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booksforevermore13 · 3 years

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Sherry Lips and Crystal Stars (Part I)

Summary: 'So, when they break away, and he looks at her, green to brown, she knows that he's the one. That in the end, he had always been the one.'

Ginny Weasley works on a strict owe-to-owe basis, but it's one person she can never fully repay. And she's always running from him. Always. Until Kaz Brekker needs her to recruit him for a highly coveted kidnapping.

A/N: This becomes one of the first MCs I have ever written, and this was, at first, meant to be a one-shot (note the word meant), but I evidently let myself get carried away.

Therefore, this extremely obscure Shadow and Bone (the show) AU is the result of the Harry and Ginny Discord's Birthday Challenge 2021! It's basically set in the Crows' part of the show (to all those who know what I'm talking about), but to all those who have no knowledge of it, you don't need to. In fact, you absolutely don't need to familiar with the show or the books, to understand it, and I would be honoured if you decide to give this a read, and, in the end, or whenever you want, leave a review :D.

Above all, I hope you enjoy, because I loved, loved writing this!

Read it on Fanfiction or AO3 if you prefer!

PART I

"I know what a million kruge means to me. What does it mean to you?" he asks, but she knows it's directed at her. He knows that she's the one most hesitant. That she's the one who needs it more than anyone here. Maybe even him.

"Freedom," she answers and she doesn't hesitate. She can't let him see her doing so. But she doesn't lie.

Weirdly, when he looks away, she can't tear her eyes away from him but after, when he finally glances at her, the briefest of briefest glances, she looks away first.

She doesn't know why.

"Fun," Jesper chuckles. "Like, at least a few months."

Why and how, they govern her life. Most of the time, she couldn't begin to explain why. That's what differs her from everyone here. The weight of anonymity lies heavy on her, not them.

So when it's Arken's turn and he doesn't miss a beat, she doesn't question why. "Retirement," he states simply, and her eyes can't help but stray to the scars peeking out from under his sleeve.

They're trivial needs, for her (for them?) and for a second, she wishes she had them too.

"Right, so we press on."

Her eyes are set on not looking at him, but when he walks past her, the opposite side of where they should have been heading, that's when she looks up.

"Where are you going?"

He doesn't answer her.

"Jesper, go with Arken," and he limps over to where the two of them are standing, handing Jesper a stash of kruge.

"Inej, come."

His boots strike the gravel, but they don't make a sound. Inej follows.

"Where are we going?"

"I don't trust him," he says, when they've turned a corner. "Arken."

"And you're still letting him take us across the Fold?" She's never understood him. One minute, she feels she's known him forever, the next, he's the boy she knew as the Bastard of the Barrel. She's always trusted him while he was both.

"He's a means to the end."

"To the end?"

When she looks around, she doesn't know where they are, where he's taking her, and even though she knows he'll never take her anywhere dangerous, at least, not without telling her, her hands are by her knives, ready for the slightest sign of trouble.

"A way out."

Kaz turns around, and as Inej follows, she sees a girl by the shadows - but the girl isn't hiding. If she'd seen her in a crowd, she'd have remembered her.

But she hadn't.

ii.

"Brekker."

"Ginevra." Ginny holds back a smile. It's been a year, but she's glad he still knows what to call her.

For a second, she does consider smiling, something she had always felt free to do around him, before he'd become Dirtyhands, before he'd become the leader of the Dregs, and after; but she doesn't. For once, Kaz is not by himself.

This time, he's with a girl. The Wraith, as he'd told her when they'd met last. And Wraith she might be, but Ginny didn't know her.

"Something tells me you need me for something."

She lets her weight fall against the wall, but she doesn't look at Kaz. Instead, she looks at the girl, who stands unflinchingly beside him, unnatural, because something about the way she was standing tells her that this girl trusts Kaz the same way she does. Maybe even more.

Ginny isn't surprised though, seeing the three daggers lodged against her waist, and one peeking out from under her sleeve, two more under her belt, but it's her hand on her knife that catches her eye. It's sickening to see, but she's glad there's someone else other than her and him who's as paranoid as them.

So she smirks, and takes her weight off the wall. "Tell your friend to ease up," she announces loudly and there's a twinge of sick satisfaction as she sees the girl's face mold into slight surprise. She hides it well.

Ginny's heard of the Wraith, never seen her before.

Kaz nods, glancing at the girl, and Ginny's eyes flicker as something unheard passes between them.

She's never seen Kaz do that before.

But when he looks at her again, she forces her face back into a line, and into a smirk.

"What? What is it you want?"

"A favour."

She scoffs, stepping forward slightly. "I don't do favours," she says, "nor do you."

"Consider this an investment."

He needs her, she realises. Needs her bad. Needs her fast.

Part of her wants to say no, all of her wants to say no. But she owes him, even though he doesn't know that. She hasn't bothered to tell him all these years, and she is no mind to do so now, but it's that part of her that worries her, the part that makes sure she doesn't have any red on her ledger, that she doesn't owe anyone anything.

The other part of her knows she'll probably regret this, but this was a chance, she figured. Kaz worked on 'owe-and-give', so did she, and this was a chance to wipe her name off his chart.

So it's that part of her which makes her say yes.

And when she does, it takes everything in her to not snap Brekker's neck for that glint in his eye. He'd known she wouldn't refuse. Known her too well. He smirks, then turns to the girl, says something she misses.

The girl hesitates but nods, and part of her wonders how she had trusted him so readily. So easily. It had taken her years to place that sort of confidence in him, years for him to reciprocate.

There were few who trusted Kaz Brekker; she'd learned too quickly. Fewer he trusted.

She follows the girl's steps, watches as she scales the wall and disappears over it. She has an elegance to her Ginny'd never achieved before, never begun to understand. But then, that had been the very reason he'd named her the Wraith. And rightly so.

"So," she begins, well after the girl has left, "last time we met, her name was Inej. What's it now?"

"Still Inej," Kaz curtly replies, and there is defiance in his eyes, and something she can't quite put her finger on. "She's not that type of girl."

He's protective over her.

It is nearly endearing to watch.

"What is her type then?" she mocks, enjoying the way he tries not to react. She's the only one who can press his buttons like that. She takes pride in it.

Kaz doesn't answer (she hadn't expected him to), merely raising a distasteful eyebrow, and Ginny shakes her head, still laughing, but it's mere seconds later she sobers down.

