Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The echoing of Kaz’s cane against the stone walkway is quiet enough to not draw the attention of the very few people nearby. Making his way down West Stave was not something Kaz tended to do. But today, it needed to be done, he needed to meet someone, again.

He weaved through the shadows. Maybe not with the skill of Inej, but she was the Wraith, no one could compare to her when it came to being invisible. He arrived exactly to the place he had been right before the trip to Ravka, he had needed phosphorus bombs. Now he needed more bombs, and he needed the man he had originally gone to again. He needed Wylan Hendriks, he needed Wylan Van Eck.

He arrived exactly where he needed to be, not a place he’d be. He had heard people call it many things. The main nickname being “Just Another Whore House” which was exactly why he had told no one of this, especially not Inej. He walked up to the main man, tossed him some kruge and made his way to the place he needed to be. The man, Leon Dersa, the owner of this establishment, the main he will likely be negotiating with after this conversation.

He knocks against the correct door. The door is almost in pristine condition, showing how much more the boy he is going to speak to is. Valued far more than others here. People just love his ‘company’ don’t they. Disgusting, he’s intelligent and valuable and most people see is a pretty face to fuck.

Kaz hears the murmur of a “Come in~” behind the door. He opens it quickly and makes his way inside, closing the door behind him. He takes a look over the boy in front of him, Wylan Van Eck. Wylan looks up, his face, originally smiling and flirtatious, immediately drops into a scowl as he recognizes Kaz.

“Kaz Brekker, welcome back, do you actually want to fuck me this time, or are you jut going to ask me to make more explosives for you, blow a shit ton of money on meeting with me in the first place, and then just throw a bit of kruge at me and leave?”

“Well, when you put it that way, this starts to sound like a waste of time.”

“One would assume it would be, but I’m guessing my bombs worked a charm, huh.”

Wylan’s smirk returns to his face, eyes still locked on Kaz’s own eyes. He makes a movement with his head, gesturing for Kaz to come over to Wylan. Wylan who has been splayed across a sofa with only a silk robe on this entire time.

“At least sit up will you, Wylan. Because, I have a preposition for you, one I strongly believe you’re going to like.”

Wylan rolls his eyes but still sits up, pulling the robe tighter around himself. His eyes have widened ever so slightly, Kaz has obviously peaked his interests.

“Well, what’s the preposition you have for me, Kaz?”

Kaz takes a second to ponder over that one sentence. A sentence laced with venom and interest, along with boredom and mockery that never seems to leave when talking to Kaz. The mockery is always there, with every one of his clients. Yet, Wylan really only lets it show with Kaz. Wylan is likely the only person Kaz will ever let get away with the disrespect he shows him.

The main reasoning for this is simple: He’s playing a character. This isn’t really what Wylan acts like, but being here, in this set where he can never break character, he isn’t going to take the risk. The risk that somebody might see him break, see him vulnerable to any extent, he can’t risk it, neither of them can. Kaz has seen what Wylan can act like out of character. He’s seen Wylan when it was just the two of them in the workshop Kaz gave him.

That Wylan was kind, far more respectful than the playboy, slutty Wylan in front of him. This Wylan exudes confidence and superiority. Both traits, Kaz has come to learn, are entirely fake. Just another part of his act. The merchling part of Wylan is still obvious, Jesper isn’t going to like Wylan. He probably isn’t going to like Wylan at all. The things Kaz lets him get away with.

They sit in silence, simply just scanning each other. Kaz’s thoughts are still drifting over how the other crows are going to react to the newcomer. Jesper is going to have to take some time to get used to Wylan. Wylan who will treat Kaz snarkily and have no repercussions from Kaz. Wylan who is probably going to have his bratty and slutty act going for a while after he meets the other crows, except for maybe when it’s just him and Kaz.

He knows very well that almost all the crows are not going to take a liking to the very obvious merchling joining the team. Nina will probably be the first to take a liking to him, followed by Matthias and Inej, and Jesper will be last. If Jesper even ever takes a liking to Wylan. However, Kaz could hardly care what they think of Wylan because he is valuable. Not only is he skilled with bombs, shown with the bombs he used in Ravka against the Darkling and the bombs he used to blow up the Crow Club.

