Work Text:
(Invisible)
Sometimes she feels as if Kaz is the only person who sees her.
She’d slip through the streets, unnoticed, unmarked in a way that kept her on an entirely different world from the rest of Ketterdam. Almost a ghost amongst the immorality and money and corruption she so wished not to be part of.
She was a ghost, translucent to all.
Kaz was somehow and exception to her silence; her most important weapon fell to pieces near him, as though he could somehow hear the sounds of silence itself.
She didn’t know how to feel about that.
.
(Doubt)
Keys flip between leather covered fingers; Inej doesn’t hide that she’s staring.
Kaz shuts the door behind him, a soft click instead of an audible clank.
“Hello.” He says, rather abruptly, ringing the key around his fingers in a slow, deliberate motion.
“How are you?” She responds with, and he eyes her.
“You know I’m always well.”
She resists the urge to smile at that, if wryly.
“Of course, Kaz.” She thinks with a sigh and but what are the keys with skulls for.
“You always are.”
.
(Take a chance)
Her fingers curl over the pages of the book; she does not read very well, but this is important.
She bites her lip in concentration, attempting to focus on the book and its teachings, but it is not very entertaining. As interesting as she’s sure the water drainage systems of Ketterdam are, it’s just not a personal favorite topic of hers.
But still she persists; she’s been informed she will necessitate using this book in the future (she tries not to bring her mind to what risky, out of his mind, possibly life threatening plan Kaz has in mind).
She’s doing a fairly well good job of concentrating until she feels a hand come to rest at her neck.
“Hello.” She hears a voice, low and rough, feels fingers pressing against the wrist not trapped to the page of the book.
“Hello, Kaz.” She says, reaching her fingers around the head of his cane, brushing over smooth leather.
She turns around, watching his movements, eyes drifting to the place where her fingers brush over his.
“Are you enjoying the book?”
She smiles. Just slightly. “It’s as fascinating as your biography will be.”
His movements pause. She likes that his fingers are warm through the gloves.
He almost, almost just cracks the smallest of smiles at that.
She’s grown used to this; this odd, stilted version of love her and Kaz are slowly coming to terms with; this silent dance they do that is not so much a dance as a game. Silent glances, knives passed between just the two of them, occasionally catching a smile of his in the corner of her eye. One time, she found a necklace on her bed, without a card or a label.
“I stole it the other day. It didn’t look like it was worth much.” Kaz had mentioned offhandedly the day after.
Inej had gone to a store and asked for the price.
They’d immediately asked what family she came from.
Her hand came up to press against his gloved wrist. He swallowed.
Her heartbeat sped up.
“Must be interesting, then.” He said, and it took her a split second to realize they were still talking about the book.
“It is.”
“But not half so as my biography would be.”
He’s daring her; take a chance.
“Not many things would be so fascinating, Kaz.” She says, and does.
.
(Firsts)
“I can help you.” He hears, a voice in his ear a hair’s breath away, like dangling roses.
His shoulders tense as he turns around. Who are y- His mind is half way to before oh and he sees her, a girl in Menagerie silk with darkened eyes who looks like she may run at any second.
She looks innocent, he thinks at first, perhaps too much so to be here. Her eyes are almost hopeful; tinged by fright, certainly.
But then he thinks again, to the hard glint in her gaze, and she looks dangerous.
But before he can say anything, he looks up and she’s gone.
Like a shadow.
Like a shadow, his mind reiterates, catching his gaze wandering in the odd Suli girl’s direction.
I could use that.
.
(Like shadows)
Kaz shoves the knife into her hand.
His eyes are cold, calm, but she sees what’s behind them.
Cover me, he’s telling her, gloved hand whipping to the lock, sleek picks twisting out of the cuff of his jacket.
She doesn’t say anything, just straightens her shoulders and stares on to face the enemy.
A blade slams next to her head, she parries. Dust kicks up in her eyes, she blinks. Metal slices her shoulder, she grits her teeth and tells herself she’s seen much, much worse.
She sees a weakness, she strikes.
When she is done, there is nothing but her, Kaz, and a corpse.
They leave the corpse.
She trails behind him, hilt knife still pressed into the palm of her hand, trying to organize her thoughts.
Kaz had handed her the knife, the small one, the one he always used for last resorts and petty revenges. The one which meant he was out of options.
And he’d given it to her.
“Kaz-“ She whispers as they trails through the darkened halls like shadows.
He doesn’t respond, even when she raises her voice, even when she lightly touches his shoulder (although his posture goes stiff), even when she presses the hilt of his knife to his palm.
“Take it.” He whispers, slow and raspy in the dusty halls, tone indicating that another word would kill them.
Her eyes widen, and she notices that she had gone very, very still, as has he.
He stops, gaze flickering to her for a fraction of a second.
Don’t tell anyone, his eyes read, and she silently swears by all the gods he doesn’t believe in she won’t.
She’d never tell them how much he trusts her.
.
(One at a time)
He watches Inej’s knife lean on the man’s throat, and then hears the deck fall into silence.
“This,” She says, eyes hard. “-Is more than you deserve.” She says, looking over to the frightened indentured men and women just freed.
She leans the blade forwards to his throat, and the whole crew watches the slave driver bleed out. Kaz watches Inej bleed out, all over the floor, just in her eyes.
The rest of them stare on.
Inej swallows. “You’re free to go.” She announces, listing off details as to how and when the prisoners will be returned to their former lives.
They stare at her in shock, and she beings walking towards them, setting out various foods and maps she uses for plans whenever they find another slave driver ship heading to Kerch.
She walks fast, but Kaz stops her, hand going to the crook of her elbow. She pauses in her steps, whipping her gaze around to him.
