"We are in the literal bottom of the Barrel."
The streets they were walking down were dirtier and dingier than they were used to, which was saying quite a lot. Smashed glass littered the damp cobbles, the mist rising the closer they got to the other side of the harbour. It was a place they tried their best to avoid for fear of the most brutal and desperate of criminals, streets writhe with poverty and unpredictable danger.
As they walked through the cold dark alleyways barely lit by any lanterns, Shan wrapped her shawl tighter around her shoulders and hugged herself in an attempt to stay warm.
"Stadtwatch don't patrol down here," Kaz reminded him. "We're safer."
"Isn't that ironic?" She mused to herself, scanning each alleyway they passed, uneasy.
She could handle a drunken mugger on any day, but she was tired and didn't fancy the fight on the off chance.
Something whispered at the back of her mind, a familiar feeling creeping up on her and she glanced over her shoulder to see Inej catching up to them, footsteps silent. She twitched a smile at the girl, but when the one she returned only half met her eyes, she knew something was wrong.
"What is it?" She asked with dread.
Jesper flinched as the silent girl passed him on the right and bit back a groan. "Saints-"
"-we're accused of murdering Tante Heleen."
"Oh, she's dead," Shan said unbothered, eyes trailing to the floor and absently rubbing her arm. "Such a shame."
"Well it is considering they want us to take the fall for it." Jesper retorted, before glancing at Inej suspiciously. "Did you..."
"No!"
"Jesper." Shan scolded.
He held his hands up in defense, pressing his lips into a thin line. "Just checking!"
"It was Pekka Rollins, wasn't it?" Kaz's gravelly voice, rougher than usual, made them look his way. He had a grave look about him, eyes exceptionally dark. "He's framed us for murder."
Shan felt her eyelids flutter as a sudden wave of fatigue swept over her. She rubbed at her brow, blinking to keep herself alert. A creeping sensation of dread left a pit in her stomach as she exhaled and tried to focus back on what they were saying, her mind starting to slip away from her.
A pain blossomed behind her eyes as she opened them, trying to breathe to regain her focus, their voices fading in and out to her ears.
"Why take it out on Heleen?"
"She held the deeds to the crow club."
Shan suddenly stiffened, her eyes flickering to meet Kaz's. She scanned his face for reason or rhyme rapidly. "What?"
He nodded to her regretfully but remained serious.
Her eyes narrowed as the pain in her skull grew with the bubbling anger under her skin. "Kaz," she said lowly, warning in her tone as her gaze turned icy. She could feel Jesper and Inej glancing between them, lingering on Shan's cold expression. "I don't know if you recall, but I own half the deeds."
His jaw was tense as his eyes lowered a fraction, lips pressing into a thin line.
"The bar is in my name."
"It was."
Her head snapped round. "What the fuck do you mean?"
He averted his gaze from hers, to stare at Inej. "I cut a deal so Inej could help us with the Sun Summoner, so Rollins killed her."
Her mind worked rapidly to fill in the pieces. He'd have needed her signature to sign over full ownership of the club, which was comprised of the gambling parlour and Slat in his name, and the bar in her own.
Suddenly, she knew exactly what he had done, and she was so tired and so fed up with it that she seriously considered punching him right in his pretty face.
"You fucker," she said in realisation. "That's why you were dancing around the question."
He glanced off to the side. "In fairness, you haven't asked one."
Shan closed her eyes, clenching her fists at her sides. Her blood felt as though it were boiling in her veins, all her thoughts turning violent.
"You forged my signature."
"In fairness again, it's very easy to forge. You should really change it-"
"-do you want me to hit you?" She cut him off sharply. "Is that what you want? You keep talking, and I am too fucking tired to have any self restraint right now."
Why didn't he just ask her? Why couldn't he just talk to her, or communicate his plans before he dove in headfirst and went through with them? Why? Why was he such a difficult bastard?
He held back information on important plans, giving them nothing but grains of sand spilling through his gloved fingers, and expected them to just follow along because they trusted him. He was impossible to talk to sometimes, like a brick wall with his emotions buried six foot deep behind his fucking ribcage. He was a cold, callous fucker who was sometimes impossible to speak to, and who didn't know how to fucking communicate properly because he was too guarded to let himself trust anyone properly.
"Maybe we should focus on the bigger issue at hand," Kaz cut in, fixing her with a stern look. "Pekka Rollins now owns the Club and everyone who works there now works for him."
Shan turned away from him, she had to. She turned away and covered her face with her hands, fighting the urge to scream.
Inej's shaky voice brought her out of it.
"There's more."