"Out with it then," she says. "You wouldn't have come to me if you weren't in a spot of trouble."

"I need you to find him."

"No."

There. There it was. The bomb. The explosive. And that's all she needs to say. All she's thinking. She has a lot she owes Kaz Brekker for, but she isn't going to do this. She isn't going to find him.

When she had said yes to their agreement, she'd thought he'd want her to steal something, kill someone (with all due respect). She was his hitman, woman, and he'd never told her to take an innocent life. Not once. And it was rarely the other.

"No," she says again, and her anger flares up at the dismissive look he still has on his face. "Brekker," she says quietly, "you can go find someone else to do your work for you. I want out if that is what it takes."

"What if I say I have something you'd want?" His voice is quiet, and if she wasn't quite so close to him, she'd have missed it.

"I'd say no."

"You," Kaz smirks, "owe him."

Ginny stills.

"What if I say I have something you could use to clear your debt?"

He'd trapped her. And she'd let him.

"I….." she falters. "It depends. On what you have."

"A location."

Her eyes widen, her breath stills. She knew there were few things he couldn't do. She thought this was one of them.

But a location is what she'd needed. What she has needed all along.

Ginny turns away from him, and slips her hand in her pocket, holding the medallion tight. It had remained her one lead on the man who'd killed her family, the one who'd ruined her life. It had remained her one chance.

This was another. But for this, she'd need him. He was the only one powerful enough.

"How long do you have?" she asks, and she turns around to see Kaz's face change. She smirks.

iii.

She knows where he is. While he'd always had the upper-hand, Kaz had been wrong. Ginny wouldn't have to find him. She's always known. All along.

She owed him. She never let a man she owed out of her sight.

"How long will it take?" Kaz asks, but she only glares at him in answer.

"As long as he needs."

Inej looks at her, then at him. Ginny isn't surprised to see that she no longer had the ice in her eyes, the contempt she regarded her with before. Now the ice had been replaced with fire, and that was almost comforting. The latter was easier to play with, easier to face.

Whatever Kaz had told her, it had clearly been enough to make her hate Ginny a bit less. She'd have to change that.

Ginny glares at him again and in a flash of fury, her hands reach for the knife she'd seen Inej holding earlier that day, snapping it out of her holster, fitting it in under her own belt. It's petty, but petty's what she wants at the moment.

And though Inej moves quickly, Ginny's no less, tripping her up, hoping she'd fall. She doesn't, much as Ginny had expected, and when she looks at her again, the girl's face is contorted in rage, twin daggers clasped in each of her hands.

"Now, now, don't want us to be hasty, do we?" she says, and she's glad her voice is coming out so flippant, so dismissive.

Ginny doesn't flinch as a dagger lodges by her head, against the wall, nicking her ear. A drop of blood trickles down, and part of her is satisfied that she'd been able to get a rise out of the girl.

Blood for blood.

"I'll return this when I come back," she says, twirling the knife in her hand. "If."

"You will give it here. Now."

She wonders why the knife held such value to her. It wasn't flashy enough to bring a good sum in the market, nor was it old enough to be a family trinket. Her thumb runs down its hilt, pausing when it comes by carved letters on its underside.

"Sankta Marya," she reads off the metal. Saint Marya. When she glances up at her again, she's slightly taken aback by the unease clouding her eyes. Behind her, stands Kaz.

Ginny moves quickly then, moving down the alley, under the tunnel, to its end. She'd never meant her thievery, petty as it was, to be of such adversity. She wasn't interested in messing with Brekker's girl. The Wraith.

"I'll be sure to bring her back to you," she calls back as she rounds the corner. Her words hold little value - after all, they are just words.

On second thought, she realizes she doesn't care.

"Or not."

Ginny doesn't miss the clink of the dagger against the wall she'd been standing in front of, a mere second ago.

She can't help but grin.

iv.

They call her the Rogue.

Ginny never wanted to be her.

It's amazing how fast the world can go from bad to total shit storm but there she is, standing in front of the building she knew he'd be in.

But then he's always there. Weighing heavily in her mind. That's perhaps why she wants him off her charts, why she needs to get rid of him in her life.

She doesn't take the entrance. She walks by the walls, her right hand on the rough bricks, feeling them scratch against her palms, sensing the parts where the cement had fallen prey to wreckage. When she finds her place, she wills the bricks there to move, the atoms to rearrange, the molecules to shift. And when they do, she's left with a hole in the wall, big enough for her to get in and get out. She's chosen a spot not travelled much, but even so, as she steps into a room she can only assume as the basement, she wills the bricks back in place.

Ginny's out of the door in a flash, the lockpicker safely back under her belt. She walks down the corridors, up the steps. Her back is to the main entrance as she makes her way to the stairs, and she's thankful she's dyed her hair black, for no one looks twice at her.

When she reaches the top level of the building, his office, or at least, what they call it, it's not hard to find. It's in the corner, and while all the other rooms are flocking with people, his is barren. Empty.

But she knows he's in there.

And she's right, for when she reaches the end, she sees him through the glass, his back towards her and his face towards the window.

Her heart skips a beat, seeing his eyes on the glass, their reflection. She hates that a mere glimpse of him can twist her heart like that, but she doesn't know if it's the familiarity or just the sight of him that unnerves her.

Ginny slips in, not making a sound, and wills the glass to change. She can't afford to let people see them together.

She knows he's aware of her there but when he turns around, she doesn't look at him, for she looks only at the glass, and not him, never him, but he's watching, and she's waiting until the glass is fully opaque. Avoiding him.

"Gin."

Ginny gasps sharply, for it's her name. It's her name, the name he calls her with, and it's the name that's completely and entirely belonged to her. It's different hearing his voice say that name, and it's painfully jarring, reminding, and she hates it.

"Don't call me that."

It's then she looks at him, his green eyes, nothing but reminiscent of what she once had been. They remind her of the sea on a cloudy day, where it reveals little blue, just the green shining through its depths.

He isn't surprised, but his eyes hold emotion she could never begin to understand.

"What should I call you then?"

"Not what you used to." Her words are sharp, inflicting, but she wants it that way.

He nods, but the look in his eyes has changed.

Ginny holds out the medallion, the family crest. The metal is cold against her fingers, a cold that holds the promise of misery. She wishes to be done with it quickly. "Malfoy Manor," she says, but he makes no move to take it from him.

