#ninazenik

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Pekka Rollins wasn’t a smart man in the academic sense.

But Ketterdam had taught him that knowing what people wanted was more profitable than knowing what they needed.

And Kaz Brekker?

Kaz Brekker wanted nothing.

That’s what had kept Pekka up at night. That’s what made him sick with rage and curiosity. What kind of boy clawed his way from barrel scum to king without wanting anything?

No weakness. No strings. Not even revenge. 

At least, not anymore.

So when the girl showed up—sharp-tongued, hard-eyed, a walking contradiction of grudge and loyalty—Pekka noticed. She was fast. Good with a knife. But something about her made Kaz hesitate. And Kaz Brekker didn’t hesitate. Not unless it meant something.

Pekka had tried to figure him out for years and nothing stuck.

Until one night, one careless moment.

It wasn’t a photo. It wasn’t a confession. It wasn’t something Kaz said.

It was something he didn’t say.

“Boss, you’ll want to see this,” Danno, one of Pekka’s street rats, said as he tossed a damp journal onto the table. He was breathing hard like he’d just run across three bridges.

“You better be interruptin’ me for somethin’ golden,” Pekka muttered, swirling his drink.

Danno smirked. “Better. I think I found his soft spot.”

It was a routine report. Kaz meeting with a few of his crew after a botched arms deal near East Stave. Nothing unusual.

But in a narrow alley behind the warehouse, Danno caught a moment.

Dirtyhands, usually frigid as death itself, stopped. He turned to face her. The girl—Rollins barely remembered her name. One of the newer assets. The one who liked to enter through his window.

Y/N.

The report described her standing toe-to-toe with Kaz, yelling at him. Something about a bracelet. Something about a promise. Something about not being a pawn.

And Brekker?

He didn’t walk away. He didn’t strike back. He listened.

Not like a boss. Like something else.

And then—right before she stormed off—he reached out.

Didn’t touch her. But his hand trembled. Like he wanted to.

Rollins almost jumped up in joy.

He read the description three times. “He flinched?”

Danno nodded. “Swear on my mother.”

Rollins laughed. Long and slow.

“You’ve been a slippery bastard, Brekker,” he whispered. “But even rats can’t hide when they start givin’ a damn.”

Pekka Rollins had built his empire not just on blood—but on betrayal.

And trust? Trust was a blade people handed you handle-first, right before you gutted them with it.

So when the opportunity came to break Kaz Brekker with nothing but a name and a girl—Rollins sharpened the blade himself.

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Y/N got the job on a Thursday.

A simple run to intercept a merchant dealing with knockoff jurda near the canals. Quick in-and-out. The kind of mission Pekka usually handed you when he needed someone precise, invisible, and deniable.

You didn’t even blink. Just nodded, grabbed her knives, and went.

That was the brilliance of it: no sedative, no ambush in a dark alley. Just routine.

It wasn’t until you reached the meeting point—a narrow warehouse on the edge of the Bridge District—that something felt wrong.

There were no guards posted.

No crates. No flickering lanterns, no whisper of ships.

Just... silence.

You hesitated before you stepped in. You wish you hadn't though.

The door slammed behind you as soon as you had two steps in and the lights went out.

Y/N’s body moved on instinct—knives drawn, pivot low, breath held—but it didn’t matter.

The floor beneath her gave out with a sickening lurch.

A trap door.

You hit the ground hard, rolling into a space that reeked of mold and iron.

A cage.

Not metaphorical.

A literal cage.

You scrambled to your feet, but it was too late.

The lights snapped on with a buzz, and there he was.

Pekka Rollins, standing on the other side of the bars, smiling like the devil dressed in velvet.

“Saints,” Y/N muttered, breathing hard. “You’re kidding me.”

“Oh, I wish I was,” he said, drawing a cigar and lighting it like he had all the time in the world. “I paid a real amount of money for you in Shu and out of all the things you become…” he smirked.

“You had to be his sister.” 

Your eyes widened.

“You just walked yourself into your own grave. Isn’t that tragic? All that work, all that double-crossing and tiptoeing around the boy’s leash—and here you are, boxed up like a street dog.”

