He turns away.
Conversation over.
I don’t linger.
There’s nothing here worth staying for.
The training yard is empty when I reach it, the air cooler away from the press of bodies and voices. The scent here is different—cleaner in some ways, sharper in others. Metal. Sweat. Old blood baked into stone.
I pick up a blade.
The weight settles into my hand like it belongs there.
Unlike everything else today.
I move.
The first strike cuts through the air with a clean, familiar sound. The second follows immediately, then the third—each one tighter, faster, driving the tension out through motion instead of letting it sit.
The rhythm builds.
My body falls into it easily. Muscle memory. Precision. Control.
But there’s something underneath it.
Something pushing harder than it should.
I pivot, drive forward, stop the blade a breath from the training post. The air between steel and wood hums with the force I didn’t release.
Again.
Faster this time.
The blade flashes, carving arcs that would split bone clean if anything stood in front of me. My grip tightens. My breath deepens.
I don’t think.
I act.
That’s where control is easiest.
The post splinters when the blade finally connects. The crack echoes, sharp and loud in the empty yard. I stop. The sound lingers.
“You’re pushing it.”
Skot. Of course. Who else would be so audacious?
I don’t turn.
“I know exactly where the line is,” I say.
“Do you?”
I glance back at him.
He stands at the edge of the yard, hands clasped behind his back, watching like he always does.
“You’re angry,” he says.