Kaz’s thoughts stop wandering when he hears Wylan clear his throat. Wylan is glaring at him intensely. The flirtatious look that Wylan uses with his clients is back in his eyes. That’s when Kaz realizes that his eyes have just been tracing over Wylan’s body for the last few minutes they had sat in silence.

“Like what you see, Brekker?”

“Shut it, Wylan. Do you want to hear my preposition for you, or not?”

“Fine, fine, okay, what is it?”

“I’m going to get you out of here, I’m going to buy you from Leon and you will work for me exclusively.”

“Ooh, exclusive, you sure you don’t want me, Brekker? Especially since you’re starting to get a bit flustered over there, aren’t you, Brekker.”

“Can I finish, please?”

“Right, right, sorry, please continue.”

“You’ll make bombs for me, you’ll be my demolitions expert. I may, occasionally, have you join the rest of my crows on jobs. You’ll be a crow as well, my sixth crow, the final one likely. Any questions so far?”

“No, no, not at all, actually, yes, am I getting paid for this?”

“You’ll be paid for each bomb I have you make, you’ll keep the workshop and you can do whatever you want with it–”

“Deal. Deal, I agree, yes, let's do this.”

“Great–”

“Final thing.”

“Oh, right. Got to make it look like I actually slept with you.”

“Yes, yes, good luck with getting Leon to agree for you to have me.”

Wylan waves his hand in the air, gesturing for Kaz to go towards the door, for Kaz to leave. Kaz takes the hint and gets up as he hears Wylan spread back out onto the sofa. Hopefully, if everything goes according to plan, he can stop having to act like such a slut. Kaz takes one last glance at Wylan as he steps out of the clean room.

“Bye Brekker~”

Chapter Text

Kaz knocks on the wooden door in front of him. It swings open and he steps inside. It’s an office, an office of a business man who couldn’t care for appearances, only kruge. Kaz can respect that, he thinks in a way similar to that, but the difference is, Kaz knows that money and appearances go hand in hand, Leon doesn’t.

“Ah, Kaz Brekker, to what do I owe the honor?”

“I have a deal for you, a transaction if I may.”

“What kind of transaction?”

“I want Wylan, and I will have Wylan.”

“Now that’s an awful mighty thing to say about another man’s property, what are you willing to give me in return for him.”

“Kruge, a lot of kruge, and a bit of territory if needed.”

At that moment, Kaz brings out the case he’d stashed nearby when visiting Wylan. He sets it up on Leon’s desk and opens it. Leon’s eyes go wide when the case is turned to him. The amount of kruge in the case is unfathomable. Leon gasps and begins to stutter a response.

“D- deal, th- the extra territory is- isn’t needed.”

“Well then, I suppose I just need you to uphold your end of the bargain.”

Leon rises from his chair quickly, striding over to a nearby file cabinet. He takes a key out and unlocks one of the drawers. He takes out a few papers, walks back over to his desk and places them in the middle of Kaz and himself. Kaz knows what the papers are. They’re the papers that say, legally, Wylan is technically property of Leon Dersa. He watches closely as Leon brings out another group of papers from his desk. Papers to transfer ownership from Leon to Kaz.

Kaz, continuing to watch Leon’s every move, watches as he begins to sign his name in the correct places. Then he leans backwards in his chair. He reaches for a string that Kaz had noticed on another visit to this office. Leon pulls on the string and Kaz hears the faint sound of a bell, and the patter of feet. Suddenly, the door behind Kaz swings open and Kaz grips his cane more roughly.

“Bring me Wylan Hendricks. Now.”

The man in the doorway nods and rushes away, the door closing behind him. Kaz turns back to Leon as the man begins to speak, again.

“So just sign here, here, and right here. Wylan will have to sign here, and then he will be yours.”

Kaz follows the instructions with ease, simply shifting the papers over to himself and signing. The door behind him opens again. Someone walks in, likely Wylan, and the door closes once again.

“Wylan, come over here and sign your name right here.”

