CHAPTER THREE;
to be queen

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T.W.: implied sexual assault. it won't happen, but it will look like it could happen, only to be stopped, so, please, if that's triggering, skip the chapter until the end. but FYI, the man gets slaughtered by Ace, so that's good. (so, there will also be gore)(this is kind of a spoiler for the whole chapter, but i felt like i should include this)

BELA MISERIA REMEMBERED THE DAY her father stopped tolerating imperfections. It was also the day she vowed not to show them anymore—with each mistake her father seemed more distant, and she wanted him close, hugging her like when she was younger. He wanted the perfect daughter like he had the perfect wife; only he didn't want her to be like her mother, a Saint-given woman who gave everything she had to help everyone—he wanted a perfect thief. After his death, Bela wanted to become the best thing she could be, her father's little Ace, a girl who made no mistakes, who trusted no one, a girl that in trying to be perfect lost herself in her loneliness.

She knew her father's expectations were impossible and still, she strived to go beyond them. Ace was the perfect thief. Everyone wanted her and yet no one ever caught her. She had treasures pilling up in her house as if souvenirs to remind her of the times her father would've looked at her—beaming with pride. Ace was the most powerful card in the deck—but she could also be the least powerful one. It all depended on the game she was playing. And, in the game of life, Ace was losing.

Bela Miseria was tired of losing. She wasn't just Ace. She didn't want to be alone—she wanted to trust people that deserved her trust, no questions asked. She wanted to show the world that she could be a queen—that she could live outside of the shadows and the false sense of security they brought. She wanted to show the world that she could be whatever the fuck she wanted and leave her father six feet under, in his grave, where he couldn't mock her for not being what he wanted her to be. She wanted to show the world she was Lavern's daughter and that she was worse than he ever was—and a better criminal than he ever could be. Bela wanted to stop pretending she was better off alone. Bela wanted to be a queen in Ketterdam, she wanted to matter in the city and leave her mark so everyone knew her face and everyone feared her taunting smile.

Ace was just a thief. She had no power, no hold on anyone. Bela could be Ace—and so much more. Bela Miseria could rule the Barrel—an Outlaw in every sense of the word, someone who could bend the world to her will, and smile while doing it.

She just had to manage to survive through the night.

Because whether she was Ace or Bela, or whatever other fucking name she had, she was human. As much as she liked to pretend she wasn't, that was her reality. And being human meant she wasn't perfect no matter how hard she tried to be. And being human meant she was vulnerable, which meant the chances of escaping certain death at the hands of Van Eck were slim.

And when she died between flames and ashes, no one would remember her; the reward posters would soon be replaced and Ace would just be another whisper in Ketterdam. And Bela would be just another girl who died too soon, just another girl in Ketterdam without a home or a family. It was all Kaz Brekker's fault. He'd been the one to look at like she mattered in the first place, like she was her, and not just some thief—and Van Eck had noticed, and he was going to get her killed.

The warehouse was becoming colder, either that or her body was failing—whatever the reason was, it made it seem as if death was looming over her, ready to snatch her soul at any given moment. The chain between the shackles on her ankles was long enough for her to walk, and the chain on her wrists was long enough that she managed to rip Kaz's shirt apart and tie it around her stomach to stop the bleeding from the stab wound that had been stitched haphazardly by a Suli man who'd been bringing her food.

They hadn't bothered to tie her back to the wall. The cuffs were still welded to her, and the doors were locked from the outside, and without tools taking the hinges off the walls wasn't going to be easy. And Ace was so tired. In fact, she was nearly sure she was slowly dying. Van Eck did feed her and heal her but only enough so he could say he did. She was cold and stuck and utterly alone.

Days had passed and Kaz still hadn't shown up. And each day Van Eck visited her, trying to get information she didn't have, mocking her for being what she was: a worthless thief with no one by her side, no one to care enough to save her.

And it was the truth. Her mother hadn't come after her when she—at twelve years of age—had decided to remain in a city full of thugs and criminals. Her father was dead and still haunting her awake with his pained groans and mocking sayings—"A good thief would be out by now, Little Ace, you're getting sloppy." Bluebeard was out at sea and though he would be devastated by her death, he'd only learn about it when it was too late. And the Crows... Well, it pained her to say, because whether she liked it or not they had become a makeshift family of her own—but the days passed and they weren't there; they couldn't possibly care enough, after all, they had to talk to her only because they were under Kaz's employment—and if Kaz didn't care neither did they.

And Kaz couldn't possibly care. Otherwise, he'd be there, saving her, making good on his promise that they were together in a world that tried to sink its claws into them. He'd be there, making an effort to help her to her feet even if tremors shook him. If he cared enough he'd be there to hold her as she died.

