She’d heard those words a thousand times. From her father. From her tutors. From the endless parade of servants and guards and well-meaning adults who’d shaped her world. She had been wrapped in cotton wool from the moment of her birth, protected from anything that might tax her weak constitution.
And for years, it had been true. She had been delicate. She’d been sickly as a child, prone to fevers and fatigue, spending more time in bed than out of it. The physicians had shaken their heads and murmured about her mother’s difficult pregnancy, about the complications during her birth, and about a constitution that might never strengthen.
But she had grown stronger. Slowly, year by year, the illnesses had faded. By fifteen, she’d been healthy enough to attend her first public function. By eighteen, she hadn’t had a fever in three years.
And still her father had worried.
“I know you’re better, little spark. But why take risks? Why strain yourself when there’s no need?”
She’d gone along with it because she loved him. Because he’d lost her mother in childbirth and had nearly lost her too. She understood that his worry came from a place of deep and abiding love and fear. Arguing with him and insisting on her own capabilities, had seemed cruel when it was so easy to simply… let others handle things.
But now those others weren’t here.
Now she was alone on a mountain with a Vultor who looked at her like she was a particularly troublesome insect, and shecouldn’t lift a bucket of snow or cook a simple stew. She couldn’t do anything except take up space and consume resources.
I refuse to be helpless,she thought, the words hard and bright in her mind.
She’d survived so far. She wasn’t delicate—or if she was, it was only because no one had ever demanded otherwise.
But things are different now.
“I want to learn,” she said after Rykan finished refilling the water barrel and starting slicing thin strips of meat from the kill he’d made earlier that day. His golden eyes found hers across the cabin, his expression unreadable.
“Learn what?”
“Everything.” She pushed herself up from the bench, ignoring the protest of her aching muscles. “How to cook properly. How to carry water without dropping it. How to…” She gestured vaguely at the cabin, at the fire, at the whole of mountain survival she knew nothing about. “Everything I need to do to pull my weight.”
“You can barely stand.”
“I’m standing now.”
“For how long?”
It was a fair question. Her legs were trembling, her burned hand throbbing again, and her body screaming for rest. But she locked her knees and lifted her chin, meeting his gaze with what she hoped was determination rather than desperation.
“Long enough to learn.”
He set down the knife. He didn’t speak for a long moment, just studied her with those predator’s eyes, and she had the uncomfortable feeling that he was seeing more than she wanted to show.
“Why?” he asked finally.
“Because I don’t want to be a burden.”
He started to say something, then clearly changed his mind.
“You are a burden,” he said when he finally spoke.
The words should have stung. They did sting, if she were honest. But there was no cruelty in his voice—just a simple statement of fact. She was consuming his food, taking up space in his cabin, and requiring care and attention that he hadn’t planned to offer.
“Then let me become less of one,” she said. “I’m not asking you to coddle me or pretend I’m capable when I’m not. I’m asking you to teach me so that I can be capable. I’m a fast learner. I work hard, and I—” Her voice caught, but she forced herself to continue. “I need this. I need to know that I can do more than sit by a fire and wait for someone else to save me.”
Something shifted in his expression. Not softening, exactly, but… contemplation. Like she’d said something that surprised him.
“It won’t be easy,” he said.
“I don’t expect it to be.”
“You’ll fail. Repeatedly. I won’t pretend otherwise to spare your feelings.”
