FORTY-FOUR #3
A muffled argument immediately follows as Rowena does her best to restrain my friend.
The composure Ardyn has worn for weeks is finally beginning to splinter.
She lunges. Raw force drives the attack as she slams into me, sending me backward toward the edge of the mat. I bare my teeth, watching every shift of her weight and every tightening muscle.
She lunges.
This time there is no measured precision. No probing feints. She drives into me with raw force, sending me backward toward the edge of the mat. I bare my teeth, reading every shift of her weight, every tightening muscle, searching for an opening.
There isn’t one.
Before I can plant my feet, she changes direction with startling speed. Her shoulder crashes into my chest, stealing my balance, and another shove sends me stumbling backward.
My back slams into a training post hard enough to knock the breath from my lungs. The metallic taste of blood blooms across my tongue.
She’s on me before I can recover.
Her forearm crashes across my collarbone, pinning me against the post as she crowds into my space. Every ounce of pressure is deliberate. Her hips are square. Her stance is rooted. Every adjustment she makes cuts off another avenue of escape until there’s nowhere left for me to move.
Several soldiers whoop and holler. Others hiss their disapproval.
“Amara!”
Lyra’s voice cuts through the hall.
I hear the scrape of boots and the sound of a brief struggle. When I glance back, Rowena already has Lyra locked in a firm grip, holding her back as she fights to break free. Lyra is cursing loudly enough for everyone nearby to hear, but Rowena doesn’t let go.
“This is her fight, Lyra,” Rowena says, her voice hard and unwavering. “It’s the Fire Clan way. You can’t interfere.”
Ardyn’s face is inches from mine. Fury twists her features, but beneath it, her eyes remain unnervingly focused, studying me as carefully as any opponent she’s ever faced. Every word, every movement, every hesitation seems to hold her attention.
She leans in, her voice dropping to a venomous whisper. “Hear that? Your friend wants to save you.”
Her smile is all teeth and cruelty.
And gods.
Fish.
With her hot breath in my face, I can smell what she likely had for lunch.
“Because she knows. They all know,” Ardyn continues.
At this point, I am having a difficult time focusing on anything except the scent of fish. Her gaze flicks briefly toward the crowd gathered around the mat before returning to mine.
“They see exactly what I see,” Ardyn continues. “A frightened little farm girl pretending she belongs.”
Instead of taking the bait, I wrinkle my nose. “Why do you smell like a fishing boat?”
From somewhere off to my side, I hear Lyra cackle. Even Rowena, sister to the Warlord and therefore expected to maintain some degree of decorum among the soldiers, makes a strangled noise.
For half a heartbeat, the training hall falls completely silent.
Then the soldiers lose it. Laughter erupts from every side of the mat. A few warriors double over. Someone whistles. Another mutters something about seafood before dissolving into laughter again.
Ardyn’s expression twists with rage.
Years of discipline snap back into place as she smooths her features, but the damage has already been done. Her breathing is a fraction faster. Her jaw is tighter. The effortless confidence she’d carried into the fight has been replaced by something far more dangerous.
Emotion.
“If only they knew, Amara. Knew how unsure you truly are. Knew the truth.”
Her voice drops, almost a purr, laced with poison.
“I see it in your eyes. That doubt. That hesitation. You wonder if I’m right.”
She lets the words linger between us, and for a moment, something inside me wavers.
Because she isn’t entirely wrong. The months of struggle.
The fear of failing. The question of whether I truly deserve this power, this place, this bond.
None of it has ever disappeared. I’ve simply learned to carry it.
And if Ardyn can see it, who else can?
For the briefest moment, doubt slips through the cracks in my resolve.
Ardyn sees it, her smile widening.
“There you are.”
The words are soft. Satisfied. Like she’s finally found exactly what she was looking for.
The statement lands harder than any blow she has thrown.
No.
The thought cuts through the doubt before it can take hold.
I am not the frightened farm girl she wants me to believe I still am.
I am not a lost child searching for someone else’s permission to belong.
I have earned my place. Every bruise, every failure, every lesson, every sacrifice has brought me here.