He shakes his head, and she knows he doesn't understand.

"It's where the Mercher is," she explains. "It's where Riddle is."

Information. A location. It's half the job done.

But it doesn't feel any different, none that freeing, and even though logic states that she has, in a way done the job for him, found his guy for him and no longer owes him anything more, it still feels as if she's trapped. Held back. Suffocating.

She doesn't feel any relief.

"How?" he wonders, and when he gently takes the medallion from her, she makes sure their fingers don't touch. "How did you find this?"

"I think the question here should be why I gave you this."

He looks at her then, and there's an unfocused look in his eyes, and she knows he's already there, at the Manor, plotting his play. But then they come back to her, and he looks at her with a longing she'd once been glad to see, but now, it's positively jarring.

She stares back at them, and she knows there's a thousand ways she can answer her question.

But only one she can say.

"This is not a favour," she says, "this is payment. For what I need from you."

And for what you did.

"What do you need me for?"

"Brekker."

"What does…" He stops midway, for he knows he's not getting an answer. Instead, his eyes change, and Ginny feels it's a game, set by him, solved by her, the mystery held in his eyes. Hers are blank, unexpressive, how she'd always wanted them to be. Lately, she'd been regretting it. But his? His, she couldn't begin to explain.

"I have to go," he says, "and I have to finish this."

She struggles to keep her smile in. For everything she owed him, she's always admired how selfless he was. After everything, it just meant she hadn't been wrong about him.

"I know," she breathes in, looking at him. "I know, Harry."

For some reason, she can't bring herself to call him Potter.

#fanfiction #hinny fanfiction #harry/ginny #romance #crime #angst #fluff #Sherry Lips and Crystal Stars #Shadow and Bone AU #Heartrender Harry Potter #Materialki Ginny Weasley #POV Ginny Weasley #Slight divergence from canon #in terms of power #written for the H/G discord's birthday challenge

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anonniemousefics · 4 years

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My Dearest Inej | Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Masterlist

Originally posted on AO3

Rating: Teen And Up

Synopsis: A series of letters kept among the personal belongings of Captain Inej Ghafa. (The one where I had to cheat a little - these are not all letters, per se. But it still fun, I think!)

Chapter Nineteen: The Ketterdam Daily Ledger

LANKSROON BAKERY ORDER FORM

Customer Information

Name: K. Brekker

Delivery Address: Fifth Harbor

Rush Processing: Yes

Payment Method: Cash plus rush deposit, paid in advance

Order Specifications:

Five layer chocolate cake with chocolate ganache, raspberry drizzle, fresh raspberries

Two dozen sugared waffles with apple syrup

Special Instructions:

Just don’t fuck it up.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

(in a package containing a folded up newspaper)

Look! We’re headline news. My father will be so pleased…to never read this, ever. Seriously, I will murder anyone who sends this to him. I’m a little tempted to buy up every copy, but Wylan’s keeping the cheque book under lock and key.

In any case, here it is, in all its glory. Your wanted sketch is so mysterious and glamorous! They got Wylan’s all wrong, and he’s quite put out about it. See if Brekker wants one framed for The Slat. I have plenty of extras.

The dust is settling here. Life is slowly resuming a bit of normalcy now that the Dregs have returned to The Slat. Anika’s at the reins for the interim, and there’s been very little activity from Stadhall. No inquiry whatsoever. I can’t shake the feeling Kaz has something to do with that. Ask him for me?

- Jesper

P.S. – Ambroos is waiting at the window again. He does it every afternoon around lunch time. Let Kaz know.

THE KETTERDAM DAILY LEDGER

Stadhall In Shambles

Explosion at the Stadwatch’s central headquarters releases dozens of alleged criminals back into Ketterdam’s streets; Foul play suspected, officials report

By A. Van Poel

Stadwatch officers are investigating the cause of a massive explosion that occurred last night in the northern sector of Stadhall in Ketterdam, as well as varying reports of what led up to the event. Citizens of Ketterdam are advised to remain vigilant after dozens of detainees who were awaiting trial are now on the loose following the eruption that tore away wide sections of Stadhall’s northern wall.

According to sources within Stadhall, investigators have set their sights on tracking down accomplices of a privateer known only as The Wraith, who is said to have connections to criminal networks in East Stave.

The Wraith was one of the dozens of detainees who escaped last night, and is described by officers as of a young female of Suli descent, slight of stature and build.

“Don’t let her fool you,” said Stadwatch Chief Inspector Hoedemann, in a statement to The Ketterdam Daily Ledger. “The Wraith is a serious threat and should be considered armed and dangerous. Anyone with information as to her whereabouts should report the tip directly to Stadhall. And absolutely no one should attempt to engage her or her associates without the assistance of law enforcement.”

Rumors swirled last night as multiple sources speculated on sightings of a rogue Grisha Corporalki and possibly a Materialki working in connection with The Wraith, but as of this morning, these rumors had not been confirmed. Speculation on what this could imply regarding Ravka’s involvement in the explosion also remained unconfirmed.

In a statement released by Stadwatch Chief Inspector Hoedemann, the events last night began after a Zemeni man dressed as a Stadwatch guard led in three detainees he was said to have arrested. It was later discovered that the arrest warrants as well as the man’s identification had been forged. Chief Inspector Hoedemann released the following sketches to The Ketterdam Daily Ledger of the man and his cohorts, who are believed to have been assistants of The Wraith.

(in Kaz’s handwriting in the margin: “Assistants”?!?! Inej has drawn a devilish little smiley face.)

In the timeline of events shared by Chief Inspector Hoedemann, the four – three male and one female – are alleged to have walked the length of the Stadwatch detainment cells as this time, as many sources reported multiple sightings around the same time in the evening.

“It is my belief,” said Chief Inspector Hoedemann, “that it was during this period of time that the suspects were discovering the whereabouts of The Wraith’s detainment and possibly other associates of The Wraith that were to be freed in last night’s operation.”

Chief Inspector Hoedemann also reported that the four seemed to have knowledge of the inner workings of Stadwatch personnel and patrolling, as, according to the timeline, they appear to have waited until a particular guard shift change to put their plan into motion. This raised many questions among reporters as to a possible inside connection to Stadwatch officers themselves; however, Chief Inspector Hoedemann emphatically denied these rumors.

