Chapter Text
Anastasya Sidorova
Sometimes, Anastasya wondered how her life seemed to always lead to more pain. Escaped her witchhunting village only to end up in Ketterdam where she starved for weeks and had to kill or be killed. Then, she fell in with Kaz and the Dregs, and the attempts on her life never seemed to stop. Lately, she had began to grow comfortable. Her reputation as the Red Scourge had grown quickly in the last year, people avoided her on the street and other gangs steered clear. But Anastasya should have known it wouldn't last. She shouldn't have gotten so careless.
How had everything gone so wrong?
It had only been hours ago that Ketterdam had been lit up as if celebrations for the new year had began, blues and yellows and oranges lighting up the streets as the skyline choked with smoke. Screams had filled her ears like a symphony, the shouts of protests from both sides of the gang war, and the silent, steely glare from none other than Kaz Brekker.
Her best friend, her partner in crime, her only family.
It had been an easy job, at least at first. Get in, win a war, get out. Yes, the middle was a bit messy but when wasn’t it?
The Dregs had managed to beat back the Black Tips from taking their territory, Dirtyhands and the Scourge taking their rightful positions at the helm of the fight. The scrap was dirty and messy and downright disgusting, but it had been over quick and before Anastasya knew it they were standing in the square, moonlight streaming through thick clouds onto blood-spattered Ketterdam streets.
Kaz and ‘Lucky’ Lommel, the leader of the Black Tips, had been working out a deal, ensuring the Black Tips stayed in their territory while Kaz expanded upon Dregs territory. It was going well. Anastasya was laughing at Anika’s new haircut—her usually long, dark curls had been cut by some back alley barber into a poor imitation of Kaz’s hair.
And then… She didn’t really understand what happened then.
Kaz and Lucky had shaken hands.
“Good doing business with you,” said Kaz, his lip busted.
Lucky nodded, the shiner Kaz had landed on him already blooming underneath his eye. “Likewise.”
“Tell your boss,” added Lucky, his hand still gripped in Kaz’s. Kaz glowered at the grip when Lucky wouldn’t release, and Anastasya could see the beginnings of discomfort show in his features. She felt the instinctive urge to reach out and break their handshake—to protect Kaz. But she held back, biting her lip. “The deal is the deal.”
“The deal is the deal,” repeated Kaz, withdrawing his gloved hand from Lucky’s.
“Relax, Nastya,” said Pim, using the nickname she loathed, and elbowing her in the side. “I think you can let Kaz out of your sight for one second.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” said Anastasya, keeping her voice even. “And you wouldn’t call me that if you knew what was good for you,” she added, feeling like she’d been punched in the stomach.
It’s what her mother used to call her… what everyone in the village did. Nastya, Nastyona, Nastenka, Nastyusha; her mother used to tell her it was ‘shorter’ than calling her Anastasya when she’d questioned her why she had ever bothered to name her Anastasya in the first place if no one would call her by her name. Kaz and Inej sometimes called her Ana, but she found she didn’t mind that so much.
“Sure,” said Anika, having overheard Anastasya and Pim’s conversation. “I also like lying. I think it’s real cute.”
“Pretty sure Kaz does too,” Pim snorted.
Anika grinned. “Pretty sure it’s not the only thing Kaz thinks is cute.”
“Shut up,” growled Anastasya, feeling her temper flare. And it didn’t have anything at all to do with the fact that she knew Kaz would never see her like that, or the fact that the thought stung more than she would’ve ever admitted.
“Ooo,” said Pim, “I think we got under her skin. It must be true.”
“I know Kaz has been eager to get under her—”
“Care to share with the class what lousy gossip you’re disrupting my deal with?” Kaz’s raspy voice cut through whatever the end of Anika’s sentence was, his steady gaze silencing her immediately.
Pim looked down at his feet. Anika was suddenly very interested in the sign above the pub in front of them. Anastasya sighed.
“It’s nothing, Kaz,” said Anastasya. “Just being idiots, as usual.”
“Not as usual,” Kaz responded, his voice grating and hard. “I will not have my own Dregs undermining territory acquisition like this. Don’t forget every single one of you is replaceable,” Kaz paused, his hard stare passing over each of them, stopping at Anastasya meaningfully. “This is business. Not a charity.”
