The crow and the beast - Kaz brekker

chapter 1 - the beast of ketterdam

The beast of ketterdam, many people in the barrel said to have seen it, however nobody has any proof. All the stories about it describe it differently. Some call it a big shadow, others say it has fur, some say it has teeth that could bite a man straight in two and others say it has no mouth at all. The truth is, nobody knows how the beast looks like. It could be an ordinary man.

what people to know is that the beast kills people on the streets of ketterdam and leaves gruesome scenes behind as it does. What people don't know is that the beast walks among them and they have most likely seen it many times.

it was a night as any other in ketterdam when the beast first met kaz brekker. She had seen him many times while stalking the streets of ketterdam. When everybody thinks you are just a large dog you can get a lot of information, about everybody including the bastard of the barrel. This is how Cara knew all about kaz brekker and his crows.

On this faithful night cara laid outside on the streets near the crow club when she saw kaz brekker coming out of the club. He did not look right, like he was panicking about something. The street was mostly empty. Kaz slowly limped down the street closer to her. Cara could see on his face that he was deep in thought, almost reliving a past memory.

he did not see the 2 men behind him walking straight for him. cara knew the 2 men were not with kaz's crew and they did not have any good intentions. Normally she would not mingle herself in conflicts but she could not just let these men take advantage of somebody when he was clearly going through something.

so she growled, a deep threatening growl. It got the attention of kaz as he looked up and snapped out of his thoughts. He planted his feet and lifted his cane as to swing at her but when he did she jumped over the cane and went straight for one of the 2 men behind kaz as they were only a few feet away.

tho she was not not bigger than a big dog she still slammed hard enough into the guy to make him fall backwards. She bit the man in his neck, deep enough to cause serious trauma but not deep enough to kill him. he pushed her off and she jumped back, as the man got up to run away she looked over to kaz who was fighting off the other man.

She lunged at him and bit the man in the leg making him stumble and giving kaz a chance to overpower him and knock him unconscious.

this was the first time they met, cara looked into the cold blue eyes of the bastard of the barrel. Kaz nodded wich was enough for cara to realize what she had just done, she turned around and ran into the night.

kaz called over one of his men to pick up the unconscious man on the ground as he wanted to question him later and find out who had send them. Once he was inside the crow club jesper almost ran to him "I am so sorry boss, I did not mean to push him into you" while he pointed to a clearly drunk but now beaten up man sitting nearby.

"jesper bring this man to my office, make sure he is secure" kaz responded while he pointed his cane towards the unconscious man that attacked him on the street. Jesper looked over to the man in confusion, wondering what had just happened, kaz was not even gone for 5 minutes. He motioned to some guys and helped dragging the unconscious man upstairs into the office. Kaz joining him soon after. When kaz motioned for it jesper threw a bucket of water on the man.

"who send you" kaz was standing in front of the man who was sitting in a chair with his hands tied behind his back. The man did not speak so kaz help his cane to the mans neck and asked again "who send you" kaz knew his efforts were futile as the man still refused to say a word.

"dispose of him" he motioned to jesper. As he started walking out of the office. "is that a dog bite? That looks fresh" jesper said. Kaz turned around and looked at jesper "it is from the black dog on the streets, stay away from it." Jesper looked from the man's leg to kaz "there is a black dog on the street?"

his question was left unanswered as kaz had already retreated to his room. He recalled the incident. When he looked at the dog it did not feel as if he was looking at a dog, he saw intelligence in its green eyes ... and fear.

why would a dog that was on the other side of the street help him, if it attacked out of fear it should have attacked him as well ... but it didn't. which meant that this is not a dog. "inej find out everything you can about the beast of ketterdam"

he knew inej was close enough to hear him. she stepped out of the shadows "do you mean the fairy tale that drunken men made up to justify the murders on the street?" kaz turned to look at her and then back to the book he had just opened on his desk. "I think it might not be a fairy tale after all"