Elora Van Eck | Kaz Brekker

TWELVE | THE HATCHING CROW

***

k a z

  "DEAD?"

  "Stone."

  Kaz drummed his gloved fingers on the wooden surface of his desk all the while he digested Jesper's unfortunate proclamation. "And the documents are all destroyed?"

  "Each one torn to shreds."

  Kaz exhaled distinctly. His one concern had verily materialized. The single droplet of a trace he had, led him facing an impasse. And anew, he appeared to be drowning, choking on the preponderance of responsibility, the conglomeration of culpability. The heftiness his promise maintained lay on his bones alike a grown-on boulder, and every muscle in his figure ached.

  "Kaz, maybe you should—" began Jesper, but was thickly interrupted. Kaz cut the sharpshooter's tongue before he dared to mouth the words.

  The fledgling merchant trained his ablaze blue eyes onto his companion, savvy of the unvoiced words. His own phrases were extensively marinated in anger upon spitting at Jesper, "Don't you dare Jes. Don't you dare suggest that I give up."

  Jesper sighed. His lack of insight happened to be plainly evident. His shoulders sunk in a hopeless mannerism. Eyes searched Kaz's demeanor for a sliver of reason, but only a tinge of the thief's venom forced itself down the dark-skinned's throat.

  The clash of Kaz's walking stick against the flooring emitted a perilous heat. His voice was close to feral. "I will not surrender," seethed he. "We will not quit. Not until Elora Van Eck is standing right before me, viable and unscathed. I do not care if I need to lay the entire city in ruins." A tsunami arose within Kaz's threatening blue, closing in on the shore as his own despair mirrored itself on the enraged crest of water.

  Still, Jesper was unaware of who the girl was truly – he was oblivious of who Elora Van Eck was to Kaz. And he was utterly wonderous about the relation that connected a wealthy young woman of the Van Eck house to Dirtyhands.

  Captured in the realm of speculation, Jesper's attentiveness seemed to ignore the fuming auriculars of his friend, who bit his tongue in a miserable attempt to calm. For, ere Jesper could have perceived the climbing smoke, the words were by then falling from his lips carelessly. "But what's the point?" the Zemini unintentionally broke the levee.

  Kaz scoffed. Following, a malicious laugh erupted from deep within the thief. Deafening and hollow. Threatening and cold. If Jesper were unarmed, or an unequivocal opponent, fear would have detained his throat and pushed him into callous parallelization

  Kaz fixated his dusky gaze on the trustworthy brown doors to Jesper's soul, familiar with its vulnerable points. That knowledge soaked up the entirety of humaneness his scarred soul clutched. He ripped the door out its hinges and demolished it to bits. "What's the point?" Mimicked Kaz, disbelief scratching his tone. "You of all people honestly thirst reasoning for why I desire to rescue a defenseless girl? Suddenly, the heinous Kaz Brekker needs justification? Is it because morality does not go with my appearance?"

  "With your notoriety, it doesn't, and you know that as well as everyone else in this city."

  At that, Brekker stepped an unhesitating meter closer.

  Jesper's muscles commanded for withdrawal, the acrimony chiseled into Kaz's forehead. But his synapses refused to transmit particular data. The sharpshooter parted his lips, yet no words fled. He had no more to add.

  Notwithstanding, Kaz was baring his teeth afresh. "Do tell me, Jesper. What specifically was your point when you shot that unsparing farm boy? When you killed the blacksmith's girl?" Kaz narrowed the distance by another painfully slow step. "What reasoning could you provide If I desired to know why the woman from the dairy had to perish? Why the old caretaker at the hotel ceased to exist?" He was by now close enough to Jesper's nose, he could feel the boy's exasperated breaths on his own scorching cheeks.