Nobody's actually going to be bothered to read this A/N, but can I just say that if you read this fic, please tell me what you think because I need as much feedback as I can get.
I kinda wrote this for fun, and I wasn't going to publish it at all, but here I am. Enjoy!
Wylan had never been particularly good with words. They ran off the page, jumbled together, twisting his mind into knots. So when words failed him, he used colour. He could spend hours painting and painting and painting, each brushstroke relaxing him. Art was his escape. He could write stories with only a paintbrush and a canvas and paint.
And music, too. What he couldn't convey with those hateful words, he played on his flute, letting the soft sounds ring around his head. And if he could write with art, he could speak with music, the notes saying more than his own broken words ever could.
He saw the whole world like that: a flurry of colour and sound buzzing around in the air. And now, he looked around at the people who surrounded him, and he wondered about their colours and their sounds.
Kaz was black and grey. It wasn't just his black suit and his black gloves - it was his grating voice like stones rubbing together, his soul like the dark concrete walls of an impenetrable prison. He was closed off and secretive; everything he did was dark and mysterious and unpredictable, each thought hiding unseen in the shadows. He was a shadowy man in general, with his dangerous jobs and secretive past. He took the mask of blackness around with him, an unlighted maze of twists and turns and unseen directions, covering his mind like a hazy web. Nobody could get through that maze. He was surrounded by stories built around the grey smog of Ketterdam, the murky black water that ran through the canals. Yes, exactly like canal water - impossible to see through, full of foul things, and very likely to kill you.
And his sound? Kaz's sound was in the papery rasp of his voice, low and thin and hard. He was all sharp, like a tune full of staccato notes, piping their dark little tune of tricks and secrets. He was all minor chords, but not gothic and drawn-out - no, they were quick and dramatic, leaping around everywhere. Quick like his nimble lockpick fingers, like the scanning of his bitter eyes, the erratic movement when he limped around the place, yet dramatic like his dark clothing and his gloved hands and the web of lies that clung to his name. But beneath that jumpy tune was a steady pulse, like the tap, tap, tap of his cane, like the steely determination that burned inside him, a determination that could last forever, lying in wait and brooding and growing. With Kaz, everything was a waiting game.
Yes, Wylan decided. Kaz Brekker was the dirtiest water in Ketterdam's canals, the thickest smog on the streets. His tune was sharp and lively, yet beneath was a steady bass, playing in broken harmony to the metronome that his cane provided.
Inej was purple. Royal purple, because she was like royalty. She was soft-spoken and she walked with perfect posture, the Queen of Ketterdam, leaping around the city without anyone to stop her. Even if she slunk around on the rooftops unseen, the Wraith was well-known and people were afraid. She had power, and she held it above her like a veil spun from expensive (and purple) material. She might as well wear a crown. Inej spoke with softest lilac and acted like sweet lavender. But however bright purple can be, it can be close to black, and Wylan also knew that purple was also the colour of the silks she wore in the Menagerie. She had shed those silks the moment she had left, but what they had done to her still hovered around her graceful figure. However much she tried to forget those days, you could see what they left: the damage, but also the reinforcements it brought to her mind. Those days donning purple silks had made her invincible.
Her tune was more difficult. It was flowing and soft, like when she walked with that cat-like grace. Wylan had seen her flying around the rigging once her wound had healed, and that was the melody - fast and smooth, like a twirling ribbon, whipping around and around, stunningly beautiful and mesmerising. This was the warmth of her melodic voice, the glow of her chocolate eyes, the dimples that appeared when she lit the air with her grin. Somehow she was speedy yet soft and warm yet dangerous. It was generally a comforting tune, full of faith. Full of trust. But, like with every person on this boat, there was a darker undertone, and Inej's was quiet, scared to reveal itself to the world, a tauntingly slow tune that slunk beneath her warmth.
When he thought about it, Wylan liked Inej a lot. She was a royal purple ribbon spinning around the air, nothing like the harsh greys of Kaz. In a way, her smooth tune complemented his jerky rhythm, softening out his sharp corners and lightening his dark shades with her own purple hue. She brought out the best in people.
Matthias was icy blue. Not just because he was from Fjerda, but because of the frostiness of his voice and other things - he spoke sharply and walked sharply and acted sharply. At the beginning of this journey everything about him had been sharp sharp, sharp, but the ice had now started to melt, and he was softening a little: cold, but no longer an icicle. His emotions ran like water (icy blue water), flowing from one into the next, rocking gently, but destined to reach the same place nonetheless. He was steady and strong and unstoppable, like the icy cold waters of Fjerda, and he instilled the calm of fluffy snowfall on his companions.
