The days elude me as they pass.
I move and train with one conviction--I will return home and place flowers by my father's grave. I will return for my mother. I will see this war to its end.
It isn't easy, living for someone else. Death is easy. It grins at me every waking hour of the day. It waves at me everyday on the training grounds. It graces me with its cold embrace every time the General has us scaling walls and completing obstacle courses. Dying, is the easy part.
I have considered it more times than I care to admit. Impaling myself on one of the staffs during the grueling trainings. Running into an aimed sword. Getting in the direct line of sight with a nocked arrow.
Living, however, is the hard part. Choosing not to end it all by impaling or inducing my own death. Going through everyday, not because I see a future for myself after this, but because of the image of my mother alone in House Ironfang, grieving and dying slowly. Living, fighting, that is harder than dying.
I wake up earlier than most every day to attend to myself and begin training. If I ever hope to be as good as the rest, I'd have to do the extra, go harder. More often than I want, Prince Rafe finds me in the ring training and sweating hard.
On some days, he trains with me and beats me mercilessly. On some days, he ignores me completely. I prefer the latter. It makes it easier to ignore the odd, underlying tension that always seems to exist between us.
I can't tell why. All I know is though I aspire to be as strong as he is one day, I still loathe him.
If he'd just taken back the decree, perhaps, father would still be alive.
With war drawing closer with each day, and the forces of Ebonheart approaching our borders, I have no choice but to ignore what I feel and learn all I can from him.
"I suggest you get to it, Val," Thane says, pushing back a tall curtain of grass. Those insufferable men will be up soon."
Scowling, I wrap my towel tighter around my hair. "This is far enough. I don't need you watching me while I bathe."
He tosses me a scathing look. "You think I'm the pervert when you're the one moaning Rafe's name in your sleep?"
My cheeks flame and I glare at him. "Stop talking nonsense--and I wasn't moaning."
Frankly, I have no idea what Thane is talking about. One morning, weeks ago, I'd woken with the Prince's name on my lips. I have no recollection of what I had been dreaming about, but Thane says I had been calling out his name the entire night.
And now, he won't let me hear the end of it.
"You should have seen your face when you--"
A soft sound has my ears perking and I jerk to a stop. Thane stops too, dark brows furrowing as he peers back at me. "What?" He mouths quietly.
"Someone's here," I whisper.
Tiptoeing, I find the nearest boulder and leech myself against it, before peeking around the greying stone.
The sight that greets me is nothing like I've ever witnessed in my life.
The moon casts light against the small river, in doing so, glistens against the bare flesh of a woman. Brown hair almost black in the light sticks to her skin. Her head drops back, her face tightening in what looks looks to be pain, but the sound that erupts from her full lips sounds like anything but.
Strong arms are wrapped around her, a dark, wet head moving along her chest with a fervor that makes me fascinated and...warm. All over. The man has his lips on her chest, sucking in each pink, puckered bud into his mouth like an infant suckling milk from his mother's breasts.
Something hot flares in my belly.
"You shouldn't watch adults doing adult things, Valka," Thane warns, but his voice seems to be underwater and I can't tear my gaze away from the pleasure pulling tight on the woman's features, or the sounds each lick pulls from her. Or the strength in the arms of the male who holds her close. Or the passion and hunger in his movements.
I swallow, suddenly thirsty for something I cannot name.
But when another ecstatic cry escapes her and she lowers her head to kiss the man, the obscure features become too clear and recognition slams into me.
Astrea.
But that could only mean...
Something hot and ugly boils around my heart as I see the scar that flashes silver on the male's face in the moonlight. The graceful tilt to his head as he spins Astrea around, wraps his fingers around her throat and brings her flush against his chest. The familiar grunts he releases as they begin to move in a way that would make the Goddess herself blush. He sounds just like he does when we train.
I whip forward suddenly, heart thundering. Eyes stinging. Lips quivering. Heat crawls up my neck to my cheeks and I hold a hand to my chest, feeling like it is being clawed in halves.
What is wrong with me? I already knew the Prince and Astrea were together. I've never given a care for that. Or him. So, why does it hurt so? Why do my hands shake like this?
Bath forgotten, I slip into my clothes and trudge back to my room, mood sullen. Even Thane has enough wits about him to keep his mouth shut and not taunt me for being jealous about a man I have no claim over.
I tell myself it's nothing. I convince myself that my body is just confused and I'm irritable because my time of the month is near. I tell myself I don't care.
But all of that convincing and mind manipulation goes up in smoke when Prince Rafe shows up to training at dawn.
And I punch him.