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The first time it happened, it jarred him. Surprised him in a way that nothing else did. Made him double-take, made him question his choices.
Why, he thought to himself, did I think that?
It had been nine months since he'd taken in the Suli girl, and three since her first kill for the Dregs. In those three months, she'd changed almost imperceptibly, but it was there, and Kaz didn't miss it.
He'd began to look for more signs of it. He noticed that she was waking up earlier than before. She was prone to spacing out, and startling when her name was called. She was always uneasy, never trustful of her surroundings. She hardly ate. She almost never talked to anyone besides Kaz.
These observations came with a price: he was always looking at her. So it didn't surprise him to find himself staring at her from across his room, where she sat cross-legged on the space beside his bed, papers for the Dregs laid out carefully around her, with the intensity and gravity of watching out for trouble.
What did surprise him was that when she found a rather confusing document, when she tucked her hair behind her ear and chewed on her bottom lip almost absently, he thought, I want to kiss Inej.
The realization caused him to start and topple over his ink bottle. He cursed, too loudly, and hastened to move his papers out of the way before they were ruined.
"Kaz?"
He looked up, back to her, to her wary gaze, to her furrowed brows, to her warm brown eyes, to her lips. Saints, those lips.
Kaz coughed awkwardly, struggling to maintain his composure. He met her stare as evenly as he could and said, "Inej, could you get me a cloth?"
"Why did you spill your ink?"
"I was being careless."
"You're never careless."
"This is the last time," he promised. It wasn't.
The second time, it was during a mission. He wasn't Kaz, he was Dirtyhands, and she wasn't Inej, she was the Wraith.
And Jesper was the most Jesper as he could get, laughing madly as he fired shot after shot at the Black Tips swarming towards them, taunting them even as the tides waned in the rival gang's favor.
Kaz knew there was a very real chance they were going to die. He turned to Inej; all three of them were leaning against a crate to shield themselves from the worst of the enemy fire.
"Inej," Kaz began, ready to tell her to flee and save herself, flee and hide, because she was the only one who could, but the expression on Inej's face made him pause.
There was a calm fire raging beneath the brown of her eyes, a sea of tamed rage, the deadliest kind of fury. Her mouth was set, and she seemed to glow, and glow, from within, like a goddess being reborn in fire.
Kaz looked upon her, and worshiped.
"We are not going to die today, Kaz Brekker," she promised, and he believed her. "I will not let you die. Not here, not on this day, and certainly not under the bullets of those scum."
And then she disappeared. Up above the crates, into some empty pocket of air she knew how to weave so expertly around herself. Kaz still hadn't gotten used to how eerie it was to watch her just... be gone. Like she never existed.
Kaz dragged Jesper out of his way and peered beyond to see what kind of damage Inej was doing--no. It wasn't Inej, he reminded himself, it was the Wraith, and his phantom girl had come out to play.
All around him and Jesper and their salvation-crate, Black Tips were falling, one after the other, from no blade that any of them could see. But Kaz saw.
She was just a blur, merely a wisp of dark hair and brown skin, a wind whispering prayers in her enemies' ears before her knives slid into their rib cages and stopped their hearts forever.
Kaz saw her pause before a rather young shooter, saw her brows furrow, before she was gone again and the young girl was dead. In that moment, with her hair curling to her temples and her mouth moving fast in a plea to her Saints, he wondered how those same lips would feel beneath his own, to have those lips whisper him awake, to have those lips assure him that he, like her victims, was worthy of salvation.
Jesper whooped in triumph, and Kaz realized that the battle was over, and his fierce Wraith had won. She stood in a sea of her dead, chest heaving rapidly, her knuckles white around her knife hilts.
When she looked up and met his gaze from across the blood-stained floor, her expression was grim, but thankful.
Thank the Saints you are alive, it seemed to say to him, thank the Saints that Dirtyhands will live another day.
He was going to buy her another knife.
The third time it happened, she had touched him.
He was having one of his worse nightmares, of awakening corpses and a sea of blood and tears, but instead of Jordie's bloated body underneath his hands, it was Inej's, and her eyes, like his brother's, were wide open.
Her blue lips moved, joining the chant of the living dead, You did this, this is your fault, your fault. Pay for your debts, Kaz Brekker. Pay with your life.
When he woke, it was to the sound of her voice, the real one, saying, "Kaz? Kaz. Wake up. You're having a nightmare."
He rose with a gasp, his chest tight and hurting. He turned to Inej, eyes wide and wondering, then his gaze fell to her hand.
On his bare arm.
