18. The Kata #2
Nothing but silence, and the faint bubbling of water from the stews.
I love the sound.
Tension bleeds out of my body, releasing my tight muscles as I banish thoughts of Elias and how he knows too much.
Of Lilliana and the journal.
Of the Sisters, my father and the academy, and imagine sinking into their warm depths instead.
Perhaps I can take a dip one night, while the others are in The Rec proving their worth to Satan.
Yes. That’s what I’ll do tomorrow.
To celebrate surviving the second game.
Kicking off my boots and socks and stepping into the center circle where the triad takes place every afternoon for the first time, I roll my shoulders and find my balance.
Out here, surrounded by iron and air and water, I can breathe.
For a moment I do, the way Silver tells us to during combat drills and the kata.
In through the fear, out through the fire.
Then, for the first time since arriving on this island’s shores, I let myself move.
The first form comes as easily as breathing.
A turn, a strike, a pivot. Each motion muscle memory from so many years in the turret. My siblings called it Alae Fractae.
The kata of broken wings.
I called it the kata of humility, at first. Later, the kata of survival.
If I couldn’t perfect each move, my father would have no use for me. A flightless nephilim, scared of her own shadow, as weak as the human blood in her veins.
A constant reminder of his infidelity.
There hadn’t been much room in my tiny slice of the citadel, only a small circular patch of floor between the desk and the bed. Here, though… here, there is space.
I can move. Really move.
My hands cut through the air, feet sliding over ash, muscles remembering what I made them forget these last two weeks.
Gone is the wallflower I pretend to be in front of the cadets and Overlords.
Vulcaris shrinks to the background, all that remains is the rhythm of my pulse and the sound of my breath.
In Virtus, training was clean, without aggression. Here, with the cool ash from the volcanoes between my toes, leather covering my skin and the crimson moon watching above my head, it’s raw.
I let the edge come through. A strike meant to wound, a kick that could break a rib.
For once, I don’t stop myself.
Sweat stings my eyes and my braid, another courtesy of Khali, comes loose, hair clinging to my neck. I catch my reflection in one of the weapon racks, a blur of black and shadows.
If I pause to look more closely, I know I won’t recognize the woman staring back.
Not the dutiful assassin. Not the half-blood mistake. Something freer.
Someone more.
Strike. Step. Pivot. Spin.
The air hisses around me as my fists cut through it, muscles burning in the best way.
I push harder, my strikes grow sharper still, the rhythm faster. It’s less controlled, more honest. Virtus taught me precision and grace. Restraint. Vulcaris demands something else entirely.
Violence. Power. Grit.
Not the measured drills I do in front of the other cadets, and not the careful, clean motions of a Virtus assassin.
This is mine.
I move until the ash kicks up around me like smoke, until sweat slicks my skin, until the pulse in my throat beats like a war drum.
Every strike carries something I can’t say aloud.
Anger, doubt, shame.
Each motion burns it away.
When I finally stop, my breath echoes against the courtyard walls, and for a moment, I feel lighter.
Free.
For the first time since leaving Virtus soil, I feel almost… steady.
Almost.
“You fight different when no one’s watching.”
I spin. Heart in my throat.
A shape shifts in the darkness, half hidden by the cloud of steam rising from one of the stews.
There he is. Shirtless and smug, partly concealed by shadow.
He sits in the farthest stew, shoulders back, arms spread wide as he leans against the sunken edge, muscles relaxed as though he’s made himself very comfortable while watching the show.
The insufferable Overlord’s eyes are bright, like tempered metal catching firelight, but the vein-like markings branching across his shirtless body and up his neck are dull and muted, not drawing on his terrifying power.
Silver.
Every rational thought flees my mind at once.
“I’m—” The instinct to say sorry is immediate, but I manage to catch the apology before voicing it.
This is not Virtus, I am not at the citadel being caught out of my turret.
Silver is not my father or siblings.
He can’t punish me for putting in some extra training before the impending game.
“How long have you been there?” I straighten but my breaths are still uneven.
He tilts his head and I take a sip of the water from the canteen hanging at my hip.
“Long enough,” he says, voice steady. “Long enough to see what you’ve been hiding.”
“I’m not hiding anything.”
“You think I don’t know the difference between training and performance?” He makes a low sound, something between a hum and a laugh. “Top marks for keeping up the charade this long.”
The air between us tightens, coiling like a snake around my lungs. I fold my arms, trying to ignore how the steam and sweat mix on his pattern covered abs and chest.
My jaw clenches. “I didn’t know this was a test.”
“Everything here is a test,” he says evenly. “Even when you think it isn’t.”
The way he speaks makes it sound less like a warning and more like a fact carved into the volcanoes and mountains that cage us.
“I’m not here to impress you.”