Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The water is still as a mirror, clear in the winter sun.  Nina walks slowly, each step deliberate and steady through the snow.  Years since she first made this journey, no longer the heartbroken girl fresh from Ketterdam’s cloudy shores but old bones and old magic and old heart.  Matthias’ steps are lighter; he was made for this land and traverses it easily, a wilderness-boy shaped out of ice and the cold breath of northern wind.  

All is deserted but for the pair trudging silently along the lake’s perimeter, side by side.  The snow, the air, the sky is still.  It barely seems to part where they step, only shudders and settles back into nothingness, undisturbed for miles on all sides.  

There’s the faintest whisper of air behind, and ahead, the ash trees still and then shiver in anticipation.  It’s a well-worn journey by now, the path familiar and everlasting, landscape eternal.  It precedes a pair of shattered lovers and will continue, infinite stillness and peacefulness and softly-glowing white, long after they depart.  Ash trees silver, water blue-grey and shimmering.  Nina pauses at the foot of a tree, and drops to her knees in the snow.

Her hand meets the smooth bark of the tree as if greeting an old friend.

Not an old friend.  

Matthias’ name is a whisper in the still Fjerdan air, half a greeting and a farewell, a breath of loss and reunion.  He feels, for a moment, almost alive - lungs expand to inhale the cold, and the sun turns his hair to gold.  If Nina turns, only the ice and the trees look back.  

And like that, the spell is broken.  Desolate grey sky and desolate icy wasteland and Nina.  An empty stage is only as good as its players, and a flaming sword is useless without one to wield it.  Nina’s arms are tired.  Matthias would say the spirit of Djel surrounds them, would close his eyes and hear the voice of god in the water and the wind.  

Nina’s never heard a thing.

Chapter Text

Listen, the ugly woollen scarf was Jesper’s idea.  A joke present on the morning before his departure from Ketterdam, so long it trails on the floor when he walks but surprisingly soft and, most importantly, warm.  Jesper had made some quip about protecting Wylan’s porcelain skin from the freezing Ravkan winter, but actually?  It’s working.

The oversized jumper and winter coat, though, that’s on Wylan.  

Very funny, he’d said, unable to hide a fond grin, and then packed a suitcase full of winter clothes anyway because if previous visits have taught him anything, it’s to be prepared.

There’s still a good five seconds after Kuwei catches sight of him and gets that look on his face when he seriously considers turning around and going home. 

“Shut up,” he says, and bends to pick up a bag. “Help me with these?”

There’s a delighted gleam in Kuwei’s eyes. “I said nothing.”

It’s times like these Wylan questions why he even bothers telling him when business brings him to Ravka anymore.  Kuwei is horrible.  He’ll let it slide, though, since Kuwei does, in fact, pick up a bag and fall into step beside him.  They’ve got this routine down to a tee.

“No Jesper?” Kuwei asks after a minute.

Wylan, to his credit, doesn’t give him the satisfaction of reacting.  “Disappointed?” 

Kuwei gives him a cool look. “I will drop this bag on the street and leave you here.” 

It’s a pretty empty threat, not because Kuwei wouldn’t do it (he would) but because even Wylan’s capable of carrying two bags five minutes down the street by himself.  Still, he’s not looking for an argument.  “Jesper’s keeping an eye on things in Ketterdam.” 

“Who is keeping an eye on Jesper?” 

Kaz, actually, although Wylan doesn’t say this out loud.  Not that Jesper needs someone hovering over his shoulder, and Kaz wouldn’t do it even if he did, but through some unspoken agreement, Kaz makes sure Jesper isn’t straying too near the barrel’s gambling halls and Jesper– well, Kaz likes having him around, not that he’ll say as much.

It’s good for them both.

Even if that equation does leave Wylan stuck with Kuwei for the next seven days.

Even if they’re not actually stuck, and aren’t obligated to spend a minute of time together just because they happen to be in the same city.

Shut up.

Wylan isn’t staying far away, and the walk most of the way in comfortable silence.  The rest of the way, they’re still quiet, but Kuwei keeps looking over at him like he’s trying to figure something out and it’s making Wylan distinctly uncomfortable, like they’re sixteen again and avoiding eye contact from opposite ends of a tomb.

He considers asking Kuwei about it, then drops the idea.  If something is on his mind, Kuwei would probably lie.  That’s kind of a recurring thing with his friends, apparently.