Some nights, when she was hanging off the cliff between sleep and dreams, he'd show up like that night in the schooner. Saying he'd always stay with her. Holding her until her last breath and she would die in peace, knowing that she mattered to the one person who mattered most to her. Kaz had always been there, in one way or another, to save her life or threaten it, it would only be fair if he was there in the end too—but life wasn't fair, and Dirtyhands didn't care about anything that wasn't money or revenge, and Ace wasn't useful if she was weak.

Ace leaned back against the wall, shivering as she huddled close to herself, and briskly wiped a tear away. They didn't seem to stop these days. Every time she thought of him, a sneaky tear slipped past her eye. The fucking Bastard. Even when she was trying to hate him she couldn't quite manage to harness any hatred for him. Every time she thought of something bad about him, a million other thoughts came to mind—because he was the Devil, her Devil.

He was cruel—but never to her. He carried her when she was dying. He'd offered his version of comfort when she hadn't even asked for it. He'd made her smile more times than he'd made her cry. He challenged her at every turn. He settled her heart and mind, and she felt at peace under that shark-like gaze of his. He'd been there since they were kids.

He wasn't there now.

The sound of the metal door opening jerked her awake from her thoughts. Ace turned to the side to see one of Van Eck's henchmen walking into the warehouse a large metal container in his hands.

Her heart stopped when he smiled at him, a sinister look in her eyes and she realized: it was today. She was going to die. And Kaz wasn't here to do it himself.

The man chuckled at the realization on her face before starting to drench the floor of the warehouse in the liquid—Van Eck loved to hire bloodthirsty servants, was something she realized, they did his dirty work, no questions asked. She watched him warily, with every step he got closer to her the smell of kerosene wafting in the air grew stronger.

When he got to where she was, huddled in a corner he put the container down and crouched in front of her, the same sinister smile on his face. Ace clenched her jaw, and went still, trying desperately not to tremble at the pure evil in the man's eyes.

"We flipped a coin for you," he informed her lowly and Ace felt chills run down her spine, the temperature in the room dropping below zero. He tilted his head assessing her with beady little eyes and reached for a strand of her hair as if examining it. "I won."

"Congratulations," she croaked out. "Just kill me already."

He shook his head. "Can't waste such a pretty little thing like you."

"Then let me go."

"Can't do that either," he said before he grabbed the chains on her feet, pushing on them. Ace let out a pained groan as her head hit the floor and fear coated her tongue when the man crawled on top of her. "I'll have you, and then I'll kill you."

Craning her neck away from him, and trying to keep the tremors off her body, Ace glared at the slimy man. "If you were smart you'd kill me now. Because if I get even the smallest of opportunities I will slaughter you myself."

He grinned and Ace forced herself not to react as his finger ran down the skin of her stomach. "The smart thing would be not to upset me, sweetheart. It will only be more painful."

Ace spat in his face. "Get off me, you fuck."

She struggled against him, trying to pry his beefy hands off her arms, trashing her legs uselessly. He just held her in place, unmoving.

"If you fight this it'll only be worse, sweetheart," he repeated, eyeing her in a challenge as if the idea of her pain caused him joy.

Ace swallowed her fear and stopped struggling. Saving her energy. She saw the glint in his eyes go away but he didn't stop. Closing her eyes tightly she thought of Kaz and his ruthlessness just as the man released her arms and went to rip apart the rest of her suit. She thought of his merciless ways just as the man went to the buckle of his belt.

The smallest of opportunities. But it was either try or die. It was either try or—

In a split-second decision, using the energy she (hopefully) still had and helped by the adrenaline running in her veins, Ace managed to throw the chains connecting her hands around the man's neck and twisted around so she was straddling him—using his lack of balance in her advantage—using all her might to choke him with the chain.

The man tried to pry the chain from his neck, trashing under her, and for a moment Ace thought it would be the end and that she wouldn't be strong enough—she was holding on for dear life. But then the man grew purple and his fight stopped coming and then he fell limp beneath her. Holding on for a few more moments to make sure he was down but not dead, Ace released him and stood up gingerly, her suit in scraps—along with her sanity.

She took two steps away from him before retching the contents of her stomach onto the ground. She knotted the suit back together the best she could before straightening her back. Her head tilted when her eyes fell on the knife tucked into the man's waistband. Clenching her jaw, she grabbed it and punched him in the face. And as soon as his eyes fluttered open the slightest, Bela Miseria gave into the madness.

Using her pent-up anger and hatred and absolute despair and misery, she carved her wrath onto the man's body, letting her hands be coated in his blood, slaughtering him like she said she would. He let a single scream before dying, a sound muffled by the waves of the sea—an anguished sound that was music to her ears. But she didn't stop—she couldn't. She slashed at his skin, opening his flesh like she was a painter working on her masterpiece—with each slice through flesh, each organ she reached, each drop of blood that left open wounds and gashes.