“Each one of my officers holds themselves to the highest standard of integrity that the good people of Ketterdam have come to expect of their lawmen,” Chief Inspector Hoedemann said.

Multiple Stadwatch officers who were on duty that night reported that they recognized the female in the group, the suspected Grisha Corporalki, but none would go on record about neither her identity nor how they might have known her.

“I will just say she’s a wiley one,” said one officer, who spoke to reporters with the promise of anonymity, “and leave it at that. She’s like no other Grisha I’ve ever seen.”

The suspected Ravkan Corporalki, described as tall and alluring, is suspected to have distracted the Stadwatch patrolmen while her associates met The Wraith at her detainment cell.

Other eye-witnesses are not as convinced that The Wraith was working in connection with these suspects as Chief Inspector Hoedemann would have the public believe. One Stadwatch officer, who asked only to be known as Officer B., was reported to be down the hall from where the suspects were releasing The Wraith. It is suspected they used a Materialki, as no keys were found missing and no damage had been done to the lock.

“I think they were kidnapping her,” Officer B. speculated. “Maybe revenge or something. From what I could see, it looked like The Wraith was trying to wrestle one of them, the tall one with the funny haircut. At one point, she had him pinned against the far wall, but I guess he won out in the end.”

It is one of multiple opinions about the nature of the relationship between The Wraith and the mysterious four who helped her escape.

“That wasn’t wrestling,” said another eyewitness who wished to remain anonymous. “They were obviously lovers. She was snogging his face the minute they let her out. I think he was an art thief or something. It sounded like she was asking about the art, and he was telling her she could do whatever she wanted with it. He must’ve stolen something for her.”

“Kind of romantic,” he added, “if you’re willing to overlook the illegal nature of it and the complete lack of conscience.”

Chief Inspector Hoedemann would not comment on the nature of the relationship of the two suspects, only that it was clear that all five were familiar with each other on some level.

“We are interested in protecting the public from some very dangerous criminals, not spreading folk lore and entertaining the public,” he told reporters.

Hoedemann has reason to want to wrap the case up quickly and air-tight, as he is running for election to the Merchant Council this year. His handling of the attack on Stadhall is seen by many as a make-or-break moment in his campaign. Many of his would-be constituents are already scratching their heads at how so many of his officers could have been witness to the events and yet were powerless to stop it or apprehend the suspects in the wake of the explosion.

According to reports obtained from Stadhall by The Ketterdam Daily Ledger, at least twelve different Stadwatch guards reported being stopped by the alleged Corporalki or were within range of The Wraith at the time of her escape. Chief Inspector Hoedemann confirmed that there was a significant confrontation that occurred between his officers and the five suspects in the hallways just outside of the detainment cells, but did not report if anyone had been injured during the skirmish.

“By my count, at least a dozen shots were fired off,” Officer B. told reporters. “But the Materialki could stop them all. And the Corporalki…could do something that terrified us all. The lights…the air…it felt like we were being suffocated by dead hands.”

Most eye-witnesses have refused to comment on the nature of the Corporalki’s small science, only that it frightened them, causing several to turn and run.

“We thought at first that we’d had them surrounded - outnumbered two to one,” said Officer B. “But it didn’t matter.”

One thing all reports have agreed on: the smallest of the suspects, a male, was the one to carry in the explosive. And when it seemed as though they were cornered, he used it – but not before the suspected Materialki had loosened all the locks on the detainment cells.

“One moment, it seemed like we could turn the tide,” said an anonymous witness, “and then in the next, a whole wall was blowing out. And there was mayhem all down the hall – all the cell doors were rattling open in the debris. Everyone was running for the hole, into the night.”

The explosion took down all internal communications within Stadhall for hours, and amidst whatever small science the Ravkan Corporalki was using, only a handful of Stadwatch guards managed to follow the escapees into the debris.

None, however, returned.

“We want to assure everyone that this was not a random act,” said Chief Inspector Hoedemann in his statement. “This was an organized, prepared attack for the sole purpose of freeing The Wraith, and, for the majority of Ketterdam, as long as you are not an associate of these people, you are as safe as you have always been within our city limits. The structural damage to our headquarters in no way hinders our ability to carry out our duties to the people of Ketterdam, and I can give every assurance that all is reparable and will be put right long before election day.”

As for any current leads about The Wraith’s whereabouts today, investigators have had nothing to show. But Officer B. put it best.

“She’s a pirate,” he said. “She could be anywhere in the world by now.”

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Dear Mr. Brekker,

This is to send my gratitude for your very generous campaign donation. I am interested in hearing your terms in regards to becoming a regular contributor to our cause and would be happy to discuss it further either in person or in continued correspondence.

I thank you for your continued patronage and support of the Merchant Council.

With gratitude,

Chief Inspector Hoedemann

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

My dearest, loveliest Inej (for you are mine, after all, no matter what Brekker insists),

We did not have anywhere near enough time to celebrate and catch up in the aftermath of this whirlwind adventure, so I’m writing this down. In my haste to come to your aid, I left all the letters I’ve been writing you in Fjerda, so one of these days, you’re going to get a massive envelope, but in the meantime, you’ll have this for now.

Saints, it was so good to see all of your faces again, but especially yours. This was somehow not at all and exactly the proper reunion we all needed, and not just because of the monstrous mountain of cake that I still can’t believe Brekker had delivered to the harbor in the midst of a goddamn getaway. What have you done to him? Or has kruge actually fulfilled his cold, empty heart after all? (I would like to reiterate that it may have been the best cake I've ever eaten, but don't let it go to his head.)

I tease, love – there was a time when I would not have wished love on either of you, but you’re here now, and I cannot imagine it any other way. The sea suits you, and he suits you, and you suit him, and if I could somehow alchemize the feeling of seeing you happy into a flavor of waffle, I’d be the richest woman in Ketterdam. Brekker, too. You can even tell him I said so.

So, while I’m sad to leave you again for a little while, know that I’m cherishing these moments and they will sustain me for months. Change can happen so slowly sometimes, it can feel as if it will never happen at all. But seeing you this time – you and your mad, sloppy prison-kissing and your chocolate-cake-filled face – and how your brilliance feeds and fuels the people around you, the people who love you, I feel I’ve caught a glimpse of the other side. Even people like Brekker can be happy. Even people like me.

