The deeper into the forest I go, the more the air fights me. It doesn’t cool. It swelters, so hot it weighs me down. My clothes stick, damp at the back of my neck, between my breasts, along my spine. Each breath is harder than the last, as if I’m dragging it through water instead of air.
The ground turns treacherous under my bare feet. Roots burst through the soil like bones fractured through skin. Pebbles cut. Twigs stab. Something sharp slices across my heel, and I feel the sting before I feel the wet.
Every step is a choice—pain or standing still—and I choose pain.
Something snaps behind me, and I freeze, listening, but all I hear is the occasional chitter of an animal and the breeze stirring the leaves. It feels older here.A reminder that these woods existed before Ashford House was even a dream. Before there were men to give it a name.
I slow, trying to get my bearings, but the forest has no face. Everything looks the same, endless trees, endless shadow, no clear path forward or back. That’s when something colder than grief slips in, sharper than anger, more dangerous than either. Not sadness. Not fear.
Resolve.
If this place wants to beat me, it’s going to have to try harder than that.
I lift my chin and wipe the back of my hand across my face, smearing dirt and tears together, and keep walking. I think back to everything. The dining hall. Jackson. Carrson pushing me away. The anger, the hate, I carry changes direction.
It turns inward.
Because what the fuck was I thinking?
Standing there silent while Carrson and Jackson talked about me like I wasn’t a person, just a tool to be used.
Anasset?
Really?
Then letting Carrson put his hands on me. He shoved me. Pushed me down into the dirt, and, even worse, I let him. I should’ve hit him back. Should’ve left a mark he couldn’t ignore. Something that made him feel the fire he was trying to douse. He doesn’t get to talk to me like that, treat me like I’m nothing.
What a jerk.
My jerk, but still.
I trudge along, my feet bleeding, each step grinding dirt into open skin. Branches snag my hair and rip strands out by the root, but I don’t slow. Don’t stop.
Pain is easy.
Thinking isn’t.
I make myself do it anyway, running through everything Carrson said, every word, every look.
He’s scared. Hurt. Humiliated. I get that.
Doesn’t mean we’re over.
I justneed to make him see the truth, that we’re inevitable. No one’s ever going to challenge him the way I do. No one’s going to see him, therealhim, the way I do.
And he’s the same for me. Anyone else would be boring.
He knows it. He’s just fighting it right now.
If that’s the game—I lift my head and scan, my eyes adjusting to the dark, making shapes out of shadow—I’ll play it better.
The noise has been building over the past few minutes. At first, I thought it was an animal prowling through the bushes. Then my stupid, hopeful heart leapt, and I thought it was Carrson, come to find me, but I’ve been testing it.
It moves when I move.
Stops when I stop.
Which makes it not Carrson. He’s not the type to hide.
