Chapter 32
Nova
I’m going to die.
Not from the Order. Not from bears. Not from whatever Silas and his father are planning. I’m going to die in a training yard in the middle of the Hollow because a woman half my size just swept my legs out from under me for the fourth time and I think my spine is trying to leave my body.
“Again,” Lena says.
“I’m on the ground.”
“I can see that. Get up.”
I get up. Everything hurts. Two weeks of this and everything still hurts. I thought it would get easier. It has not gotten easier. My body is a collection of bruises wearing skin.
The training yard is behind the community hall — a cleared patch of ground that used to be a garden before Brent and Cal turned it into what I can only describe as a place where joy goes to die.
They’ve been running sessions every morning.
Anyone who wants to participate shows up. Most of the town does.
The guys love it. Obviously.
Locke is across the yard demonstrating a takedown on some poor volunteer who didn’t realize what he was signing up for.
Brent calls out the technique and Locke executes it in slow motion, which is somehow more terrifying than if he did it fast because you can see every precise movement that’s about to ruin your day.
Vaelor is running the strength exercises.
He’s got a group of six people doing things with logs that I’m pretty sure violate several laws of physics.
He’s being encouraging about it. “You’re doing great!
” he says to a woman who is clearly about to pass out.
She looks at him like she’s not sure if she wants to thank him or hit him.
Kyron is teaching observation drills. Which basically means he sits perfectly still while people try to sneak up on him and nobody has succeeded once in two weeks. The kids think it’s a game. It is not a game.
Rane shifted an hour ago and has been running patrol routes with Marcus, which I think is his way of getting out of ground training. Smart.
Trey is sparring with one of Cal’s guys and winning, which is making Trey’s day and everyone else’s worse.
And me? I’m getting my ass kicked by a woman half my size who won’t stop telling me to get up.
“You’re dropping your left side,” Lena says.
“My left side is bruised.”
“That’s why you’re dropping it. That’s why they’ll hit it. Again.”
I put my hands up. She comes at me and I manage to block the first strike and the second but the third catches me in the ribs and then my feet are gone again and I’m looking at the sky.
“You know,” I say from the ground, “I’m just going to be a fucking phoenix when they get here anyway. What is the point of this?”
“The point,” Brent says from somewhere behind me, “is that you can’t always be a phoenix.”
I turn my head. He’s standing at the edge of the yard with his arms crossed. He’s not angry but he’s being very Brent right now.
“There will be moments when the shift won’t come,” he says. “When you’re tired, or injured, or it’s not safe to light up in a room full of people. And in those moments, you need to be able to function without it.”
“I function fine.”
“You’ve been on the ground five times in the last twenty minutes.”
“That’s functioning. Poorly. But functioning.”
Lena extends a hand. I take it and she pulls me up and I try not to wince.
“What’s your shift?” I ask her. Because I’ve been wondering for two weeks and she’s never mentioned it.
She pauses. Something flickers across her face.
“A butterfly.”
I hold back a laugh, and it’s really hard. “I can’t believe you’re a fucking butterfly.”
“The kind with wings and antenna and absolutely zero combat applications.” She puts her hands back up. “Which is why I learned to do this. Because when the bears come, I can’t exactly flutter at them aggressively.”
I laugh, finally. I can’t help it. All I can do is picture a pretty butterly frantically hovering in a bears face. But reality crashes in and my laugh fades.
Lena can’t defend herself shifted. She can’t defend the town. She can’t protect anyone she loves in butterfly form. So she spent four years learning to fight as a human. Every bruise on my body right now is evidence of how seriously she took that.
And here I am complaining about ground training because I have wings made of fire.
“Okay,” I say. “Show me again.”
She almost smiles. “Which part?”
“The part where I end up on the ground. I want to see it coming this time.”
“You won’t.”
She’s right. I don’t.
But I get up faster. And the sixth time, I block the sweep. It’s ugly. My form is terrible and Brent makes a face that suggests I’ve personally offended his training standards. But I stay standing.
“Better,” Lena says.
“That was better?”
“You didn’t fall.”
“The bar is on the floor.”
“And you’re standing above it. That’s progress.”
Trey jogs over, sweaty and grinning. “You look like you’re having fun.”
“I look like I got hit by a truck.”
“Yeah, but like, a fun truck.” He dodges my swat. “Lena, you should teach her the thing you did to Jonah last week.”
“Jonah is still upset about that,” Lena says.
“Jonah is upset about everything. It was amazing.”
“What did she do to Jonah?” I ask.
“Put him on the ground so fast he didn’t know he was falling until he was already there.” Trey’s grinning widens. “He’s like six-two. She’s like what, five-four? It was beautiful.”
“It was efficient,” Lena corrects. But she’s smiling.
The morning goes on. I get hit. I get up. I get hit again. Somewhere around the fifteenth time I end up on my back, Locke walks over and looks down at me.
“You good?”
“Define good.”
“Alive.”
“Technically.”
He holds out a hand. Pulls me up. Doesn’t let go immediately.
“You’re getting better,” he says quietly. Just to me.
“Liar.”
“You blocked four more than yesterday.”
“You’re counting?”
“I’m always counting.”
His hand is still on mine. Warm. Steady. In the middle of a training yard with forty people around us and he’s looking at me like we’re the only two here.
“Get a room,” Rane calls from somewhere across the yard before shifting and trotting off toward the tree line like he didn’t just say that.
I drop Locke’s hand. My face is on fire. Not the phoenix kind.
Brent claps once. “That’s enough for today. Same time tomorrow. If you can walk.”
I can walk. Barely. Everything is sore and I’m covered in dirt and sweat and I’m pretty sure I have grass in my hair.
But I blocked four more than yesterday.
And tomorrow I’ll block more.
Lena falls into step beside me as we head back toward the main road.
“For what it’s worth,” she says, “you’re tougher than you think.”
“I’m a disaster.”
“You’re a disaster who keeps getting up.” She shrugs. “That’s the only part that matters.”
The crow is waiting on the porch of our house when I get home. Same spot. Same dark eyes.
I sit down next to it. Every muscle screaming.
“Don’t judge me,” I say.
It ruffles its feathers.
“I blocked four.”
It tilts its head and makes a sound that sounds suspiciously like a laugh.
“Shut up.”