“I’ll kill you,” you hissed, grabbing your last knife.

“Oh, I don’t doubt that.” He exhaled smoke through his nose. “But I think you’ll scream first.”

You lunged at the bars and threw the knife, arms swinging through the space between them.

His eyes widened as the knife almost lodged itself on his cheek. He groaned as he felt blood trickle down his jaw, you smirked.

“You little brat.” he snarled as he grit his teeth.

“Hold her down.” he ordered and his men chuckled darkly as they entered your cage.

He’d been waiting too long for this.

It wasn’t just revenge. It wasn’t even about the five million kruge he would ask for next.

It was about breaking the boy who had made him look like a fool.

And breaking a boy like Kaz Brekker?

You start by cutting the only thing he's ever dared to care for.

Outside the cage, Pekka laid the ransom letter on a table and dipped the quill in fresh blood.

Her blood.

“Let’s see if your brother remembers how to beg.”

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Kaz Brekker did not flinch.

Even when Jesper pushed the envelope onto his desk with a look that could make a saint sweat. 

Not when Inej stood in the corner, arms folded, like she'd seen a ghost crawl out of the Ketterdam canals.

Nor when he unfolded the letter and blood smudged the edge of his glove.

But when a single strand of dark hair slipped from the fold and curled against his cane, his breath caught.

"5 million kruge. Half your shares in the Dregs. You have 3 days. You know where to find me. Try anything clever, and I'll start sending bones instead of notes." —P.R.

"Kaz..." Jesper's voice was oddly quiet. No quip. No grin.

Kaz didn’t look up. "Get Nina. Tell Wylan to prepare explosives. Inej—"

"I'm already watching the Slat," she said softly.

The others waited. He didn't speak for a while. Just stared at the blood.

"She's alive," he finally murmured.

"Who is?" Jesper asked.

“Jesper.” Inej called silently, begging him not to pry, but Jesper had enough. 

“No, Inej. He can’t keep on doing this,” Jesper said, Kaz’s stare bore holes in his chair, “One night he stopped a carefully planned heist, made me repeat it three times, all just to back off the minute all things go our way for once?” he continued. Inej swallowed thickly and looked to Kaz, stoic as ever.

Say something, Kaz. She begged.

“Kaz–”

“My sister,” Kaz answered with his jaw ticked, “Pekka Rollins has my sister.”

Inej almost fell out the window.

Jesper blinked.

Once.

Twice.

Then:

“…Okay.” His voice cracked like a match. 

“So, just to clarify—Pekka Rollins kidnapped your sister, and we’re all just finding out you have a sister now? Cool cool cool. Love that. No notes. Totally not spiraling internally.”

Kaz didn’t move.

Jesper threw his hands in the air. “Saints Kaz, I thought you were spiraling over market shares. Or-or maybe the merch shipment of crow pins that came in bent. But this? This? You—” He laughed, but there was no humor in it. “You don’t just drop something like that and expect us to keep moving like we’re still playing pretend.”

A long silence.

Then came Inej’s voice—soft, razor-edged.

“You’ve known this whole time?”

Kaz’s hand twitched on the head of his cane. He didn’t look up.

“Since the canal job,” he said, voice barely audible. “The one where she slipped past Pekka’s radar. I knew. I wasn’t sure until…”

Jesper gestured wildly. “Until the literal envelope of blood and hair?”

Inej moved closer, a storm gathering in her dark eyes. “Kaz,” she said, steady, quiet, devastating. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

He couldn’t answer. Couldn’t meet her gaze.

Jesper dropped into a chair like gravity suddenly remembered him. “You let her get close. You knew who she was, and you let her bleed for you, and now Pekka has her?” His voice cracked. “Do you even know what he’ll do to her?”

Kaz’s jaw clenched so tight Inej could hear it.

Inej’s voice dropped to a whisper. “You’re not the only one who’s lost family.”

Kaz looked up then. Sharp. Bleeding.

“I know exactly what he’ll do to her,” he said, voice like rusted iron. “Because he already did it. To me. To Jordie. And now he’s going to pay.”

Jesper leaned back. “How do you even know she’s alive?”

