In the amazing book series The Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo which is part of the Grishaverse, there are two characters named Kaz and Inej. Six of Crows is about six seemingly random teenagers with different backstories coming together to do a crazy heist. I love these books because of how amazing and deep all of the characters are and how well they fit together. Along with a lot of the other characters, Kaz and Inej have a special relationship. I think it is partially related to Kaz’s obsession with magic and Inej’s ability to vanish at a moment’s notice. Kaz’s love of music goes back to when he was little. Along with how he became a crow, this article will dive into where Kaz’s love of magic came from and how that connects to Inej.  

When Kaz grew up, he lived a contrasting childhood from Inej, they both were brought to Kerch because of a tragedy but in different ways. Kaz grew up on a farm with his brother Jordie and his dad. His dad got into an accident with a landfall which killed him. He and Jordie then moved to Ketterdam where his brother got fooled by Pecka in an investment scheme. Then the boys were back on the street, where they got sick. Jordie died so Kaz went to the Barrel and became the leader of the crows. Inej grew up in a moving circus, taken from her carriage and brought to the Menagerie where she was touched and used by lots of people. For example, the owner Tante Heleen would slap or kiss people’s cheeks without warning which kept them always on their toes when she was near. When Kaz stopped by the Menagerie, Inej snuck up on him so he bought out her contract and finished turning her into the spy that we know as the wraith. 

Later in the books, Inej becomes one of Kaz’s most trusted companions, along with Jesper and Rotty. We can tell how close Kaz and Inej got by the 2nd book when Kaz says,  “I would come for you… I would come for you, and if I couldn’t walk, I’d crawl to you, and no matter how broken we were we’d fight our way out together. Knives drawn pistols blazing, because that’s what we do we never stop fighting.”(Leigh Bardugo 184-185). 

One of the reasons that I think that Kaz likes Inej so much in the first place ties back to his love of magic. Inej is good at disappearing, which grabs Kaz’s attention because magic tricks, especially the vanishing coin ones, are tied to his childhood. We also see him do a vanishing magic trick in the show Shadow and Bone. Which I believe is where his interest in her started. 

In the 2nd book Crooked Kingdom, Inej thinks while talking to Dunyasha about her being the heir to the crown while they are dueling, “What about the nobodies and the nothings, the invisible girls? We learn to hold our heads as if we wear crowns. We learn to wring magic from the ordinary.” In addition, Inej is thinking about fighting and about how she is happy with the choices she’s made. This leads us to her abilities as the Wraith, which includes her power to disappear. 

In the show, we see Kaz practicing magic tricks with a little girl. Originally from the books, we learn she was set up by Pecka while Jordie was talking to Pecka presumably about the investment that Jordie was tricked by. This could tie Kaz’s love for magic back to his obsession with ending Pecka because he hurt Jordie. In the books, we are told that Kaz was pulled away from watching the magician do the tricks. This means that Jordie was there when Kaz was watching the magic tricks. He also might think about it as a tie to Jordie, which could give Kaz an even bigger attachment to the magic tricks and Inej because of how obsessive he is with Pecka and because of how much he cared about and loved Jordie.  

In the Six of Crows, we get a flashback to when Kaz watches the Magician do the tricks and we see Kaz say, “The card tricks had been good but the disappearing coin kept him up at night. How had the magician done it? It had been there one moment and gone the next” (Leigh Bardugo 207). This shows us that even though he liked all of the card tricks, the disappearing one is his favorite. Also, the way he describes it is very similar to how they describe Inej. 

We don’t actually know where Inej got her talent to disappear or how she learned it.  All we know is that she snuck up on Kaz cause she wanted to be heard. Unfortunately she wasn’t. She was taught and worked on how to balance and be nimble on tightrope walking when she was little. Kaz taught Inej how to pick locks, but we are just left to assume that being quiet and being able to appear and disappear was just something she picked up along the way, or that she magically got the ability to do these things when she met Kaz.  

So in the end I think that Kaz likes Inej so much because she can disappear like a magic trick and because he is attached to magic. This allows him to form a connection to Jordie and it brings him back to his childhood when he was innocent and wasn’t the ruler of the crows running dangerous heists that no one should try to do.