Page 64 of Brutal Union
The words splinter something deep inside me.
I don’t answer. Because I don’t know. I’ve never felt love. I’ve felt control. Hunger. Power. Obsession. Unyielding loyalty. Companionship. I’ve felt the ecstasy of bloodshed and the high of victory. But love? That’s a language I never learned. No one ever taught me. No one ever stayed long enough. I don’t even know what love would feel like, but I can’t lose him. I can’t feel this everlasting pain in my chest.
I can’t call what I have with Sho love, but I know he was the first person to see the monster inside of me and still want to touch it.But I don’t know if that’s love. Or just something close enough to trick me.
Sho exhales shakily on the other end. “Ilovedyou, Nadia. Even when you had a blade to my throat. Even when I knew you could end me with a word. I never lied. I never betrayed you.”
“We’ll figure it out,” I whisper, like if I say it softly enough it’ll be true. “Sho, please. We’ll figure it out.”
“I can’t trust you.”
“Youcan?—”
He laughs again, louder this time, crueler. “Don’t say that. Don’t you fuckingsay that.”
My heart feels like it’s trying to claw its way out of my chest.
“I meant what I said in the basement,” he continues, voice steady now—too steady. “If you wanted me, you’d have to come get me yourself. But don’t bother anymore.”
“Sho—”
“This is over.” His voice goes ice-cold. “I’m as good as dead to you now. That’s what you wanted, right? To kill me? To sentence me to a life of torture.”
I gasp, the words not leaving my lips.
The empty chuckle that crawls across the speaker and laces through my flesh makes me want to scream. “You got your wish, Hime.”
And then—Click.
The line goes dead.
And for the first time in years, I feel something dangerously close to fear.
Not for him. For me.
Because I think I just lost the one person who made me feelanythingat all. I think I may have just lost the closest thing I have ever felt to love.
16
SHO
THREE YEARS LATER
One.Two. Hut. One. Two. Hut.
My knuckles are purple, bloody and tortured, with splinters digging deeper and deeper into my flesh with each movement. The wood beneath my fists is stained with sweat and iron—indented from the months of training. My hips are stretched so far they burn, but I keep the position. Arms straight. Back straighter. Knees bent. Every tendon in my thighs trembles like a decaying bridge threatening to break, but I don’t move. If I fall now, I bleed for it. Again.
Three years ago, I held my breath with every shift in my muscle. My back is an array of switch marks from every time I broke my position. Some faded, some fresh. Each one a signature of failure. But not today.
Today, I don’t breathe. I endure. I become stone.
My teeth are clenched so tight my jaw aches, but I dare not relax. One sigh and I risk another whip. One blink and the stingreturns. The voice above me barks orders, but it fades into a dull echo. All I hear is the thud of my pulse and the crackle of fire building in my spine.
“Again,” Bhon orders, his arms crossed behind his back. A patient look on his face as I move my body through the movements.
At the beginning, he told me there was a music to getting through this pain. To pushing through every gritted tooth. To allowing your pain to play the tune you can stomach.
I thought he was pulling my leg. Something that a mentor says just to make you feel as if you can push through the pain. This is me assuming that Bhon isn’t the sadist I predict him to be.
