i know this is a popular headcanon for kanej but i still like thinking out loud about it. i imagine kaz starts to really take to playing with inej’s hair, especially when the darkness relapses and he can’t bring himself to touch her skin. but he still wants to feel close; to feel her, and he knows she needs it too. so those soft straight tresses fall from his hand like water–water wholly different from the strangling cold of his memories, threatening to rise and rise. he inhales. he focuses. the shimmer of gold as it catches the lamplight becomes a lighthouse. the brush in his hands, an oar. and slowly, slowly, with every stroke, with every strand passing through his fingers, he brings himself further and further from the shores of ketterdam, and closer and closer to her.
he asks inej to teach him how to braid her hair, a skill his nimble card-dealing hands quickly master. and then, just like those magic card tricks he had once obsessed with perfecting, he finds himself studying as many intricate braiding patterns as he can on the tourists, his patrons, and other city residents. he practices every chance he has with string, or rope, and once with the mane of a very patient mare during a stakeout in a countryside barn.
it was nina who first took notice of the variety of complicated braids that crowned inej’s head and wrapped down her shoulder. it was strange, she thought, that she only saw these designs when they were both visiting ketterdam. whenever the captain of the wraith would disembark in ravka, her hair returned to the simple three-stranded braid. nina makes a mental note to ask inej who her hairdresser in ketterdam is.
you can imagine her surprise when inej laughs and tells her, oh it’s just kaz.
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