And when she was done and he was barely recognizable as a man—organs on display, members detached from his body, eyes caved in and bloody, and his tongue stuck to his heart with the knife—she stood up, wiped at the sweat on her face, smearing her own skin with his blood in the process, and then drenched his body in kerosene.

She looked at the scene she created. A man slaughtered to perfection, strewn across the kerosene-filled floor, a display of her lack of morals, of her thirst for revenge. Even the Devil would sit back and admire her work—and if he was here, her Devil would hand her a match so she could set fire to the vermin on the ground. But he wasn't there. And she had to save herself before any more of Van Eck's bloodthirsty workers got any ideas.

Releasing a pained breath, Bela turned around and slipped through the still-open door of the warehouse, using the shadows of the night and thanking every Saint that the moon was hiding behind clouds, and ran to the edge of the cliff where the warehouse was in, as silently as she could be, given the chains on her hands and feet. She could see the little lights of the Fifth Harbor shining not too far.

She looked behind her, seeing in the distance as two other men waited by cart on the other side of the warehouse. As one of them lit a match. As the match fell to the ground. As the building of her nightmares was engulfed in bright flames illuminating everything around it. Her included.

Without much time to think or she would be found, Ace jumped, just as the men started screaming, having realized their friend was still inside. She jumped just as another group of guards came running, screaming "No."

And as she felt herself hit the gelid waters below, her bloodied body being swallowed by the depths of the sea, Bela finally felt like she could rest.

She felt herself get taken by the tide,

her lungs begged her to give up, burning as she was rocked by the waves,

her heartbeat was barely enough to be considered present.

She felt the blood wash away with every lull of the sea, with every ripple in the water,

felt her life slipping away,

and yet Death never really came, just barely present, reaching out a hand but never really putting her out of her Misery...

She wasn't sure if she swimming to shore, she didn't know how much time had passed,

but at some point, she felt her body hitting the ground and felt herself being dragged out of the water.

And yet Death refused to take her in its cold embrace. Refused to accept her pleas with his black eyes and raven hair...

Death looked like Kaz, she realized,

he was there to take her life, 

after all, it was his to take.

"Bela?" she heard someone say, fingers trying to pry her eyes open. "Bela, can you hear me?"

"Is she dead, Ciara?"

"She's breathing, Luka."

"But she's bleeding!"

"We just have to get her some help. Remember that healer she helped us pay for when Mum was sick?"

"Mum will know him—"

"Bela? Do you remember our Mum?" someone asked her, and Ace was vaguely aware of the little girl patting her cheek to try and wake her.

Her Mum? Bela wasn't even sure if she still remembered her own mother's face. She'd become a long-lost memory in her mind, and no matter how many times she looked in a mirror, trying to see the woman she supposedly looked like, all that she saw were her grey eyes staring back at her. She saw a girl who was alone. A girl who just wanted Death to take her.

"Bela?"

Dark eyes flashed in her mind. Death. Kaz. She didn't know which she needed but in some ways, they were one and the same.

She needed her Devil. She needed him to warm her cold body with the flames of hell. She needed him to hold her with a tenderness only her villain had—because he was willing to burn the world for her.

She could feel Death looming over her. She could see her Devil in her mind.

It was all Kaz's fault.

He should be there to end it.

"Bastard," she mumbled lowly, her ears drumming, her heart fading and swaying between the line of life and death.

"She said something!"

"I know, I'm here too, Luka! Now stay back, alright? Bela needs space—"

"Bastard," she mumbled again into nothingness, "Kaz."

She heard a gasp, "Kaz Brekker?" the little girl whispered and Ace felt herself nodding. "He did this to you?"

"Who?" she heard the boy ask from afar.

"I need... him," Ace said, her voice hoarse, her mind barely functional.

"Dirtyhands?"

"Please," she heard herself beg and then she gave into exhaustion.

Or Death. She wasn't sure.

But she saw his eyes. And his smile. And she remembered his arms holding her to him, grasping onto her as they nearly drowned together in Fjerda.

How he was making sure he didn't let her go.

How he had anyway.

She gave into the darkness, knowing he'd come to her if she lived or if she died. Because Dirtyhands might've not cared to save her, but he wouldn't let anyone take what was his, not even Death himself. And her life was his as much as his life was hers.

♠

author's note:

ace towards the end of this chapter is a bit melodramatic but the girl has been through hell and back so... she can blame whoever she wants. and Kaz groveling a little never hurt anyone.

also, i made the end of this chapter kind of visual to show how ace wasn't exactly conscious, idk if it worked but i love using the page like that for scenes like this.

the chapter isn't long, but it is what it is, and it was pretty heavy in terms of TWs, so, I hope everyone is mentally okay after that, remember that it's important to keep your mind's health in mind.

anyway, idk when the next chapter is out, but until then thanks for supporting the story <33