Kaz turns in time to see the quick flash of fear in his eyes. The flash was quick enough for Leon to not notice, however. Leon groans and leaves the office when he hears a man outside the door call “Boss!” and closes the door behind him.

“Uhh, what do I do?”

“First of all, why are we whispering? And secondly, just sign your name.”

“How well can you mimic handwriting?”

“Well enough, why?”

“Because I quite literally am unable to do that so I need you to write the signature for me.”

Wylan walks over to the desk and takes out two of the papers. One is the paper he needs to write his signature on, the other is one that already has his signature. Kaz gets the memo. He picks back up the pen and does a damn near perfect imitation of Wylan’s original signature.

“Alright now that that’s all done, we just need to wait for Leon to get his skinny ass back in here.”

Wylan is always quick to get back into character, Kaz notes. Once more, the door opens and Leon walks back in, closing the door another time. He walks to the desk and looks over the finished papers with the new signatures. He stacks them together and hands them to Kaz. Then, he picks up the rest of the papers and throws them into the fire.

“Well, I suppose all there’s left to do now is for you and your new fucktoy to walk back over to his room and clear out his things. Enjoy having that fine ass for yourself.”

Leon laughs to himself as Kaz pulls Wylan and himself out of the office and back towards his room. They arrive and begin to clear things out. Once the room is barren, all of Wylan’s things that he’s collected from his time in the Barrel sit in a bag in Wylan’s hand.

“Ahem, Brekker~ You don’t actually expect me to carry this right?”

Wylan flashes Kaz an innocent yet flirtatious smirk. Kaz rolls his eyes but returns the smile and holds out his hand to take the bag. Wylan quickly hands off the bag. Kaz knows he has people he could make do this for him, could also just make Wylan carry his own damn bag, but he won’t.

They begin their walk back to Wylan’s workshop. On the way Kaz fills Wylan in on the other crows.

“Jesper and Inej are basically my right hands and Nina and Matthias are the backup. There’s also the dregs but you’ll mainly be dealing with the crows, since you’ll be one of them. Inej will likely be wary of you at first, but she’ll warm up to you since you’ll be a crow. Nina will probably be the first to warm up to you, and Matthias will probably do the same because whatever Nina does he will gladly do. Jesper… Jesper will be the difficult one. He won’t like anything about you basically, so expect the worst from him. I will make damn sure they all respect you though, any questions?”

“Can I keep my bitchy act going? Can purposefully try to keep the other crows from bothering me unless told they have to?”

“Do whatever you wish, Wy. Ah, we’re here.”

“Well see you later, lover. I’m gonna set the rest of this shit up, and fully move in, you know.”

“Yes, yes, well, I’m going to go collect the other crows and bring them here to meet you, so expect company soon.”

“Oh, I’ll be waiting, lover. See you later, Brekker.”

Kaz takes one last look at Wylan’s flirtatious smirk and turns away, smiling to himself. He leaves the workshop and heads to meet with the other crows to bring them back here.

Chapter Text

“Hottest person I have ever slept with, the hottest. And he left before I woke up. Are you kidding me, I finally score with someone like him and he leaves me first!”

“Oh, calm down, Jesper. Serves your right since you always do that to everyone else.”

“Who’s side are you even on, Nina? What about you Matthias? Or- or you Inej- or maybe the man of the hour himself, what’s your opinion Kaz?”

Kaz gives a disgusted glare to Jesper as he looks over at the other crows. Nina looks annoyed, obviously the main one Jesper was having his discussion with. Matthias looks as concerned as he always does whenever Jesper starts talking. Inej looks bored and half asleep, well, until Kaz walked in, that is.

Kaz finally speaks, but ignores Jesper’s question entirely. “I need all four of you to come with me, the crows have a new member and I’d like for the rest of you to meet him.”

Kaz is met with wide eyes and dropped jaws. Inej is the first to recover and question Kaz’s statement. “A new member, why do we need a new member?”

“Because we did, because we do. We needed a demolitions man, and I provided one.”

“Bu- but Kaz-” Jesper starts.

“No buts, now get up and follow me.”

Kaz immediately turns on his heel and walks out. He listens as the crows scramble to follow behind him.

