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[indent][indent][indent][indent][justify][color=808080]With her hands no longer torn open, Sloane sat silently between the siblings, running her right thumb along the warm, newly healed skin of her palm. She paid no mind to the other groups or conversations buzzing around the arena. Her gaze, while focused on the dirt around her feet, looked far off and lost in thought. It wasn’t the fussing or forced healing that lingered on her mind but the unbidden memory that slammed into her like a tidal wave, pounding against her carefully built walls, and drowning her in a flood of repressed emotions. All her willpower honed in on grounding herself and damming the images into the shadowy recesses of her mind. 

She hadn’t been able to bring herself to look at either one of them since her brief panic, but especially not Kacper. Nothing like that had ever happened to her before and then, all of a sudden, it crashed into her twice within 24 hours. [i]What the fuck was going on with her?[/i] She knew he wasn’t going to hurt her. Nothing about how he grabbed her was like [i]him.[/i] Yet her body still reacted like a beaten animal bracing for its next lashing. This never would have happened if she would have remained in her solitude. It was easier when she was isolated. If she wasn’t around others then she couldn’t slip. If she didn’t slip then there weren’t any questions… No questions meant no lies… 

[i]But she was lonely and they were nice…[/i]

[color=c7b29b][i]Get a fucking grip,[/i][/color] she repeated in her mind like a half-baked mantra trying to stop the incessant push and pull of her thoughts. She closed her eyes tight and sighed as she shook her hand in an attempt to stave off the memories and put her overthinking mind to rest.

Katryna was the first to notice the stillness—not the quiet kind that came with rest, but the rigid, inward kind, like a door shut too quickly. She and Kacper exchanged a glance over Sloane’s bowed head, a look that needed no words because it had been forged long before camp, before gods, before any of this. It was the look of two children who had learned early how to read the air when someone disappeared inside themselves. Kat shifted slightly, angling her body closer without touching, her presence a soft bracket rather than a demand. 

Her voice, when it came, was casual on purpose, light in the way one is light around something fragile. [color=a4ded2]“So,”[/color] she asked, eyes on the arena rather than Sloane, as if the question were merely passing curiosity, [color=a4ded2]“Have you ever thought about what you’d do if you left camp?”[/color] The words were simple, almost random, but chosen carefully, forward-looking, grounding, an invitation rather than an interrogation. [color=a4ded2]“Like… really thought about it. Not what you [i]should[/i] do. Just what you’d want.”[/color]

Kacper caught on immediately, because of course he did. He leaned back a little, stretching his legs out in front of him, posture loose, unthreatening, his tone pitched somewhere between teasing and observational. [color=54998e]“You seem like the studious type,”[/color] he added, glancing sideways at her with a faint, crooked smirk that didn’t cut. [color=54998e]“Books, plans, contingency plans for the contingency plans. Probably had your life mapped out before half of us figured out how to pack a bag.”[/color] There was no mockery in it, if anything, a quiet respect threaded through his words, an acknowledgment of a kind of discipline he recognized. He didn’t press her to look at him, didn’t crowd her space again. He just let the comment sit there, a small hook tossed gently into the water, something she could choose to grab or ignore.

They didn’t say [i]are you okay,[/i] because they knew better. That question came with expectations, with answers people felt obligated to soften or lie about. Instead, they offered distraction the way they always had, by pulling someone sideways, just enough to interrupt the spiral. Kat watched Sloane from the corner of her eye now, expression open and patient, while Kacper’s attention drifted between her and the arena, as if this were all perfectly ordinary. Between them, without naming it, they built a quiet buffer; no pressure, no urgency, just space to breathe and something else to think about. It wasn’t graceful. It wasn’t perfect. But it was gentle, and it was the only way they knew how to reach for someone without making them feel trapped.

