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When you were little, the name along the inside of your forearm read “Kaz Rietveld” in childish, blocky letters. As you grew through the same hardships that every Barrel rat wore like a second skin, that name was the only thing that kept you sane. When you were gnawing the flesh off a discarded animal rib you found in some restaurant’s garbage, your eyes kept trailing over the letters, imagining what your soulmate would be like should you be so lucky as to meet them.
Already, the letters were closer together than they used to be. Sharper, like your soulmate got more used to writing.
Then one day, the name changed. Those familiar letters shifted to read “Kaz Brekker.” You were still young. The name did not yet have any meaning in the Barrel. That would come later. In that moment, you wondered why he would have changed his name. Maybe that plague that almost killed you took out his family. Maybe he’d been adopted! That happened sometimes, right? Some kids were lucky enough to find new homes when theirs died.
Soon enough, mutters of a kid people called the Bastard of the Barrel started to trickle down to your ears at the bottom of Ketterdam’s pecking order. Everyone either respected or feared him too much to call him anything other than that title or Dirtyhands. You heard of him moving quickly up the ranks of the Dregs, forging a reputation that few made few bold enough to act against him.
You were in your teens when you stepped out of the lice-infested warehouse you called home, straight into what appeared to be some kind of interrogation. A boy your age with a black cane stood beside another with a gun trained on a grown man whose face was more ground meat than human flesh. “Uh . . .” the mumble left your mouth the same way breath did when you were punched in the gut.
“Kaz?” the boy with the gun muttered the name as a question.
There was no way . . . But then, you’d never heard that name before . . . With that cane and those gloves, you rationalized that you could only be looking at Dirtyhands himself, and that meant . . . “Kaz Brekker?” you questioned quietly.
The boy blinked, clearly surprised, before his previous sneer fell back over his face. “And you are? This is my warehouse, and I was not told,” he smacked the whimpering man with the bottom of his cane, “of any squatters when I acquired it.”
You offered your name, already certain of where this conversation would lead.
“Jesper, take our friend back to the Crow Club. Deal with him there.”
“Kaz--”
“Did I indicate that anything about that was a request?”
“. . . No.”
“Good. Go.”
In just moments, you were alone with the boy you knew to be your soulmate. The meeting was nothing like the daydreams you used to cling to. “So I was right?” You just wanted confirmation.
Kaz coughed. “Yes. I assumed you would be out in the country.”
You could read into that later. Instead, you informed him, “Barrel, born and raised.”
“Gang?”
“None. Why do you think I live here?”
He hummed lowly. “You know no one can know about this?”
“Would I have lived this long if I was stupid?”
“I didn’t . . . That’s not what I meant.”
“I know what you meant, Kaz. I won’t tell anyone that we’re . . . you know.” You didn’t want to say it out loud. There was always a high chance that you had eavesdroppers, even here.
“. . . Good. What do you want in return?”
“Is knowing you on the table?”
You thought you saw a slight flush bloom in his pale cheeks. “That could be arranged.”