“Father’s little rat now, are you?” I snapped.
“Better a rat than a cold-heartedmurderer,” Drystan bit back.
I suffered more from that than anything physical. Not the harsh comment, but watching Drystan’s heart become ice right before my eyes was something I’d wanted so desperately to prevent from happening. He couldn’t turn out like me. One of us had to be good, bebetter.
Forgiveness clawed in my chest, but I couldn’t let it out. It would be so easy to tell him I didn’t blame him.
Drystan pushed me away, and his eyes threw spears into my chest. He looked like he might say something else, but it seemed we both had claws against kindness growing stronger within us. I watched him walk away with his hate washing over me in waves with every step he took.
Just forgive him.
He’s all you have.
Just forgive. Forgive.
I shook my head, remembering again that this was just a memory.This had already happened.
Where was I now…?
As I started trying to figure that out, the room spun again, but I held onto my reality, firming my mind against reliving another cruel memory from the past as if it were the present.
This is a trial.
Between me and Drystan…
A trial of forgiveness.
To break the vicious cycle we’d grown up with.
Drystan failed when he didn’t forgive me for killing his pet even though I had no choice. I failed for not forgiving him for turning me into father. These were only two events in our long history. If I kept falling into full immersion in these memories there’d be centuries worth for this trial to feed on.
We have to make it out.Astraea was waiting, and the thought of her was a thread of light to keep me aware, which I clung to with everything I had.
The next time the room stopped slamming me against its walls, I landed on my feet, gripping something firm between both hands. Only when an impact ricocheted off it with a high pitch did I register it was a blade, and when my eyes adjusted from the disorientation, I stared through crossed swords at the contorted determination of Drystan, my opponent.
“This will not end until one of you draws first blood,” father’s voice echoed from across the training hall.
Drystan pushed off first, going on the attack, but he was no swordsman. Not even close to contending with me. This wasn’t so long after we first met Astraea. Father had been so furious that he took it out on us, on his soldiers, on anything he could use to grapple with his shame over how easily she’d slipped right out of his grasp.
Astraea. My starlight. My light back.
“Drystan, you need to snap out of it; this isn’t real,” I said, bracing against each of his amateur attacks.
Though he wasn’t a novice swordsman now. In this memory he was missing the centuries he would spend training. The centuries during which he would force himself to become something he never wanted to be. A fighter to be a survivor.
“You’ve always been his favorite.”
“That’s not a worthy achievement,” I bit back.
I shook my head.Don’t let the trial distract you.
Keeping myself grounded made sweat trickle down my forehead.
“You’re far better than this now. You can actually contend with me,” I said, parrying around the hall at his onslaught. He had no form and little skill, but his rage was enough to inspire a commendable attack.
“Don’t patronize me, brother,” he snarled.
Father called over, “You’ve always been weak, Drystan. You’ll never match Nyte.”