He almost wants to smile but doesn’t; can’t, not yet; despite that it was him who taught her he still feels unnatural watching the dimmed light in her eyes when she kills.
So he steps up to her, and they walk in tandem.
.
(Phenomena)
Their lips touch, and it takes everything in both of them not to pull back.
It’s not an accident; it’s a plan, maybe, like a lot of theirs; purposeful and calculated but somehow goes wrong at the very last of minutes.
Kaz feels his shoulders press up against the cold walls of the Slate, digs his fingers into the stone and for once he’s grateful that he’s trapped because it means he can’t run away.
Inej leans into the touch, more, wondering how different the rush in her heart is than the fear that would strike her at similar touches years ago. But she can’t pull back; doesn’t, won’t, she didn’t spend this long trying only to give up, and neither did Kaz.
It’s odd and stiff and awkward but Kaz doesn’t want to stop.
Inej is slow and hesitant to start but takes heed in it; the heart is an arrow with a steady aim, and there is nothing her heart wants more.
And slowly, slowly when they pull back, Kaz can swear there’s magic in the world, if just for a second.
Inej doesn’t need to swear; she’d always known there is.
.
(Tilt)
The world blurs in and out of vision; Kaz doesn’t even have the energy to swear at the damned Dime Lion who shot him, right in the shoulder, center pin to the heart. Although it would be useless, because even if he could he wouldn’t.
He stumbles, pushing up off his broken leg until he’s upright, swearing he’s not shaking.
Suddenly, he feels pressure; a hand against his shoulder, bone to the crook of the wall behind him. A warm finger pressed to his lips.
“Kaz.” A voice is saying, low and half whisper, and he’s pretty sure that’s Inej, a warmth pressing up against him that must be her.
His vision shakes and shatters; he blinks and sees her, and thinks he might faint again, just from how close they are.
.
(Tattoo)
Kaz’s eyes cut to the blade, then the needle, simple and shining in the dim light.
He looks up and sees Inej staring at him, eyes fixated on his hands, where the two pieces of metal rest with equal weight.
There’s a question in her eyes. He averts his, just slightly. To the table, the stash of banknotes near her hands.
“You don’t have to.” He says, words leaving his mouth before he actually thinks them.
She looks up at him, eyes widened in unbridled surprise.
There’s this hint of a smile on her lips and for some reason his chest feels tight.
He shrugs, ignoring it. He’s been through worse injuries.
“I don’t want to be the one to mark you.” Again rings in the back of his ears like the bells of churches he’d never bothered to go to.
Inej nods, seeming to bite off words before she says the, eyes searching his for something before she finally settles on a quick “Saints bless you.” Although he’s told her hundreds of time he doesn’t believe in gods, or saint, or anything other than money and human greed.
Still she tells him, holding his gaze as if a dare.
He nods back. “The saints don’t bother with people like me” He says, a familiar reiteration of theirs, a debate repeated over and over until having it almost feels like breathing- too easy, too hard.
He flips the folding knife shut, hearing a snap as its lock clicks shut.
As he leaves he could swear he heard a sound that might have been a response, but he doesn’t have time to hear because he leaves before she can.
.
(Stay)
“Can you…”
His heartbeat stutters over the ringing in his chest; he looks down at her, dark eyes and parted lips and his hands are shaking.
“Kaz.” She says, meeting his eyes, grasping his trembling hand on her shoulder and taking it in hers.
She smiles at him; half crooked and sly, running her fingers over the width of scars the rope around his hands. Unlike him, she’s completely still, eyes unreadable. Fixatedly calm.
He tries to swallow. “Inej.” Is what he manages to get out, over the thrumming in his veins and the don’t pull back pushing against every instinct that he’d had from before, twisting against the adrenaline that made him want to lean in, lean in, lean closer.
Her eyes meet his, shaky smile, and slowly, slowly, the hand clasping his unwinds their fingers, drifting over exposed wrist, forearm, touching shoulder.
He doesn’t pull back.
He stays, a statue under her touch, until her hand touches the base of his neck, presses her glinting nails and warm fingers to his pulse.
In. Out. Breathe.
He brings a hand to her collar, just touching the first button of her shirt.
She inhales sharply, but continues, bringing a hand to the back of his neck.
And then she pulls him down and kisses him.
.
(Dreamer)
For someone who is supposed to be a shadow, Inej is unnaturally present in his life.
He sees her- in places she has never been to, in places she would not care for, in places she was never meant to be.
He sees her in the back of his dreams, the ones where he wakes up sweating in the dark hours of twilight and has to convince himself that he is capable of falling back asleep, the ones where his hands shake and he almost wants to remove his gloves.
He sees her in the shadows; the ones she isn’t, the ones that are simply darker versions of the world and not spies upon it.
He sees her next to him; atop a throne made of bones and money, all sweet smiles that send shivers up his spine because she is Inej she is not supposed to be like that she cares, somewhere down there, for a world that couldn’t give a coin for her.
But the one that feels like walking on the blade of a knife is when he’ll look at her, and see a glint of who he might’ve been.
.
(You and me)
Her feet steady on the rocking of the boat, sea water kicking up aside to her, spraying over her hair.
She draws her blade, quick and nimble as a shadow, although she does not slip into one.
She glances ahead of her, to the bow of the boat where her enemies hang, guns and knives and magic and power. She doesn’t have the time to count; there’s so many of them impossible.
Briefly, she considers what she has. A pistol, somewhere in the below decks. A few men, maybe four capable of fighting. A myriad of knives.
She glances to her side.
She also has Kaz, who meets her gaze, and she watches, in the spilt of a second as his lips tilt up, barely noticeable to anyone but her.
And she draws her blade, watching the enemy attack.
She likes these odds.