Ruthless

*Isla*

"What's going on?" I murmur, more to myself than to Liora.

Liora squints, her keen eyes cutting through the gloom. "Sparring circle, I believe they call it," she says, a grim sort of amusement in her tone. "Second-years unwinding after a long day of watching us first-years get our asses kicked. It's tradition."

I am wondering if my brother is friend with this cursed guy, or if it just a coincidence they are on the same side in this fight.

A hush falls over the gathered crowd, a strange, tense silence that's louder than the previous shouting. The two opponents in the circle square up. They're big, both of them, but one moves with a swagger that screams overconfidence. He lunges forward, a sloppy, telegraphed tackle aimed at Ian.

Ian sidesteps with a contemptuous ease, tripping the guy with a casual foot. The lout goes down in a heap of limbs and dust, provoking a fresh round of jeers and laughter from the onlookers. Ian just grins, looking out at the crowd, preening for an audience I'm sure includes Cedric. He's all flash and show, the perfect warrior everyone expects him to be.

But the real show is on the other side of the circle.

Caelen's opponent, a wiry, nervous-looking guy, hesitates. You can see the fear in the tense line of his shoulders. He knows who he's facing. He takes a tentative step, then another, feinting left, then right, trying to find an opening. Caelen doesn't move. He just watches, his startling green eyes fixed, his expression utterly blank. He's a predator giving prey just enough rope to hang itself.

The guy finally makes his move… a clumsy, desperate lunge. And that's when the world seems to shrink.

Caelen moves. It's not a blur of motion, not the explosive power of Ian's easy takedown. It's economy. A single, fluid shift of his weight, a subtle turn of his body. He's not there when the guy arrives. Instead, he's behind him. One arm snakes around the guy's neck, the other pins an arm behind his back. It's over in a heartbeat. A perfect, silent takedown. There's no flourish, no gloating. Caelen simply holds him, a statue carved from shadow and muscle, until the guy taps frantically at Caelen's arm, a frantic, panicked surrender.

Then, just as silently, Caelen releases him and steps back, melting into the darkness at the edge of the circle as if he were never there. No words. No acknowledgment of the stunned silence of the crowd. He's done.

A cold shiver runs down my spine, one that has nothing to do with the night air. He didn't just win. He demonstrated a complete and utter mastery. He could have broken that guy's neck with a single, practiced movement, and the terrifying part is, I think everyone watching knows it. Including me. The heat that had coiled in my stomach earlier is back, but it's different now. It's not just attraction. It's recognition. Of what I could be, if I let go of everything holding me back. Of what I fear I might have to become.

Liora lets out a long, slow whistle. "Ruthless," she breathes, the word full of a strange, grudging respect. "And that's just a friendly spar."

"Friendly," I echo, my throat dry. I can't tear my eyes away from the spot where Caelen disappeared. The crowd begins to disperse, the tension broken, the spectacle over. I watch Ian clap a laughing Cedric on the shoulder, their camaraderie a stark contrast to the chilling isolation of the other warrior. They are everything the Academy wants: strong, social, predictable.

"Let's get some sleep, Limpy," Liora says, nudging my good shoulder gently. "We have provisional warriors to be tomorrow."

I nod, forcing myself to my feet. My leg screams in protest, a familiar, grounding pain. We make our way through the thinning crowd toward the first year girls barracks, a long, low building set slightly apart from the main ones. The path is dark and uneven, and each step sends a fresh jolt through my body, but I welcome it. It keeps me focused.

The inside of the barracks is simple and sparse. Rows of narrow cots line the walls, each with a thin wool blanket. The air smells of pine cleaner and damp wood. We find two empty cots near the back, side by side. Liora flops down onto hers without ceremony, her face etched with exhaustion. I'm slower, lowering myself carefully onto the hard mattress, wincing as the movement pulls at my shoulder.

For a long while, we just lie there in the semi-darkness, lit only by a single, sputtering lantern near the door. I can hear the other trainees settling, a symphony of creaks, coughs, and muted whispers. I'm bone-tired, but my mind is racing, replaying the day in a chaotic loop. The obstacle course. The fight. The board. Cedric. Caelen.

"He's wrong, you know," Liora's voice cuts through the quiet, a low murmur from the cot next to me.

"Cedric?" I ask, though I know she doesn't need to clarify.

"Yeah. He sees your limp and your size and thinks 'broken'. He sees a girl and thinks 'fragile'. He doesn't see the fire."

I turn my head to look at her. Her silhouette against the lantern light is still, but I can feel the intensity of her gaze. "What fire?" I whisper, the vulnerability in my own voice surprising me. "I barely passed. I'm 'provisional'."

"Fire isn't about passing or failing," she says, her voice certain. "It's about what makes you get up after you've been thrown down for the tenth time. It's about looking at a trial designed to break you and saying, 'I'm still here'. That's you, Limpy. You didn't just survive those obstacles; you defied them. You stood up to that second-year, even with a broken shoulder. Cedric sees a liability. I see a survivor."

Her words land with the weight of truth, settling into the raw, tender places inside me. A survivor. Not a victim. Not a charity case. A survivor. For the first time all day, a flicker of something that feels a lot like pride ignites in my chest.

I think of Caelen Fennec again. The silent, deadly grace of him. The way he dismantled his opponent without seeming to try. He is a survivor of a different sort, forged in a fire of curses and isolation. I wonder what he saw when he looked at me. A curiosity? A joke? Or did he, for just a second, see the same fire Liora is talking about? The thought is absurd, and yet, it lingers.

I close my eyes, but the images are burned onto the backs of my eyelids: Ian's arrogant grin, Cedric's pitying smile, and Caelen's cold, assessing stare. They are the three faces of my new world. The brother who doubts me, the guy who wants to save me, and the stranger who feels dangerous enough to break me. My future, it seems, is a battlefield in more ways than one.

"Get some sleep, warrior," Liora's voice is a low murmur in the dark. "The real fight starts tomorrow."

I nod into my pillow, the word echoing in my mind. Warrior. Provisional first year warrior. It's a start. And for tonight, in the quiet dark of a strange new bed, surrounded by the sleeping bodies of other young women who refused to be told no, it's enough.