Sloane was brought to the surface of her drowning thoughts by a hook in the form of Kat’s voice, wrapping around her mind and pulling her out of the heavy shadow. She cleared her throat, sitting up a little more straight as she looked over at her. The question was so entirely out of left field that it caught her by surprise and threw her off a little. Whatever had been plaguing her two seconds before slipped away as she tried to sift through her time before camp in search of an answer. She parted her lips like she was going to speak, but nothing came out, only her brows furrowed in pensive disappointment at the lack of words. Kacper filled the silence she couldn’t, drawing her attention from his sister to him. 

[color=c7b29b]"I—Well, [i]yeah,[/i]... Kind of,"[/color] she confessed with a quiet laugh while her posture eased slightly. A soft sigh fell from her lips as she shrugged and tilted her head to the side. [color=c7b29b]"I was good in school, liked reading—[i]still do,[/i]"[/color] Sloane corrected herself. [color=c7b29b]"But, uh, my mom pulled me out of school to apprentice under her for awhile and then boy bullshit—"[/color] Her gaze found Lochlan in the crowd briefly then fell to her lap. [color=c7b29b]"It kind of messed up any [i]‘later’[/i] plans."[/color]

Her life had a plan once. Sloane hadn’t picked a course yet, but her focus and priorities were always on school, getting the best grades possible so she could go to any college she wanted. But then Eris happened, then Sylas, and then Lochlan. It was like she was being pulled in every direction but the one she had mapped for herself. Her mother wanted a progeny, Sylas wanted power, and Lochlan… Well, you don’t date a popular guy from behind books and inside of libraries. 

She tried desperately to find a single sliver of a memory where she had a goal or tangible dream for her life in the future, but it was like trying to catch smoke with her bare hands. If Sloane ever had a plan it was lost beneath the sea of other people’s plans for her. She rapped her hands against her knees and sucked in a sharp breath. [color=c7b29b]"If I had a choice… I think I’d want a simple life. None of this Gods… [i]shit.[/i]"[/color] She waved her hand, motioning to everything around them. Maybe a house in the mountains, somewhere quiet with a husband and kids, far away from the people who kept chipping off pieces of her until there is nothing left. [i]Peace.[/i]

Kacper’s gaze snapped first, sharp as a blade catching light, following the invisible thread of Sloane’s attention across the arena. One heartbeat, two, and then he found the target: Lochlan, haloed in the glow of sweat that didn’t quite fill the space it demanded. Kacper’s brows crept upward with an almost comical inevitability, a silent [i]oh.[/i] The realization landed with a thud of protective instinct he hadn’t known he possessed for her; maybe it sprouted from proximity, or maybe it was just that Sloane’s voice tasted like bruised honesty in the air. 

His mouth tightened, a half-formed scoff shaping there like a reflex. [i]She can do better anyway,[/i] the thought muttered through him, sharp and private. [i]He’s fugly.[/i] The word didn’t refer to Lochlan’s face—though Kacper could argue that too on a petty day—but to something deeper, even if he couldn’t quite put a name on it yet. The thought startled him a little, unwarranted disgust toward a stranger, but he ignored it as he did most unpleasant things. Eagerly.

And as if she felt that thought shiver across the tether that bound her to her brother, Katryna’s breath caught, and then a laugh slipped free. It was soft, startled out of her, as though she hadn’t intended to let it be heard. She lifted her hand to her lips too late to smother it, eyes dancing for a moment before her expression gentled, warmth smoothing the angles of her face. The arena’s heat curled around them, a false summer spun from magic, brushing their cheeks like a hand that meant well and didn’t quite succeed. Outside, the world was frost and teeth. Here, the walls held back winter long enough for honesty to breathe.

Kat leaned forward. [color=a4ded2]“A house somewhere quiet. Away from all of this. No gods breathing down your neck. No one waiting to decide who you’re supposed to become. Just a front porch. Warm coffee. Maybe… on a lake? I think that’s what I’d want, far away from everyone else.”[/color] Her gaze drifted, unfocused, as though she could see the place already; timber eaves under drifting snow, pine needles brushing windows like lullabies, the world small and merciful for once. Her smile tugged at the corners, warping like light bending through water, there, and not, as if the thought tugged too hard on something tender. Her voice faltered, the last word barely a shape in the air. 

