This was care.
From the same man who had ordered me to kneel just moments ago—who had allowed his enforcer to strike me when I hesitated, when I broke one of their codes.
He shouldn’t be tending to me.
He should be punishing me for going to that meeting with Renzo.
Renzo and I should face the same measure of retribution.
So why was he caring?
I couldn’t wrap my head around it.
The contradiction settled in my chest, heavy and disorienting.
I felt like I was caught in something I didn’t fully understand.
Or deserve.
When he finished, he slid one hand under my elbow and another beneath my arm, guiding me carefully back into a sitting position.
I followed, moving slowly, my body still tender, still aching—but no longer overwhelmed.
He reached into the kit and pulled out a blister pack.
Shook two white tablets into his palm.
“These will help,” he said quietly.
He held out a bottle of water.
I hesitated for just a second before taking both.
The pills.
Then the water.
I swallowed them with a small sip, careful not to look at him.
Careful not to let myself linger on this version of him.
Because it didn’t make sense.
None of it did.
I had caused irreparable damage.
The third battalion. His most loyal, his best-trained soldiers. Men who had lived and breathed for his command, who wouldhave followed him into any fire, any war, without hesitation. All of them—gone.
I could only imagine the weight that pressed on him now.
The void left in his ranks, the roles that would go unfilled, the strategies undone, the lives he now had to compensate for.
Every loss a testament to my recklessness.
I should be in the dark cell beside Renzo.
Not here.
