would throw him away - this can’t be fixed. the don’t make spare parts for redheaded boys with blue eyes.

and it hits hard this time, as he lies there, head on jesper’s shoulder. wylan can’t hear a thing. jesper's ribcage is silent, and wylan wants to sob. I'll never hear his heartbeat again.

sure, he can feel it, and he can also feel as jesper breathes, as his ribcage vibrates, but he can't hear the soft breaths that play with wylan’s red hair. and he can't hear jesper's heavy breathing as they kiss anymore, he can't hear jesper laughs or huffs. not anymore.

saints above, wylan can't hear jesper's voice! he will never hear jesper whisper in his ear, he will never hear jesper shout his name or tell him a joke.

he'll never hear jesper tell him he loves him. never again. and that makes wylan want to take one of inej's daggers and slit his chest open, rip out his heart and throw it away. (even though it’s be easier to just accuse blow himself up. wouldn’t hurt as much.)

of course, he won't do that. or, at least, he can’t. he couldn’t stand knowing he did that to jesper. but wylan still feels like he could do it, and it wouldn't even hurt. not more than living does.

or wait, no. wylan wants to laugh at himself, how could i be so stupid? someone already has. wylan’s chest is already bare and bloodied, ribs cracked and broken, heart ripped out by force, by the reddish flames from an explosion.

wylan will never hear anything else but echoes and ghosts and sounds that no longer exists. he's trapped in his own mind. trapped in a world without music, without songs, without melodies, without happy tunes. he's lost.

he feels utterly useless. what good am i now?

he can talk, he knows that, but it's fricking scary not to hear yourself. and it makes cold sweat burst out of his skin, every single time. almost makes him not want to open his mouth.

and he can't write.

I'm useless.

wylan closes his eyes, refuses to let the tears fall. please let me wake up, please let this be a dream, please...

but wylan doesn't wake up. and he keeps his lips sealed. he’s too afraid to talk.

and no one knows. anything.

[klbwriting]

Unexpected Allies - Chapter 17

Fandom: Six of Crows

Pairing: Kaz/female!Reader

Summary: disaster strikes and Kaz has some planning to do

Notes: ugh, once again this is going to get worse but you’ll love it

Taglist:  @mcntsee @amwitherspoon @cxlpxrnia @fcvcritecrime​ @aysegust​ @sagewrites111​ @spawn0fsatan​ @itsemy01 @thedelusionreaderbitch

              Y/N wasn’t surprised when Kaz didn’t come out to see them off in the morning, but she was surprised to see Inej there, looking annoyed.  She approached the smaller woman and folded her arms.  Jesper and Matthias took that as their cue to go make sure the Fabikator and the horses were ready.

              “You didn’t have to lie to him and keep the parem a secret” Inej whispered.   Y/N cocked an eyebrow and felt a little vindicated in knowing that someone would have heard them had she told him.  Inej would have told the leaders, she was one of them now.  “I would have kept it a secret.”  

              “Liar,” Y/N retorted.  “Look, just, give this to Kaz if you see him, I know he might just tear it up but I want him to know how sorry I am and how much I love him.” Inej took the letter and pocketed it quick before Mal came over.  The look he gave her told her that everyone knew she had slept in her own tent last night and she didn’t like the pity.

              “Ready to go?” he asked.  She took one last look around, hoping that maybe he was in the shadows somewhere, still watching her even if she didn’t see him.  She nodded finally and went to climb on her horse.  “Try to just lead him away from us alright?  You don’t have to have the big fight all alone, we just need time.”  

              “If I can kill him, I’m killing him,” she said, urging the horse to walk away.  She took a last glance back and saw the glint of something shiny in the sun and smiled a little.  He had been there, at least, she hoped he had been.  

              It took nearly two days before they found the Darkling, alone in a field, waiting for them.   Y/N had figured he would be setting a trap and she was glad that the Fabrikator had almost finished the amplifier.  Even though it wouldn’t be at full strength it would help.  They stopped about 20 feet from their king and stared.  He smirked.