You slurp up every moment of goodness in your getaway. You are not a criminal slinking away into the night. You are a mastermind seizing her bit of the world.

Until we are together again, love,

Nina

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Dearest Jesper,

Kaz is annoyed that the paper called his haircut funny, and he’s not thrilled at all at the prospect of having that framed. But don’t throw them all out yet. Maybe he’ll change his tune by the time we get back to Ketterdam.

From the bottom of my heart, thank you. Jesper, I don’t know what I would have done without you, and that goes equally for Wylan. Kaz would be dead, and I probably would be, too. You held us all together like the valiant and steadfast true friend you have always been. Kaz agrees – begrudgingly and in far fewer words, but he agrees.

Kiss Wylan and Ambroos for us. Well, fine, for me. Kaz just made a face, but I know, deep down, he wants to make sure Ambroos is patted and kissed, too.

We’ve a long journey ahead of us to Leflin, and I’m not sure yet how long we will be in Novyi Zem. A couple months, I think, if I can have my way, and I think I can. We’ll have a more celebratory reunion when we return than this last one, I promise.

With all our love,

Inej and Kaz

(in Kaz’s handwriting)

P.S. – Dogs respond to body language and consistency. Try not to ruin him while I’m gone.

#six of crows #soc #crooked kingdom #grishaverse #leigh bardugo #kaz brekker #inej ghafa #nina zenik #jesper fahey #wylan van eck #ketterdam #kanej #kanej fanfic #fanfic #kaz x inej #kaz brekker x inej ghafa #fanfiction

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carelessgraces · 3 years

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@clpdwings said: five times of comparing matthias to the ice and one time he wasn't. ( five times | accepting )

one.

They stand with their backs to the door, Astoria’s shirt cast aside, her hair gathered over her left shoulder. Tidemaker and Heartrender stand together, and Nina’s hands glide across her companion’s tattooed skin — red lilies in bloom, beginning at her right shoulder and cascading over her back, the petals of the bottommost lily dipping just below the waistband of her skirt. It’s the sole burst of color on her skin — the other tattoos entirely black ink — and Nina marvels audibly.

“Must have hurt,” she hums, and Astoria laughs.

“Especially over my spine.”

“Why’d you get it?”

“To own my own body again. Nineteen years in Fjerda made it everything besides a body — weapon of war, tool of destruction, vessel of sin. Now, it’s a work of art.” Astoria looks fondly at the ink that curls tenderly over her shoulder, but there’s some sorrow in her eyes. “I hate to cover it, but the more attention we can avoid in the Ice Court, the better. And I figured, better to start sooner than later with this. Your hands will be full with all my hair.”

Nina laughs, that beautiful belly-laugh that warms Astoria to her core despite the chill in the air. “Thank you for that. Could we cut it, maybe?”

Astoria looks at the hair in question, deep red curls that fall to her elbows; she certainly has enough to send Matthias back with a belt made from her braided hair, and unbidden comes the image of Matthias binding her hands with her own cut hair. She clears her throat, lets out a little laugh that sounds rattling and dry in her throat, and she says, tentatively, “You’ll be tailoring Matthias too?”

“Mm. Black hair, I think. Brown eyes. He’s so tall, and he’ll draw attention whether or not we want him to, but those eyes have to go. They’re too — ”

Remarkable, Astoria thinks despite herself, and she nods at whatever Nina says. Poor Nina is exhausted — between caring for Inej and the discomfort of being on a ship again, it’s been a great deal to carry, and she chatters comfortably as she starts at Astoria’s shoulder and begins the work. Her eyes are trained on Astoria’s tattoos as she talks, filling Astoria in on gossip from the White Rose, while Astoria listens, a small smile on her face, her eyes flickering across the reflection of her face.

They’ll have to change her, too. Her hair will become brown, not unlike Nina’s, and her eyes will darken to a deep blue. She sees the movement in the mirror before she hears it, and poor Nina, tired and distracted, doesn’t hear the arrival of a new heartbeat — but Astoria stops to listen for the sound of water, and she hears it as it picks up and beats an erratic rhythm.

She sees him in the mirror, too, his eyes widening at the sight of her half-undressed, the pale skin of her back against the deep deep red of the lilies, and she feels something shift in her.

Astoria knows what she looks like, for all her jokes about her hair as the great draw. She knows that she has a graceful neck that begs to be marked, that the curve of her neck into her shoulders is like poetry. Elzinger used to tease that he could compose sonnets about the line of her spine along her bare back, which is now marked, beyond the tattoos, only by a puckered pink scar from the very same man’s knife. She can’t quite see where Matthias’ eyes are, only that they’re moving over her bare skin as if he’s in a daze.

For all her respect for his vow, she finds she wants to be watched. Astoria likes the thought of him looking at her, and so she keeps her eyes fixed on his reflection and she hooks the thumb of her left hand under the waistband of her skirt. Still watching him, she pulls it down enough to expose the last of the lilies, and at her left side, she pulls it down farther, exposing the second tattoo in its entirety.

She listens for the sound of his breath catching, but either Nina is speaking too loudly, or Matthias is all Fjerdan ice. His eyes move to the newly exposed skin before dragging up to her shoulder, along her hair, her eyes on his in the mirror.

Astoria smiles, then, and she rolls her lower lip between her teeth and bites down before releasing it again.

For his part, Matthias, his expression inscrutible, simply takes a step back and out of the room, closing the door silently behind him. Ice, she decides, a little disappointed, but what had she been hoping for? For him to leap across the room and crawl under her skirt?

Nina continues speaking beside her, unaware of their visit, and Astoria says nothing until she’s finished. When she dresses again and goes to leave, she finds Matthias on the other side of the door — had he stayed? Had he left and returned? — and when he sees her, he simply nods before stepping into the room. He won’t meet her eyes.

two.

She is ashamed to admit to any weakness, but especially now, and especially with him. The house beside them is unremarkable, painted a deep emerald green that looks almost blue when the sky is overcast; about a foot from the street, on the front wall, there is a smudge that came from a little hand and a great deal of mud that baked against the wall under the summer sun.

Veronika had laughed when she’d seen it, and had pressed a kiss to the top of Astoria’s hair and told her that now the house was theirs forever, and that this would always be home. She catches sight of that smudge and she feels the wind knocked out of her.

