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she-posts-nerdy-stuff · 10 hours

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Don't Go Blindly Into the Dark

Summary:

To hide that he can't read, Jan Van Eck has been forcing his son to pretend he's blind since he was eight years old. Wylan is now attending Ketterdam University, and meeting Jesper Fahey may very well be about to change his life. But is he safe to tell Jesper the truth? And what will Jesper say if he does?

Jesper is struggling to weigh up his life in the Barrel and his life at the University of Ketterdam, and there's a good chance that his growing debt is about to make the decision for him. He hasn't attended class consecutively for months, but maybe that will change when his newest project includes partnering up with Wylan Van Eck. But can he really leave the Barrel behind him? And how long can he keep up the pretence of who he thinks Wylan wants him to be?

Content warnings for this chapter: weapons, implied ptsd references, gambling addiction

@justalunaticfangirl

If anyone else would like to be tagged let me know :)

AO3 link: https://archiveofourown.org/works/55445686/chapters/140819224

Chapter 4 - Jesper

By the time Jesper woke up, he was supposed to already be in the library. Shit. Shit shit shit. He fumbled his way into his coat and hurried out of his dorm, arriving just in time to see his new Business and Markets partner walking back out of the building. Shit shit shit.

“Excuse me,” he’d said, hurrying to catch up with the boy yesterday.

He’d turned to face him slowly.

“Hi. Are you…” Jesper surveyed the piece of paper in his hand, as if he didn’t know exactly what it said and exactly who he was talking to, “Wylan Van Eck?”

Wylan raised an eyebrow, tapping his slender cane pointedly against the floorboards. Up close Jesper could see that the kid’s eyes were slightly clouded over, softening the edges of what otherwise would have been a startling blue, but there was no sign of whatever accident might have caused him to lose his sight - except maybe a small, slender scar above his right cheekbone. But unless a good deal of it had faded since he was a child, the scar didn’t cross either of his eyes.

As soon as the note had shown up at his dorm this morning, stating his new partner for Business and Markets was none other than the merchling he’d seen leaving the office yesterday, the reason the dean had put them together was glaringly obvious: Jesper would have to take responsibility for writing the project, so he would be forced to do the work himself instead of letting Helena Dentte gift-wrap him a decent grade. Not that a single decent grade would’ve let him escape from the approaching surety that he was going to flunk out and end up wandering aimlessly around the Barrel until - until what? Until he ended up dead in a ditch somewhere?

“You already know that,” said Wylan, folding his arms.

“Alright, yeah, I already know that. I’m Jesper Fahey, I’m in your class; Economic Principles for-”

“For Business and Markets, right,” he nodded, “We’re being reassigned as partners?”

“Yeah,”

There was a pause.

“Do you, erm, want to meet some time to get started, or…?”

Jesper wasn’t really sure where that ‘or’ was going.

“I have to get home pretty quickly after class,” Wylan swallowed, “My father worries. But I could meet you in the library tomorrow morning?”

Jesper nodded, then caught himself and said:

“Yeah, that sounds good. Say ten bells?”

“Ten bells,”

To be entirely honest, he hadn’t been thrilled to see Wylan Van Eck’s name on the note he was currently distractedly crumpling between his fingers. The chances of him being more likely to pay for a grade than work for it were too high, and if Jesper was going to be stuck doing all the work alone then this plan of the dean’s was going to crash and burn about twenty times faster than it was already likely to. But at least he seemed prepared to start the project - Jesper couldn’t actually remember what the project was, so he’d have to hunt through the piles of abandoned papers in his room later to try and find the original assignment. But he’d had things to attend to first, and judging by this morning he’d apparently let them get out of hand. At least he woke up on campus though.

“Wylan!” he called, rushing up to the boy as he reached the base of the stone stairs, one hand on the railing and the other using his cane to find the edge of each step, “Hey, sorry, it’s Jesper. I’m so sorry-”

“Oh, so you decided to grace me with your presence?” Wylan snapped, turning to face him.

Jesper was taken slightly by surprise.

“Really,” he said, “I’m sorry, I just-”

“Showed up horrendously late,”

“Hey, look kid,” Jesper snapped, because it only took about three seconds for him to get defensive, “I’m trying to apologise to you here-”

“Don’t call me kid,” said Wylan, turning away, “If you want to try showing up tomorrow, I’ll be here from eight,”

Jesper was too taken aback to reply, and for a moment he just stood at the base of the stairs, watching Wylan walk away. He sighed - what time was it? He pulled the timepiece from his pocket and discovered he was over two hours late. Okay, maybe Wylan was right to be a little annoyed. More than a little annoyed.