The doubt is still there, buried deep where I suspect it always will be, but it no longer has its hands around my throat.
I shove Ardyn backward and meet her gaze. Without breaking eye contact, I spit blood onto the mat and smile.
It’s not the response she’s expecting. Surprise flashes across her face before she buries it beneath years of practiced composure, but I catch it. She expected her words to break me. Instead, they’ve reminded me of everything I’ve already overcome.
I cock my head, my breathing finally evening out.
“You talk too much, Ardyn,” I say evenly. “And I think you’re starting to sound desperate.”
“Hells yeah!” Lyra whoops from somewhere off to the side. “There’s my girl!”
Ardyn bares her teeth. The perfect control she’d carried into this fight is beginning to fray, and I see it in the way her shoulders tense and her breathing quickens.
Good.
She lunges without hesitation, locking onto me again as she drives me backward with enough force to steal my footing. Her hands clamp around my neck, and the relentless pressure of her weight forces the air from my lungs.
For a moment, breathing becomes difficult.
Ardyn leans close, her breath hot against my ear. Gods, that fucking fish breath.
“See?” she whispers, tightening her grip. “You don’t have what it takes.”
The words are meant to break me. Instead, they tell me she’s stopped fighting with discipline and started fighting with emotion.
All I can think about are the months I spent getting knocked down and forced back to my feet.
The bruises. The failures. The endless hours Thane, Garrick, Rian, and Jarek spent drilling the same lessons into me until my muscles remembered them even when my mind couldn’t.
I have what it takes, and I am done letting her tell me otherwise.
I snap my arms up, trapping her grip between my wrists before twisting sharply to one side.
The hold doesn’t break completely, but it shifts her weight just enough.
I slam my forehead into her nose. Ardyn cries out, stumbling back as her grip loosens, and I wrench myself free, dragging in a desperate breath before she can recover.
She comes at me again immediately, but the calm precision she’d carried into the fight is gone.
Frustration has taken its place. She throws a high kick toward my head, putting everything she has behind it.
I duck beneath the strike, feeling the rush of air against my hair, and the moment her foot leaves the mat I see exactly what Thane has spent months teaching me to watch for.
Her hips turn too far. Her weight commits too early. She’s overextended.
Instead of retreating, I drive into her, wrapping my arms around her planted leg and turning with all the force I can muster. She tries to recover, but she’s already committed. Her balance disappears beneath her, and she crashes onto the mat hard enough to shake the floor.
The impact echoes through the training hall. Ardyn stares up at the ceiling, momentarily stunned, while I stagger back a step, my chest heaving as I fight to control my breathing.
For a heartbeat, no one moves. Then a low whistle breaks the silence.
“Holy gods.”
Murmurs ripple through the crowd as warriors exchange disbelieving glances, the reality of what they’ve witnessed settling over the room.
Then Lyra explodes.
“HELLS YES!” she shouts, throwing both fists into the air. “That’s what I’m talking about!”
She spins toward Rowena, practically bouncing with excitement. “Did you see that? Did you see that?”
Rowena shakes her head, though I catch the faint twitch at the corner of her mouth. Nearby, a group of warriors exchange glances before the murmurs begin to spread through the training hall.
“Damn.”
“Didn’t think Ardyn could lose.”
“Guess the Spiritborn really does belong here.”
Ardyn remains on the mat, breathing hard as she stares at the ceiling.
Blood trickles from her nose, but she makes no move to wipe it away.
When she finally turns her head, our eyes meet across the mat.
Her composure has been stripped away, her frustration laid bare for everyone to see, yet the resentment burning behind her gaze hasn’t dimmed.
If anything, it burns hotter than before, settling into something colder and more deliberate that sends an uneasy feeling through me.
Rowena steps quietly to my side and extends her hand. My promise ring rests in her palm, waiting. I take it without a word. The metal is cool against my skin as I slide it back onto my finger, returning it to where it belongs.
I taste blood where I bit the inside of my cheek when she slammed me into the post. Wiping it away with the back of my hand, I turn toward the doors. Rowena falls into step beside me while Lyra hurries to my other side, still celebrating loudly enough for the entire training hall to hear.