And the worst of it is that there’s no one else to turn to but him, a drüskelle desperate to don his cloak once more. Nina and Inej and Jesper and Wylan know next to nothing about her childhood, certainly not the street where she grew up, or the little gap between the stones in the street where her foot got caught every spring between the ages of six and fourteen. Her left ankle is still perpetually a little tender as a result of the annual twists. They don’t know that this is where her first love begged her to marry him and where she’d turned him down, because she couldn’t tell him the truth and she wouldn’t have that hanging over them. They don’t know that this is where she told her closest friend, the boy across the street, that she could make the water dance at her fingertips, or that this is where she saw the white of her own bone piercing through her skin and the deep red of her mother’s blood spattered across the floor before her vision went black, black, black.

Kaz knows most of this. And were Kaz anyone else she would turn to him for comfort, but Kaz is himself, is Dirtyhands, is the Bastard of the Barrel. Kaz won’t hold her hand and stroke her hair and comfort her weariness, nor will he look kindly on the way she’s struggling to breathe if she calls his name. The others are huddled together, speaking in hushed tones, and only Matthias walks near her.

She doesn’t think — she reaches for him, clutching the sleeve of his shirt almost desperately. He looks down at her, his eyes the wrong color but still a strange comfort all the same, and then his eyes follow hers to the house, and she sees the recognition in his face.

Matthias doesn’t say a word; instead, he shakes her free from his sleeve and winds his arm around her shoulders, knowing that if she is left to her own devices the urge to walk through that front door and look for any trace of herself, of her mother, of the life that they lived there, will be too strong to resist. His grip is strong and sustained, his hand curled around her upper arm just tightly enough to steer her. There is something so comforting about him like this, when he embodies home — solid as the ice, reliable as the snow in the winter.

In these moments she thinks she can understand how Nina fell in love with him a year before, and Astoria wonders, not for the first time, if she is in entirely over her head.

When they pass the house he releases her; she puts a step of distance between them, but not before murmuring a quiet thank you. She fixes her eyes on Jesper’s back, a few feet in front of them, and she doesn’t see the way he flexes his hand, gaze flickering to his fingers, then, all too quickly, to her face.

When she turns to look at him again, he’s staring straight ahead, and she tells herself that she doesn’t feel the disappointment settling in her stomach like a stone in the water.

three.

If she could apologize to him now, she would, but they must play their parts if they are to survive. Beside her, Kaz has her blood on his cane, and for the first time since they boarded the Ferolind she trusts him to do what’s right, not just for the Crows but for her.

( It means that he’ll leave her there. It means that he’ll do as she asked and do his best to prevent Matthias from following. This is her share of the take: keep him safe, do not let him throw himself headfirst into danger for her sake, do not compromise his well-being for her own. She casts a look over her shoulder at Kaz, who doesn’t say a word, but he offers the barest hint of a nod. The deal is the deal. He will trade her life for theirs, and he won’t look back, and if they’re lucky and Matthias is the man she feared, the man she hopes, he’ll leave her there, too. )

Astoria wears an expression of rage and defiance, blood drying around her mouth and under her nose, three of her fingers crooked and swelling, her hands bound behind her. Matthias’ hand is curled around her elbow and he guides her forward more gently than is necessary, and she wants to tell him to push her, to make her stumble, to insult her and shove her and make it look real.

More than that she wants to press close to him and let him taste her blood in her mouth and tell him that if they had more time, if they just had more time, she would have spent it with him. She will be the next in a line of women to leave him, and if she’s very lucky, he’ll forget her in a short while; she can be a memory for him to share with his good Fjerdan wife and his good Fjerdan children, the drüsje who heard songs in the water and thought the melody of his blood was the sweetest she’d heard, the witch audacious enough to spend her last thoughts on the shape of his mouth and the gentleness of his eyes and the power of his hands.

Instead, she says nothing, and she won’t turn to look at him, because if she turns to look at him she will weep, and she will beg, and she would rather he remember her like this. When the doors come into their field of vision, she clears her throat, and she feels Matthias’ hand tighten around her elbow.

“I’m sorry,” she says after a beat. “This is going to be unpleasant. But I’ll be fine.”

She is, it will, she won’t. She wants to wrap herself in his arms and close her eyes to the world and forget that this was ever a thought that crossed her mind, but if she doesn’t do this, they may not have the time to finish this, and get out. And she thinks of the others — Jesper’s debts paid and Inej free of her indenture and Wylan’s anger sated and Nina’s penance fulfilled and Kaz’s power grown and Matthias finally, finally coming home.

The doors open. She misses the details of the conversation, and she flinches away from him when he turns his eyes to her. Behind her, Matthias grips her arm even tighter, as if he means to pull her away from there himself — but then the drüskelle speaking to them grabs her and calls for another to help him escort her to a cell, and she screams.

It’s an awful scream, filled with a fear she couldn’t feign if she tried — desperate and primal in its terror, and she is nineteen years old she is eleven years old she is four years old she is crying now, thrashing against their hold, and when she looks back over her shoulder for one last glance at them, Kaz’s shoulders are hunched, just barely, and Matthias is cold, unmoving. Unforgiving as the Fjerdan ice. For a moment she feels real doubt — had he wanted this from the start? Had he craved the sight of her bloodied and thrown to his brothers for whatever bloody retribution they intended to exact?

When they hang her bound hands from a hook in her cell, she closes her eyes and she thinks of her mother, whom she loved, and her father, whom she never knew, and the first boy who said he loved her and asked her to be his wife, and the sight of Matthias’ smile that first night on the Ferolind, laughing at some shared and private joke, looking at her for a moment as though she might not be a monster but a miracle.

four.

The tailoring has been removed now and he looks like Matthias, like her Matthias, just as she looks like his Astoria, with her curls a shade or two darker than the lilies restored to her back. Matthias pays inordinate attention to her hair at times, watching it in wonder as he fists his hand in her curls and marveling at the strands that get caught in his fingers. She’s been doing the same with the color of his eyes, the impossibly distracting shade of ice whenever he looks at her. Even now, she’s distracted by it, as Matthias moves beneath her, one hand grasping desperately at the headboard, the other tight around her side.

Each step has been slow, taken only at Matthias’ guidance; she’d made it clear early on that it was up to him how quickly they moved, that she would respect whatever timetable he set for abandoning the vows of celibacy and abstinence, and he has surprised her less with his timeframe than with his intensity. Every time he touches her he does so with reverence; every inch of her is holy to him, and he makes it clear to her whenever given the opportunity.

