REAPER ─ kaz brekker

sixteen; brick by brick

016;            BRICK BY BRICK 

"I SWEAR TO THE SAINTS ONE OF THEM FOUND US BY SMELL." 

"Is that even possible?" Inej asked, horror etched across her features. 

Even Onyx squirmed uncomfortably in her stiff seat. It was one thing to believe the Shu could manage to use parem-addicted Fabrikators to physically alter the human body, it was even easier to believe it was the work of heavily advanced tailoring, but it was another thing altogether trying to accept they could be tracked by scent. To any passersby, Grisha walked and talked and were for all intents and purposes exactly the same as everyone else on the outside. It was that fact that made it so easy for Onyx to hide herself for so long. 

"That makes me feel horribly uncomfortable," Onyx muttered, crossing her arms over her chest. "That's not actually possible, is it?" 

"I've never heard of a Grisha giving on a particular scent," Nina answered. "But I guess its possible. If the soldiers' olfactory receptors were improved-- maybe its a scent ordinary people can't detect." 

"I don't think this was the first attack," Jesper said. "Wylan, remember how terrified that Squaller in the rare books room was? And what about that merchant ship Rotty told us about?" 

Kaz nodded a few times, confirming. "It was torn apart, a bunch of sailors were found dead. At the time, they thought the crew's Squaller might have gone rogue, busted out of his indenture. But maybe he didn't disappear. Maybe he was captured. He was one of old Councilman Hoede's Grisha." 

"Emil Retvenko," Nina confirmed with a nod. 

"That's the one. You knew him?"

"I knew of him. Most of the Grisha in Ketterdam know about each other. We share information, try to keep an eye out for one another. The Shu must have spies here if they knew where to look for each of us. The other Grisha--" Nina stood up, then lurched suddenly, grasping the back of her chair as if she might faint. 

Onyx jumped up, followed shortly by Inej and Matthias. She looped her arm through Nina's. "Are you okay?" 

"Splendid," Nian responded. She shot Onyx a less than convincing smile of reassurance as Inej looped her arm around Nina's on her opposite side. Onyx shared a brief glimpse with Inej over their friend's shoulders. "But if the other Grisha in Ketterdam are in danger--"

"You're going to do what?" Jesper asked, an uncharacteristic edge to his words. "You're lucky to be alive after what happened today. Those Shu soldiers can smell us, Nina." He spun on Kuwei. "Your father made that possible." 

"Hey," Wylan cut in, "go easy." 

"Go easy? Like things weren't bad enough for the Grisha before? What if they track us to Black Veil? There are four of us here."

Kaz rapped his knuckles against the table. "Wylan's right. Go easy. The city wasn't safe before and it isn't safe now. So let's all get rich enough to relocate." 

Nina scoffed. "Are we really talking about money?" 

"We're talking about the job and making Van Eck pay up."

Inej glanced briefly to Nina, then to Onyx as she slipped into her previous perch, kicking her feet up as she did so. The Suli girl slipped up behind her chair and slid her arms over Onyx's sore shoulders. "I want to know what we can do to help the Grisha who are still in Ketterdam. I'd also like to know how we're going to make Van Eck suffer."