Once they reach his room, Wylan forgoes unpacking in favour of falling unceremoniously onto the bed.  Screw dignity; he’s tired.  “Are you staying?”

“Not for long,” Kuwei replies, setting down his own bag and stretching.  You’d think he’d been forced to carry a sack of rocks for a mile instead of one lightly-packed travel bag down two streets.

That considering look is on his face again.  “I need you to do something.”

“What is it?” Don’t be anything illegal, don’t be anything illegal, don’t be anything illegal.  Wylan really needs to reconsider his life choices if that’s his automatic response, but it’s about five years too late for that.

Whatever he’s been mentally analysing for the past ten minutes, Kuwei still doesn’t look entirely sure about it.  Then again, Kuwei’s not the easiest person to read in the first place.  When he says “Take this back to Ketterdam?” and hands over a small white envelope, Wylan has to wonder if he’s heard wrong.

“For Kaz,” Kuwei is saying. “Well– for Nina, but Kaz will keep it safe.”

Okay, sure.  Nina’s hard to pin down these days, never in one place for too long, but never away from Ketterdam for longer than six months at a time since that first lonely year and a half.  What Wylan doesn’t understand is why Kuwei can’t just post it.

Or what he’s actually being asked to take.

“What’s in it?”

“I would prefer not to say.”

This is typical, and more than Wylan’s currently prepared to deal with.  Kuwei has this effect, he’s noticed - talking to him for longer than five minutes at a time is draining, particularly when he won’t just say what he has to say, which is always.  

Despite himself, Wylan’s kind of curious. “Why can’t you send it?”

Kuwei looks for a moment like he isn’t sure what to say.  When he speaks, his words are slow, chosen carefully. “I need this to not fall into the wrong hands.”

Technically, Wylan could just say no.  They’re not working a job together anymore, and he doesn’t owe Kuwei anything - he has a sneaking suspicion Kuwei’s only asking because Wylan happens to be in the right place.  And since when did Wylan van Eck start saying no to people anyway, right?

It could be now.

“Is it important?”

Fuck him.  Of course Wylan’s not going to say no, if it is.

He really hates Kuwei looking at him like that, like he’s weighing up options, judging and discarding things without saying a word.  The thought comes into his head, suddenly, that maybe Kuwei’s only asking him because he knows Wylan can’t read whatever’s in there.  

After an uncomfortably long pause, Kuwei steps closer, and it seems like a visible effort to make himself look at Wylan as he speaks – quietly, as if he’s worried someone else could be listening. 

“I– We think we might have found a cure.  For parem.  At least something that might…” The words are spoken slowly, at first, and then having started talking, it’s like he can’t say the rest quickly enough. “Perhaps there’s even a means of administering it.  There is more, in the letter, but you have to keep it safe.  Nina should know.”

Kuwei looks somewhere between exhilarated and terrified, and Wylan realises this is probably the first he’s told anyone of it who’s not directly involved in some way. 

A cure.  For jurda parem. 

It feels like hope, wild and bubbling and unexpected, because everything they did, everything they risked… It’s like seeing the light at the end of an impossibly long road that he’d never believed, never really believed, they would reach the end of.  

A cure for jurda parem.  

He can’t help it - he’s laughing, sudden and unexpected because this is it.  “That’s amazing.” 

It takes Wylan about two seconds to realise that momentarily forgetting where is is and who he’s with and hugging Kuwei from sheer excitement might not have been the best response to that piece of news.  It seems to catch Kuwei completely off-guard, and fuck, Wylan wasn’t thinking, did not think this through at all–  And then Kuwei is actually hugging him back, and it’s definitely only because they’re so close together that Wylan hears him whisper “Yes?” in a tone that sounds slightly less sure than he did a moment ago.  

“Yes.  Ghezen and his works, Kuwei, you did it.”

He did it.  It’s done, or close to done, close enough that Kuwei feels confident in writing to Nina about it.  This is going to change the world.  

This is going to change a lot.

Kuwei probably knows that too, the brat, and when he pulls away, he looks as self-assured as ever.  What was Wylan saying before?  Oh, yeah.  Typical.

“And you said I’m not good at science.”

Chapter Text

The Ketterdam library is high walls and thin, winding balconies, bookshelves built to the sky and dusty light falling across the floor.  Nearer the entrance, people are milling gently, silence broken only by shuffling feet and the turning of pages.  Further back, though, it’s emptier, the silence somehow quieter.  Inej melts into the shadows like a ghost, but when Nina’s fingers brush against her wrist, she’s warm to the touch.  Nina can feel the other girl’s pulse beneath her fingers.

