Chapter 6 – Human Reflexes

Rae

By the next morning, Combat Training remained the one class I had been dreading since I saw it on my schedule.

Every other course at Ravenwood could pretend I belonged there if everyone tried hard enough. History could be studied. Pack Law could be memorized. Strategy depended more on thought than claws.

Combat belonged to wolves.

The training arena sat behind the main academy building, half enclosed by dark stone walls and half open to the surrounding forest. Wide doors revealed an outdoor field marked with sparring circles, obstacle courses, and reinforced targets scarred by years of use.

Inside, padded mats covered the floor. Practice staffs, wooden daggers, and dulled training blades lined the walls. The air smelled of leather, pine, and old sweat.

Everyone else seemed comfortable the moment they entered.

I felt as though I had stepped into territory that had already rejected me.

Chrissy stood beside me, tugging nervously at the sleeves of her training shirt.

“Well,” she whispered. “This is horrifying.”

I glanced at her. “You’re a wolf.”

“I’m an academic wolf. My most developed survival instinct is avoiding group projects.”

A smile tugged at my mouth.

“Pair up,” a voice commanded.

Mr. Calder strode onto the mats and clapped once. He was broad through the shoulders, with close-cropped gray hair and the expression of someone who considered student questions a personal insult.

“We’re beginning with defensive breaks,” he announced. “No claws. No shifting. No teeth. Anyone who turns this into a dominance contest will spend the next week cleaning mats.”

The room divided almost instantly.

Students found friends, packmates, and partners of similar rank before I had fully processed the instructions. Chrissy was pulled into a pair by another Omega girl from one of her morning classes.

She gave me an apologetic look.

I shook my head to tell her it was fine.

It wasn’t her fault.

No one else approached me.

Several students glanced in my direction, but their eyes moved away the moment I noticed. Within seconds, everyone had a partner.

Everyone except me.

Mr. Calder counted the pairs before his gaze settled on where I stood alone.

“Rivers, sit this exercise out.”

I stared at him. “Excuse me?”

“You’re the odd number.”

“This class is required.”

“I’m aware.”

“If I sit out, I lose the participation marks.”

“That’s correct.”

A few students laughed quietly.

Mr. Calder folded his arms. “There is no one left for you to train with.”

“Then assign me to a group.”

“This is a paired exercise.”

“Then make one group of three.”

His expression hardened. “The course was designed for wolves, Rivers. I’m not placing you into a physical drill where you are likely to be injured merely so the academy can pretend everyone entered this room with equal capabilities.”

He delivered the words without cruelty.

That somehow made them worse.

To him, excluding me was practical. Sensible. Barely worth discussing.

Quinn stood across the room beside Grant.

“At least someone is being realistic,” she murmured.

Grant looked at her.

Whatever she saw in his expression made her straighten.

I kept my attention on Mr. Calder.

“I didn’t ask you to pretend the class was equal,” I said. “I asked you to let me complete it.”

His jaw shifted. “Watch your tone.”

“I am.”

A few students failed to hide their laughter.

Before Mr. Calder could respond, Julien spoke from the far side of the mat.

“She can train with us.”

Every conversation stopped.

Julien stood beside Linc, adjusting the wrap around one wrist as though he had made a completely ordinary suggestion.

Mr. Calder turned toward him. “You already have a partner.”

“There is no rule prohibiting three students from practicing a defensive break together.”

“This is a paired drill.”

“It can be adapted.”

Mr. Calder’s eyes narrowed. “Are you questioning how I conduct my class, Bennett?”

“No, sir.” Julien’s voice remained perfectly polite. “I’m questioning whether Ravenwood intends to penalize a student for being excluded from a required exercise.”

The arena went silent.

Julien did not raise his voice or challenge Mr. Calder’s authority directly. He simply identified the weakest point in the instructor’s decision and stood there waiting for him to defend it.

Linc remained beside him without speaking.

His silence made the challenge feel even more deliberate.

Mr. Calder looked from Julien to me.

“Fine. Rivers, join Bennett and Adler. Try not to interfere with their training.”

I crossed the mat before my expression could reveal how much the remark stung.

Julien waited until I reached them.

“Problem solved.”

“You didn’t have to do that.”

“No,” he agreed. “I didn’t.”

Linc’s pale-gray eyes moved toward Mr. Calder. “He would have let you fail.”

“I noticed.”

Julien tightened the wrist wrap. “So did I.”

I lowered my voice. “How did you make him change his mind?”

“I asked an inconvenient question.”

“That was all?”

“I’m the future Beta of Ravenwood. He knows inconvenient questions eventually become official ones.”

I stared at him.

Julien’s mouth curved faintly. “I don’t outrank him today. He knows I probably will for the rest of his career.”

“Julien is polite,” Linc said. “People mistake that for harmlessness.”

Julien looked pleased. “Thank you.”

“That wasn’t praise.”

“I’m accepting it anyway.”

Mr. Calder called the class to attention and demonstrated the first technique with one of the senior students.

