Page 98 of Ravaged By the Reaper

“I trained to entertain, not survive. I was a Companion, not a killer.”

He says nothing.

I pull my knees up to my chest. “I was alone at the Academy. The other girls… they were polished mirrors. I was always a crack.”

He leans forward slightly, face carved from quiet tension.

“I made myself useful,” I continue. “I smiled, flirted, studied. Played the perfect role. And then I met you. And suddenly, everything that made me valuable didn’t matter.”

He stiffens, just a bit.

“I don’t mean that in anger,” I murmur. “You never asked me to change. You just... survived in a world that had no use for softness. And I followed.”

Still, he holds his silence.

“I don’t regret it,” I say. “I chose this. But I still wake up afraid that I’ve erased something I can’t get back.”

His voice, when it comes, is gravel-soft. “You haven’t.”

I look up. He’s closer now. Knees touching mine.

“You’re more now,” he says simply.

My throat tightens. “Sometimes I miss being less.”

He doesn’t argue. Doesn’t offer comfort where there is none.

Instead, he opens his arms.

I go to him.

Not as a diplomat. Not as a warrior. Not even as his jalshagar.

Just… me.

He holds me like I’m breakable. Like he knows this isn’t about lust or dominance or even devotion. It’s about grounding. About remembering who I am in the spaces between war.

We lie down on the faded cushions. He doesn’t kiss me. Doesn’t strip away the armor or chase the heat. He just pulls me against his chest and breathes with me.

In. Out. In. Out.

Like a rhythm we’d forgotten.

That night, we don’t make love.

We heal.

Together.

CHAPTER 27

HAKTRON

The Widowmaker smells different now.

Not of blood and rust and burned-out plasma coils—though those still linger like old ghosts. But beneath that? There’s a new scent riding the recycled air. Sharp. Focused. Something like lavender and steel. It smells like her.

Amara doesn’t bark orders like a war chief. She doesn’t need to. She moves through the halls like a force of gravity, bending the atmosphere around her. The crew shifts when she enters, subtle and immediate. Raiders who once scoffed at her now listen when she speaks. They call her “the quiet storm” when they think I can’t hear.