Kaz set the letter aflame with the candle nearby and let it burn until the flame kissed his glove.

"Because if she were dead, Pekka would be parading her body through Fifth Harbor."

No one argued.

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Y/N woke to the sound of dripping water and your own heartbeat rattling like dice in your ribs.

Rollins had five men come at you all at once, your rage blinded you as you let your instincts move your body, you managed to take three down but the other two had seemed more skilled, albeit smaller than the other three.

Your body protested with every move as you tried to sit upright. You tried to move—your wrists screamed in protest, rope tight and cruel against raw skin. Your lip was split and your ankle throbbed. They had taken away your knives and cut off pieces of your hair. Your breathing came in and out with a wheeze.

But worse than the pain was the remembering.

Your head, your traitorous head, kept flashing—

Kaz, thirteen, gripping your hand in the canal as Jordie lay dying.

Kaz, fifteen, eyes burning when you snuck out to pick pockets with Rollins’ crew.

Kaz, seventeen, saying your name like it was a crime.

“You think he cares?” Pekka's voice cracked the dark like a whip. “You’re a pawn. Just blood with leverage.”

You didn’t answer. That made him laugh.

“Still quiet? Let's fix that."

Then came the knife.

And as the first cut was made, your mind betrayed you again.

Kaz handed you a black string bracelet, clumsily braided.

"Let’s go get her back for that cup trick, yeah?"

"You’re not real," you whispered. "You’re already gone."

You didn't know if you were talking to Kaz, to Jordie, or to yourself.

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The Slat was too quiet.

Jesper sat backwards on a chair, chewing on his glove. Wylan was pacing like the floors were made of hot coals. Nina nursed a mug of something thick and bitter—something Ravkan and unforgiving. Matthias stood in the corner like a statue, looking like he’d rather be punching someone (preferably Jesper and his glove chewing).

And Kaz?

Kaz was still.

Until he wasn’t.

"She’s being held in the old Ravkan smuggler tunnels beneath Fifth Harbor," he said, voice colder than Ketterdam’s canals. "Pekka thinks I won’t find her in time."

Jesper raised a brow. "Do we tell him that we always find people in time, or let it be a surprise?"

“I’m more concerned with how many people we’ll need to find after this,” Wylan muttered.

Kaz turned his eyes on him.

Wylan shut up.

Nina leaned forward. "What’s the plan, Dirtyhands?"

Kaz cracked his fingers, one by one. A rhythm, a ritual. Like sharpening a blade.

"We walk into Rollins’ personal vault. We walk out with Y/N and all of his secrets. Then we set the place on fire."

Jesper grinned. "Can we take a few of his teeth on the way out? You know, for souvenirs?"

"Only if you don’t lose yours first," Matthias said.

"Oh Helvar, I missed this dynamic," Jesper sighed dramatically.

Kaz ignored the bickering.

"He has her under the west wing of the tunnels. They’re sealed, high-security, layered with guards who are paid in blood and don’t ask questions. But they’re human. They make mistakes."

"And you know what they say," Nina said, smiling thinly. "Crows don’t."

Kaz outlined it in meticulous detail:

Inej would move through the vents—silent, invisible.

Jesper and Matthias would create a distraction on the upper levels—a heist classic: loud, chaotic, impossible to ignore.

Nina and Wylan would work the back corridor—one with explosives, the other with deadly charm.

Kaz would go in through the sewer grate behind the furnace line. Alone.

Jesper groaned. "Every time, Kaz. Every time it’s you in the sewer."

"You're welcome to switch places."

"No thanks. I just had this coat cleaned."

Wylan frowned. "And if this goes south?"

Kaz tapped the floor once with his cane.

"It won’t."

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They hit the vault at midnight.

Jesper and Matthias kicked things off by impersonating drunk guards hauling in "prisoners". 

The real guards were too confused to react before Jesper had disarmed three and Matthias had thrown a fourth into a wall hard enough to crack a rib.

Inej slipped in through the vent like smoke and dropped down with the grace of a shadow’s whisper. One guard blinked—and his eyes didn’t open again.

BOOM!