Twelve bells. He could go to the library alone, to study for a while. He could go and find that assignment, so he knew what he was actually doing when he met Wylan tomorrow. There were a thousand things he could have done.

He walked back to the Barrel, wondering vaguely what Wylan Van Eck was doing at the library from eight in the morning. It was a rare thing for Jepser to see eight in the morning. Jesper didn't want to cross paths with Wylan again until tomorrow; it was impossible to avoid the Geldcanal on the way back to the Staves but Wylan had gone North so Jesper moved South and crossed into East Stave not far from the Slat.

When he’d arrived last night it had been about eight bells, leaving Jesper just enough time to change out of his ugly brown coat before he got to the Crow Club, and he’d found Nina on the doorstep of the Slat. It had taken him by surprise - she didn’t come this way much. Kaz had branded her a snob for it, but they all knew Nina was only here to find a means to an end. Jesper didn’t know the full story, but her beau was stuck in Hellgate on some false charges - at least she was claiming they were false, anyway - and she was making very slow progress through the living nightmare that was Kerch’s legal system in an attempt to win his freedom. But she wasn’t here tonight, and as Jesper wandered past and up towards the Crow Club he wondered what she’d been up to last night. He hadn’t seen Kaz, in the end, except very briefly when he crossed through the Club and gave Jesper nothing more than a sidewards glance, but he had seen Inej.

When Kaz walked through, Jesper was briefly overcome with the need to go and apologise to him. But that was the stupid in him; the part of him that imagined Kaz would forgive him and move on as though this weren’t the fifteen hundredth time he’d brought trouble to his door. He had to wonder why he kept him around, but the answer came pretty easily: he was a good shot, and they both knew he would stay no matter what Kaz said because he had nowhere else to go. So he didn’t make eye contact with Kaz, and instead turned his attention back to his hand of cards and the group of pigeons ready to pour their hard-earned cash into the Dregs’ coffers. It had been a couple of hours later when Inej appeared from nowhere and tapped him on the shoulder.

“Saints -” Jesper jumped, “you have got to stop doing that,”

“Not likely,” she said, “I might need you, I’m going to West Stave,”

Jesper frowned.

“You are?”

“Nina needs me for something, didn’t say what in the message. I just - well, I don’t know what she wants. She said she’d meet me at Goedmed bridge,”

“Okay,” Jesper paused, “What do you need me for? I’m supposed to be here all night,”

“Kaz knows,”

Jesper fidgeted with one of his rings for a moment, then nodded. He kept up a steady stream of chatter as they walked to West Stave, because he knew Inej would find it easier than the quiet.

“And you’re joining me at university this week then?” he asked, when he was finally starting to run out of topics.

“In three days, if all goes to plan. I don’t really know what the plan is, but…”

“Let’s face it,” Jesper sighed, “even when he tells us, we never actually know the plan. I’ll never know how he does it,”

“I think it’s called running on up to sixty percent dumb luck,” said Inej, as Goedmed bridge and the silhouette of Nina Zenik came into view ahead of them.

As they approached Jesper realised the strange thing: Nina was wearing her kefta. Of course he knew she wore one at the White Rose, he’d been enough times when jobs went wrong and either he or a compatriot needed Healing, but he also knew she never wore it outside of the building. It just wasn’t safe to wander the streets so brazenly proclaiming you were Grisha like that. He fidgeted, finally falling quiet, and he felt Inej’s eyes flicking over him. Did she know? Had Kaz told her?

“Sorry,” said Nina, looking at Inej as they met on the bridge, “I know the note was vague, I wasn’t sure how much I could really say,”

“What’s going on?”

She played with the sleeve of her kefta.

“I’ve got a job, I don’t… I don’t know exactly what it’s going to look like, and I don’t like going out in this thing. I was just going to ask if you could tail me?”

Inej nodded, slowly.

“Where’s the job?”

“The Geldstraat,”

Jesper raised an eyebrow.

“What are you doing on the Geldstraat?”

“I have absolutely no idea. Something a Merchant Council member didn’t want to touch the White Rose for,”

“So literally anything?” offered Jesper.

Nina made a face that said ‘yeah, pretty much’. Inej rested her fingers on the knife handle in her belt - the one with the roses on, Jesper couldn’t remember which Saint she’d named after. He was distracted, because he’d noticed that she laid her hands on it or any of her other knives the same way he did his guns. She was on edge.

Now, as Jesper reached the Crow Club and the sun remained obstinately hidden behind a cloud, the building was about as quiet as he had seen it all month. He fought a yawn as he wandered in, surveying the several empty tables, but before he had a chance to take a seat at one of them games that was actually in progress Kaz had appeared ahead of him.

