'It is very difficult to make ones way in this city without being wicked at one time or another, when the cities way is so wicked to begin with.'
Or in which: Kaz Brekker didn't need a reason - but his little sister was the closest thing to it.
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Violet had been only two weeks away from fifteen when she found Saskia again.
It had taken her a while, of course, not to say she hadn't been searching beneath the waves of jobs and heists for her own selfish gain.
With the Wraith on their side, and as her friend and confidant, it had made things easier.
She never forced Inej to go any further into the West Stave than she was comfortable. She only asked for information. She still had her connections at the Menagerie, and though Inej insisted she would be fine travelling alone there, Violet refused to let her.
Inej had never taught her to climb like she did, had never offered - she knew it would be wise, but the thought of her little body falling, her foot slipping and in one moment breaking something - Inej could not knowingly put her at that risk. (No matter how many times she had begged when they'd first met.)
But she was smart, and wickedly observant. She watched where Inej put her feet, what little hooks and nooks in walls she sought out, where she leant her balance, how she did it.
She wasn't anywhere as quick and lithe as her, and she wasn't the keenest on going as high as she could without a flinch, but she had taught herself enough to get by. And in a sticky situation, she had an extra escape option. When no one was around or when sleep escaped her, she sat herself on the roof with the magpies and crows to watch the dark city move beneath her.
Kaz had argued with her about it when he found out and in response, she had climbed out his attic window and gone to sit on the roof where she knew he wouldn't (or couldn't) follow.
(In response he had locked the window from the inside so she couldn't get back in, but Jesper had let her back in through his window out of sympathy.)
Of course most of her leads had ran themselves into dead ends because the girl she was looking for no longer went by the name she knew her by.
Saskia was long gone along with the memory of her dead brother.
Violet wondered how many names she had foregone since she had last seen her. How many stories she had twisted for someone else's gain, how many roles she had played.
The pressing question that plagued her mind right when she didn't want to think of the past was, did she even remember her? Did she remember Kaz, and Jordie? Did she even remember playing the role of Saskia, or had she been moved too quickly onto the next little role to play to even before she could settle on the name?
She had grown to understand that it wasn't her fault - that Pekka Rollins had been the puppet master to the whole charade - had ruined their lives so devastatingly that both Kaz and herself had never been the same.
Her own brother could not bare the touch of another, hiding his emotions behind his leather gloves and shady reputation, and when Violet wanted nothing more, needed nothing more than the embrace of her only brother to keep her from shattering to pieces - he couldn't.