Wylan’s carefully placed charge blew the back wall. Nina waltzed through the dust with a grin, casually stopping one man's heart with a flick of her fingers. "Ravkan medicine," she winked, Wylan shivered.

Kaz moved unseen. Unheard. A rat among rats. 

He found the corridor—lit dimly, damp, reeking of fear and metal. The vault was at the end. 

Inside, Y/N.

He didn’t let himself think. Thinking would slow him down.

The door, heavy steel, was locked. But when did locked doors ever stop the Bastard of the Barrel?

It took him less than a minute to pick the lock and the sight that met him nearly took the breath away from his lungs.

You were slumped in the corner, eyes glassy. Blood crusted on your lip. Wrists raw and bound to a pipe. The bracelet he gave you tattered but still hanging on. 

Your body was still but your eyes flickered up at him, like you’d been waiting.

“You’re late,” you rasped.

Kaz moved fast, slicing the rope. "You’re heavier than I remember," he muttered, hoisting your hand over his shoulder like you were made of glass and guilt.

He could feel your ribs through your bloodied shirt, you hadn’t eaten for days.

“I got tortured, not fat,” you croaked.

Kaz didn’t answer. He couldn’t. He was too busy trying to keep the waves at bay. For Jordie’s voice to stop whispering in his ear.

But his grip tightened.

“Hey Kaz?” you mumbled as he ducked from gunfire and raced through collapsing tunnels.

He remained silent but you continued anyway.

“If we die, I’m blaming you.”

He smirked at that.

Your body ached with how he carried you, hands far too clammy to hold onto his coat. He stopped just behind Jesper and Matthias to give you his cane. You were drifting in and out of consciousness but your eyes widened at his gesture.

“Take it,” his eyes bore into yours. “Please.”

Let me help you. He almost said. 

You understood, nodded, and took his cane.

Matthias had to be hallucinating when he had heard that. He thought he would die without seeing Kaz bat an eye at anyone other than Inej yet here he stood, stopping mid-air about to throw a punch before Jesper's voice snapped him out of his thoughts.

Jesper’s voice rang out ahead. "Oi! Save the bonding for after we live!"

Y/N slumped in his arms, barely breathing, her blood soaking into his coat. Her head lolled against his shoulder, too light, too quiet.

The hallway ahead curved sharply — toward freedom.

But behind them…

Footsteps echoed, a sharp contrast to the gunshots and groans.

Slow. Intentional.

Kaz didn’t have to turn around to know.

Pekka Rollins.

His shadow filled the corridor long before he did — smug, sauntering, every inch of him reeking of victory.

“Well, well,” Pekka drawled, voice echoing like a curse. “Look what the rat dragged in.”

Kaz set you down gently against the wall. He called Nina and Matthias to get you, clutching his cane until his knuckles turned white.

Jesper skidded to a stop ahead. “Kaz—”

“Keep going,” Kaz said, voice razor-thin.

Jesper hesitated. So did Inej.

But one look at his face told them: Don’t. He’s mine.

They slipped forward in silence, taking you with them despite your weak protests. 

Pekka stood at the other end of the corridor, flanked by two of his men, hands in his pockets like he had all night to die.

Kaz tilted his head.

“You sent a letter.”

His voice was calm. Hollow.

Pekka grinned. “You liked it? Thought the blood was a nice touch. Hair too. Bit of poetry, that.”

Kaz’s fingers twitched on his cane.

"You always were dramatic,” Pekka added. “But this? Falling for family? Thought you cut those ties years ago.”

Kaz said nothing.

He took a step forward.

"You know what I learned watching you?" Pekka asked, voice curling like smoke. “You’re not hard, boy. You’re cracked. One good hit and everything inside leaks out.”

Kaz took another step.

Pekka pulled a knife, twirling it. Blood dripped off the sharp edge-–Inej’s blood, Kaz  noted. 

“I gutted your crew. Bought your informants. And you still came crawling for your sister who barely remembers your name,” he spits. “Pathetic.”

That was it.

Kaz moved.

Fast.

Faster than anyone Pekka had seen.

The tip of his cane caught one thug square in the ribs — crack. The second lunged, but Kaz ducked low, swept the leg, and drove the point of his cane into his throat.

Two down.