              “Hello Y/N, please, I know that you are going to try to fight me, and I have heard rumor that you have gotten a Grisha made amplifier, why don’t you put it on?” he asked.   Y/N felt wrong about all of this but before she would say anything the Fabrikator stuck the collar around her neck, sealing it on.  

              “Alright Aleksander, leave now and I won’t have to kill you, just leave us be,” she said, standing ready.  She heard a clinking sound to her right but ignored it. Jesper cried out a warning but by the time she reacted the chain had already been fused to the collar.  The Fabrikator was running towards the Darkling with the chain in his hands.   Y/N tried to stop him, slow his heart, but her power was suddenly gone.  Then with horror she realized that they had been betrayed.

              “You know, the problem with Alina was I gave her a collar, but I forgot to make sure she had her leash,” the Darkling said as the Fabrikator put the chain in his hands.   Y/N’ eyes widened.

              “RUN!” she yelled to the other two.  The Darkling lifted his hands and a shot rang out.  Jesper had fired but the Darkling had assumed this was coming, moving at the last moment so that he was just grazed in the shoulder.  Luckily this gave Matthias time to grab Jesper, pulling him onto his horse before the cut took him out.   Y/N tried to run but was yanked back hard by the Darkling.  She sputtered as she stood again, only to be dragged back another time. This time the Darkling just dragged her to the tree line where a carriage was waiting.  He had the Fabrikator enter before tossing her inside.  He joined her, making sure to sit right next to her as they were driven back to the Little Palace and what she assumed was her execution.  

                Kaz was waiting at the gate for Y/N.  He knew it was too early to expect the group back, but he wanted to be the first person she saw.  He had cooled off from their fight, talked to Inej, hell he even talked to Nina about everything, and both had set him right on what was the real problem.  He understood now that Y/N’s priorities were to save Ravka and to keep him safe, the only way in her mind to do that was to keep herself as the only target.  If she was the only person who had or knew where the parem was then he was safe.  He was an idiot; he would have done the same thing in her situation.  Now he just wanted to set things right and then he was asking her to leave with him.  This place got rot for all he cared, he hated it and wanted out.  He just hoped the Dregs and Y/N would leave with him.

              When Jesper and Matthias came over the horizon Kaz started to walk over but then saw that they were alone.  He felt panic rising in him.  Was she dead?  Captured? Where was Y/N?  The two men got off the horse as other joined Kaz at the gates.

              “We were betrayed,” Matthias said, panting from exertion.  They hadn’t stopped riding since their encounter, and they were exhausted.  Jesper looked at Kaz.

              “The Fabrikator…he made the collar to dampen her powers.  He was the Darkling’s plant here,” he said.  Dammit, Kaz had been weeding out other plants, knowing exactly how to recognize them from his time in Ketterdam and he had missed one.  “He made a chain too, gave it to the Darkling so she couldn’t run from him.”  Nina and Wylan helped the other men back to the camp while Inej and Mal approached Kaz.

              “Brekker, I think we need a thug to handle this,” Mal said after a moment.  Kaz stared at him.  “Can you plan something to help us?

              “I need time to plan,” he said, stomping off without a word to Inej as he went back to his tent.  He couldn’t think right now, everything in his brain was just screaming. She was at the Little Palace, probably going to be executed in some display of power by the Darkling and the last thing he had said to her was that he gave up on her, on them.  He started swinging again, once again breaking everything in sight. Once he was done he looked to the door to see Inej there holding out a letter.

              “ Y/N wanted me to give this to you.  I was hoping that she would be back to tell you herself but now…I’m sorry I kept it,” she said.  Kaz snatched it away and dismissed her with a wave of his hand.  He moved to the cot and sat down, opening the letter.

