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“I’ll be gentle, don’t worry.”
“I’m not worried about that, Wraith,” Kaz says, training his eyes on her as she examines his wounds. He feels oddly vulnerable sitting before her, watching her eyes trace over him with great focus.
Unbidden, a shiver of guilt trails up Kaz’s spine. Before she left for her voyage, he had promised her that he would take care of himself and try to avoid needless conflict, yet she hasn’t even been back for half a day and she’s already cleaning up his mistakes. He’s continuously proving to her that he hasn’t changed since she boarded that ship.
Her skin glows a warm, yellow hue from the dim lanterns illuminating his small office. Kaz can see the differences in her after eight months at sea. Her cheeks are slightly fuller, the dark circles under her eyes lighter than before. The braid in her hair is not as tight and rigid; tendrils of her hair fall across her forehead and brush her cheeks. She is beautiful, more mesmerizing than any person he’s ever seen.
Inej looks up at him, her gaze sharp through her thick eyelashes. “You’ll need to remove your shirt.”
The waters come rushing in, lapping at the heels of Kaz’s boots. In an attempt to ignore it, he looks down, assessing his wounds and noticing that the right sleeve of his charcoal-gray dress shirt has ripped. His pale skin surrounding the wound is stained a vivid maroon. He hadn’t even felt that injury while he was caught in the heat of the moment. “Surely you can handle the other ones first.”
“This is the largest. It could get infected.”
Her voice is cold. Kaz grimaces, knowing he deserves it. He was supposed to be bettering himself so that he could be someone worthy of her love. That is what he’d sworn to himself the minute she walked onto that ship because he knew that if he had been better, she would’ve stayed. Instead, all he has done since she left was fight and scheme so he could climb to the top and become the King of the Barrel, just as he’s always desired.
Choosing not to argue with the already provoked—slightly scary —Inej, he undoes the buttons of his dress shirt. The draft in the room hits him suddenly, and Kaz can’t help but shut his eyes. The waters come in faster now, like waves crashing their way up his legs, aiming to pull him under. He feels colder.
Still, he prevails, sliding the shirt off his injured arm and letting the other side hang from his shoulder. She raises her hand, searching his eyes for some kind of permission before letting her fingers gently trace the edge of his fresh wound. She leaves a trail of warmth in her wake, causing his skin to burn and his heart to pulse. With every soft touch, the waters miraculously recede.
“If you want me to stop,” she says, her voice slightly softer but still quiet as the night, “just tell me.”
“It’s fine,” he responds, but he’s not sure how fine he is. It’s a feeling he hasn’t felt before—at least, not in a long time—and the unfamiliarity of it all makes his head swim in a waterfall of thoughts. The golden hues illuminate her face, and her dark hair shines brighter in the dim light. She looks like something out of a fantasy, like something this beautiful couldn’t possibly be real. Yet, when he hears her heartbeat, steady like a drum in her chest, he’s reminded that she’s beside him. That she’s alive and well. That she’s thriving .
Kaz thinks back to all the times when he lay awake at night, hoping that nothing would happen to Inej while she was out at sea. He wouldn’t admit it to anyone, but he doesn’t know what he would do with himself if something horrific were to happen to her. He’d gotten close to doing terrible things when Inej had gotten injured before their Ice Court job. Those days of waiting for Nina to heal Inej were the longest of his life.
He’d felt those same, overwhelming emotions when Inej had been captive under Van Eck. He’d never felt that kind of fear before.
He’d never realized how much he could need someone, either.
And because he couldn’t change, he’d lost her again. She is home, but in a few weeks’ time, she will leave again, and he will keep thinking about what could’ve been. It’s all his fault.
“You really should stop fighting every person on the street.” Inej dabs his wound with the damp washcloth, pausing to let Kaz hiss in discomfort. “There must be other ways to become King of the Barrel.”
“Someone like me can’t be soft, Inej. That’s not how it works. Besides,” he adds, “it’s not like I fight everyone .”
The corner of her lips lilts in the slightest hint of reluctant amusement. “Well, I can’t have you demolishing yourself when I’m not there looking out for you.” She winces as she cleans the wound on his arm. “Saints, what did these goons do to you?”
Kaz stiffens, directing his gaze away from her. “It was nothing I couldn’t handle.”
They stay quiet as Inej wraps the cleaned wound in a thin cloth. Her touch is gentle and filled with some strange tenderness. Kaz doesn’t know how he isn’t drowning, buried under the tidal wave of his past. He has found someone to pull him out of his darkness, out from under the waters. If only he could tell her that.
“Why were you so hell-bent on treating my wounds? You practically forced me into this,” Kaz says, gazing at her reverently—like she’s his treasure.
“Kaz, you walked in looking like someone had cut you into pieces.” She pulls her hands away from him, meeting his sight, her stare just as fierce. “Your limp was worse, your face was bleeding, and I…” The look in her eyes softens just a bit as she trails off.
He looks down at his gloved hands, watching his fingers shake. For so long, he’d worn them like a shield. They were his protection against everything he was afraid of, everything that would remind him of the past. In truth, he hasn’t changed. He is still the same, selfish bastard that the Barrel either feared or wanted to kill. He was after money, after power, after vengeance, after…
What is he after?
Trembling, Kaz tugs at the hem of his leather glove, watching it slide across the back of his hand, revealing the pale, unscarred skin underneath. He gathers his strength and lifts the bare hand to her face, letting it hover against her cheek. She looks at him in surprise as he lets the pads of his fingers brush the sharp curve of her jaw. The waters rise around him, reaching his knees, threatening to pull him under. He ignores it, holding his hand there for as long as she would let him.
“I…” He isn’t good at this stuff. He’s not good at saying what his mind is screaming and hoping the jumbled words translate. He isn’t smart enough to deal with the uncertainty vulnerability entails. Yet, the second he locks eyes with Inej again— his Inej—he feels this tsunami wave of desire crash over his heart, much stronger than the fear that binds him. The same desire that coursed through his veins every day she was gone, when he would stare at the window in hopes that she would appear.
He draws in a shaky, disoriented breath. Her skin is warm against his hand, but it’s different. This isn’t the night he lost Jordie. This is something better.
“I missed you, too.”