[color=c7b29b]"I find comfort in solitude,"[/color] Sloane confessed quietly. She filled the silence with her own gentle words, not dwelling on the way Kat’s voice struggled to finish her thought as if the words were stuck in her throat like a dry pill. [color=c7b29b]"Although I’d choose a mountain over a lake,"[/color] she added with a subtle smile as her gaze drifted over to the girl beside her. [color=c7b29b]"Somewhere buried beneath tall trees and surrounded by snow covered peaks… Maybe a family someday if I can find someone kind."[/color] She shrugged her shoulders and lightly clapped her hands together as if the mere thought was more fantasy than reality. Dreaming was dangerous and could get her hopes up for a life she’d likely never lead but she humored the question nonetheless, if for nothing else than to sink into lighter conversation. [color=c7b29b]"Although I’d take anything over camp, Moscow or Manhattan."[/color]—[i]or the Underworld.[/i] Her time there alongside her mother was far more time than she ever wished to spend in Hades’ realm, living or dead. [color=c7b29b]"... Even a lake,"[/color] she added with a smile, small but warm in its unguarded openness.

Kat let Sloane’s words settle between them like snowfall—soft, weightless, and impossibly loud in the quiet they carved out together. Her gaze drifted across the training field, unfocused, as though she could already see that distant lake shimmering like a dream cupped gently in two hands. [color=a4ded2]“Somewhere far,”[/color] she murmured, voice careful, like a match struck in a windstorm. [color=a4ded2]“Quiet. Where the mornings start slow and nothing rushes to find you.”[/color] The thought snagged on something unseen—the way she slipped into other people’s dreams at night, waking with echoes that weren’t hers, sleep feeling like a trapdoor instead of a refuge, but she let the confession rot on her tongue. Instead, a small shrug, barely more than a breath. [color=a4ded2]“Maybe with a neighbor. Not too close. But close enough that I remember I’m not… alone.”[/color]

She imagined it then, a lake house cradled by pines and mountains, mist coiled like silk across the water’s surface, her mind finally her own. She turned back to Sloane with a grin, small but real, warmed by the surprising ease in the other girl’s smile. [color=a4ded2]“A lake in the mountains does sound peaceful,”[/color] she said, and something inside her loosened, unclenched, as if the words themselves were an exhale. For a heartbeat, she was simply glad—glad to see Sloane’s shoulders unburden, glad she could help scatter the ghosts for even a moment. 


Kacper’s hum slipped in to catch the silence before it fell, low and grounding. He straightened, the wards’ warmth catching the faint sheen of sweat collaring his throat. [color=54998e]“Gods bullshit is overrated. Camp, too. We act like it’s all some grand honor, but half the time it feels like being stuck on the last page of a prophecy someone forgot how to finish. We don’t have to live here forever. We get to leave. Retire. Buy that lake house with the drafty windows and the leaky pipes and a view that makes up for it.”[/color] 

He angled a glance toward Sloane, something like certainty flickering in his eyes, a spark refusing to die. [color=54998e]“Let the gods figure out their own mess when we’re gone. They can choke on their destiny without us, they’d do the same to us.”[/color] His tone turned bitter at the end, a scowl tugging at his lips, and it was clear that this topic was something he was not only heated about, but one that Katryna had heard several times, just in differing variations.

Kacper let out a long and slow breath, and when he spoke next, his tone was more even, level and measured. [color=54998e]“I just mean… this is temporary, we get to retire eventually, and if our parents don’t like it they can go fu—”[/color] Kat made a strange noise, something like a groan and a gasp, and he cut himself off, sighing through his nose loudly. [color=54998e]“You get the point, so start working on a retirement plan.”[/color]

Sloane was initially caught off guard by the fervor that poured from Kacper, a topic that began innocent—albeit a thinly veiled attempt to pull her from the darkness of her thoughts—quickly shifted to a rant about the Gods and the trajectory of their lives. His passion, while abrupt, brought an amused smile to her lips while her brows raised in intrigue as she listened. It was clear to see that there was no loveloss between Kacper and the Gods. No piety or blind devotion, just resentment and hatred… not that she could blame him for it. A life in servitude to her mother was low on her list of favorable outcomes, but in her experience it seemed [i]‘retirement’[/i] wasn’t common among demigods. She was unaware of any reaching middle age… Not that she’d speak that thought out loud. 