Anastasya’s nostrils flared. Making an example of Anika and Pim was one thing, but to single out Anastasya? She has been there for him since he was twelve and she thirteen. Together, they tamed Ketterdam streets and made a name for themselves. She has been there through thick and thin, through every nasty, bloody, messy part. Even when he was so broken anyone else in the Barrel would have spat on him and kicked him in the gutter, Anastasya had picked him up and swore to always be by his side, and after months of coaxing, he swore to be by hers.
So much for promises, she thought bitterly.
“Kaz—”
“What part of replaceable don’t you understand?” said Kaz, cutting her off.
Flames curled around Anastasya’s clenched fists as she approached Kaz, holding in barely contained rage. Murmurs rose up around them in response. “It was just a joke, Kaz.”
“It was disturbing my deal,” he said, leaning toward her. “And I didn’t want you to get any ideas that just because you’re Grisha you get special treatment. You’re just like everybody else in this rat-infested hole.” He paused, looking her up and down. “Worse, because you don’t seem to know how to keep your mouth shut.”
Anastasya made a small noise in the back of her throat. “Why are you doing this?”
“I told you—”
“Oh, for fuck’s sake—” Anastasya threw her hands up, enraged, and a fireball hurtled out of one hand into the sky. Crowds ducked as the ball of flame flew through the air and struck a fountain on the other side of the square.
Kaz turned to look at the cracks forming in the marble, expressions of shock on the faces of both the Black Tips and the Dregs. Anastasya was breathing hard, her blood thrumming with adrenaline and the use of her power. When Kaz returned his focus to Anastasya, her blood ran cold.
“They’re right about you. Everything they say,” he spat, low enough that only Anastasya could hear as he stalked closer towards her, cane scraping across the cobblestones. “You’re a wild dog out of control. I don’t know why I ever bothered with you.”
Anastasya’s heart clenched in her chest. “Then you should’ve put a fucking muzzle on me when we first met,” she snarled back, trying not to choke on the words and her heart in her throat. She tilted her head to the side, feigning innocence. “Didn’t they ever tell you not to cage wild animals?” She moved even closer to Kaz, until he could feel her hot breath on his face. “You never know when they might get loose.”
Flames sparked to life in Anastasya’s palms again and she smirked back at Kaz when all she wanted to do was cry. Kaz stared back at her with cold eyes.
The Dregs and the Black Tips stopped short, staring at Dirtyhands and the Scourge. Dangerous energy crackled in the space between them.
Kaz was quiet and Anastasya said nothing. They stared at each other for what felt like eternity, as if staring at the gap growing in between them, tearing them from each other when they had been by each other’s sides for so long.
The two of them had fought before, argued constantly, incessantly even, much to the disdain of everyone around them. But it had never been serious—petty, heated words said in the moment and forgotten in the next. But this was real. Anastasya could feel it. Messy, painful, shattered. They had finally cut each other on the jagged pieces of their broken selves.
Besides, Anastasya had always liked the mess. She liked to get her hands dirty, she relished the feeling of her power coiling around her like a spring ready to bounce—sure, she practised often, and she practised hard, but training just didn’t bring her that same sweet satisfaction as a fight. When the flames were burning with the desire to live; that’s when her power drummed and churned within her like a black hole.
Limitless.
It had taken a long time, and too many frustrated nights to mention, but when Anastasya had finally realised the key to unlocking all of her potential—all of the power that was at her fingertips… Well, it had been worth every drop of blood.
The key was: heat was everywhere if you focused. She didn’t need a spark any longer, she didn’t need a flash of fire. She was the flame itself, and everything around her kindling.
So, it had been easy. Far too easy to let the balls of flame hurtle towards those storefront windows.
It had been so easy to encourage the flames to burn higher, brighter, hotter.
It had been so easy.
Too easy.
Wood burned and glass melted, nameless faces screamed and ran from the carnage, filling the street with chaos. And through it all, Kaz Brekker, motionless, glaring at her as he never had. Glaring at her as if he wanted her dead.
“Oops,” she said. Her heart thundered in her chest, but she only smiled back at Kaz. “My hand slipped.”
Then Anastasya turned and stormed away. But good old Anika and Pim were waiting just for that, and their rifles crossed together to block her path. Anastasya met Anika’s eyes, then slid her colourless gaze to Pim, raising a single, red eyebrow. The two hardened their faces, though she saw sweat beading across their foreheads.