Kaz,

I’m sorry I didn’t tell you about the parem.  It wasn’t that I didn’t trust you, not really, its that I don’t trust the world anymore.  As soon as I let a secret slip disaster always seems to strike.  As soon as I trust the world is going to work in my favor it cuts me down and I didn’t want that to happen.  I never lied about how I felt about you.  I love you more than I thought I possibly could love anyone.  Remember back when you proposed to me?  Next time someone asks me my full name I’m saying Y/N Brekker because it was yes then and its yes now.  Hope I can see you soon, I miss holding your hand.

Love,

Y/N

              Kaz leaned his head to his hand and for the first time since Jordie he cried.  It was like he broke and every time something bad had happened to him came rushing to him, bringing out desperate sobs.  He knew what she meant about trusting the world, the world never cared about him just like it didn’t care about her.  He cared about her and he had thrown that in her face.  He took a deep breath and finally pulled himself together.  He put the letter under his pillow before getting a pen and paper of his own and writing out two things, one was instructions for Jesper and the second was something for Y/N.  Then Kaz stood and let the tears and sadness behind.  It was time for Kaz to lay low while Dirtyhands came out to play.  

              First, he found Jesper and gave him the instructions and the letter, telling him that if he read the letter that Kaz would personally rip his eyeballs from his face.  Jesper took the instructions and went to work.  Second, Kaz called a meeting of the Dregs and Mal.  He had a plan and it needed to be put into action immediately.  Finally, he told Nina that after the meeting they needed to have a talk.  Once the Dregs were assembled and Mal had sat down Kaz started.

              “Jesper is already on his way to the Little Palace,” Kaz started.  There was a gasp and Wylan actively gagged on his saliva in surprise, coughing loudly.

              “Why in the hell is he going there?” Mal asked. Kaz threw him a glare.  He was in the middle of his plan and Mal needed to fall in line or it wouldn’t work.

              “He is going because I kicked him out of the resistance, and he is going to tell the Darkling that.  Jesper came back empty handed, a Grisha returned to us without Y/N, what use is a Grisha if he can’t use his powers to protect his comrades?” Kaz asked.  Mal’s mouth fell open, he had been the only one in that room unaware of Jesper’s abilities. “He is going to go to the Little Palace and tell them everything he knows about the resistance, proving his loyalty.  We are going to evacuate and head south, just outside of Os Alta and ready for an attack.”

              “We don’t have those numbers…” Mal started.  Inej shushed him.

              “No, we don’t but by the time we reach Os Alta we will. Matthias is going to go to Frejda and gather the small army from there, and Kuwei will go to Shu Han and tell them what happened to his father,” he said.  “Make sure they know that the Darkling is ready to attack everyone, he’s not only after Ravka, he wants everywhere under his control.”

              “Why would they believe that?  He has been relatively peaceful with them before,” Mal said. Kaz smirked and he could tell that made Mal uncomfortable.

              “Before she was taken Y/N and I were planning an all out war with the Darkling, we drafted counterfeit proclamations of war to the Frejdans and the Shu, which they will be receiving just before Matthias and Kuwei arrive,” he said.  “After we have gathered this army we will attack, in which case I assume that the Darkling will try to use Y/N’s power against us using that collar he created. But we’re going to have its creator in our camp before then and he will tell us how to remove the collar.”

              “How will we get him?” Inej asked.  

              “A good question, you will be getting him out of the Little Palace throw a series of tunnels that Y/N created there while she was serving the Darkling, she drew a map for me,” he said, producing the paper, showing several tunnels that led in and out of the Palace.  “You will have to be more careful than ever before Inej, she didn’t know if the Darkling found these tunnels and sealed them or is guarding them.  Once inside Jesper should have the Fabrikator ready for you.”

              “How will we get the Fabrikator to talk?  If he was willing to betray us once he might lie,” Wylan said, still looking sick that Jesper was walking into the Darkling’s stronghold.  

              “That is for me and Nina to worry about.  Shall we Nina?” Kaz extended his gloved hand to her. She took it with an uneasy sigh and he pulled her out of the tent to explain the final, and most difficult, part of his plan.