She didn’t dare interrupt his rant, crossing her legs, resting her elbow on top of her knee and her chin in her palm, simply watching and listening. A giggle slipped out at Kat’s gasp and the way Kacper cut himself off before finishing his thought. Sloane muffled the laugh with the balled sleeve of her hoodie. [color=c7b29b]"It takes a lot more than the word ‘fuck’ to offend me,"[/color] she mused. After a beat, she sucked in a sharp breath, conceding to his wishes if only to put his easily concerned mind to rest. [color=c7b29b]"I’ll… think about it."[/color]

Kacper blinked, slow as a cat caught in a sunbeam, Sloane’s giggle landing in his chest like a pebble tossed into still water, small, unexpected, rippling outward. His gaze flicked from the way she’d folded herself so comfortably into that posture of observation, chin propped in palm, eyes steady and amused, to the glimmer curling at the corner of Kat’s mouth like mischief wearing silk. The contrast tugged a huff of breath out of him, a sound balanced on the fault line between annoyance and reluctant amusement. The arena’s heat curled around them, warm as breath against the nape of his neck, and he rolled his shoulders back as though trying to shake off something too intimate for the open air to hold.

[color=54998e]“Well, thank the gods,”[/color] he drawled, voice slicing clean through the din of training like a blade dipped in honey and sarcasm in equal measure. [color=54998e]“I’d hate to scorch anyone’s delicate sensibilities. Wouldn’t want to see a mass fainting spell because I used the wrong four-letter word.”[/color] The grin that hooked his mouth was all sharp edges softened by warmth, insolence wearing charm like borrowed jewelry. It tugged wider when Sloane conceded, when that small, uncertain promise—[i]I’ll… think about it[/i] bloomed into the air between them like a fragile flower daring frost. He didn’t press, didn’t prod; instead, he simply nodded once, smugness unfurling in his chest like bright plumage. Kat swore she could [i]see[/i] it, her brother, metaphorical feathers fanned, preening on some invisible stage as though the universe existed solely to admire the spectacle.

Kat’s grin bloomed, teeth catching the light. If she spoke, it would’ve been to tease him for the way pride glimmered in his eyes like constellations eager to be charted, but she let silence do the talking. Her amusement was a warmth spilling between them, threaded with affection and exasperation in equal measure. In her mind, Kacper stood larger than life, a storm with hands, a heartbeat shaped like rebellion, feathers fluffed in victory even when that victory was just a girl whispering that she’d [i]think about it.[/i] And yet, she knew, beneath the display, beneath the dramatics and the snark, there was a tenderness in him sharp enough to cut. A hope so fragile it felt dangerous to touch. She watched him watch Sloane, and she wondered if he knew how soft he became when he thought no one was paying attention.

The trio’s conversation lulled as Sloane noticed the final group finished and watched in silent anticipation for River to conclude whatever calculations he was running, before approaching them once again. There was a part of her that wanted to know her time, but then a smaller more pragmatic piece twisting behind her sternum already knew she failed and didn’t want it broadcasted to the entirety of camp. Considering she was in the first group, there was no doubt in her mind that nearly everyone in the arena watched as she struggled her way through the obstacles, securing her place as a pathetic burden rather than a useful ally on a battlefield. It wasn’t like she was trying to impress anyone… [i]Right?[/i]

River didn’t mince words with hollow compliments or more speeches. He was plain and straightforward which was a trait she could appreciate even if it lost a bit of the bedside manner previous leaders had. He didn’t waste much time before diving into their results, removing any possibility of privacy or anonymity, leaving all their capabilities laid bare for the rest of camp to hear and judge, even if only in secrecy to avoid his scrutiny. 