He yanked it away and pushed himself further from her until he hit the wall, all the time screaming, like a child throwing a tantrum, "Don't touch me! You know better than to touch me! Get away from me!"
Inej didn't flinch, but he saw the hurt in her eyes quickly hidden by a glare. "You wouldn't wake up," she growled, standing up from her crouch beside his bed. "I'm sorry for trying to save your life. I could hear you screaming from my room." She began to walk away.
"Wait, wait." Kaz rubbed a hand through his face, desperate and frustrated and angry with both himself and her. "Wait, Inej, Saints, wait."
Inej stopped by his door and leaned against it, turning to him with one eyebrow raised, arms crossed. Her I'm listening, but I'm still going to be angry about it pose.
That was something he liked about Inej, her unwavering self-respect. She knew when she was crossed, and she didn't back down so easily, not unlike most of the cowering Dregs that drew back at one glare from Kaz.
"Inej," Kaz began. I'm sorry stuck at his throat, and he ended up just staring at her.
She stared back, waiting.
His window was thrown open (that must have been the way she came in, seeing as he equipped his door with locks only he was adept enough to pick), and the moonlight slanted over her, creating shadows over her face, making her seem... otherworldly.
But Inej was always otherworldly to Kaz. He'd never really believed someone like her was real; she'd always seemed like a fantasy, a mirage given to Kaz by the Saints to spite him.
"Here is a girl," they had sentenced him, "who is pure and good and everything that you are not, and she is here as your only real ally in the world, but we have made it so that you cannot touch her. You can never be sure if she will stay."
Kaz closed his eyes to shut her out, and gritted through his teeth, "I gave you no permission to enter my room."
He heard her sigh, long and furious. She had expected more of him, it would seem. She always tried to make him better than he ever could be. "I couldn't let you die in your sleep, Kaz," she said after a long silence.
"I'm glad you did, Inej." He opened his eyes just in time to see her mouth drop open, just slightly. "Thank you."
She stared at him a while, eyes wide and eyebrows furrowed, confused as he was about the sudden appreciation. But then she nodded, pleased, and walked towards the window.
"Good night, then," she said quietly, perching on the frame. She looked back at him once, and the moon broke out just then to light her in a silver light, the brightest thing in Kaz's entire existence, and his heart skipped two beats as he wondered, What would happened if I kissed her right now?
She would be surprised, for sure. Would she hate it? He'd never... He'd never kissed anyone before, never wanted to after Saskia. But he wondered what Inej would like, what she'd do, if he did. Because he wanted to. More than anything else in the world, he wanted to kiss the beautiful, wonderful girl on his window, who climbed a story to wake him up in his lowest time, who demanded and earned his respect.
It took him a while to realize she was already gone, the window shut behind her, and a while longer still to realize he hadn't hated being touched that much, because it had been Inej. Another while longer to fall asleep, and much, much longer after that, inside a dream of moonlight and laughter, to acknowledge that he, Kaz Brekker, Bastard of the Barrel, the Demon of the Dregs, was in love.
The fourth time was when they found her, free of her chains and in no need of any help but a ride home to Ketterdam.
He hadn't expected any less of his Wraith--no, of his Inej--but it hadn't stopped him from unleashing all the pent-up darkness that had been brewing in his soul for years, calmed only be Inej's trust that he was good, and spurred into motion by her absence, to the white-faced bastards that stood his way.
When he saw her running towards him, the dress she had worn the last time he saw her in tatters, face bloody and eyes dimmer with the dark he'd sworn never to let touch her, the worst kind of fury beat at his ears, at his mouth, at his heart. But he didn't let it loose, not with her in front of him, not with her looking at him as she'd always looked at him before, with faith and complete belief in the salvation of his soul. He needed to preserve that, even for just a little while until he hunted down every single being involved with hurting her.
"Inej." Her name clawed through his throat, and his cane fell to the ground, abandoned and useless. "Inej!"
"Kaz," Inej replied, close enough to touch, but his hands were bare and he was unsure... "Kaz, Saints, I can't believe you're here."
"I can't believe you're here," Kaz said, and damning it all to hell, he reached for her. Grazed his bare knuckles along her jaw, brushed his bare thumb against the dark skin below her eye, took one of her hands in one of his, and offered his soul to her, stripped of all armor, just as she wanted.
"I'm here," he assured her, leaning his forehead against hers and closing his eyes to the rest of the world that wasn't Inej and the skin beneath his bare hands. "I'll always be here."
And the only thing left to do then would have been to inch forward and meet her open mouth with his, taste the sunlight and beauty on her lips, feel the warmth and grace with every movement, and tell her he'd do it over and over again if she'd let him, and that he was here, and he was real, and he was no longer afraid.
