Page 112

My boots scrape against the floor as I dig in. His arm tightens until air thins in my lungs. My pulse hammers. My mind wants to scatter.

Leon pins me in place.

Not panicked.

Not pleading.

Waiting.

The training knife flashes through my memory.

Leon’s arm around me. The dull edge beneath my jaw. My body freezing so hard I thought shame might split me open.

Fear is not failure.

My pulse hammers against the blade at my throat.

Leon hadn’t been teaching me how to become someone worth saving.

He’d been teaching me to see the woman he already trusted to fight beside him.

Leon shifts his weight, barely a fraction. His attention cuts to the floor near my dropped pack, then to the arrows beside his boot, then back to me.

A plan.

He has a plan.

Good.

So do I.

I give Leon the smallest nod.

His mouth changes.

Not a smile.

Something worse.

Something lethal.

Then I go slack.

My weight drops in the man’s arms, sudden and heavy. He curses and shifts to keep me upright, grip loosening just enough.

There.

I drive my heel back into his shin. Bone meets bone with a crack that jolts up my leg. He grunts, and his hand slips from my mouth.

I bite down hard.

My teeth sink into the meat of his palm.

He screams.

Iron floods my tongue. I tear free, spitting blood and skin onto the tile as I drop low. His knife swipes over my head and catches a shelf instead, sending plastic containers clattering down around us.

I slam my elbow into his ribs once.