The grip of his hands sometimes leaves bruises; he’d been apologetic at first before realizing that she preferred to have a few marks from him, that the purple imprint of her fingers on her sides was intoxicating. His hand falls from the headboard and settles on her hip, guiding her, and after a moment he sits upright and he winds his arms around her and he pulls her close as she rocks against him.

It occurs to her then that she has never been so close to another living soul. There’s something almost euphoric to it — to being seen, held, known. Astoria winds an arm around his back, grips his shoulder with surprising ferocity, as if she means to keep her hold on him indefinitely. ( She does. ) Her other hand slips into his hair, but here her grip is gentle. He has been an apt student, responsive to her suggestions, watching her every move with the dedication of a lifelong scholar, and she wonders if he takes to all new things with such enthusiasm, or if it’s the sort of enthusiasm that only comes with love for the subject.

He kisses her just before she comes and he smiles against her lips when she cries out, and he follows her soon after, his hands tightening at her sides. For a long moment, neither of them move, and Astoria watches him in silence. The blue of his eyes is distracting. Wonderful. Intoxicating. She could stay like this for hours, simply watching him, and be content. There’s a light sheen of sweat across his brow, over his shoulders and chest, and his hair is a mess of tangles from her ministrations.

“You are beautiful like this,” Astoria rasps when she can speak again, her voice hoarse but genuine. Her hands fall and instead she rests them lightly against his neck, and she kisses him slowly, carefully, as though she is afraid to break the spell between them.

Spent, Matthias gingerly lowers himself back to the bed, drawing her down with him. He is everything of home worth preserving — the ice in his eyes and the strength of his hands and the way he sounds like he’s praying when he comes undone. He is beautiful, he is holy, he is pure magic — if there is enchantment to be discovered between them it’s in the way he says her name. Astoria, always, drüsje, when he teases, and mine, mine, mine. Astoria carefully climbs off of him only to curl up against his chest, one of his waiting arms winding around her shoulders the moment she’s settled in. She rests her head over his heart and she listens for the movement of his blood beneath his skin and she hears the song in him the same way she heard it in the water below the ash tree, or in the open sea, or in the snow and ice of their homeland.

“I hear Djel in you,” she says quietly. He is an honorable man and breaking any oath, no matter how little it serves him, is not something done lightly. She knows what it is to leave their old lives behind for something different, something so antithetical to everything they were taught in their youth, and she knows that it troubles him sometimes that there is nowhere to worship here, that the only god anyone prays to besides Ghezen is their own kruge. She feels it, too, though she has become skilled in pretending otherwise. She looks up at him and she says it again. “When I listen to your heartbeat, I can hear Djel singing. You are so beautiful.”

Matthias looks at her for a moment before he rolls her onto her back and hovers over her, propped up on his elbows. “What does it sound like?” he asks quietly.

He’s too far, even just inches away, and Astoria lifts herself up just enough to meet him, to press her mouth tenderly to his. “It sounds like home.”

five.

The shares in the Crow Club come with Kaz’s warning that if she shirks her duties there or with the Dregs, she will regret it, and the caveat that as a shareholder, she will need to work in the club as well. And so she learns to deal, and she spends weeks at it before Kaz lets her take over one of the card tables, until she’s able to trick Jesper and Nina both while Kaz watches her shuffle.

Her costume changes as well — the higher necks she tends to prefer when leaving her room are traded in for something a bit more dramatic and plunging, but only on the nights when she deals. If her slender hands and sweet smile don’t attract attention, then her décolletage certainly will. Matthias laces her into the corsets, littering kisses along her bare neck and shoulder as he does, and he spends the first night she deals sitting at the bar to keep an eye on things. When a patron gets loud and indignant at a loss, he walks behind her and rests a hand on her shoulder, waiting for the patron to settle down, and later, when that same patron tries to corner her to apologize, Matthias watches, eyes narrowed, as she laughs.

“Careful now,” she says, the warning tone clear in her voice. “My husband is a possessive man.”

The patron lets out a drunken laugh and curls a hand around her arm, and then the offending hand is being held in Matthias’, the sound of cracking fingers loud enough to stop conversation at another table as everyone swivels around to watch.

“She was not exaggerating,” he says, releasing the patron, who cradles his injured hand against his chest and scurries toward the door. From across the room, she sees Kaz rolling his eyes at the intervention, though she knows Kaz is less annoyed by losing a handsy customer than he is by the way Astoria presses a kiss to Matthias’ cheek afterward.

( “You’re the one who encouraged me to flirt with him,” Astoria pointed out once, and Kaz had sighed so heavily she thought for a moment he was unwell.

“I regret it everyday. I never would have if I’d guessed you two would be so disgusting in public.” )

It’s the first and last time a patron tries anything similar, but Matthias spends time in the club with her when he can spare it, his fingers brushing along the back of her neck when he walks past. It keeps the patrons thinking she’s honest — too easily distracted to cheat, or catch them cheating — and it makes her smile every time he does it. It’s only once or twice a week, on a trial basis while they keep track of how much she brings in, but there’s a chance it will continue.

The rain that night is cold and heavy, and Astoria shivers a bit as she settles in at the table. Matthias isn’t with her tonight; he’s with Jesper, delivering a message. ( She had kissed Matthias goodbye warmly, and when she’d pulled away, Jesper offered his cheek expectantly and asked, “Where’s mine?” as she laughed. ) They hadn’t told her what they were looking for, and Astoria knew better than to press. Wylan is sitting at the bar, keeping her company, fidgeting with something she can’t identify, and Kaz is in his office.

There are no clocks, no windows, and so she keeps track of time by the drinks served and the men working behind the bar. She nurses her own gin for well over an hour, and it takes some time for her to worry. It’s only a job; they’ve done this a dozen times by now, and rarely, if ever, with incident. ( But there are still things that concern her. The Dregs’ victory does not mean that they are beyond anyone’s reach. )

She worries when Wylan, yawning, takes his leave of her. She worries when Jesper returns and Matthias does not, and when Jesper makes a point to avoid her as he moves through the club. Still, she focuses her attention on the cards, on the players and their clumsy hands and their eager faces. She smiles, and she shuffles, and she deals, and she doesn’t lose her composure even when she sees Kaz standing in a doorway, watching, unmoving.

