Our Fractured Souls | Kaz Brekker

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Inej

Kaz Brekker didn't need a reason.

Those were the words whispered on the murky streets of Ketterdam. In the taverns and Coffeehouses, in the dark and bleeding alleyways of the pleasure district known as the Barrel.

The boy they called Dirtyhands didn't need a reason any more than he needed permission - to break a leg, sever an alliance, make a dirty deal, or change a man's fortune with the turn of a card.

Of course they were wrong, Inej considered deeply as she and her hooded twin sister crossed the stone bridge over the blackened waters of the Beurscanal and into the deserted main square that fronted the Exchange.

Everyone close enough to Kaz Brekker - or as close as he would allow them; knew.

Kaz Brekker had one reason.

A reason fitted with silver swords, red hair, and a blackened heart of gold.

Only his inner circle saw the way they cared for each other. With veiled looks when neither thought the other was looking, with misspoken words of concern sometimes concealed in insults.

Only the inner circle knew.

No one else.

No one else really cared to know.

Romance was a myth in the Barrel.

A weakness that couldn't be allowed.

Not for the Barrel's best at least.

Gore, murder, and violent delights was the language of the broken figures that resided in the slums. Desperate creatures that crawled from the worst places the Barrel had to offer, and found sanctuary in the scraps the city offered. The canals, the clubs, the reek of alcohol and numerous other wretched scents on the wind, that was home to them.

Those people had nowhere else to go. No one else who cared.

The Ghafa twins were two of the only people in this hellscape with true family.

They were each other's family. Each other's lifelines. Each other's souls. They were blood.

Birthed to the same mother and father, together, on the same day sixteen years ago. They were twins. Identical sisters.

Forever each other's closest companion.

And of course they had the Dregs.

Their own personal gang of thugs, bandits, thieves and killers that had risen from the lowest rungs of society to become one of the most feared organisations that existed in the Barrel. All thanks to a pair of gloved hands riddled with secrets.

Kaz Brekker is the reason we're alive today. Zahra always said. He's the reason the Dregs are what they are, why Per Haskell's name still holds power, and why you and I are who we are. Even if he's an insufferable damn bastard.

Her sister would always quote as she sharpened her knives and throwing stars in their room at the Slat, whenever Inej would begin to feel apprehensive or guilty about the life they led.

He built an empire from nothing and made it a rising power among Merchants and Barrel royalty.

Every act of violence was deliberate coming from Kaz. And every favour came with enough strings attached to stage a puppet show.