[veorlian]

forged of steel

pairing: Kaz Brekker x Inej Ghafa

rating: T for stabbing

A reflection on freedom, unsaid words, and the rooftops of Ketterdam.

read it on ao3 here

Inej

The Barrel had reason enough to be haunted. People from all across Kerch and beyond came to Ketterdam, only to meet an untimely end in either the dark alleys or brightly-lit streets. Dazzling lights and hidden blades were the only constants there. No mourners, no funerals, in the depths of the city. Ghosts were a dime a dozen. But only one had a title.

The Wraith, they called her. Never above a whisper. It was said she carried a hundred knives. A thousand knives. That she could walk through walls. That she’d killed a man at 100 paces, only by looking at him. That she could steal the secrets from inside your own head.

Inej’s father had told her once that many boys would bring her flowers, but the right boy would learn her favourite flower, her favourite song. Inej had been given flowers before. Flowers withered. Their scent turned cloying, their colours faded. You learned, in the Menagerie, that even your favourite flowers could be ruined.

Kaz Brekker had given her a knife. Flowers withered, but the sharp bite of steel was evergreen.

They will fear you, he’d said to her. Good, she’d replied.

Her knives were wicked-sharp and unyielding. Like him. Like her, now.

Everyone knew that the rooftops of Ketterdam were hers and hers alone. No one dared climb there, lest the Wraith find them. The wind against her face and the red and gold reflection of the setting sun on the harbour tasted like freedom.

And if occasionally she wished for flowers carried in a gloved hand, as she lay unsleeping and alone in her room, that was a secret she could keep.

Kaz

Kaz Brekker was not a patient man by nature, but it was the only way to survive. You waited for your enemy to show their hand. You waited for your mark to come to you. You waited for years until your vengeance burned like ice. Little by little, brick by brick, Kaz had learned patience.

He wasn’t patient now, as he waited for Inej to arrive. His fingers drummed along the table, waiting for the slight change in the air that meant she was near. A weakness, he thought, to be so unnerved. She could take care of herself. He couldn’t stop himself from looking at the clock.

He pointedly ignored his slight sigh of relief when she appeared next to him. Not too close. Never too close.

“And?” he asked brusquely.

“Hello to you too, Kaz,” she said. He didn’t smile.

“I don’t pay you for politeness,” he said.

“You couldn’t afford it,” she replied dryly. Soundlessly, she sat down in the chair by the window. One by one, she cleaned her knives. Her Saints, for all the good it did her. “Brahm Daven has a lover. They meet once a week at a run-down inn. The landlady has a loose tongue.”

“Name?”

“The landlady, or the lover?” Her lips quirked up in the ghost of a smile, one that he caught himself almost sharing.

“The lover, Inej,” he said, his voice clipped.

“Sylvia Aseren.”

“Married?”

“To a very wealthy man. They’re planning to elope.”

“So that’s why Daven’s been looking for money. Unlikely that he’ll return any loans, then.” Kaz flipped through the papers on his desk, making tidy annotations. There was an almost imperceptible rustling of fabric as Inej leaned forward. He might’ve missed it, if he wasn’t so damnably attuned to her every move.

“They might pay for silence.”

“And the husband might pay for the information. What else?”

She listed off the sins she’d collected like she was telling him the time of day. Discretions, petty and major crimes, who was bribing who and why. Kaz carefully filed the information away, making a note of potential targets, problems to address, people to rob. And all the while, the gentle click of her knives being set down next to her. It was dangerously close to domestic.

“You were late,” he said, once she’d finished. A flicker of something — annoyance? Embarrassment? Anger? Crossed her face.

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“Someone spilled oil along a stretch of rooftops. Had to take the long way around,” she explained. And then, “They’ll have to try harder if they want to stop me.”

“No one can stop you,” he said quietly, and he looked away from what he saw in her eyes.

Inej

It was just another night in the Barrel. Inej was returning from her evening activities (a little light larceny) when she felt eyes on her back, and heard the clatter of a deliberately loosened roof tile. She was almost at the Slat, firmly in Dregs’ territory. Whoever was out on the rooftops was either a fool or desperate. Maybe both.

