Shadows: A Six of Crows Fan fic

Chapter Thirty-Two: Inej pt. 2

The words flowed from him as if there weren't enough words to say what he needed to, would never be enough. As if he had never imagined a time he would speak the stories into existence and now stumbled over the wrong words to run for the right ones.

The stories came out in fragments, in shards of different times and places and moods. Some were happy stories of a family proud of the name Rietveld, no matter how little they had. Some were sad ones of death, of lost parents, of hatred for a girl's ribbons. Some were of simple contentment with a cup of hot chocolate or practicing a magic trick till it was perfect and a familiar face returned home. Jordie. A name she'd only heard spoken a couple of times but had held so much weight-- still held too much weight.

Things only fell into order when he began to speak of the time his brother had figured out their money was gone. From there, the words became robotic, distant, spoken into the air above them as if he hoped the truths of them would be blown away. Truths of sickness, hunger, and pointless prayers. Devastating truths filling her mind with images of swollen, water-logged flesh and the smell of rot.

As he explained his life after he'd finally made it to shore, reborn from Ketterdam's waters, each word worked to pull him under. His face grew clammy, sweat soaked his brow, his eyes pinched in pain. He grew quieter and quieter until the words ended with him pulling on his first pair of gloves.

Together they laid on the bed, still sharing the same pillow but never touching, never looking into the other's eyes. The silence after his story stretched and all Inej could do was wait in silence for him to act next. His breathing was ragged, only his chest moved up and down, the rest of him still. The toll of spilling his memories in every twitch of muscle and bead of sweat on his forehead.

As she waited, still propped on an elbow hovering above him watching the light of the morning inch further across the bed, she started trying to process all that he had said.

It made sense now, to some lengths, why he did what he did. Why the gloves were always on, why he distanced himself from his old self, why he could handle being close to other people, why he shut himself down. But, while it made sense, it didn't make any part of her soul hurt any less for him and what he'd gone through.

Inej thought back to the day Jesper had come into her room to comfort her after the storm. After Kaz had again handed her back the love she tried to give.

She had roared to her empty quarters about the unfairness of it all. About all the crap that they had endured without deserving any of it. She was right, back then, when she had said that none of them had set out to be the criminals they were today, not even Kaz.

He had been a lost boy with no family, no money, and no hope for a future. The world had tried to kill every ounce of happiness and love that he had and because of it— yes, he was ruthless. He had stolen, killed, maimed, tricked, manipulated, and done so many other despicable things to earn him the myths that were whispered in the mist-covered streets of Ketterdam. But, where some may judge him for it, Inej found a kernel of pride and respect growing inside her.

She didn't agree with all of his methods, but Kaz was no worse than her. He had survived the death that stalked him, he had made himself stronger than the waves trying to drown him, and he had fought for her, for his crew, without a care to the damage done to his soul too many times to count. The fact that he could even stand to speak the words he just had to her was only a testament to the true strength and light that was kept inside of him, protected from all the darkness through the years, even if he wouldn't admit it to himself.

They would never have a perfect relationship, she realized. One with conventional standards or behaviors wasn't realistic. But what they could have together could be so much more than that. They had fought through more than most people would in their entire lives and survived. In her mind, she was only that much more assured that they could be something the world would never be ready for.