[ i can’t bear this hits like a slash that you don’t register until the aftermath. a swing that hurts the more he looks and thinks about its meaning. impossible to know how or why it would be followed by a kiss, head pounding. can’t move, too uncertain to break this fragile moment. too slow, he corrects, as nikolai abandons him.
kaz dives so he doesn’t lose sight of nikolai and glimpses his suspended form. it swiftly occurs to him that nikolai means to die here. his shout of protest bubbles into nothing, and he bursts above the waterline in seconds, adrenaline and panic warring for control of his system. you’re in no state to fight. not in the water, with his leg bleeding black. the singular blade left on his person could be enough to draw out the demon — no, that could lead to losing nikolai, anyway. saints. countless, half-nonsense schemes flood his mind, but instead of acting, he starts counting.
and he waits, the one thing he has always excelled at. kaz brekker knows how long the average man can hold his breath (and then some, with the encouragement of jesper and rotty’s capable grips), but rarely has waiting for the give been this painful.
when he judges that nikolai has likely managed to tire himself and the demon out, he breathes in the manner nikolai instructed, plunges into the deep, and seizes him with an iron hold. kaz fights to break the surface faster than the last time, even with his injury. (something to be said for practice.) dragging himself and nikolai over the lip of the rocky interior of this alcove proves just as haphazard, with red dotting his scraped stomach and pearling down his wounded leg. all secondary concerns to the coldness seeping into nikolai’s skin — the way it seems to ribbon away from bone in kaz’s unreliable gaze. is he breathing? he can't tell, perception muddied by care. memories clatter into one another. jordie in the water — nina looking down on him, pressing her mouth to his — kaz does the same trick for nikolai, unaided by grisha magic or honed skill. you’ve killed him, the way he almost killed inej, jesper, nina: by chasing a distraction. never should have pursued nikolai like this, if he meant to save him. nikolai was right to accuse him of playing games. and a gambler’s luck always runs out.
somehow, nikolai coughs a breath — or maybe he was always breathing, or all of this was a bloody nightmare — and kaz chokes on nothing. never been so relieved or so angry to see someone. nikolai’s pulse jumps to life under his palm, but that isn’t enough to halt the tide of nausea that’s been building since kaz grabbed him. as nikolai’s eyes flutter open, kaz scrabbles to lean over the stone edge and dry heave. he was dead. he wasn’t. he felt — corpselike, to be sure. kaz upends his dinner into the sea. ]
Don’t you dare — [ another heave, all seawater. his eyes feel wet and must be red. ] — make me do that again. [ as hoarse as he is, kaz still manages to inject lethal venom into those words. ]
You accuse me of bartering with my life and then forfeit yours. [ breathless and wrathful. he raises his voice, the nearby formations amplifying the sound. ] Death would only end this for you. [ another cough, and his grip slips, palm catching on a jagged rock. a pained noise trails into a broken laugh. it’s the first injury he allowed nikolai to inflict on him, repeated. ] I’d have to live with it. [ haunted by nikolai and jordie, his twin failures doubly mocking in their symmetry. both of them led him here, to this watery mausoleum. attachment is a risk — a damnation. and he does not even love you. if he did, nikolai wouldn’t wish this ruinous pain on him again — wouldn’t have said if, as though it would scare kaz more than the threat that he was nothing, wielded so expertly in ravka. ] If you wish to meet death so badly, you’ll have to accept my company. [ he rolls onto his back to rest his aching arms, blinking up at the stars in near-delirium. perhaps he’s the selfish one, for wanting to be near nikolai, for asking him to stay in this wretched world, for not caring if he’s half-demon and entirely lost.
of course you're selfish, brekker. you're a thief. ]
no subject
kaz dives so he doesn’t lose sight of nikolai and glimpses his suspended form. it swiftly occurs to him that nikolai means to die here. his shout of protest bubbles into nothing, and he bursts above the waterline in seconds, adrenaline and panic warring for control of his system. you’re in no state to fight. not in the water, with his leg bleeding black. the singular blade left on his person could be enough to draw out the demon — no, that could lead to losing nikolai, anyway. saints. countless, half-nonsense schemes flood his mind, but instead of acting, he starts counting.
and he waits, the one thing he has always excelled at. kaz brekker knows how long the average man can hold his breath (and then some, with the encouragement of jesper and rotty’s capable grips), but rarely has waiting for the give been this painful.
when he judges that nikolai has likely managed to tire himself and the demon out, he breathes in the manner nikolai instructed, plunges into the deep, and seizes him with an iron hold. kaz fights to break the surface faster than the last time, even with his injury. (something to be said for practice.) dragging himself and nikolai over the lip of the rocky interior of this alcove proves just as haphazard, with red dotting his scraped stomach and pearling down his wounded leg. all secondary concerns to the coldness seeping into nikolai’s skin — the way it seems to ribbon away from bone in kaz’s unreliable gaze. is he breathing? he can't tell, perception muddied by care. memories clatter into one another. jordie in the water — nina looking down on him, pressing her mouth to his — kaz does the same trick for nikolai, unaided by grisha magic or honed skill. you’ve killed him, the way he almost killed inej, jesper, nina: by chasing a distraction. never should have pursued nikolai like this, if he meant to save him. nikolai was right to accuse him of playing games. and a gambler’s luck always runs out.
somehow, nikolai coughs a breath — or maybe he was always breathing, or all of this was a bloody nightmare — and kaz chokes on nothing. never been so relieved or so angry to see someone. nikolai’s pulse jumps to life under his palm, but that isn’t enough to halt the tide of nausea that’s been building since kaz grabbed him. as nikolai’s eyes flutter open, kaz scrabbles to lean over the stone edge and dry heave. he was dead. he wasn’t. he felt — corpselike, to be sure. kaz upends his dinner into the sea. ]
Don’t you dare — [ another heave, all seawater. his eyes feel wet and must be red. ] — make me do that again. [ as hoarse as he is, kaz still manages to inject lethal venom into those words. ]
You accuse me of bartering with my life and then forfeit yours. [ breathless and wrathful. he raises his voice, the nearby formations amplifying the sound. ] Death would only end this for you. [ another cough, and his grip slips, palm catching on a jagged rock. a pained noise trails into a broken laugh. it’s the first injury he allowed nikolai to inflict on him, repeated. ] I’d have to live with it. [ haunted by nikolai and jordie, his twin failures doubly mocking in their symmetry. both of them led him here, to this watery mausoleum. attachment is a risk — a damnation. and he does not even love you. if he did, nikolai wouldn’t wish this ruinous pain on him again — wouldn’t have said if, as though it would scare kaz more than the threat that he was nothing, wielded so expertly in ravka. ] If you wish to meet death so badly, you’ll have to accept my company. [ he rolls onto his back to rest his aching arms, blinking up at the stars in near-delirium. perhaps he’s the selfish one, for wanting to be near nikolai, for asking him to stay in this wretched world, for not caring if he’s half-demon and entirely lost.
of course you're selfish, brekker. you're a thief. ]