It’s one of the things she misses most about her powers, as they were.  She never needed to reach out before, not like this.  But Inej understands, and lets her do it, although Nina can hear the way her breath catches even as she remains perfectly still.  

Inej’s hair is tied back.  The bare skin of her neck suddenly feels hyperaware, and she suppresses the urge to shiver.  When Nina’s hand comes to rest there (gentle, barely touching) she can feel herself tense.  Nina feels it too, pauses, ready to pull away if Inej asks.

Inej doesn’t want her to move.

“Is this alright?” They’re hidden away in the shadows, past deserted rows of bookshelves away from anyone who could see them, and the whisper of Nina’s voice seems to echo louder than a gunshot. “Inej?”

She swallows.  Nods.  Tries again, and finds her voice. “Yes.”

And then they’re kissing.

Nina’s lips are a little dry, but plenty warm (like Nina herself, Inej thinks fleetingly, she has a way of making you feel warm), and Inej tilts her head to kiss her better.  It presses them closer together, and when Inej puts a hand to Nina’s shoulder, her fingers tangle in long hair, like strands of silk.  There’s the faint rose smell that clings to Nina wherever she goes, in her hair, in the folds of her skirt.  Inej feels like somebody’s hollowed her out and put stars inside her.

When they break apart a moment later, both are a little breathless.

Maybe that’s just the Nina Zenik effect.

Conversely, Inej feels more full than she did before.  A creature of air made real, and tied for a moment to earth.  There’s no way of wording it without sounding foolish, so Inej leans up to kiss the side of Nina’s jaw, feather-light.  

Nina makes a pleased humming noise that’s not quite a sigh, and Inej bites her lip to keep from giggling.  They’re in a public library, hidden away, perhaps, but still very much there for somebody to stumble across should they turn down the wrong aisle. 

A coy grin tugs at Nina’s lips.  She, like normal, seems to know exactly what Inej is thinking. “Quiet.  We might give some poor scholar a heart attack.”

“I think they’ve seen worse.” Inej has spied and eavesdropped on half the people in the room.  The university has its own library, so most of the visitors here are merchants, council members, religious scholars - Ketterdam’s purest and holiest, and most corrupt.  

“Oh, I don’t know.” They still haven’t moved apart.  Nina’s almost speaking the words into her skin. “I’m sure we could find a few ways to shock them.”

Despite her words, Nina really doesn’t want to get caught.  This sort of thing might have been fun to tease Matthias with, but this moment is something else entirely, something quiet that belongs just to them.  Inej is made up of sharp edges and invisible balance, and kissing her is dizzying.  Nina’s seen Inej move like gravity bends to her will, like she carries gravity within her and chooses to let it go, but now –

as she leans forward to kiss her again, as Inej’s fingers slide through her hair and Nina feels like all the breath has left her

– it’s like Inej has pulled her up, too, nothing but height and sky and impossible knife-edge balance.

It’s a fall she’d be glad to take.

Chapter Text

i. There’s no welcome home, only the salty Ketterdam breeze, grey sky and grey streets and narrow, leaning buildings.  The roll of the waves around her ship and the brush of a hand against Inej’s.  Fingers intertwine and she feels her stomach twist, breath catching.  It’s more it’s more it’s more and further than she ever thought they would come.  

ii. Kaz doesn’t like goodbyes.  circling birds and a harsh, freezing wind see inej away as Kerch becomes a smudge on the horizon and then nothing at all but the sea and clouds and cold air around her.  Her crew come and go, and at night Inej counts the stars.  No goodbye, but they will see each other again.

iii. Ihe words I love you choke and die on her tongue.  It’s too huge and terrifying to name, even to think about, but looking at her friends and the city that made them, Inej thinks trust, thinks devotion, and if they fall a little short of what she wants to say, they’re close enough.  

“Wraith,” says Kaz, and in his voice Inej hears dangerous girl and I almost pity the slavers.  

It’s enough.

Chapter Text

Jesper doesn’t look up when Wylan joins him, overlooking the side of the ship.  He’s used to it by now.  The sea, the stars, the silent side-by-side.  It’s peaceful – some might even call it romantic – and Wylan hates as much as treasures it because Jesper doesn’t even know it’s him.  

Ninety-nine percent of the time, wearing Kuwei’s features is a relief.  Wylan can’t even recognise himself in the mirror, except as a stranger, and it makes him feel freer than he can remember.  People have always told him he looks like his father.  Familial resemblance be damned, there’s nothing familial about it.

