I doubted I still needed to be here, but I found myself coming anyway.
Today was the first day Savannah was sparring Vallie, and with Lilia working through maneuvers and drills we showed her earlier, Peter and I found ourselves doing the same. But I keptwatching them, watchingher,instead of my own fight with Peter. I couldn’t fucking tear my eyes away from the onslaught.
“Tighten your core here,” Savannah said as she stood behind Vallie, her arm wrapped around her abdomen as she pressed a hand to her stomach. Vallie flinched, but she didn’t pull away. She never pulled away from Savannah’s touch, and I seemed to not be able to pull my gaze away either.
Savannah’s eyes slid to mine when she found me already staring. “When you engage your core muscles, you can add more strength to your punches.” Why wasn’tshelooking away? She was holding my gaze, her eyes never leaving mine as she kept instructing Vallie on what to do, as her hands kept moving over her body and repositioning her… Fuck. I swallowed.
She had a glint in her eyes like she knew she held power over me. I gritted my teeth as I forced myself to meet Peter’s green-eyed gaze instead. He smirked, seeming amused as fuck, as we wordlessly went back to our own sparring.
He threw a kick, just narrowly missing my ribs, before he subtly tugged his ear.
I entered his mind, our signal when he had something to say.What?I snapped, furious even in my own head.
I told you she wants to murder you,he taunted. I threw a punch to his jaw. He rubbed it as he spoke out loud, “Ouch. That freaking hurt.”
I didn’t care. I kept fighting him, trying to ignore the purple hair to my left. Because while I kept looking at Savannah more and more out of curiosity, she looked at me like I was an ant to be squashed. I couldn’t tell if I loved that she wasn’t terrified of me or if I hated that she wasn’t even the slightest bit intimated.
Maybe it was a little of both.
You need to get laid,Peter said as I just narrowly missed his leg slamming into my head.
Fuck off,I spat, this time landing my own hit, but hecountered with the same. I ground my teeth as I rubbed my hip where his foot just connected.
He shrugged, then spoke in my mind.I’m just saying, a good shag never hurt anyone.
Worry about yourself,I seethed.When was the last time you even touched a girl?
Peter’s eyes gleamed.I can transform into one whenever I need a good boob grabbing.
That’s completely fucked. I don’t even want to know if you’re serious or not.
My eyes—my traitorous fucking eyes—flicked to Savannah again. She let out a hiss as she fell into her own sparring match with Vallie, who just landed a punch to her gut. The slight noise that came out of her had me wondering what sounds she’d make if I fucked her. If I slammed her body against a wall, grabbed her by her throat, and… shit. I was so completely and utterly fucked if this was what my mind was coming up with… with ahuman.
Maybe Peter was right. Maybe I needed to find a random Tennebrisian girl to screw for the night. I hadn’t had sex with anyone since I met Scotlind, which I didn’t even want to wrap my head around how long ago that was.
But at least the thought calmed my nerves. I didn’t actually like Savannah. Not even the slightest. I just needed to put my dick somewhere and then I’d stop thinking about her.
Peter gave me a smirk, knowing exactly where my gaze had landed. I exited his mind, not wanting to hear whatever taunts he’d throw my way, and went full force into beating the living shit out of him.
Sapphire eyes seepedinto me as I picked up my pack from the grass. I had spent all day at the training rings, blowing offsteam and fighting whoever was willing. It was all I did lately. Wake up early to train Vallie and Lilia, then grab a cup of coffee—which was a habit I was quickly becoming addicted to—even though I refused to go at the same time as Savannah.
I’d wait fifteen minutes after our early training session before heading into the dining tent, knowing full well she’d already drained her own cup of poison. Then, after I drank the bitter liquid, I’d forced myself to eat something before heading back to the rings. I would fight until I only had a few spare minutes left to shower before the nightly meetings with Dravenburg would start.
My days were simple. Mindless. And I tried my damn best to keep them that way. Most days, the Fire Prince still sparred me, which I hated to admit that I loved. It was the only real challenge I felt, and now that I was exercising every day and was no longer consuming poison, my body was growing exponentially. I could feel myself coming into my strength again, probably stronger than I was before.
I rubbed my rib. Tezya landed a hard kick to the area minutes earlier, and I was pretty certain he fractured it. I was supposed to get it mended. Dravenburg made it clear that everyone should continue to train, but we had to see a healer afterward so we were in top-notch shape for whenever the real fighting would start. But I refused to go. The healer’s tent only reminded me of the one healer I’d never see again.
Besides, I wanted to feel the pain. It was something to think about. Physical injury was better than the mental war that was destroying me from the inside out.
I was surprised to see it was Scotlind who came up to me, though, and not the prince I despised. She hadn’t been coming to the rings for weeks now. I knew she was training with Kallon, working on her enhancement.
I tensed, unsure what to make of it. I wanted this so fucking badly. Every damn day I prayed that she would have picked me,that she would’ve chosen me instead of him. But I also wasn’t naive enough to think that’s what was happening now. She already picked Tezya. Every person in the entire camp knew it.
“Hi,” she said sweetly.
“Hey,” I replied, not bothering to stop to talk. I started making my way toward the communal bath house with my pack over my shoulder and stifled the wince it caused when it landed on my ribs.
“Sie, I…” I could hear her voice growing louder as she followed me. “I want to talk to you.”
