#crowsnkruge

in me nothing is extinguished or forgotten my love feeds on your love, beloved and as long as you live it will be in your arms without leaving mine

— If You Forget Me by Pablo Neruda

Inej always feels the invisible tug at her mind when Kaz is upset, and she knows what it means. She feels his anger with Big Bolliger’s betrayal and his fear when the Council takes her. She feels his anxiety when he brings her long-lost parents to her, and she feels his apprehension at bandaging her wounds. But, like everything else, it’s easier to ignore something when it isn’t in your face, and for the most part, Kaz’s emotions do just that: they stay out of the way, pushed so deep inside of himself that he can barely feel them himself. It’s only when the situation is really dire that they start to bubble to the surface, choking him.

Kaz knows it, too, and he’d be remiss to push the notion of their unlikely connection away without assessing it. He’s learned to use Inej’s feelings to his advantage; he’s learned to gauge the situation based on her emotions that writhe and churn like the restless waters of the True Sea. Not that he’s manipulating her, at least not in the technical sense, but Kaz indeed has always known where to push her buttons for the benefit of all the Dregs. Besides, he supposes that Inej doesn’t really care too much, for Kaz is skilled at reading people even without a soulmate bond.

Soulmate bond. The two simple words that they’ve been skirting around for months or even years now. It’s a rare, delicate thing, almost nonexistent at this point. Inej knows that it has been said that the legendary Sankta Alina formed one, although legend doesn’t say with who. There are those that speculated it was with the late Darkling, those who guessed that it was in fact the Ravkan tsar himself. But in the end, it doesn’t really matter, because it’s not the nature of the bond that matters, but that only the truly special and their respective soulmates can have one. Or so Inej has been told.

Sankta Alina was legendary; of course she shared a soulmate bond, whether it was with a king or a peasant or a grisha. But Inej? And Kaz Brekker?

She knows that he is not worthy to have a soulmate bond bestowed on him, for he is a cheat and a liar and a con artist and a manipulator. But she can’t find it in her heart to put up a fight, especially since she can sense everything he’s feeling. Inej of all people would know that Kaz is not the monster he pretends to be. She wishes she could forget that she knows that, but she can’t. Kaz is as much a part of herself as she is. It hurts to admit it.

There are times, though, that she wonders if she isn’t his soulmate, though he is hers. Those are the times when he acts more callous than usual and buries his emotions under an entire desert, piles of pale, unrelenting sand that falls back into place as she tries to dig it out. And then he does something to confuse her all over again.

She wishes that she herself were not so easy to read.

And Kaz feels, often, that he is not good enough for her. They both know this, and there is no need to discuss it, because they can both sense that within him. And though Kaz once tried to bring up the nature of their bond, his own mind delirious and wandering, Inej only shushed him and disappeared not a moment later.

So at least he can say that he tried. Though of course, he didn’t try hard enough.

Despite everything, despite all the goodness and guilt and shame he can feel within her, Kaz only senses what he knows is the topmost layer of her psyche, and a part of him wants to plunder her mind and let her plunder his; for them both to be totally open with each other, bare and naked in a way even more intimate than sex.

It’s not until he removes his gloves that he finally gets the chance. Kaz’s knuckles are raw and red from the warm air and the cold water; his shirt sleeves are pulled back revealing toned, albeit pale, forearms; his mouth is set in a firm line. Inej watches his concentration deepen, and then, when his skin accidentally touches hers—

Oh, holy Saints.

His soul is ice, and hers is of fire, and they can see all the way through each other right in that moment. And then, before either of them can realize what is happening, he’s yanking his hand away, the dull, grey rag in his grip dripping on the bathroom tiles as he sucks in a breath. Kaz can barely breathe, and yet he wants to touch Inej again and again and again. He never wants to let her go.

But across from her, he can see Inej’s lips thinning and her eyes darkening. He sees her whole body tense its muscles and knows that she must have felt everything inside of him just as he felt everything inside of her, and for the first time, Kaz feels ashamed. He’s never allowed himself to feel this way before, but as he raises his eyes to meet hers, he allows some of his barriers to loosen and slip away, relishing the weight it takes off of his heart.

To Inej, this feels like rolling thunder, but it’s the good kind—the kind of thunder that precedes a beautiful summer storm, the kind Summoned by an Etherealki in stories that come from across the sea. To Inej, Kaz’s conscious opening to her is like a million flowers of all varieties; a newly invented birdsong; that gritty sand covering his soul swept away by a gust of strong wind. She can see him clearly now, or at least, she can see the top layer of his emotions, more than she’s ever seen before, save their one accidental brush.

And she watches as Kaz sucks in a breath and steps back toward her, deliberately placing a hand on her face. His eyes widen as he does it, for her skin there is soft and warm and not at all how he expected. He supposes that he had assumed the feel of her would have been naught but shadow and secrets, and his lips curl upward when he feels that she is flesh and bone.

For five long seconds, he doesn’t pull his hand away, instead leaning forward so that his lips just barely brush hers. It’s more of a rock in her direction, anyway, and yet somehow, to both of them, it counts. The emotions rush through them then, and Kaz and Inej cannot tell whose are whose. Kaz closes his eyes and bites his teeth to keep from retching, and Inej does her best not to let tears fall. She knows, then, that he is her soulmate with all absolute, and that she is his as well. There is no question, and she is back to wondering why.

Perhaps, one day, they will do great things. But for now, they are just two broken, healing teenagers in a bathroom, touching for the first time, and it’s something they will remember forever.