Sometimes, just once, he wishes Jesper could realise who it is standing next to him.

Of course, Wylan would never have the nerve to do this looking like himself, so maybe the fact that he’s here and able to do it at all is a blessing.  There’s no point, though, when Jesper looks at him and sees Kuwei, gives him the polite smile reserved for a reticent stranger, with none of the warmth and brightness Wylan’s come to know and he feels a second behind the rest of the world.

Jesper doesn’t know.  he doesn’t know, but– Wylan hates the feeling of being a stranger among people he’d begun to feel at tentative ease with.

They never talk.  Wylan doesn’t know much Shu, and his Kerch (unaccented, fluent) would give him away.  Jesper’s content to stay silent too, which is strange, but Wylan can’t push it because he can’t speak, although he wants to ask.  He wants to ask so much the need of it almost chokes him, to say something, anything.

Jesper, it’s me.  

Would Jesper care, even if he knew?  Now that they’re set for home (home?), going their separate ways, three million kruge richer, would he care who’s at his side when there’s nothing left to bind them together?  It’s not like there’s much of a chance to find out.  

Just girls?  No.  Not just girls.

Did they really survive the ice court just to end up here?

“What did you say?”

Jesper’s staring at him, full attention - quizzical, surprised, a little bit uncertain.  Shit.   Wylan said that out loud.   Muttered quietly enough that, small blessings, Jesper probably didn’t have time to recognise the voice or even realise what he said, only that he said something.  That’s why he’s staring, Wylan reminds himself.  He thinks it’s Kuwei talking.  

That’s why he’s surprised.

Words dance on the edge of Wylan’s tongue, but he swallows them down.  The tips of his ears are flushed and his heart beats in his throat as he drops his eyes from Jesper’s, turns back to the sea.

He can feel Jesper’s eyes on him a minute longer, considering and then dismissing.  What’s one more strange passenger in a crew of thieves and criminals, after all?

What’s one more could-have-been in sixteen years of not good enough?

Nothing.  And so they say nothing at all.

Chapter Text

Kaz ignores her.  He must be able to hear her sobs - the slat’s walls are thin, rooms close together, and despite her best efforts, Inej can’t be quiet tonight - but though a small part of her doesn’t want to be alone, she refuses to be disappointed when Kaz remains locked in his office.

She’s killed tonight.  

Dangerous, kaz had called her.  She’d liked it then, but she had never killed anyone before.

Inej knows sitting passively doesn’t keep you alive.  She understands there are times when you have to fight, fight dirty, fight bloody, to the death.  

It had been self-defence, but she’d felt the blood on her hands and nearly been sick, still more horrified at, despite her feelings, the relative ease with which she had done it.  Adrenaline, fear for her life, Kaz Brekker’s orders.  Whatever she was acting on can’t change what she did.

Her saints must be turning their heads and weeping.

They would not , Inej tells herself fiercely. T hey understand what I have to do.  They would not abandon me.  

She feels so alone.

It’s hours before Inej emerges from her room, face pale, eyes tired and rimmed with redness.  The others mostly ignore her, too.  She’s not expecting anything from Kaz, but halfway down the stairs, a voice calls her back.  There’s no words of comfort, just her name and the tilt of Kaz’s head towards his office.

Inej expects he wants to talk to her about last night, or perhaps a new job, even a request to cry more quietly next time so she doesn’t disturb the others.  Kaz, however, says none of that.

“Here.”  There’s a knife on the desk, bone-handled.  Gleaming.  Inej’s eyes dart to the blade and then to Kaz.  She doesn’t understand. “You’ll do better with this, next time.”

There has to be a next time.

Inej still isn’t sure she understands.  Kaz had picked out the knife she used himself; it’s not like Inej had the means or knowledge to buy one herself.

As if he can tell what she’s thinking, Kaz pushes the knife towards her. “I need you working to your best.  Consider this an early investment.”

You’re obviously dangerous.  Inej’s fingers close around the handle.  She feels the weight of it in her hand.  He’s arming her, equipping her, an investment in killing.  There are still faint tear-marks on Inej’s cheeks.  

Her saints will see. They will understand.  Surely, if they saw, they would have to know she doesn’t have a choice.  It’s this or the Menagerie and death - she won’t survive that place a second time.

She tightens her grip on the handle.  There’s work to be done.