𝐅𝐑𝐎𝐌 𝐄𝐃𝐄𝐍 | Kaz Brekker

「a toll on the soul」

"Does this look right? I haven't done this routine since I was fourteen."

Valeria shifted her weight in the silks and blinked her eyes open to study Inej's lithe form as she lay in the silks, a hideous costume gracing the Wraith the same way it did the Viper. Val cringed at the thought and shut her eyes.

After splitting up from Kaz, Jesper, Inej and Val had had to disappear away with the circus. Valeria had said she could skip out and go with him but he had insisted she stay and deep down she was grateful. She had missed the freedom that came with silks and she knew he knew that.

Inej waited for Jesper to say something but Valeria merely sighed as she lay, suspended in the air by her silks.

"He's too busy eying up the stable hand, Inej." Val said, then raised her sarcastic voice just loud enough for Jesper to hear. "God knows he hasn't had any action in a while."

She heard Inej groan and slip from her silks patting gently onto the floor so she did the same, not wanting to be the only one hanging form the ceiling. No matter how comfortable it was. Inej took Val's hand as they sidled up to Jesper.

"Wouldn't take him as your type, Jes." Val said, eyes roaming the stable hand. He wasn't ugly at all but Valeria had always imagined Jesper with someone more... surprising. But maybe he just wanted a good shag. "I like his nose though, you know what they say-"

"Sorry, what now? Don't think Kaz would want you talking like that, love." Jesper said as he looked down at the two considerably shorter girls. Val rolled her eyes at him, swatting his arm.

"You know one day your going to hate that you weren't listening to me, I'm so very wise." The viper said mockingly as Jesper put his hand on her shoulder, smiling sarcastically at her. 

"What if we had fallen from the silks? When did you stop paying attention?" Inej continued on, truthfully just to annoy Jesper.

"I vaguely remember you both being airborne. Was that recently?" Jesper replied, matching their teasing tone as he always did. 

"Aren't you supposed to be scouting our way out?" Inej asked, looking away from the stablehand.

"What do you think I'm doing?" Jesper asked, gesturing to the stables. Valeria looked up at him with a raised eyebrow.

"I think you're making eyes at that stablehand-" Val said, smirking up at him.

"-at the expense of the mission." Inej finished cooly.

"What stable- oh him." Jesper said, wrapping his arm around Valeria's shoulder as his eyes returned to the boy, a grin on his face. "I suppose he's moderately attractive but I hadn't really noticed."

Valeria admitted to herself that he wasn't ugly, but she preferred dark hair. That was just her opinion.

"Moderately." She said with a shrug. She had always been Jesper's wingwoman as he had been for her, but she had also always had higher standards than Jesper. Very specific standards.

"Oh please, just because he isn't tall, dark and brooding like you like them doesn't mean he's ugly." Jesper said, nudging her. "You know, our bastard fits that-"

"This is going to be a lot less amusing when the carriage you find isn't fast enough." Inej stated to interrupt the two Zemini bisexuals so as to bring them back to the present of where they were. A palace full of people who would gut them if they discovered their true identities. Not as circus performers but as kidnappers.

"Oh so now you're an acrobat and a carriage expert? Tell me, what makes one carriage faster than another? Wheels? Weight? The year it was built?" Jesper rambled, looking over Val's head to Inej. "Don't answer, trick question. The right answer is there is no answer because the carriage does not matter. It's the horse that makes the difference. The horse determines how far, how fast and that determines whether you get caught or not."