The movement looked simple. One partner closed a hand around the other’s wrist. The trapped student rotated toward the weakest part of the grip, stepped backward, and pulled free.

“Do not fight strength with strength,” Mr. Calder instructed. “You will lose against a larger opponent. Break the structure of the hold.”

He repeated the warning twice.

I appeared to be the only person in the room who actually needed it.

Julien demonstrated with Linc first. Linc caught his wrist, and Julien escaped with a smooth turn and step that looked almost effortless.

“Rotate toward the thumb,” Julien explained when they reset. “That is where the grip is weakest.”

“Don’t pull straight back,” Linc added. “You’ll give him more leverage.”

“You make it sound easy.”

“The movement is easy,” Julien said. “Executing it under pressure is the difficult part.”

“Encouraging.”

“It’s physics, not encouragement.”

Linc held out his hand.

I placed my wrist in his grip.

His fingers closed firmly enough that I could feel the strength he was holding back. He wasn’t treating me as though I might shatter, but he wasn’t pretending I had the same power as everyone else either.

“Turn here,” Julien said, touching two fingers lightly to the side of my wrist. “Then step away.”

I rotated toward Linc’s thumb and pulled.

His grip opened.

I blinked. “That worked?”

“It usually does when performed correctly,” Julien said.

Linc extended his hand again. “Repeat it.”

We practiced until the movement stopped feeling borrowed.

Each time, Linc adjusted something small. The placement of my foot. The angle of my elbow. How far I allowed my shoulder to rise.

Julien explained the reasoning behind every correction.

Neither of them grew impatient when I made a mistake.

That unsettled me almost as much as Mr. Calder’s dismissal had.

Across the arena, Grant trained with Quinn. He corrected her stance while she complained that he was gripping too tightly.

He wasn’t.

Even from where I stood, I could see how carefully he controlled his strength.

His gaze lifted once and found me between Julien and Linc.

The contact lasted only a second before I looked away.

“Again,” Linc said.

I placed my wrist in his hand.

This time, his grip tightened.

Only slightly.

The pressure changed enough to make the drill real. My previous escapes had worked against the controlled resistance he offered. Now his fingers formed an unyielding circle around my wrist.

I tried the same turn.

Nothing happened.

“Don’t rush,” Julien said. “Find the weakest point.”

Linc’s gaze remained on my face. “I won’t hurt you.”

“I know.”

I adjusted my stance.

His grip tightened another fraction.

Something shifted inside me.

It wasn’t fear. There was no time for fear.

One moment, Linc held my wrist.

The next, I stood two steps away from him with my arm free and my body angled defensively.

The movement happened so quickly that I did not feel myself make it.

Silence closed around the three of us.

Julien stared at my empty wrist.

Linc looked at his hand.

“What did you do?” Julien asked.

“I used the break.”

“No,” Linc said quietly. “You didn’t.”

My heartbeat accelerated. “Of course I did.”

“I didn’t feel you rotate.”

“I must have.”

Julien’s attention moved between my feet and Linc’s hand, reconstructing a movement neither of us could explain.

“Try it again,” he said.

Linc reached for my wrist.

“Bennett.”

Mr. Calder’s voice stopped him.

The instructor stood several yards away, watching us.

I hadn’t seen him approach.

His gaze moved from me to Linc. “What happened?”

“We were practicing the assigned break,” Julien answered.

“I saw that.” Mr. Calder looked directly at me. “Do it again.”

Every nearby pair had stopped training.

Heat crawled across the back of my neck as Linc closed his hand around my wrist once more.

His grip was firm, but the strange certainty that had seized me was gone.

I rotated toward his thumb and stepped back.

This time, the release happened exactly as Julien had taught me. Controlled. Visible. Entirely ordinary.

Mr. Calder’s expression did not change.

“That wasn’t what you did before.”

“It was the same technique.”

“No.”

The single word cut through the arena.

I opened my mouth, then stopped.

Because I didn’t know what I had done either.

Warmth flashed beneath my training shirt.

The moonstone pulsed once against my chest, sudden and sharp enough that I nearly reached for it.

Mr. Calder’s eyes narrowed when I flinched.

I forced my hand to remain at my side.

“Continue,” he said at last.

He walked away, but his attention returned to us twice before he reached the center of the arena.

The surrounding students slowly resumed their drills.

Julien stepped closer and lowered his voice.

“Are you trained in another form of combat?”

“No.”

“Did anyone teach you an alternative escape?”

“No.”

His brow furrowed. “Then how did you move before Linc could react?”

“I don’t know.”

Linc remained focused on me with an intensity that made the arena feel smaller.

I rubbed my wrist, although it didn’t hurt.

The moonstone had already cooled.

“Maybe you loosened your grip,” I said.

“I didn’t.”

“You must have.”

Linc shook his head.

Julien looked toward Mr. Calder, who was still watching us from across the room.

“We should keep practicing.”

I held out my wrist again, determined to prove the moment had been a mistake.

Linc didn’t take it.

His gaze remained fixed on mine.

“Humans don’t move that fast.”