He's been doing this several times over the past week, always waiting until most everyone else has turned in for the night or at least retired to their rooms. It's not that he thinks he'll be stopped from using the training grounds—Kellin said they're available to anyone who wants to practice. But he doesn't want to bother anyone with this undeniable itch underneath his skin, this desperate need to be more.
More useful. More self-sufficient. More reliable.
More worthy of keeping.
The thought drives him forward even when his muscles scream protest, even when exhaustion makes his movements sloppy. He knows his residence in the Drakarri lands is tentative and could be taken away at any time for any reason. Vaike made that clear—he has to prove his worth, has to earn his place everysingle day. One misstep, one failure, and he could find himself sent back to face his father's fury.
Because without this new life, what does he have? He can't return to his father's estate. He has no money or possessions to his name beyond the clothes on his back. And beyond a basic knowledge of cultivation and weaving, he has no real skills to offer. Right now he's digging in the dirt and tending vegetables—work that, if he's honest with himself, almost anyone could do. A task that could easily be managed by someone with more experience, more strength, more of everything he lacks.
This was the problem before too, wasn't it? His father had looked at him and found him utterly worthless. That's why he'd sent Evran away in the first place—because the only value Callum could see was as something to be traded, used, discarded when no longer useful.
The training with Kellin is going well—the weapons master has even complimented his progress, saying he has good instincts if somewhat unrefined technique. But Kellin has many students to teach, and Evran has other responsibilities that limit how much time he can spend in formal training. A few hours every other afternoon isn't enough. He needs to improve faster, needs to prove he can be an asset rather than a burden.
So he practices alone in the dark, pushing himself through drills until his arms shake and his lungs burn. He knows the basics now—knows the proper stance, the correct grip, how to transition between guard positions. What he needs is repetition, muscle memory, the kind of automatic response that only comes from doing something hundreds of times until your body knows it without thinking.
For a week now Evran has been coming out here after dark, training by moonlight in an attempt at staving off the doubt that creeps into his mind during quiet moments. He spends hours performing the maneuvers Kellin taught him, pushing his bodypast fatigue in an effort to get stronger, faster, better. By the time he drags himself back to bed, his limbs and lungs are burning with exertion, sweat cooling uncomfortably on his skin despite the mountain chill.
And still he pulls himself out of bed each morning when the sun rises, joining Eira in the gardens even though every muscle protests the movement. His hands shake sometimes from exhaustion as he works the soil, and more than once he's had to pause and close his eyes against waves of dizziness.
Eira has noticed the shadows under his eyes, the way he moves more stiffly as the week progresses. Yesterday she'd asked if he was sleeping well, her voice gentle with concern. He'd deflected with a smile and a joke about adjusting to mountain beds, but her worried look had followed him for the rest of the day.
But her kind words don't ease the voice in his head that says he's not enough—that he's never been enough, will never be enough no matter how hard he tries.
Tonight, Evran arrives at the training grounds fully expecting to have the space to himself as he has the previous nights. Instead, he finds it already occupied with the one person he's been carefully avoiding, the one man who is capable of taking everything away from him with a single word.
Vaike stands in the center of the grounds performing basic combat forms with a training sword, his movements flowing from one position to the next with the kind of effortless precision that comes from a lifetime of practice. He's stripped to the waist despite the cold night air, and the muscles of his back glisten in the moonlight with a sheen of sweat, flexing with each controlled motion.
He looks every part the warrior trained from birth—someone who wields a sword like it's an extension of his own arm and moves gracefully through every dodge and parry as naturally as breathing. The moonlight catches on the tattoos that spiralacross his shoulders and down his spine, turning them silver against his skin.
Evran freezes in place at the edge of the training ground, his breath catching in his throat. His heart hammers against his ribs, sending blood rushing in his ears. He doesn't know whether he's more affected by the unexpected sight of all that bare skin and controlled power on display, or by the fear of finding the very man he's been trying to avoid here in front of him.
This is the man who looked at him with such disgust in the audience chamber. The man whose approval he desperately needs but is terrified to seek. The man who holds Evran's entire future in his hands and could crush it without effort.
He urges his feet to work, to turn him around and carry him back to the refuge of his room before he can be noticed. But he should know better than to think he can sneak up on a predator. Some instinct born of years leading warriors in battle must have alerted Vaike to his presence, because even though Evran made barely a sound, even though he's still a good distance away, the Warlord knows he's there.
Vaike lowers his sword and turns on his heel in the dirt with fluid grace, his steel-gray eyes finding Evran immediately across the distance still separating them. The moonlight makes his gaze even more intense, if such a thing is possible—catching and reflecting like polished metal.
His expression is unreadable as always, giving nothing away of his thoughts or mood. Then he speaks, his voice cutting through the quiet of the night with calm authority: "Come here."
It's not a request. It's a command from a man accustomed to absolute obedience.
Evran feels the urge to immediately flee, warring with the compulsion to obey the order he's been given. Where would he even run? This is Vaike's stronghold, his territory. There's nowhere Evran could hide that he wouldn't be found if theWarlord wanted to find him. And running would only confirm every negative thing Vaike might think about him—that he's a coward, that he can't be trusted, that accepting him was a mistake.
Despite the apprehension crawling up his spine like ice water, his moment of frozen indecision lasts only a split second before he finds himself moving forward. His feet carry him toward the center of the training ground almost of their own accord, drawn by the magnetic pull of that commanding presence.
As he gets closer, Evran can see details he couldn't make out from a distance. The rise and fall of Vaike's chest as he breathes, the slight sheen of exertion on his skin, the way his hair has come partially loose from its tie and falls around his face. He looks more human somehow than he did on his throne, more real, but no less intimidating for it.
"You've been out here every night," Vaike says, and it's not a question. His gaze rakes over Evran in a way that makes him want to cross his arms defensively in front of himself, though he resists the urge. "Or nearly every night. The guards have mentioned it in their reports."
Of course the guards report to their Warlord. Of course Vaike knows exactly what Evran has been doing. The realization makes heat creep up his neck—embarrassment at being observed, fear about what conclusions have been drawn from his late-night training sessions.
An apology is already forming in Evran's mouth—I'm sorry for presuming, I didn't mean to overstep, I'll stop if it's not allowed—when Vaike gestures to the rack of training weapons mounted along the wall and says, "Grab a sword."
The words hit Evran roughly, sending warning bells ringing in his ears. This is a test. This has to be a test. Vaike wants to see what he's been doing out here alone, wants to evaluate whetherall this extra practice has actually improved his skills or if he's just wasting everyone's time.
Or maybe—and this thought makes his stomach drop—Vaike wants to personally demonstrate exactly how inadequate Evran is, how much he doesn't belong among warriors like the Drakarri.
But there's no refusing. Not when the Warlord has given a direct order.
