Drowning (Kaz Brekker)

xiii - Broken and Bound

She couldn't touch him. She couldn't speak either. They couldn't give themselves away to the prisoners, give them ideas about running. Asra snapped her fingers in front of Kaz's face. He blinked, flinching back slightly. He turned to her, face pale and waxen. He met her eyes, she gave him a nod, Kaz returned it. Then he got to work on the prisoners. They were chained to the roof by the collars around their necks, held up like dogs in a kennel, corpses a noose. Asra pushed down her own fear. If Kaz could steel himself and do this, so could she.

She gave the signal. The others rushed over.

"What's happening?" One prisoner asked in Ravkan as Asra yanked him out the wagon.

"Tig!" Matthias snapped. A ripple went through the crowd of prisoners, a terrified hush. The drüskelle's scowl deepened.

Kaz freed seven prisoners closest to the door. Matthias led them over to the ditch, where Nina slowed their pulses till they dropped. Wylan stole their hoods while Nina injected them with a sedative so they'd sleep longer. They stashed the bodies in the trees and headed back over to the wagon.

Wylan was the first to be schackled in, then Nina. Jesper next, sending a wink at Inej as she lowered his hood. Then Matthias. Then Asra locked in Inej, and if was just her and Kaz.

Kaz had removed the hinges on the door, and he simply took the whole thing off to get in. Doors already locked, he put them back into place and got work refastening the hinges. Asra was already shackled around her wrists and feet, her hood held tight in her hand. Her collar hung beside her head. She couldn't bring herself to pull it on. She felt like she was gonna be sick. She was shaking. And Kaz was just as bad.

He dropped the lockpick while working on the hinges. His movements were clumsy and shaking. Only he and Asra weren't hooded, only he and she could see the others' weakness. Asra wasn't sure how she felt about it. She was just scared.

Asra placed her foot on the pick and slid it back over to him. Kaz picked it up without a word and got back to it. Asra wanted to bolt. She shackles jangle at her every move.

The drivers were outside. Kaz dropped another pick. He just grasped the hinges in his gloved hands and squeezed. The doors shook. The hinges held. Th drivers returned to the front. Kaz finished the hinges and stood beside Asra. She turned to face him.

She could see the fear in his eyes, the sheen of sweat on his brow. Could he see the terror in hers? The tremble in her body? She almost hoped he did.

"No mourners," she whispered, because for once she wished they'd speak.

"No funerals." Kaz whispered back, and closed the chain around her neck.

He placed the bag over her head. Asra knew he could easily get himself into the shackles. Asra didn't pay him much mind. Kaz's weakness was his and Asra's was hers. They'd already seen too much of each other.

When Asra was twelve, her mother started sending her on jobs. Small things, always watched from a distance. Simple assassinations, spying, lying, guarding. She was small and bold and she did not fail. She was a prodigy, an anomaly of brilliance, a girl with no name and murder in her blood. She loved to work. Loved to lie and see what it was to be someone else. Loved to see the world outside the House, the cultures she'd researched and the languages she'd learnt. She loved being twelve years old in those split seconds she could. She just the wagon rides.

None of them knew where the House was. It was a security measure, a prevention of familiarity. The common language within was theirs, made up and without a name, just like them. She didn't know where it was. There were no windows on the outer walls. The halls were too maze-like to know where the outer walls were. She didn't know how many doors led out of the building. Every time she left it was hooded, every boat and wagon ride to where she needed to be bound. She was drugged most the time too. Her mind felt like lead, eyes heavy, body liquid. She'd sit and shudder in her seat, too dazed to be scared.