She could see Kaz’s room from where she was, the light silhouetting him in the window. He’d left it open for her. He glanced down at his watch and she saw him frown. Ah, she was late again.

Her eyes lingered on Kaz. A mistake.

A knife came arcing towards her, and she neatly dodged away, already turning around to face her attackers. She dodged a second knife, and a third, but she didn’t move away in time for the gunshot to her leg. She offered up a prayer to her Saints, and then she was moving.

There were five men behind her. Fools, then, if they thought that was enough to stop the Wraith.

The first one went down with a blow to the back of his head. The second was knocked clean off his feet, hitting his head on the roof. The third she brought down with a roundhouse kick to the face. In the dim light, she saw fear in the eyes of the other two. One stumbled back, landing squarely on a trap tile. He went careening off of the roof, four stories down. The last one held the gun. It still smoked slightly from the shot to her leg.

“Who do you work for?” she asked, knowing that it would be the first thing Kaz would ask her. Probably before he asked if she was okay, damn him. The man raised his gun, pointing it directly at her. His hands shook. Inej tested her weight on her bad leg. It burned, but it didn’t give out.

The gun cocked. Inej rolled to the side and drew Sankta Lizabeta. She pressed a kiss, a prayer, to the flat of the blade before letting it fly. The man fell, crashing heavily onto the roof. It was over in seconds.

Inej exhaled, pressing a hand to the wound on her leg. The first three were still breathing, although she didn’t envy them the headache they would have in the morning. She went to retrieve her knife, making a note of her attackers’ tattoos.

Inej prayed softly, and she went to see Kaz.

Kaz

Kaz heard the gunshot, but that wasn't unusual. If you couldn't hear a fight in the Barrel, the saying went, you were probably already dead.

Inej appeared a moment later. She landed heavily on the ground and Kaz was immediately on his feet. His eyes flickered down to her leg. Sweat beaded her forehead, flyaway hairs tugged from her neat braid.

"Who was it?" he rasped. There was a flash of humour in her dark eyes.

"Medicine kit please, Kaz," she said, easing herself down into her chair.

"Inej—"

"Medicine. Kit. Please. I'm no good to anyone if I can't climb."

He handed her the kit, carefully avoiding touching her hand as he did. He pulled away, moving over to the open window. His eyes scanned the streets for more threats.

“Three from the Razorgulls, two from the Black Tips,” she said, hissing as she applied a poultice to the wound.

“Dead?”

“Two dead, three unconscious.”

“Only five against you?” he asked. “Careless of them.” He did look down at her, then. A mistake. His voice didn’t shake, but he couldn’t disguise the anger in his eyes. Not from her.

“I have to send a message,” he said roughly.

“I’ll be fine, Kaz. There doesn’t have to be more violence,” she murmured. She wrapped a clean bandage around her leg.

“And when they send more than five?”

“I can handle myself,” she said coolly.

He could see the pain stamped on her face, could hear her uneven breathing as she patched herself back up. And always, always the white-hot anger that he couldn’t help her, couldn’t move any closer.

“No unnecessary risks,” he said. And then, before he could stop himself: “You’re too valuable to lose.”

“I’ll be ready.” Her eyes were darker than the sky. “Trust me.” Kaz looked away.

“Very well,” he said eventually. “Then let’s get to work.”

Inej

The Wraith, they called her. She wrapped the name around herself like a cloak as she vanished into the night. The rooftops of the Barrel shifted, replaced with traps and alarms carefully crafted by Wylan and Jesper. Anyone that dared set foot in Inej’s domain was sent tumbling down. Word spread like wildfire, as it so often does. Kaz made sure that it did.

It was said that she’d bewitched the houses of Ketterdam. That she could hear you coming from a mile off, and appear behind you in the space of a breath. That you would be dead before you saw her.

Soon enough she was able to race along her rooftops uninterrupted again, the moonlight her only witness.

Kaz Brekker would never give her flowers. But perhaps he’d given her something better.