He should be more animated, he knows that. Giving them his attention as he spoke but Kaz knows if he looks directly at either of them, he's going to stop. Just stop and not finish explaining. He can't look at them, not as he goes on, because he can't have their faces fresh in his gaze as he talks about what comes next.
So instead he stares at the floor before them, acutely aware of being there between them, of Inej's touch and Jesper's gaze, their words, that question.
"Just shy of ten, yes," he admits. "You needn't have this part of the story to understand but maybe..." If he's going to do this, then they get all of it. At least as much as he can manage to get out. "Maybe you deserve it. And let me finish. I don't know if I'll start ever again if I don't."
He could already feel it in the back of his throat, clawing it's way up from his gut and spreading through his blood like that damned plague. Already he felt pale, clammy, and he was determined to finish what he'd started, but he wasn't sure he could.
"We had come to make our fortune, as does everyone we fleece, and we fell victim just as everyone does. It's why we were on the streets and why we couldn't get out of the city when the plague came. I suppose you both can imagine by who."
They had known there was bad blood there, now they would know just how bad.
"One night... I don't remember much of the before. I remember feel hot and then cold, of my teeth rattling in the night, and the water and the damp. Then there was just darkness. I passed out. When I woke..."
His hands tighten into fists, loosening and then tightening. An exercise in control to keep himself from bolting. His heart racing so hard in his chest that it hurt. Each breath quick, short, and he knows that running would be easier. Getting up and going, shutting down, ending it all.
But then he risks ending so much. With those who matter the most to him. So his fists tighten once more and he goes on.
"We had been rolled onto the ferry to the reaper's barge," he manages though his tones are soft and that rasp is rougher than normal. A rasp that is what remains of his disease and surviving it. "I was alive and sick and surrounded by bodies. Bodies that ..."
Then he shakes his head. He can't finish. Not with the bodies in all manners and stages of death, the rot and pus and blood and all that he had been surrounded with.
"And Jordie was dead," he finally manages, eyes closing, remembering his brother's unseeing eyes and lifeless face. He'd never forget it. "I was weak still, dying and yet not dead, and I knew I had to get back to Ketterdam. If I didn't get off that boat, I wouldn't live. I would... So I did all I could to get away. I... I used Jordie and I floated my way with the tides back to Ketterdam."
He doesn't think about it, hand slightly shaking as he fought for a breath. Lifting his hand and covering the R tattooed on his arm. "Kaz Brekker was born that night I returned back to the Barrel," he admits, almost feeling the R of his family name throbbing under his touch. "The rest, I suppose, is history."
cw anxiety symptoms, talk of death, talk of dead bodies and disease/plague
So instead he stares at the floor before them, acutely aware of being there between them, of Inej's touch and Jesper's gaze, their words, that question.
"Just shy of ten, yes," he admits. "You needn't have this part of the story to understand but maybe..." If he's going to do this, then they get all of it. At least as much as he can manage to get out. "Maybe you deserve it. And let me finish. I don't know if I'll start ever again if I don't."
He could already feel it in the back of his throat, clawing it's way up from his gut and spreading through his blood like that damned plague. Already he felt pale, clammy, and he was determined to finish what he'd started, but he wasn't sure he could.
"We had come to make our fortune, as does everyone we fleece, and we fell victim just as everyone does. It's why we were on the streets and why we couldn't get out of the city when the plague came. I suppose you both can imagine by who."
They had known there was bad blood there, now they would know just how bad.
"One night... I don't remember much of the before. I remember feel hot and then cold, of my teeth rattling in the night, and the water and the damp. Then there was just darkness. I passed out. When I woke..."
His hands tighten into fists, loosening and then tightening. An exercise in control to keep himself from bolting. His heart racing so hard in his chest that it hurt. Each breath quick, short, and he knows that running would be easier. Getting up and going, shutting down, ending it all.
But then he risks ending so much. With those who matter the most to him. So his fists tighten once more and he goes on.
"We had been rolled onto the ferry to the reaper's barge," he manages though his tones are soft and that rasp is rougher than normal. A rasp that is what remains of his disease and surviving it. "I was alive and sick and surrounded by bodies. Bodies that ..."
Then he shakes his head. He can't finish. Not with the bodies in all manners and stages of death, the rot and pus and blood and all that he had been surrounded with.
"And Jordie was dead," he finally manages, eyes closing, remembering his brother's unseeing eyes and lifeless face. He'd never forget it. "I was weak still, dying and yet not dead, and I knew I had to get back to Ketterdam. If I didn't get off that boat, I wouldn't live. I would... So I did all I could to get away. I... I used Jordie and I floated my way with the tides back to Ketterdam."
He doesn't think about it, hand slightly shaking as he fought for a breath. Lifting his hand and covering the R tattooed on his arm. "Kaz Brekker was born that night I returned back to the Barrel," he admits, almost feeling the R of his family name throbbing under his touch. "The rest, I suppose, is history."