Page 57 of Warlord's Plaything

Just amused.

"That,"Xiva murmurs,"is what men always say before they lose everything."

I exhale slowly, forcing my shoulders to stay loose."You think she will break me?"

"I think you do not yet understand what she is,"my father corrects, swirling his wine.

His gaze is piercing. Unforgiving.

"You let her into your bed."

Not a question.

A statement.

I don’t answer.

I don’t need to.

He already knows.

"She fights like something untamed,"Xiva muses, voice thoughtful."Like something that does not know its own chains."

He raises his head, gaze narrowing.

"Tell me, son. What happens when you finally leash her? When she stops fighting? When there is nothing left for you to chase?"

My jaw tightens.

I don’t have an answer.

I don’t fucking know.

And Xiva grins.

"Do you remember what I told you when you were a boy?"

His voice is lower now.

Softer.

It pulls at something inside me.

A memory—of me, much younger, standing before him in the training rings, my hands bloodied, my lip split from the last round of combat.

"Strength is not just in the body, Xyron. It is in the mind."

"In the patience to hold the knife without using it. In the wisdom to know when to strike."He leans forward now, handssteepled."So tell me, my son—do you still hold the knife? Or have you already cut too deep?"

The question settles like a stone in my chest.

I don’t understand.

Hira is under my skin. In my blood. In my fucking bones.

I am not certain who is hunting who.

Xiva watches me, eyes unreadable.

---