Only Pekka left.

Kaz dropped the cane and took off his coat.

For once, he didn’t need leverage. He needed fury.

Pekka struck first — wide swing, all brute strength.

Kaz ducked, twisted, drove his fist into Pekka’s stomach, then another into his jaw, and a third into the side of his neck.

Pekka stumbled, coughing, spitting blood.

“You think this makes you strong?” Pekka growled. “You’re still that little boy on the ice.”

Kaz’s face didn’t flinch.

He grabbed Pekka by the collar, slammed him against the wall.

“You should’ve stayed dead,” Kaz said, low and lethal. “You took everything from me.”

Pekka laughed mockingly, blood in his teeth. “I made you.”

“You made a monster,” Kaz whispered.

Then he let go.

Kaz stood over him.

He could kill him now. Snap his neck. Beat him until his bones turned to ash.

But that would be too easy.

Instead, he leaned close, cane pressed to Pekka’s throat.

“From now on,” Kaz said, voice like a coffin lid closing, “You don’t walk in this city. You crawl. You beg. You watch every alley like it breathes my name.”

Pekka’s lip curled. “You won’t kill me?”

“I want you alive,” Kaz hissed. “I want you ruined. I want every kruge you touch turn to rot. I want the city to forget your name, except in warnings.”

He stood.

Cold. Composed.

“Pekka Rollins is no longer feared,” he said.

“He’s pitied.”

Because monsters didn’t die in the Barrel.

They just stopped being scary.

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Jesper had seen Kaz break a man’s wrist with a spoon.

He’d watched him out-bluff assassins, burn bridges before crossing them, lie without blinking, and steal the future out from under men twice his size.

But this?

This was different.

Jesper had doubled back after handing Y/N off to Nina—told himself he was making sure Kaz wasn’t dead, or bleeding, or doing something stupid like bleeding on purpose.

He was halfway down the corridor when he saw it.

Kaz.

Standing over Pekka Rollins.

His coat was soaked. His gloves were off.

His hands were shaking.

And not from fear.

Jesper didn’t move. Didn’t speak.

He just watched.

Watched Kaz crush Pekka’s windpipe with the heel of his cane—not enough to kill, but enough to scar. Watched him lean close and whisper something that made Pekka pale like death itself had offered a trade.

Watched as Kaz turn his back and walk away like the whole thing hadn’t just happened.

Jesper exhaled, slow and shaky.

That wasn’t the Bastard of the Barrel. That wasn’t even Dirtyhands.

That was something else entirely.

Kaz smoothed out his coat and picked up his cane, walking towars Jesper who said nothing.

When they had reached the others standing beside a carriage Kaz got in, Jesper soon following suit as Matthias drove the carriage.

Jesper sat next to Wylan as Kaz sat in the far corner, scrubbing Pekka’s blood off his gloves like it was just another job.

Jesper stared at him for a long time.

“I always thought there was a line you wouldn’t cross,” Jesper said quietly.

Kaz didn’t look up.

“There wasn’t,” he replied.

And that was the scariest part.

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They got out.

Barely.

Inej had a knife sticking to her side. Jesper had two new scars. Nina was drained, Wylan smelled like firecrackers, and Matthias was furious about it all.

But Y/N was breathing.

And Kaz…

Kaz was broken.

He sat by your bedside in a safehouse near the harbor. The others gave space. For now.

You stirred and looked at him.

“You look like shit,” you said.

“You’re not exactly radiant.”

They smiled. Just barely.

Then silence.

Until you whispered, “You left me, once.”

Kaz nodded slowly.

“I remember.” you added. Kaz swallowed and looked down.

“You didn’t before?” his voice was small, like when you both stayed up late and was afraid to wake Jordie. Like it was before.

You shook your head.

“I left you.” his voice broke.

You were quick to reply.

“You saved me now.”

Kaz didn’t speak.

“I thought I had to choose between losing you and ruining you. I chose wrong.”

You blinked.

“I’m not ruined,” you whispered. “Not yet.”

Another silence.

“Where you go, I go,” you murmured.

He flinched.

But you reached out, trembling, to take his hand. And this time, he didn’t pull away.

Not fully.