“Move or burn,” Anastasya growled, her fingers twirling by her side, a line of fire trailing the cobblestones until it wrapped around the ground at Anika’s feet. Anastasya’s hand rose higher, and the flames followed suit. “Choose.”
Pim jumped back hastily, eager not to let the fire envelop around him.
“Please,” Anika whimpered. Unshed tears glistened in her green eyes.
The flames were at her chest now.
Suddenly, violently, Anastasya’s heart lurched in her chest and she immediately dropped her hands. The fire died instantly, and Anika retreated hurriedly to the rest of the Dregs.
Anastasya’s hands shook. She looked around her at the chaos, the flames rising higher across the buildings, the smoke blacking out the sky, her own gang glaring at her with enough force to put her in the ground. What had she just almost done? Burned one of her own for daring to try and stop her? Stop this destruction? This destruction she caused because… what? Because her feelings were hurt?
Her parents had been right. Her village had been right. They should have burned her on that stake instead of her sister.
She was dangerous. Her power felt limitless, unending, a deep hunger within her that burned painfully. A witch, demon—whatever name they wanted to call her, she was it. She wasn’t right. Wasn’t natural.
Her mother should have smothered her in the cot.
Anastasya swept her arms in an arc and the flames around her sputtered out to nothing.
Then she fled.
***
Now, she was on the ground, knees skinned, head swimming with drink, staring up at three snarling heads, their faces obscured by big, green hats.
Anastasya spat out a mouth of blood.
The only thing she knew: she was in trouble.
Somewhere between her fifth and fiftieth drink, her memory started getting fuzzy, the edges blurring around the details. She’d been in the Crow Club, then danced her way to the Emerald Palace, traversed the streets on over to the Menagerie, where she had been kicked out on her bruised ass for knocking a mercher through a door. Side alleys blended into one long corridor, but somehow, she had found herself in the Fifth Harbour.
Huh, she thought, glancing across the street, right beside Kaz’s favourite bakery.
Then someone punched her.
Anastasya’s response was delayed, and the pain fractured her focus even more, jolting her into a panic. She tried to rise to her feet, hands grasping desperately for the wall behind her to help her climb up. But she needn’t have bothered.
Someone yanked a handful of her hair and dragged her to her feet—they spoke to her, words blurring into one another. You’ll sing to us soon, she thought she’d heard. But that made no sense. Anastasya didn’t sing. Not anymore.
“What do you want?” she croaked out, pain and drink and confusion rushing through her.
“What the fuck is she saying?” A man demanded.
“Who cares?” Another responded.
The person holding her by her hair shoved her away from them and Anastasya landed against the stone wall, hard. Her desperate, sweaty fingers clung to the grooves in the stone in an attempt to help her stay standing.
She let one shaky hand move her curls from her face and she blinked at the men surrounding her. They looked familiar, green vests and hats and clunky revolvers in their holsters. She thought she made out a flash of blonde hair in the moonlight—that looked familiar. But then her vision split in two and she winced against the pain, shoving her back against the wall and leaning all her weight on it.
Desperate, she tried to summon. Heat was in everything. She’d once boiled a man from the inside. She could do this. She stretched her fingers and called to the heat, trying to ignite it into flame. Fire flashed on her hands. Anastasya smiled, turning towards her attackers who took a step back.
“You said she shouldn’t be able to summon here,” one of them hissed at the other, backing towards the water behind them.
The other glanced at her warily. “She shouldn’t.”
“Never underestimate the Scourge,” she said, but her voice was wobbly as she pushed herself off the wall and approached with burning hands.
She tried to summon a ball of flame and pain shot through her like lightning; her vision split again. She collapsed to the ground. The fire sputtered out to nothing.
And this time she didn’t have a chance to fight back. The men were on her before she knew what was happening. Someone punched her and her head knocked against the concrete. Pain exploded inside her head; her hands were wrenched behind her back. Black spots swam in her eyes. She tasted salt water and copper. She felt herself losing consciousness.
Anastasya tried to take a small measure of satisfaction in knowing it took her being black-out drunk for someone to get the advantage on her before her thoughts became incoherent.
“Kaz,” she mumbled, his name inseparable from her moans of pain. “Kaz.”
“He can’t help you now, Scourge,” someone above her taunted. “No one can.”
The last thing she remembered before the darkness took her was the crack of a rifle against her skull.