They watched her brandish her wrist and the feather tattoo marking her bronze skin, and a sinking feeling settled into all of their stomachs at the realisation.
"The Menagerie." Said Kaz.
"He owns that now, too." She said, lowering her arm and absently brushing her thumb over the tattoo. She averted her gaze to the floor. "Along with everything else the Menagerie owns."
Shan regarded the girl gently, her anger fading into something different as she wrapped her arms around herself.
"So, stadtwatch are everywhere and Pekka's untouchable." Jesper surmised, placing his hands on his hips. "Never thought I'd miss the Fold..."
Inej met Shan's eyes, filled with worry, mind clouded with dreaded thoughts. The white haired girl leant to her side, their arms brushing, and she twitched a weak smile that didn't reach anywhere near her eyes.
When Kaz held out a stack of money to Inej, they both eyed it warily.
"What's this for?" She asked in confusion, taking it.
"We aren't the only ones under a false accusation." Kaz explained roughly. "Your saint has a new bounty on her head. This time from Fjerda."
Jesper filled in, "they think she's in the cahoots with the Darkling."
"Fjerdans people are so narrow-minded." Shan commented under her breath.
All three of them gave her a strange look, and she shrugged. Sue her for being self aware.
Kaz looked back at Inej seriously. "This is your ticket to go and protect her." Shs furrowed her eyebrows in response. "Go to Third Harbour and find a stevedore named Jari. He'll put you on a cargo ship out of here."
Shan pressed her lips into a thin line, unsure if she liked the idea of being without their Wraith. Inej had already thought of leaving before, but with the stakes raised now, she would understand if she accepted the offer. It didn't mean she had to like it, but she understood. Oddly, it was quite kind of Kaz. In spite of him being a bastard, he did take care of his own.
Inej frowned accusingly, however. "You're sending me away?"
"I promised you freedom. This is me sticking to that promise."
"This isn't freedom, Kaz," she gestured with the wad of money, shaking her head with disgust in her eyes. "My indenture is owned by Pekka."
"I'll take care of it." He said certainly, something dangerous but resolute in his expression. As he glanced between them all. "It isn't your fight now. It's mine."
With no more words left, he turned away from them and continued on down the street, leaning heavily on his cane. The other three glanced between eachother in mild shock.
The imagery of a group of birds together struck her heart. The leader Crow with the broken wing leaving them first, while the others hesitated. The ones who's feathers shone an iridescent purple fluttered her wings and turned away, glancing back with hesitation before flying off. The crow and the dove left stared after the ones long gone in sadness, wings fluttering uncertainly.
Shan swallowed back her emotions as Inej shook her head and stormed after Kaz, determination in her step. Jesper quickly followed while Shan limped to catch up, gritting her teeth.
Inej had handed back the money and forced Kaz to stop by the time she reached them.
"What happens to saints is fate," Inej said, a newfound confidence in her stance. "What happens next is up to us."
Kaz glanced between all three of them, gaze lingering a second longer on Shan who's hand was pressed against her thigh in pain.
"Fine." He said. "But you'll have to stay in the shadows. We reconvene at two bells at the end of Rozenstraat. Look for a workshop around the back."
Vague as ever, shan thought bitterly to herself.
Still, they nodded to eachother and split up.
Shan tried to keep a steady pace but the longer she pressed her legs to move, the more the dull ache in her thigh became a sharp throbbing. Her head was killing her and she felt tired enough to fall asleep standing if she let her eyes fall closed for long enough. She took the necessary twists and turns before coming across the almost abandoned looking workshop.
Her legs were stiff as she entered and closed the door behind her. Given the fact it was already open, she assumed someone else had already arrived.
She used the wall for support and limped down the dark hallway towards a set of old wooden stairs leading down into what looked like a decently lit basement.
Voices drifted up to meet her as she entered slowly.
"You said that was a one time thing, not a real step into your world," a male voice spoke. "I was strapped at the time."
They sounded well-educated judging by the way they put their words together and she began to wonder what someone like that was doing in such a dodgy area of the Barrel.
She decended the stairs as quiet as she could, biting on the inside of her cheek to stop herself from exclaiming in pain. Everything seemed to be piling ontop of her at once and she didn't know if she could handle it much longer.
"And now?" She picked out Kaz's gravelly voice instantly, lowered. "When was the last time you ate?"
As she scanned the basement that looked more like a science lab combined with a makeshift living space, her eyes fell on a russet haired boy a head shorter than Kaz with delicate, kind features.
Her heart warmed uncomfortably at Kaz's surprisingly caring tone, and she paused on the bottom step, leaning on the rail in exhaustion.