[color=86a8ad]"In first place, finishing at 9:23, was Trinity Wallace…"[/color] There was no surprise there. The daughter of Ares was a force of indomitable will, just like Liam was. He would have demolished the course with time to spare. [i]Stop thinking about him,[/i] Sloane chastised herself and shook her head to try and push away the thought and erase his name from her thoughts. He left. He wasn’t there… wasn’t worth her time like—


[color=86a8ad]"...11:24 Kacper Lis."[/color]

Sloane’s gaze raised from her cupped hands, shifting to stare at the man in question out of the corner of her eyes. It was obvious he did well. She knew that before ever hearing his time and he probably did too. Still… [color=c7b29b]"Good job,"[/color] she commented quietly for only him to hear. It probably wasn’t in her best interest to stroke his ego, but the surprising way he was kind toward her left her with a weird soft spot she couldn’t quite explain. It was hard to thank someone for something they tried desperately to hide and make inconspicuous. So a small, soft spoken compliment—throw away at most, but no less genuine—would do for now. 

Kat felt the words fall like stones into a well, River’s voice echoing against the cold places in her chest where hope once lived. Each name, each time, was another reminder of the divide carved between some of the campers. By the time her brother’s name cut through the air, she had already gone still—resignation coiling through her ribs like smoke, familiar as breath. She stared ahead without seeing, already imagining the weight of River’s gaze when her own time dropped like a guillotine. 

Kacper, for his part, didn’t sit in his victory so much as fidget beneath it. The number clung to him like an ill-fitting coat, stiff at the shoulders, tight at the throat. Passing didn’t feel like triumph when the air tasted like someone else’s disappointment. His throat bobbed as he swallowed, jaw tightening around the shape of guilt he couldn’t quite name. When Sloane’s soft words brushed against him, he blinked, surprised, almost boyish for half a heartbeat, before something gentler, smaller, tugged at the corner of his mouth. He didn’t turn to look at her, but his voice slipped out low, roughened with sincerity like a hand offered palm-up. 

[color=54998e]"Thanks."[/color] It was all he could manage. Anything more felt like hubris in a moment meant for humility. He sat there, spine straight but spirit folded, aware of his passing time like a spotlight he never asked for.

There was a large procession of names following his and none of them were hers. With every new time Sloane would perk up slightly, expectantly, hoping to hear her name only for someone else to fill the space. Then she heard it… 15:02 and a name that wasn’t hers. She failed. She knew it, she did, but up until that moment she was holding onto hope that somehow she managed to slip by. Her shoulders sagged and gaze fell to stare at her sneakers as she scuffed them into the dirt mindlessly. [color=86a8ad]"16:33 Sloane Astor, Rae Kowalewski, and Katryna Lis."[/color]

Sloane sighed softly. [color=c7b29b]"[i]Well[/i]... There is it,"[/color] she muttered beneath her breath as she looked over at Kat with a sympathetic smile. Luckily—[i]or unluckily[/i]—they weren’t at the bottom alone. There was even a strange sort of irony that they finished at the same time. If training didn’t suck so much she’d almost call it poetic. 

[color=86a8ad]"Anyone who finished in under fifteen minutes is excused for the rest of the day."[/color] Sloane looked over at Kacper, preparing some snide but harmless remark but as the words formed and her lips parted, the realization sunk in… If he was excused, what did that mean for her? As if knowing her question, River continued, filling the silence after several demigods gathered their things and headed for the exit. [color=86a8ad]"For everyone that remains, you will run the course a second time."[/color]

Her heart sank, body slumping, as an exasperated, defeated laugh fell from her lips like a sigh. Sloane heard the rest of River’s words but it was like the muffled buzzing of noise while her head was submerged underwater. Her hands slowly shifted in her lap, palms upturned, the healed skin a silent taunt like the universe knew she’d be sent through the gauntlet a second time. She flexed her hands and gave Kacper a sidelong glance knowing that somewhere behind that smug smirk he was patting himself on the back for forcing her to be healed. [color=c7b29b]"There’ll be no living with you after this,"[/color] she grumbled.