His tune was a military march, very proper and strict and sharp. It lay in his gruff voice and soldier's posture, his traditional way of looking at everything. His tune marched along right until he was affected by his days in Hellgate, and here the march became rougher - less like an army and more like a line of prisoners marching in misery. Here it was less strict, and became more of a street brawl then a war with soldiers. Occasionally, this march of Matthias' army (or prisoners) became softer. When he remembered the past, he either stepped up his march until it blocked everything else, or he let things shine through, revealing that his true mind was soft as a wolf's fur, that he was kind and slow and comforting.
When Matthias' ice had melted, Wylan felt himself grow fonder of him, gruff coldness and all. His heart was difficult to budge, but once it had, it was very strong and loyal. Somehow the cold Fjerdan ice and the march of armies and prisoners had become warmer and less strict in the past few days. Wylan definitely liked it that way.
Nina was red. Red, red, red. Wylan didn't even have to think about it. Everything about her was loud and brash and bright. Sometimes she was happy, and when she was happy she made sure everyone knew it, her complete … redness (here, words failed Wylan yet again) so commanding that anyone could see she was red. Sometimes she was angry, her redness like blood - when Nina was angry, she could drain the blood out of anyone. Nina was a crazy smile and a promise of waffles. She was a red kefta and red lips and red cheeks and red red red. But sometimes she was the red of roses - sickeningly sweet, yet covered in thorns. Because however happy or angry (she was never anything in between wild emotions), Nina had scars like the rest of them.
She was loud. Her tune was loud and swinging, like a drinking song. Everyone knew it was outrageous, but everyone sung it anyway right with her. There was something about that song that made Wylan want to be part of it. Maybe it was the smile that went along with it, or the camaraderie that Nina projected, or maybe it was just a catchy tune. Because surely everyone had to like Nina. There was nothing not to like. But maybe there was. Something dark. Something that all that loudness hid, and no-one listened out for. It was full of mournful long notes, full of heartbreak and homesickness.
However loud and bright Nina seemed, there was a dark tune, the red of roses lingering beneath, completely unseen and unheard. But Wylan saw it. Wylan heard it. He was observant, and when he couldn't get enough out of her words, he turned to colour and song.
Jesper was bright green. Bright green because of his stunning joy, that impossible fervour that could be passed on to anyone (apart from Kaz). Like the most outrageously bright greens, he drew eyes from all around, a very tall Zemeni boy in the middle of Ketterdam with revolvers strung around his hips. Jesper was green like the grass and the leaves, naturally beautiful and able to bloom anywhere in resplendent colour. Sometimes Jesper could be green like a cactus. He was a welcome sight to see, with a large grin and long gangly limbs, but prickly if you tried to touch him. Jesper liked to be the best, liked to win, and wouldn't stop until he did. When he was really down, when the winning streak died away, he was the green of a snake - likely to lash out, and poisonous when he did. Wylan could admit that he liked Jesper, but he also knew that Jesper was green in all these ways, and sometimes that wasn't a good thing.
Jesper's music was Wylan's favourite. It was bright, like Jesper's shining smile; it was happy, like his general atmosphere; the notes swung into each other like his gangly limbs as he walked. Every so often, the contented tune was punctuated by a sharp gunshot, BANG BANG BANG, and the randomness, unpredictability of everything was just so Jesper. It was swingy like his lolloping walk, sharp like a gunshot, full of joy. The darkness that lay in the rest of the tunes was nonexistent, because it was something Jesper simply never thought about, pushing it away for later.
Jesper was full of bubbly happiness, and although his green could be that of cactus, the predominant emotion that radiated from his every pore way joy. He was so relaxed and funny, and Wylan found that however annoying the Zemeni boy could be, he comforted him. Wylan didn't mind when he called him merchling - well, not really. Jesper was just too warm to be annoyed at.
Wylan was on a ship with five other people, their greys and purples and blues and reds and greens flowing around each other, occasionally bumping and leaping away when they did. The ship was full of these colours, occasionally mixing to create a brand new hue.
And their tunes - those impossible tunes somehow danced around each other in a dangerous harmony. Who needs Mozart when you have those six? Everything that made up each of them played at the same time, crooked and broken and strange, but perfect.
Despite Wylan's extensive knowledge of art and music, he couldn't help but think that all their tunes played together at the right moments, all their colours painted together in the right painting, would be something loud and dramatic and big and bright and entirety unstoppable.