Sometimes she wanted to strangle Kaz Brekker, and other times... oh, those other times.
"I didn't know you had friends, Kaz," Shan mused, breaking the silence and forcing the discomfort off of her face. "I'm impressed."
The two glanced her way, the boy fiddling with his fingers in front of him while Kaz placed a random glass bottle down and brushed his glove off on his coat.
"Oh, hello," the boy waved. "I'm Wylan."
"Shan," she smiled plainly, carefully lowering herself to sit down on the bottom step. "Pleasure."
"Are... you alright?"
She hummed and nodded, clutching her wound through her skirts with clenched teeth. Her eyes flitted around her new surroundings with feigned interest as she attempted to distract herself.
But not a minute later, eyes were on her and she was refusing to look up. At least until his mismatched footsteps stopped beside her on the stairs.
"I'm going out." He said simply.
Her eyes flickered up to meet his. "Are you going to delight me with the knowledge of where?"
"No."
"Of course not." She murmured in passing, tired with his closed off nature, and now too tired to even argue. "Why would you bother?"
Kaz paused on the steps, words dying on his tongue along with the taste of bitter regret. But he forced himself on and she listened to the tapping of his cane until it faded past the door and out into the night.
As Wylan pottered around, making himself busy with organising liquids and glass bottles of substances she couldn't even put a name to, it became almost impossible to keep her eyes open.
She rubbed them futilly but rested her temple against the wooden rail, the room beginning to fade away as different images took over her mind.
The scent of smoke, the sound of breaking glass and a terrible burning sensation in her chest that made it hard to swallow back her emotions.
As she blinked through her tired daze, staring down at the same divot in the wood by her boot for quite a while, a slow sinking feeling settled in her gut. Way after Jesper arrived, she seemed to be waiting and listening out for that tapping of a cane to settle her nerves, but the longer she waited, the worse her anxiety grew because now she had convinced herself that whatever Kaz was doing - she wasn't going to like it.
Which was why he had chosen to be so vague. But then again, why bother letting her know he was going out at all?
It itched at her mind like a spider traipsing its spindly legs along a web, and for reasons she couldn't describe.
But it had been a long, long day and she wanted nothing more for once in her life, than to sleep in her bed at the Slat and forgo any responsibilities. The exhaustion ws practically weighing her down, tethering her to the floor.
When Kaz finally did return, Shan was half asleep curled up on the stairs with her head resting against the rail.
The quiet murmurings of everyone else arriving didn't disturb her for she was far too gone to even notice their words, nor if they were important at all.
But at the tap of that familiar cane passing by her, she nearly flinched out of her daze and managed to blearily prise her eyes open.
Jesper coughed to hide his amused grin, which she caught but didn't have the energy to chastise, at which point she realised there was a finely dressed girl sat on the stairs beside her.
"You didn't miss anything interesting, I assure you," the brunette told her while leaning towards her playfully.
Shan cracked a weak smile at her, before her eyes finally focussed and something slipped into place in her mind.
"Oh," she realised quietly, mumbling under her breath, "You're the little red bird."
The expression on the womans face was unreadable as she regarded her.
Shan shook her head, realising what she'd said when in fact she'd meant to say Nina. "I'm sorry, I'm getting my words mixed up." She put a hand out to excuse herself.
But Nina had a gentle expression on her face, her eyes lined with the pain of a memory, the memory of a man she held close to her heart. But the white haired girl had been asleep while they had discussed her presence among the group, or so she had thought.
"Why... why did you call me that?" Nina titled her head curiously, heart aching a touch.
Shan was surprised she wasn't upset with her. When her dazed mutterings spilled from her lips, it was often not well received. Usually her conscience liked to pull up secrets that people liked to keep buried deep, or, in this such case, close to their hearts. And here Shan could see she had struck a chord.
She hesitated, unsure how to answer such a question, wondering internally if she even could.
"Forgive me," was all she could say, and she meant it. "Sometimes the things I say make little sense."
The cryptic response left Nina stunned.
But before they knew it, Kaz's voice cut through the air and instructed them to take to the roof.
Shan averted her gaze and pulled herself to a stand, following the others as they all made it up the stairs. She did so with stiff movements, trying to ignore the dread rolling around inside her skull as the cold midnight air hit their skin.
She shivered and tugged her shawl closer as she moved to stand closer to Inej's side. The girl gazed at her and brushed her shoulder with hers, eyes lingering in concern on the side of her face.
Shan swallowed thickly and glanced at the others, glad to find she wasn't the only apprehensive one.