“I need you at Fifth Harbour,”

“Well, good morning to you too,”

Kaz didn’t look amused.

“Fifth Harbour. We’re quiet,”

“It’s always quiet at this time,”

“It’s too quiet. Go,”

Jesper went. And as much as he might have wanted - needed - to do otherwise, he took himself back to the University District that evening and he went to the library the next morning. He didn’t go at eight, because that was just ridiculous, but he managed to make it for nina bells half chime and he didn’t think that was bad at all. He found Wylan sitting alone at one of the tables, apparently not doing anything.

“Hey, kid, it’s me - Jesper,”

“I’m not a kid,” Wylan snapped, turning towards Jesper’s voice.

“Sure,” Jesper sat down opposite him, “You’re an elder statesman,”

Wylan ignored him. They started work, evidently both half-heartedly, and at some point Wylan muttered:

“I hate economics,”

Jesper snorted.

“Same. What a perfect partnership,” he plunked his fountain pen onto his desk, “Why do you even have to take this class then? Don’t you inherit Daddy’s business either way, merchling?”

Wylan grimaced.

“That’s even worse than kid. And no, I don’t,”

“What do you mean you don’t?”

“How am I supposed to run a business, Jepser?” he shook his head, “My stepmother’s kid’ll take it,”

There was no spite or jealousy in his tone, and yet there seemed something profoundly melancholic about every word he spoke. Jesper wasn’t sure why being blind meant you couldn’t run a business, so he said so, and Wylan just scoffed.

“I’m just saying,” said Jesper, “if they think there’s any hope of teaching me how to run a business they must know how to teach you to run one. And anyway, if you hate economics and you’re not even gonna run the business, what are you doing in this class?”

Wylan shrugged.

“It was the only thing that would make my father agree to let me come to the University,” he said, “One business class. Just in case,”

“Just in case of what?”

Wylan either didn’t hear that question or just ignored him, but Jesper was pretty sure it was the latter based on the blush that gathered in his cheeks.

“Why are you here, if you hate it so much?”

“To find my entrepreneurial spirit, of course,”

Wylan raised his eyebrows, his scar shimmering ever so slightly in the sunlight coming through the window.

“And what’s your grand business idea, then?”

Jesper grinned.

“I’m thinking of providing a service for rich kids who want to make their parents mad,”

“I’d roll my eyes, but that would probably be quite fruitful,”

Jesper barked a laugh.

“And that’s without even knowing how cute I am,” he teased, “Trust me, if you knew what I looked like you’d know I’m gonna charge a pretty steep fee,”

“Is that so?”

“Sure is. What do you think merchling? You could be my first client,”

Wylan did roll his eyes then, and Jesper watched the blue move beneath the slightly cloudy film.

“I think you need to stop calling me merchling,”

“I’m afraid that would come with a price tag attached,”

“Are you flirting, or just broke?”

Jepser laughed again.

“Oh, it’s almost definitely both,”

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crvptidgf · 17 days

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Whipped

Kaz Brekker x Reader

➸ summary: just as you start to think that Kaz is incapable of basic human decency, he proves you wrong (in his own, Kaz-like way)

➸ warnings/notes: none

word count: 1.2k

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ONE THING YOU quickly learned about Kaz was that he never showed outward emotion. In fact, sometimes you weren’t too sure he even felt any at all. That was what everybody said - Kaz was robotic in the way he interacted with people, hardly sparing a thought on the well-being or opinions of others.

While it wasn’t far off the truth, you knew there had to be more to him than a void machine with no care for anybody but himself. He was still, after all, human (despite what anybody else might say).

It wasn’t without reason that he gained his infamous aliases. Bastard of the Barrel, Dirtyhands, Demjin. That’s why it surprised you when you started getting nervous around him. Not the kind of nervous that most people felt with Kaz, but more like a stupid, naïve school-girl kind of nervous. Why? You could probably name a million reasons.

Putting aside all that he has done and all that he is, Kaz was genuine. Perhaps not like how Jesper and Inej were - and sure, he didn’t have the softness that Nina held, or the undying open affection that Matthias bared for his lover, or even the sweet, lovable awkwardness that Wylan had. He was, however, intriguing in his own way.

He was brutally loyal to those he deemed worthy; his mind worked unlike anyone else you had met; and he never, ever, took shit from anyone - no matter if it was a stranger off the street or one of his Crows. Not to mention that he always seemed to be 2 steps ahead of his foes, which was something you admired greatly. These special qualities made him who he is and you couldn’t help but fall for his cold and calculating personality.

