TROUBLE , kaz brekker

xxv. the beginning.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

WHEN SHE DIED, ECHO imagined her story would be a tragedy. That is, if she got any story at all.

It would end as it began: a lonely tale, full of deceit and lies and a copious amount of murder. Perhaps she'd die in alone, perhaps she'd die in gunfire, perhaps no one would care to tell. But it didn't matter. Because regardless of the miserable beginning and the inevitably tragic ending, there would be a middle full of the one thing Echo Caddel never ever thought she would find - happiness. Fleeting, but present all the same.

Amongst the pain and blood and aching, this would be a moment worth immortality. The scene would be set. There would be a campfire, barely embers in the swift Ravkan wind. There would be seven wayward souls and a lifetimes' worth of memories between them, huddled over the flames in varying stages of dishevelment and decay. There would be a girl with red hair and more scars than she had freckles, watching a boy with a cane as he watched the world and tried to unravel it from the inside.

Poetic, peaceful, a brief interlude from the world they'd left behind in the Fold.

Inej was smiling at her saint, mutterings Echo couldn't discern, given their precarious position on the border of what she could hear and what she couldn't. But the Tracker by her side was less preoccupied, staring mindlessly at the rag that had pried the dried blood from his fingertips. Echo could feel her own dirtied skin screaming under all that red.

She lifted an absentminded finger to the sanguine flush that stained her cheeks. The Tracker looked up, offering her the rag with an outstretched hand. At any other moment, perhaps Echo would comment on the sanitary issues of the filthy rag but this was not any other moment. She took it with a grateful nod.

"Mal Oretsev," Echo smiled, "you might just be my new favourite person."

The Tracker gave her the slightest of grins in return. "I would say the same, but I never got your name."

"Echo-" She halted. Echo what? Caddel was Kaelish word she'd chosen because she liked the connotations: battle. It was superficial at best, a coward's name, for a girl who would rather run from her ghosts than face them. Not anymore. She lifted a flippant hand in direction of the Fold and the corpse that lay within. "Echo Whatever-His-Last-Name-Was, I suppose."

Her mother's name was a distant dream. The mere thought of being a true Orlova had died the moment her sister's heart stopped beating because if she hadn't been formally uninvited from the family before, murder would have been the last straw. But this name, his name, was a chance to spite the one who had destroyed her life. First she'd take this victory from him, then she'd take his name, then she'd take his reputation.

"Morozova." Echo didn't hear the Sun Summoner's words, only saw her lips move in a way that she thanked the Saints she could understand. Vulnerability, here, amongst Saints and legends? Not an option. But now, at least, the last piece had slid into place.

Whatever the Darkling could do, she could do better. Echo would make the Morozova bloodline her bitch.

The hand she extended to the Tracker was hiding an identity crisis of epic proportions ."Echo Morozova, pleased to meet you."

But it was met with warmth all the same.

By the light of the fire's dying embers, Echo scrubbed away the dirt and gore that clung to her like a parasite, the shadow of destruction lingering on her skin no matter how viciously she tore at the stains. She could feel Kaz's eyes on her, a leaden weight that felt heavier than all the blood that clung to her clothes. He moved amongst their dishevelled group of grisha and ordinary folk alike, dodging the ferociously beautiful glares of the Squaller who had saved Inej aboard the skiff. Then he was at her side.