How do you fight an enemy who never shows his face?
The murder of crows must band together with a privateer prince to face their greatest challenge yet. But though Kaz is playing for the Dregs, Nikolai suspects that the future of the world is at sta...
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Kaz strode down the Geldstraat, heading straight for the Silver Sun Casino. Inej had gone to fight Raven and he'd be damned if he didn't do something to help her.
He was probably damned no matter what.
The day was very nearly spent, the last rays of sun bleeding out onto the horizon like ink onto a page. The first stars would soon start to wink into existence.
Bastards, Kaz thought. The stars were one of the things he hated most in the natural world. First on his list was the sea – it had turned Jordie's body into the bloated monstrosity he had been forced to swim with. Second was snow – he'd seen enough of that in Fjerda to last him a lifetime and a half. He couldn't imagine how the Fjerdans stood it. Perhaps it accounted for their obsession in hunting Grisha and slight madness.
Third had to be stars.
They were always silently ridiculing him, peering down from the sky to wink in mockery at him. Kaz swore that on the night where Inej had been stabbed – when he was sitting on the deck of the ship deep into the night, sleep evading his thieving fingers, desperately worrying about his Wraith who was bleeding out somewhere below him – the goddamned stars had seemed to be laughing.
Saints, he thought, with a slight tinge of worry. I even sound crazy in my head.
His leg screamed in protest with every limping step. The fall he had taken during his fight with Nina was taking its toll – and by Ghezen, it hurt. His gait was more uneven than ever, he was leaning even more heavily on his cane than usual, and he knew he was walking like a drunk, or someone not used to sailing on board a ship during heavy waves. People were giving him strange looks. Cripples or drunks weren't seen on the opulent streets of the Lid.
Finally he plunged into the ramshackle alleys of the Barrel and let out a sigh of relief. Here, people knew exactly who he was and why he walked the way he walked. Here, even the smallest little street urchin knew his name. Here, the pitying stares turned to those of fear and respect. Dirtyhands, they called him, and though the name wasn't exactly flattering it was better than cripple.
Better than pigeon.
He was a crow now, not a stupid brainless bird following the flock, waiting to be plucked from the air. He was a predator with a purpose, and he ruled these skies – no matter how dirty and smoke-filled. He would not fall into the trap of the hovering hawks again. He was not like Jordie, and he would never be. Inej was everything he could ever want and more, but she didn't understand that need to prove himself to the world, to prove he wasn't helpless, to prove he would not be caught so easily.
Kaz stopped walking, just as the sun finally sank below the skyline.
In front of him was the Silver Sun Casino, the most profitable casino in the whole of the Barrel. Kaz's lip curled at the sight of it. Nine and a half thousand square feet of garish silver, black and gold trappings, practically dripping with cheap bling. He had no idea what made it so attractive to the denizens of the Barrel, but somehow something worked and the pigeons swarmed. He refused to make the Crow Club as tasteless and ridiculously decorated, but sales had slumped and the losses were racking up, forcing him to cash in more and more of the goods he had previously stolen on the blackmarket just to keep the doors open. And then, of course, there was the drug Thorn.