Katryna pressed the heels of her palms to her eyes, shutting out the world for a heartbeat, maybe two, until the pressure steadied her breathing. The arena’s magically conjured warmth suddenly felt suffocating, like it had turned heavy and wet, clinging to her lungs. She drew in air through her nose and it churned in her stomach, nausea rolling like a tide against her ribs. Tapeesa’s healing earlier had smoothed her around the edges, burned away the exhaustion, the ache, but now it came roaring back, a betrayal written in her own body. [i]Cruel,[/i] she thought, the word like a shard of glass turning in her mind. Cruel to ask the ones already sinking to dive again. Cruel to make effort irrelevant unless it was dressed in victory, all under the guise of them [i]learning[/i] from the humiliation of the experience. 

They had tried. Gods, they had tried. But trying didn’t matter here. Not when they were told to follow a [i]kid[/i] named after a form of water, really where was the imagination, pulled into command like fate was a joke only the pantheon found funny. Making the most exhausted and down-trodden of the campers run the course a second time to learn [i]muscle memory[/i] was some of the dumbest shit she’d ever heard, just ridiculous enough for her to be surprised at the stupidity. Having them run the course over multiple days would have been more logical, coaching them through the parts they clearly struggled with instead of standing around and watching would have made more sense. But no. 

Resentment lodged sharp behind her sternum, a thorn she didn’t know what to do with. She thought of her father, sending them here without telling them anything, every message sent through a third party, and something inside her went cold. Without looking at either of them, Katryna pushed to her feet. A scoff cracked from her like ice breaking. Her face settled into something blank, a canvas wiped clean of frustration or hope. [color=a4ded2]"I’ll… go run my second round now,"[/color] she said, voice flat enough to pass for calm. And then she was already turning away, boots scraping against dirt, hair swinging like a pendulum behind her, no sarcasm, no complaint, not even her usual attempt at reassurance. She just left. 

Sloane parted her lips to say something, [i]anything[/i], but nothing came out. She simply sat in silence, mouth agape with furrowed brows and not a sound escaped. The tips of her fingers rubbed against the opposite palm as an exhale puffed out her lips. It sucked, truly. The last thing she wanted was to run that damn course again. She’d do it, follow orders without complaint like she always did… But she wasn’t happy about it, didn’t enjoy the prospect of tearing her palms open a second time. Her body remained frozen, trying to find the resolve to get to her feet and follow, but there was also a part of her that felt like the last thing Kat wanted was for her to trail after her like a stray kitten. 

Kacper watched her go, eyebrows lifting as though she’d just sprouted horns or wings or something equally improbable. His gaze flicked between her retreating back and Sloane’s slumped shoulders, surprise lining the angles of his expression. Then, with a low exhale, half rueful, half impressed, he leaned back on his hands. [color=54998e]"She’s mad,"[/color] he muttered, the words tasting strange in his mouth, like they weren’t meant for Katryna’s shape. [color=54998e]"She doesn’t… get mad. Not like that, anyway."[/color] There was no judgment in the observation, just a quiet sort of awe, like he’d just witnessed a rare celestial event. 

[color=c7b29b]"She’s too kind for that,"[/color] Sloane commented casually as if she had known them for years, not the better part of a morning. It didn’t take a genius to see the way Kat wore her heart on her sleeve. It was written all over her in the puppy-like way her face lights up at simple pleasures like lake side houses and a reassuring hug. People like Katryna, Colton, and Tapeesa were too sweet… Too fragile for a place like camp. Meanwhile, her hands tugged her long brunette hair free from its tie if only to refasten it more securely into a messy bun… Any delay was better than her inevitable second attempt. [color=c7b29b]"I’m sure you have the monopoly on anger between the two of you,"[/color] she teased with a subtle quirk of her brow and a sly smile as she finally pushed off the bench and rose to her feet. 

A shrug followed as her only answer, his gaze cutting sidelong to Sloane with something gentler ghosting behind the green. [color=54998e]"Don’t make me wait too long, yeah?"[/color] The smirk that tugged at his mouth wasn’t quite smug this time, not fully, anyway. It was tempered by something reluctant and real, like pride softened into concern. The feathers of his ego still fluffed, sure, but maybe with room now for someone else to roost beside them.

