For weeks after the funeral, I’d tried to get through tohim. Asked questions about mother, about grief, about the hollow space in our house where her laughter used to live. He’d answered with facts. Details. Practical arrangements. Never once did he speak of loss or longing or the way her absence made even breathing feel difficult.
“Emotion is weakness,” he’d finally told me when I pressed too hard. “A warrior who cannot master his own heart cannot master anything else.”
I’d learned the lesson well. Too well.
The problem was Korrath’s teachings pulled in another direction entirely. The god of sacred combat was also the god of brotherhood, of bonds forged in shared struggle. His followers were meant to understand connection, loyalty, the strength that came from trusting others completely.
I’d mastered the individual parts—combat, discipline, physical perfection. But the bonds? The sacred partnerships that were supposed to deepen understanding and strengthen resolve?
Three failed attempts. Three partners who’d found me competent but cold, skilled but distant. We’d completed the rituals, fulfilled the obligations, and failed to sustain ourselves against the ever-increasing pressure of the bond. It had suffocated us to the point of being unbearable.
I stood and moved to the window, looking out at the training grounds. In the largest sand pit, two militants worked through grappling forms. The larger man—someone I didn’t recognize—had his partner pinned, but there was something gentle in the way heheld the position. Patient. Teaching rather than dominating.
That’s what I was supposed to be able to do. Guide without crushing. Lead without demanding. Find the balance between strength and care that made sacred bonds possible.
Twenty-eight days with Kaelen. A scholar who’d studied power dynamics, who would expect me to embody everything he’d read about militant dominance. Who would watch for the confidence and natural authority that were supposed to come as easily as breathing.
I pressed my forehead against the cool glass.
What if he discovered the truth? That underneath all the training and discipline and physical perfection, I was just a man who’d learned to hide too well? That when stripped of military necessity and life-or-death situations, I didn’t know how to command anything—not even myself?
What if, in trying to give him what he expected, I revealed what I was really afraid of?
That I didn’t want to lead at all.
That I’d been waiting my whole life for someone strong enough, sure enough, kind enough to tell me it was safe to stop pretending.
The thought terrified me more than any battle I’d ever fought.
I turned away from the window and began practicing the forms again. Straightened shoulders. Steady voice. Controlled expression.
Twenty-eight days. I could maintain the pretense for twenty-eight days.
I had to.
The moonstone had dimmed to its softest glow by the time I gave up on sleep.
I sat at my small writing desk, staring at blank parchment. The temple was quiet around me—even the most dedicated acolytes had retired hours ago. Only the night watch remained, their footsteps a distant rhythm on stone corridors. The pale light from the stone embedded in my wall cast everything in silver and shadow.
I dipped the quill and began to write.
Father—
The words came slowly, each one pulled from some place I’d kept sealed for years.
I am to be bonded again. A scholar this time, from the Temple of Aerius. His name is Kaelen. I know nothing of him save that he studies the very things I cannot master.
I think of you often when these obligations arise. How you stood so straight at mother’s bedside. How you never let the grief touch your voice or bend your shoulders. You were everything a militant should be.
I am not.
I stopped, quill hovering over the parchment. Was I really going to confess this? To the man who’d taught me that weakness was the only unforgivable sin?
I fear I will disappoint him. Not through lack of skill or knowledge, but through lack of... something I cannot name. The thing that makes bonds sacred rather than mere duty. You wouldtell me emotion is weakness, and perhaps you are right. But without it, what am I offering him?
Your son,Rion
I set the letter aside and reached for fresh parchment.
