Drowning (Kaz Brekker)

xiv - Alive

SHE WAS STILL GRINNING AS SHE LEFT THE HOTEL. After Kaz and Nina had left the morgue, Jesper had pounced. Matthias, ever the modest gentleman, did the honourable thing and went back to sleep instead of picking apart Asra and Kaz's relationship.

If it could be called a relationship.

Which it could.

Jesper knew no such honour. For almost an hour, he drilled her with questions and teases and laughter. Asra fired right back with the kiss he'd shared with Wylan, something she'd accidentally peeked on her way to see the Triumvirate, but he'd merely grabbed the merchling and kissed him again. Then Wylan was involved and even Inej chimed in with a few witty remarks.

It wasn't until Colm, bleary-eyed and grumbling, came out of his bedroom and pleaded with them to get some rest, the Crows dispersed in search of sleep.

But Asra didn't. She left the room and went down the hall and picked open the lock on the window. From there she made her way to the roof and she couldn't quite resist the temptation of climbing her way to the top of the bell tower. She sat, hands stinging and muscles aching with effort from the climb, on the edge of the room and stared at the expanse of Ketterdam before her.

She'd missed this place, these people. She couldn't even lie to herself about it. The knowledge was... unpleasant, but at the same time Asra took it as a victory.

How long had it been? A year? A year and a half? This all started with a freak accident on a job that left her too injured to survive the routine dosage of clearance. For the first time in four years, for a split second, she'd been sober. The anaesthetic had worn off, the booze had seen itself out, and the clearance had never entered her in the first place.

For the first time in four years, she'd been able to think clearly. For the first time in four years, she could see further than the next two seconds. For the first time in two years, the nameless girl had a chance to truly think.

And in that blinding moment of clarity, it all came crashing down. She'd known, right then and there, she needed out.

And now here she was, almost two years later and she'd become Asra Behandelar, bartender and Crow and friend and family and dare she say it,  lover to one of the most dangerous man on the planet.

She'd come back. She wouldn't lose all she'd worked for to the woman who'd ruined her in the first place. She may never be whole and she may never be totally free of that place's clutches, but she'd be damned before she lost all she'd come to know and love.

Asra Behandelar would be back. She promised it to herself right then and there. She'd survive this onslaught, and then she'd see what it was like to really fucking live.

She was not born dead. She was not a monster forced into human skin. She was a girl, a living breathing girl and she deserved to be seen and treated and the person she was, the person she'd fought to be. Asra Behandelar was real. Asra Behandelar was her.

Asra Behandelar would not go back to the House she'd called home, the woman she'd called Mother, the pack she'd called family. She would not. She could not.

The damage was irreversible, but all she'd done was removed herself from hell and realised it was, in fact, hell. She'd earned respect for herself beyond the realms of her leathal abilities and instead, Asra liked herself because she knew she should, because she knew it was not her fault, because she knew she deserved it.

She was not healed, not by a longshot. But she was healing. Every day was better than the last. Every easy laugh and smile and every comforting touch and word helped mould her into something she liked to look at in the mirror. She was becoming herself. She knew the meaning of the word self. She liked this life.