Sloane scoffed, rolling her eyes and shaking her head at the way he didn’t raise a finger to go help his sister. Considering the fuss he made about siblings, it almost was surprising. [color=c7b29b]"It’d probably go faster if you [i]helped[/i],"[/color] she replied as she looked down at him with a tight lipped smirk, vaguely judgemental in a way that wasn’t likely to go unnoticed. 

She raised her brows in a silent challenge as she held his gaze, before grabbing the hem of her hoodie and pulling it over her head. She tossed aside the bit of clothing in her vacant seat, then adjusted the straps of her sports bra. While she removed a layer for practicality, there was a part of her that was still uncomfortable, fighting the urge to close in on herself. Sloane was rarely that… [i]exposed[/i]. People in her life didn’t refer to her as a porcelain doll for no reason. She was always just so, not a hair out of place, makeup perfect in its simplicity, clothes pressed, and skin unblemished. But camp stripped away the comfortable confines of her pristine mask piece by piece. The perfect illusion now shattered from a scar, gnarly and unbefitting for someone as delicate as her, marred her back, a stark reminder of the box and everything she lost. Three claw-like slashes ran down her back, stretching from her shoulder to far beneath her waistband, stared back at the world where eyes followed after her.

Sloane hated that scar, even contemplated putting her hoodie back on before anyone saw, but she got so disgustingly sweaty in her first run, she couldn’t stand the thought of sweat soaked fabric clinging to her skin. Before she could overthink it, she tightened her bun and ran off in the direction of the obstacle course to try and catch up to Kat. She didn’t slow down when she hit the tires, keeping her pacing and rhythm as she bounced back and forth with each foot. At the end she hopped across the top of the logs like she did the first time then dove into the low crawl. The grit of sand clinging to the sweat on her stomach felt horrible, but it was marginally better than the coarse little grains worming their way into her sweatshirt and getting stuck in the fibers. 

Kacper made a show of it first, because of course he did, letting out a groan so theatrical it bordered on parody, a long-suffering sigh that curled from his chest like smoke from a smoldering fire. It was the sort of sound meant to keep his reputation intact, to carve him neatly back into the shape of the unapologetic bastard he pretended to be. But the performance stuttered when Sloane’s hands found the hem of her hoodie and pulled. He wasn’t prepared for the shift, for the moment the fabric peeled away like a curtain lifting on a stage he hadn’t agreed to step onto. His breath snagged mid-scoff, caught like a hook behind his ribs. Oh. Not because she was in a sports bra, he’d seen plenty of skin in this place, sweat-slicked and battle-worn like the ridiculously attractive man missing an arm, but because of what really lay under the cloth. 

The scar. Three brutal slashes, like something’s claws had claimed her and refused to let go. It wasn’t a mark meant to heal; it was a declaration. A story carved into her back in a language of pain. He froze, the arena noise fading to a dull thrum in his ears. The wards’ heat pressed against him, but for a heartbeat he felt cold, sharply, violently cold. It was one thing to rant about the gods, to sneer at destiny and spit at prophecy. It was another to be reminded, viscerally, that the cosmos had teeth, and it bit down hardest on the ones who never asked for its attention. 

He wasn’t sure what made his jaw clench, the sight itself, or the instinctive surge that said [i]someone[/i] should have protected her. Someone older. Someone wiser. Someone divine. Someone. He wasn’t used to feeling that. He didn’t know what to do with it.

By the time he blinked, she was already moving, darting across the arena, shedding hesitation like a second skin, racing toward the course as though she could outrun memory. Kacper scrubbed a hand over his face, exhaled once, sharp and grounding, and pushed to his feet. He didn’t announce his decision. Didn’t try to catch her with words or offer some clumsy comfort she’d have to pretend not to choke on. He simply started walking, steps long and certain, sneakers beating up the ground like the earth would open if he slowed.[/color][/justify][/indent][/indent][/indent][/indent]

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