The rain hadn't stopped since dawn.
It soaked the dirt into sludge, turned the training field into a mess of mud and bruises. Recruits slipped and cursed. Captain Ren shouted from the sidelines, his voice cutting through the storm.
> "If you can't fight in the rain, you're already dead."
I kept moving. Sword up. Eyes forward. No complaints.
Pain reminded me I was alive.
The cold reminded me I wasn't home.
---
Kaelina was assigned to my squad.
I noticed her before she ever spoke to me—how she moved with a fighter's grace, how she never laughed at the others' jabs. She kept to herself. Ate alone. Sharpened her blade like it was part of her body.
The scar along her throat looked old, but not healed.
She didn't speak to me. I didn't speak to her.
But when another recruit "accidentally" shoved me into the mud and walked off smirking, I caught her watching.
Expressionless. Just watching.
---
Bastien was worse.
He didn't trust me, and he didn't pretend to. Every drill with him was a reminder that he thought I was weak—or lying.
Maybe both.
He didn't say much, but his sword did. His strikes during practice were always harder when they were meant for me.
I matched them. Block for block. But I never pushed back the way I could have.
> Because every part of me still believed I didn't deserve to win.
Not yet.
---
One evening, after weapons maintenance, I stayed late cleaning the grit from my blade. My fingers moved on instinct—clean, oil, check the balance. Muscle memory.
Kael was there too, sitting across the room on a bench by the window, her boots off, drying her socks near a lantern flame.
Silence stretched between us.
At some point, she spoke without looking over.
"You're too careful when you fight."
I glanced up.
She kept her eyes on the rain outside.
"You hide your form. Pull your strikes. You make mistakes you don't mean to."
I said nothing.
But she wasn't accusing me.
She sounded… curious.
"You trained before this," she said quietly. "Not here. Somewhere polished."
Still, I didn't answer.
After a beat, Kael stood, slipped her boots back on, and tossed a cloth at me.
"Next time, just don't hold back. Bastien's already a bastard. Don't give him the satisfaction of being right."
Then she left.
> That was the first time she said more than two words to me.
---
I sat alone after she was gone.
The rain kept falling.
And I realized—for the first time—I wasn't the only one hiding.