The cold air howled, bringing in the faint scent of salt on the air as they stared out at the lit up city. Lantern light illuminated the clubs, bars and businesses truly alive this time of night, nearly creating the illusion that the dull, drab city was actually glittering with life.
When she closed her eyes for a moment, a black feather set alight burned through her brain, making her snap them back open and search for Kaz's eyes.
But a blinding pain struck her head as she put a hand over her eyes, overwhelmed by the feeling. Without meaning to she must have swayed on her feet, nudging shoulders with Inej, for the girl had quickly put an arm around her to steady her.
"Shan, are you alright?" She asked gently, eying the woman in concern.
Instead of responding with a simple I'm fine like she intended, whispered words fell from her lips without her control.
"The lions and the flames will roar once the match is struck," she breathed, the sentence nearly lost with the wind if Inej hadn't been listening intently. "And the Crows will have to fly the nest."
Her hand lowered as clarity swept through her vision and suddenly, she was aware of where she was again and what was about to happen.
She opened her mouth to say something, going to search for Kaz's gaze across the roof, but something exploded before she could.
The girl flinched and Inej held her arm tighter. She barely withheld the urge to cover her ears at the booming sound. A bright flash of golden flame burst out in the distance and her heart raced.
All of them were stunned into silence.
The explosion burst upwards and settled in a cloud of smoke and flickering light as faint alarm bells rang out along with the growing chaos in the streets, far off in the distance.
It all seemed so far away but something in her heart burned with a familiar ache that had her tired eyes stinging.
"What was that?" Inej demanded, turning on Kaz.
Shans lips parted as she stared at the destruction, knowing only that the feeling in her chest had warned her, and she had ignored it, been naive to it.
Kaz Brekker had told her he was going out for a reason; because Kaz Brekker always had a reason.
He told her as a warning. A warning that he was going to do something, something that she wouldn't approve of, and he was saving her the details to prolong the what would be the aftermath of her reaction.
"The Crow Club." He revealed stonily.
And while her rational mind understood the move he had made, understood it was no longer their home, no longer theirs - and even if she understood that he had told her, in some round about way that something like this was going to happen - Shan felt nothing but the exhaustion threatening to send her crashing to the floor and the burning rage inside her heart, a bad cocktail tipping towards disaster.
Shan took a deep breath and steeled her gaze at the smoke wafting into the night sky.
Jesper and Inej's complaints and arguing muffled in her ears, and before she knew it she turned to face Kaz, finally, and cut in.
"Kaz," she said evenly, clutching her shawl over her heart. "Be a dear and give me your cane."
He shot her a look. "Why?"
Her response was immediate. "Because I need to hit something."
"No."
"Why not?" She asked innocently, a gleam in her eyes as she challenged him.
She could feel multiple burning sets of eyes watching her curiously, but only Inej and Jesper were unnerved by her calm, icy tone.
Kaz's eyes narrowed, "Because you'll only go and hit me."
"Take a gamble. Maybe I won't." She challenged darkly, suddenly stepping up into his personal space. Tension sparked within the air as the rooftop was swathed in heavy silence. Only the scent of smoke drifted between them. He stared down at her stoically, but a small muscle in his jaw tightened. She said quietly, "You destroyed our home."
"It wasn't ours any more." He responded shortly.
That wasn't the point-
Her voice rose a fraction as she snapped, "You destroyed my bar."
After forging her signature as though she didn't even have half ownership. As though they weren't business partners, or fucking friends.
"I'll get you a new one." Kaz said. His eyes were dark as he maintained her icy gaze.
He could feel the unease of the others behind her, their eyes flitting between the two like they were great stags crashing antlers together.
And yet at those words and his promise, her gaze softened all of a sudden.
Despite the fact a part of her did believe him, and any other time she would have swooned at such a promise, now, Shan was far too tired and in far too much pain to listen to that voice in her head.
Maybe it was the lack of sleep, maybe it was the bloodless or the pain--
Shan swung on Kaz before anyone could blink, her bony knuckles colliding with his nose with a distinct cracking sound that rang impossibly loud across the rooftop.
Someone gasped behind her as he stumbled back a step before righting himself, face angled away from them and downcast by shadows. Slowly he turned to face them, the hand not holding his cane in a vice like grip reaching up to trace his upper lip. He had a sudden ruffled look about him.
Crimson flashed across his pale skin, an unreadable look in his eyes as the ends of his gloves came away shiny and red.
"While you're in the market," she began lowly as she went to move past him, meeting his eyes as Ice clashed gainst stone. "You can go looking for a new nose."
Shans presence disappeared fromtbhe roof like a whisp of cold air. Leaving them all still and in a state of mild shock.