I stared at her for a second before a laugh escaped me too, rougher and quieter but no less real. I was still trying to catch my breath. “Yes, I believe we did.”
Aleksy reached us first, hauling Mila into a fierce hug before gripping the back of my neck hard enough to jolt me.
“That was disgusting,” he declared in heavily accented English.
Irina smacked his shoulder immediately. “He means beautiful.”
“I meant both.”
Mila was still laughing.
Anya appeared next, throwing her arms around both of us at once. “You looked so free out there,” she whispered into my ear before stepping back.
Sokolov stood several feet away from the chaos, arms folded as always, expression unreadable. However, the rigid line of his mouth had softened, and his shoulders no longer carried that relentless tension that usually followed every performance. My gaze met his, and he gave a sharp nod of approval.
For a moment I was twelve years old again.
Beside him, Marek remained apart from the others, his expression impossible to read, but its weight felt like assessment.
That unsettled me more than overt criticism might have.
“Come.” Mila grabbed my wrist. “Scores.”
We made our way toward the Kiss and Cry, the Velkaran flag hanging above it. Aleksy squeezed my shoulder as we passed, and Irina kissed Mila’s cheek before everyone stepped back to let us sit.
Mila’s hand found mine the second we sat down, and I knew that had nothing to do with optics. I held on tightly, the arena noise blurring around me as the replay started on the giant screen overhead. I barely looked at it.
Mila squeezed my fingers. “Breathe.”
“Iambreathing.”
“No, you arevibrating.”
That almost pulled another laugh from me.
Then the scores appeared.
77.54
For one suspended second, I simply stared.
Then the ranking flashed beneath it.
Georgia
Velkarya
United States
The arena reacted instantly, applause swelling again as Mila sucked in a sharp breath beside me.
“Second,” she whispered.
I simply stared.
I had prepared myself for many outcomes.
That was not one of them.