There was always a wall separating him from being honest with people, his lack of trust and need to be in control too strong to ever let up. Yet bit by bit (or brick by brick) his shell started to gather cracks and crevices in the shape of you.

You had somehow wormed your way into his icy heart. Of course he would never dare admit it to himself, much less say it out loud, but deep down he knew. And he hated it.

He hated that he remembered your favorite color. He hated that he knew exactly how you liked your tea in the mornings. Most of all, he absolutely loathed the fact that you, out of anybody he has ever encountered, managed to become his biggest weakness.

Kaz always prided himself on his nonchalant façade. Nobody could ever read what was going on inside his mind and he worked hard to keep it that way. Until you came along. Until you wrung and twisted his insides until he couldn’t take it anymore - the thoughts of you so polluted in his mind that he couldn’t help but chastise his childish behavior.

He wasn’t a boy anymore. He didn’t have crushes (although what he felt for you was a little more than a measly crush).

All of this to say that, when he saw the small smile that tugged on the corner of your lips whenever he did something thoughtful for you, he actually found that he didn’t mind being reduced to a mindless, clueless idiot around you. He actually realized that he liked making you happy. This epiphany scared him. But if tossing and turning at night, his mind completely overtaken by you, meant that he could see your grin light up the room just one more time, he could live with it.

You, on the other hand, had no idea of his inner turmoil. Yeah you knew he was a bit gentler when you were around (not by much, you noted), but that could be for a multitude of reasons. Surely Kaz Brekker, the notorious Dirtyhands, didn’t take a fancy to you of all people. Right?

These thoughts were however thrown from your mind when you awoke to your floorboards creaking, the sound alerting your fight or flight response. Constantly being in imminent danger does that to a person. You can never be too sure when death would knock on your door.

Yet when you slowly reached your hand under your pillow for your dagger (a gift that Inej had graced you with on your first birthday at the Crow Club), a voice stopped you from your worries.

“It’s just me. No need for any violence so early in the morning.”

Turning in your small but cozy bed, you were met with a somewhat startled looking Kaz. He wasn’t expecting you to wake up - he should’ve forseen this. Saints, he was losing his game. He always did when it came to you.

“Oh,” you replied simply. “Did you need something?”

Kaz’s lips formed into a line, something in his hand shuffling as he mulled over his thoughts. He should leave, he thought. But he didn’t. Instead he stood at the foot of your bed like a total creep, his eyes traveling over your face so quickly that you almost missed it.

“Breakfast,” he said, throwing the bag that he previously toyed with in his hand.

It landed with a soft thud on your bed, the brown paper almost unfolding as it reached your knee. Picking it up slowly, you looked towards Kaz for any indication of what it was. Nothing could’ve prepared you for what was inside.

It was a sugar-roll. Something you had been craving for months, but could never seem to get your hands on. There was only one bakery in the Barrel that sold these, and it was on the complete other side of the city.

“How did you- Where-“ you stumbled over your words, utterly struck by surprise.

Kaz spun his cane in his hand, the crow's head glinting in the sunlight that peeked from your window.

You never thought you would see the day, but he hesitated before answering.

“Had some business to attend to. I just happened to walk by that bakery that you’re always harping on about.”

So he did listen to your meaningless rants. Nina had mentioned the bakery a while back, and you and her bonded over your shared enjoyment of the confectioneries that they sold. You didn’t think Kaz actually heard it, much less remembered what your favorite pastry was.

“Thank you,” you breathed out.

Kaz nodded, retreating backwards as he responded. “Hopefully now you’ll stop bugging me about that stupid roll of yours,” he said.

While his words were harsh, you could see the glint in his eyes as he spotted your excited expression, your hands pulling the doughy goodness out of its bag. In his own backwards way, Kaz was as whipped as somebody like him could get.

As he limped out of your room, the comfort of your presence leaving him, he spotted Jesper outside the door, smirking.

“What,” Kaz snapped.

“You just happened to walk by?”

Kaz rolled his eyes, sighing. He continued to walk, ignoring Jesper’s attempts to annoy the man.

“That bakery is at least 30 minutes away,” he stifled a laugh, “you need to think up better lies, boss.”

“Tell anyone and you’ll never see your guns again,” Kaz said, knowing there was no point in lying any more. He cast a backwards glance at his friend, who immediately put his hands up in defense.

Jesper smiled to himself as he was finally left alone upstairs. He was going to have so much fun taunting that over Kaz's head in the next few weeks.

The Bastard of the Barrel - whipped.

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