#but i might one day write a companion fic with jesper's pov

[astrhae]

i really enjoyed your latest six of crows fic!! this is probably going to sound so strange, but kaz's brief cameo was so on point that it made me wish for a concurrent fic of the other crows and what they're up to in this au

hi hello!! thank you so much 🥰 and that isn't strange at all! i'm really glad that you liked it down to all the little cameos 💙 i can't promise a concurrent fic but here's a little scene i deleted that has kaz in it (this is when wylan actually first meets kaz, a little bit after jesper reads their marriage contract for them)

"Why the change of mind?" Kaz didn't bother addressing Wylan. "All your letters until a month ago told me you despised your husband."

Jesper swallowed, and cast a guilty glance at Wylan, his fingers drumming nervously on the windowsil they were perched on. "I, uh," he shrugged, smile turning suddenly coy to smother his guilt, "was reminded of some things."

Kaz didn't look remotely impressed. He simply stood in the palace guest rooms they'd prepared for him and Inej, looking both distinctly out of place and perfectly suited to the gilded halls and carpeted floors. "I need to know I can trust your reasons, or I'll be taking my kruge on my walk to the palace vaults."

The only reason he doesn't steal from me, Jesper had told Wylan, is because good standing with the royal family is a better long term investment than a crown jewel.

"I blew someone up for him," Wylan answered before Jesper could, and that made Kaz turn to him, a hunter catching a sniff of prey.

"After I shot a guy for him," Jesper grumbled.

Kaz ran a gloved hand over the corner of a framed oil painting. De Kappel, the matching painting given to Wylan's father as part of his dowry. Stealing Wylan's flute from the mansion had turned out to be proof of concept: that it could be done.

"You didn't tell me your husband had marketable skills," Kaz said.

"I'm not for sale," Wylan frowned.

Jesper snorted at Kaz. "And if he was, you wouldn't be able to pay for him."

"Is that a challenge?" Kaz asked.

"Wylan's a sure bet," Jesper said, "Besides, it was a change of heart too."

What? Wylan didn't catch Kaz's little scowl, or what he muttered next, too busy running his mind over possibilities, turning Jesper's words around in his head. A change of heart -

"I've decided my terms of payment," the snap of Kaz's cane as he walked closer was muffled by the carpet, but it was sharp all the same. "I'd like Wylan as my consultant."

Jesper scrunched his nose. "No."

"Yes," Wylan said. He knew what Kaz had planned was likely illegal. He also knew that Jan Van Eck's accounting books never added up. "I can tell you everything you need."

"Let me rephrase," Kaz said. "I want you as a permanent consultant."

"He's a Prince!" Jesper protested.

Kaz raised a brow. "So are you. It's called career diversification."

Jesper groaned when Wylan laughed. "Wylan's already diversified into a royal mess."

Wylan sniffed. "I melted a table once, and I cleaned up the mess."

He declined to supply that he'd spilled the chemicals because he'd been a little distracted, by Jesper's little laugh, and the spin of the gun that followed.

"Melting tables," Kaz didn't allow himself to be sidetracked, his eyes taking an edge of wildness to them, a stormcloud flashing lightning. "What about melting locks and safes?"

Wylan nodded. "I just need to change the formula a little."

"See?" Kaz smirked. "Marketable skills."

Jesper groaned again, and Wylan wondered what he'd gotten himself into. Marriage, his mind supplied, and then friendship and family, and, as he thought of Kaz burning Van Eck's power to the ground, he thought, just maybe, home.