“So, where exactly are we headed?” Matthias asks.

“His workshop, which I suppose is also his new home.” Kaz says, mostly to himself. Kaz keeps walking, the crowd now in silence behind him. There are a few quiet murmurs from them every so often but not commonly.

Kaz stops in front of the door to Wylan’s workshop and brings out his key. He unlocks the door and steps inside. Then he gestures for the other crows to follow while he calls out.

“Wylan! I want you to meet the rest of my crows.”

“Did he just say Wylan…”

“Yes, Jesper, he said Wylan, why?”

“That’s the guy I was just talking about, the one I slept with.”

Everyone goes stiff around Kaz. The boy himself plasters a fake smile across his face and turns to give a death glare to his crows to warn them from bringing up that subject. The air has grown frigid by Jesper’s statement when the boy of the hour walks through the doorway.
“Welcome back, Kaz. You were gone for like two hours alone, but nonetheless… Hello! I’m Wylan, lovely to meet you four. Welcome to my workshop. I’m your new demolitions man.”

All of the crows turn to their newest member. Kaz looks calm again, Jesper looks even more uncomfortable than earlier, and the three other crows who have yet to meet him can understand Jesper’s distress. He’s drop-dead-gorgeous. Shining orange hair, piercing blue eyes, and an incredibly alluring smirk on his lips. Everything about him seemed to be perfect. From his perfectly manicured nails, to his firm-fitting, silky outfit, to his hair where every strand seemed to have been methodically placed.

Jesper stared in shock, mouth slightly agape. He knew this boy, or, he thought he knew this boy. He had seen this boy from below. He had seen his eyes roll back in his head, heard his shallow breaths. He had met this boy a few months ago. The place had slipped his mind, seemingly unimportant. He had bought him stroopwaffles of all things, which makes sense now. Jesper apparently hadn’t noticed the obvious signs that he was not fully in his right mind at the time, but he sure realized them now.

The place he mainly remembered him being in was his own bedroom. Jesper’s bedroom, Jesper had no idea where Wylan even lived. He didn’t remember Wylan looking so well dressed either, but, in his defense, clothes had come off pretty quickly. Except for Wylan's shirt, that had never come off. Jesper had tried to get it off him, to no avail as Wylan had pushed his hands above his head before he could finish unbuttoning it.

Kaz could feel Jesper’s uncomfort from behind himself, and he chose to fully ignore it. Instead, all his focus went to Wylan in front of him. Inej was the first to actually recover and respond.

“Hello, I’m Inej. I’m who they call the Wraith.”

“Ah, I’ve heard of you, Kaz has mentioned you, well technically he’s mentioned all of you, but you the most.”

Nina is the next to speak up. “I’m Nina, Nina Zenik, and this is Matthias, I’m Grisha and he’s just- well, him.”

Wylan gives a soft smile and nods to them. Then he finally turns towards Jesper. Jesper freezes, waiting for the awkward moment of recognition, but it never comes.

‘And you are?”

“Uh, uh, Jesper? Jesper Fahey. We’ve met before, do you not remember?”

“We’ve met? Are you sure? Must have slipped my mind.”

“That’s enough for today.” Kaz finally speaks. “The four of you can leave.” He turns and gives them a cold stare. He’s not saying they can leave, he’s saying they will leave. And they listen, Jesper, of course, being dragged out by the collar, still frozen from his short interaction with Wylan.

Jesper is shocked. Pure shock. Not only did he leave Jesper before he awoke that night, he didn’t even have the decency to remember who he was. Jesper sits at the table in the slat. Shell-shocked. He’s been obsessing over Wylan since he had the audacity to leave him as a one-night-stand and Wylan doesn’t even know who he is. Other than, apparently, that he works for Kaz.

Jesper is even more confused when he remembers Kaz in that whole interaction. He had smiled at Wylan. An actual genuine smile. Not one born of malicious intent or faked for appearances. Jesper can’t remember the last time he had gotten that smile, or if he had ever gotten it in the first place. That kind of thing was rare, especially from Kaz Brekker. He didn’t give out those kinds of smiles for free. Wylan was a mystery to Jesper, one he intended to solve.