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My knees met the dirt one at a time in a shattered rhythm.

I fell onto my hands. Cool earth grounded me. Sharp rocks dug indents into my palms.

“Malakai,” a calm, impossibly steady voice said. Not a hint of the torment I toiled through showing. Blue eyes swam before me.

I couldn’t look, though. Couldn’t face anyone.

Instead, I gathered whatever strength I had remaining, pushed to my full height, and fled from the arena.

I stormed into my tent, the flaps slapping shut behind me. As the clashes of training echoed in my mind, I dug into the trunk storing my belongings until my fingers locked around the canteen with herb-infused water. I downed the last few drops and dropped it to the floor, breathing heavily.

Silence wrapped around me.

“Fuck!” I growled, kicking my cot. The metal frame rattled in the quiet tent. I pressed my hand to my side; the blood had stopped flowing, the wound already healing. A sticky mess remained.

There was no world in which I’d be fit to be on a battlefield. At least it made the decision easier. Still, when I’d first started fighting, I thought, maybe I could do it, despite not completing the Undertaking. For a few minutes, it had felt right.

I thought maybe I could be the warrior everyone wanted me to be.

It was all I’d ever known anyway, being that man. I’d prepared for it all my life, worked to fulfill everyone else’s expectations until the day I found out about that damned treaty and the world unraveled at my feet.

“Malakai.” The one voice I didn’t want to hear echoed from the doorway.

“You don’t have to say it.” I didn’t face Mila. “I don’t want to fight anyway.” Then why was my heart stuttering so desperately?

“What?” Mila asked. She moved into the tent and made herself at home in the small space. It felt so full with her—with her scent, something sweet but strong like cinnamon—and the sound of her voice. It overwhelmed me.

“Why else would you be here?”

“To help,” she said baldly.

I scoffed, looking over my shoulder. “How could you help?”

She straightened. Eyes turning icy and arms crossing her chest. “I’m going to pretend you didn’t say that given everything you’re going through and the fact that you know very little about me.”

“Everything I’m going through?”

“The fear in the yard, and the?—”

“I’m not afraid,” I spat, crossing the tent with two steps so we were face-to-face. “I’m not.”

Mila’s brows shot up, but she didn’t back down. She was quiet for a moment, maybe giving me a chance to admit the truth. “Fine.” She stepped away. “You’re not afraid. But I was going to offer to help you overcome the mental block you’re obviously not struggling with. Clearly, you’re fine on your own.”

She didn’t give me a chance to respond before sweeping from the tent, leaving me with an uncomfortable guilt swarming my chest.

Chapter Fourteen

Malakai

I couldn’t fucking believe myself. Mila hadn’t deserved that. She responded well in leaving—that was for sure. Honestly, the way she stood up to me and called me on my bullshit had been enticing, letting me stew on my mistakes rather than forcing me to listen. Seemed I was doing that often lately.

But Mila had only been trying to help.

Now, after sleeping off the drugs I’d downed for the majority of the day, I was stuck in the freezing night, stomping to her and Lyria’s cabin to fall on my damn sword and admit things I didn’t want to admit to anyone, let alone her.

“Mila?” I called, pounding on the door. I didn’t want to intrude. Hopefully she was alone?—

I hadn’t thought about the fact that she might not be. I hadn’t seen her with any men in the day since we’d arrived, though, so she hopefully wasn’t…entertaining any guests. If she was, well, I couldn’t look more pathetic than I already did. Interrupting couldn’t hurt. Give her more ammunition for me.