When her shift ends she approaches him, and the only thing he says is, “There was trouble, and they were split up. We’re not sure where Matthias is.”

She doesn’t bother to change; she only grabs the long leather coat she wears in the rain from where she’d left it in behind the bar and she slips out of the Crow Club without another word, the low heel of her boots clicking, her hands shoved into her pockets and shoulders hunched and her hair dripping wet after only a few moments outside.

She knows every street of the Fifth Harbor inside out and backwards, just like she knows that it’s foolish for her to walk those streets alone, but she carries herself with a confidence she doesn’t quite feel and she cuts through the night as quickly as she can, ignoring the whistles and catcalls from drunken tourists. One falls into step beside her — a university student, she thinks, given his bearing and his obvious wealth — and he grins.

“This is a bad part of town for a pretty face,” he tells her, and the look she gives him is enough for him to stumble back as if pushed.

She’s out less than an hour, but long enough that she’s starting to feel hopeless, when she feels an icy hand brush along the back of her neck. Astoria whirls around, hands raised, only to let out a sigh of relief when she sees him — Matthias, shivering and soaked through, his face white from pain but wearing a smile nonetheless.

“What happened? Where have you been?”

“We were separated. I was injured. Nothing terrible,” he rushes to assure her, seeing her eyes widen, “but with this rain, I need to go slowly.”

She notices now that he’s favoring a leg, and she crouches down for a better look, her skirts soaking as she does. It looks like a break, his ankle bruised and swollen; there are a few scrapes on his hands and his knuckles are split and he’s sporting a nasty bruise on his cheek but otherwise, he looks whole.

She wants to ask who it was to touch him, whether or not any of them are nearby, if he’d mind terribly if she split their skulls open, but she’s too relieved to have him in front of her again to manage any of that. Instead, Astoria stands on her toes; his lips are cold, too, when she reaches them. When she settles back on her heels she takes his icy hands in hers and she warms them, and she moves around to wrap her arm around his waist, pulling his over her shoulders, on his injured side.

“Lean on me,” she says. “Try not to put weight on it. We’ll get you a medik, but first, let’s get you home.”

He shivers against her and she only pulls him closer. They begin their slow walk back to the Slat, the both of them soaked through and freezing when they arrive.

He falls asleep with his nose buried in her hair and his arm around her and his cold hands held lovingly in hers.

...and one.

They’d had no luck in Elling. Perhaps Veronika had gotten wind of Kaz’s agents looking for information, or perhaps she’d simply grown tired of the city, but by the time they reach it, she’s nowhere to be found, and neighbors report that a woman fitting her description vanished without warning one night weeks before.

There is some finality to it. She is alone in the world, now, except for the Dregs; the only family she knows is gone, determined not to be found, and Astoria doubts that she’ll be able to manage it. Matthias had wound his arms around her and pressed a kiss to her temple after she heard the news, but she had been less troubled than she might have imagined. She still has family.

That family is asleep now; they’ve taken shelter in a cave and huddled together, shivering, while they waited for a freak storm to pass. With them is the proof that their endeavor had been a success in part if not in whole: Matthias is curled up around a wolf he’d introduced as Trassel, who bared his teeth at Astoria at first before licking Matthias’ face and trying to climb into his lap. The laughter that echoed off the ice had been so bright, so warm, that her heart ached to hear it, and despite her discomfort Astoria has already begun to think of the isenulf as an extension of Matthias and, thus, as something she loves.

He looks younger in sleep, she realizes fondly. If he hadn’t fallen asleep beside a massive killing machine against which she had no defense, she would stroke his hair back, or curl up beside him; she can’t sleep, too uneasy with their company, and sits watch instead. She wonders if this will be the first night of many that she’s displaced by a wolf, but she supposes she can learn to live with it.

They should get a bigger bed, she thinks. Or, perhaps, find a place of their own, if there’s nothing bigger available at the Slat. There’s something almost comical about it, imagining playing house with Matthias while she’s huddling in a cave not unlike where she took refuge when she fled Fjerda in the first place. They’ll get a massive bed with room enough for the cats and Trassel both, and Matthias can sleep in the dead center, flanked by the great loves of his life. She’ll paint the front door emerald green and they’ll hang an ash bough over the hearth.

He wakes slowly, comfortably, and he stretches, reaching for her. He’s careful not to disturb the wolf beside him, who yawns and rolls onto his back, much more a needy pup than an insenulf in the moment. When he looks at Astoria he smiles, the dying fire reflecting in his eyes.

“You can continue to rest,” Astoria says gently. “The storm won’t stop anytime soon.”

“He won’t harm you.” Matthias’ voice is soft, and terribly sweet. “You can sleep too.”

“Who will tend the fire if I do that?”

“We are plenty warm here. You look exhausted.”

“You’re supposed to tell me I look radiant.”

“You are beautiful,” he promises, “but you look tired. Come.” He rolls onto his other side, Trassel settling against his back, and he gestures for Astoria to join him.

He is warm when she stretches out obediently beside him, her head tucked under his chin and her fingers curled in the fabric of his shirt, their cloaks through together over the both of them.

“I am sorry we could not find her,” he says finally, and Astoria shakes her head.

“Don’t be. She knows what she is doing. I’m glad we found him.” Beside Matthias, the wolf lets out a noise that sounds a bit like a snore. “You seem brighter than I’ve ever seen you before.”

And there’s that smile again, so beautiful it almost hurts to see.

“We may need more room than what we have at the Slat,” he murmurs, and Astoria laughs, nestling closer.

“We may,” she agrees, and her eyes feel heavy, and when he drops a kiss to the top of her head moments later, she’s already asleep.

She wakes hours later, warm in his grasp, a weight across their bodies. Trassel is asleep across the both of them, his massive head resting on Astoria’s hip, and she doesn’t move except to reach down and scratch gently behind his ears.

#clpdwings #clpdwings ( matthias helvar )#i. here's the truth from my red lips. ( answers )#v. i savor bitterness. it is born of experience. it is the privilege of one who has truly lived. ( grishaverse | ketterdam )#iii. until i wrap myself inside your arms i cannot rest. ( matthias x astoria )#nsfw;#(i thought this one was gonna be shorter and then it clocked in at...)#(5.2k lmao love u sorry 2 never have a reasonable length for anything i write)

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