But then Jesper's bomb exploded in the distance, and Inej and Kaz jumped apart. They looked at each other, then nodded.
"One last time, Wraith," he promised. "Just one more time."
"Let's go, Dirtyhands," she replied, smiling, and there was a promise in her eyes, too.
One last time, the Wraith and her Dirtyhands picked up their weapons and ran to the fight. One last time, together.
"So today's the day."
Inej glanced at the boy who had joined her on the dock. Kaz Rietveld was a different man from Kaz Brekker, a much different man.
After he avenged his brother, and avenged Inej (brushing away her help, because the Wraith was no more, and Inej's killing days were over and done), he'd finally found it in himself to acknowledge that Kaz Rietveld hadn't died with Jordie, and that he was still very much alive, and Kaz Brekker had the power to free him. That acknowledgement had led to more things, greater things. Forgiveness, hope. Peace.
And it led to this, this moment. Five months after their skirmish with Van Eck, four after Kaz Brekker had set about his plan to ruin his brother's killer, two after he'd done it, one after she'd told him that she'd done it, too. Bought a ship, hired a crew of her own.
Kaz had his hands in his pockets, but Inej knew they weren't gloved. They hadn't been for a long while.
"Today's the day," Inej confirmed, nodding.
Her ship was in front of them, beautiful and majestic and all she'd ever imagined. Her crew was busy scrambling about for last-minute preparations, their shouting almost drowning out her and Kaz's conversation.
They were silent for a while, but then Kaz said, "You're going to save a lot of lives, Ghafa."
Inej nodded. "That's my plan, yes."
"I haven't told you thanks, by the way." He turned to her, the brim of his hat pulled low over his eyes.
"For what?" Inej's heart was creeping into her throat.
"For saving mine."
"I didn't save your life, Kaz." She swallowed painfully, but didn't look away.
"You did," he insisted. Gravel and stones, the voice of the boy she'd known first as Dirtyhands, then as the Bastard of the Barrel, and then simply as Kaz. Her ally, her friend, her treasure. "More than you know. You saved my life, Inej Ghafa. You saved my soul. If you could do that, you could do anything."
Inej closed her eyes against the pain threatening to crush her. "Is it to late to persuade you to come with me?" she asked, her voice breaking.
"I have no business in your dream, Inej," he said, "and I have work to do in Ketterdam. Somebody has to flush out all the damned rats of this hellhole." She could hear his grin, stretching over his face and bursting his eyes with joy the way Kaz Brekker's grins never had.
"Then promise me you'll think of me, Rietveld," she implored, still not opening her eyes.
His voice was soft and honest as he said, "Every minute of every day, awake or asleep, at work or at peace, I will think of you, and I will remember your light and I shall remember your grace. Know this, Inej Ghafa, wherever the winds may take you, wherever the tides may bring you, wherever your soul may guide you, I will think of you, and I will never forget. This, I promise."
When Inej opened her eyes again, they were full of tears, and she saw that Kaz's were as well. Kaz Brekker never cried, but here was Kaz Rietveld, the soul she had saved, and it was enough.
"Thank you for not asking me to stay," she whispered, the wind loud in her ears and her heartbeat erratic and stuttering.
"Thank you for being real," he replied, and wrapped his arms around her to pull her closer, and closer...
Their eyes closed again, just as their lips met, and everything else faded away.
There was only Kaz's lips on her own, warm and inexperienced but still the best kiss she'd ever had with anyone. There was only Kaz's hands--bare, skin on skin--cupping her face, unafraid and unhesitating. There was only the taste of sea breeze and the salt of tears. There was only the silkiness of his hair as she ran her hands through it, the soft sounds he was making from the back of his throat, the joy and grief that divided Inej. There was only them, pressing towards each other to claim more and more, and more and more, a kiss that could last them through a lifetime apart.
Inej's breath hitched in her throat as they broke apart, needing more than she got, wanting to give more to the boy who deserved more.
"Thank you, Inej," Kaz said again, burying his face against her shoulder, and she hugged him to her, one last time. "Twisted. Crooked. Wrong. And yet still you fixed me. You fixed me. You fixed me."
"You fixed yourself, Kaz Rietveld," she said. "You fixed yourself."
"So this is goodbye?"
"This is goodbye."
The next time Inej saw Kaz Rietveld, it was two years later, and they had both accomplished something great.
When their gazes met across the crowded dock, Inej on top of her ship with the crew almost tripled, and Kaz smiling brighter than he ever had before, they raised their hands in greeting. In salute.
"I am real," the gesture said. "And I am here."