Freya

I'm no stranger to the concept of training.

I trained with Casimir when the sun went down almost every evening for an entire year. And yet this kind of mental training is far more draining.

I've mastered the stillness, how to tune out the forest and its surrounding sounds, but that's where my attempts end.

Any shot at recognising my 'anchor' or feeling the power of the cloud are null.

"Well done." The voice filters in through the emptiness. It takes me a few seconds to remember how to open my eyes.

When I do, Alaric stands before me, his blue eyes glowing wide in the darkness. They search my face.

"How did you feel?" he asks.

"I felt... nothing." The left side of his mouth tilts up. "Is that good?"

"That's very good. You're getting the hang of it."

I can't help myself. A smile spreads over my lips, tugging at the edges so forcefully I can't shove it down. Alaric returns my smile with one of his own. It softens the shadows shrouding his face from the leafless branches overhead.

"That feeling of nothing, is that the anchor? That peace?"

"No," he says. "But it is much easier to reach the anchor if you can clear your mind of all else. You need to be able to clear your mind in any situation. It is when Kinjri are most in tune with their gift. Whether it's in the dead of a silent forest or the middle of a raging battle."

So managing it here and now, with nobody else around isn't much of a feat, then.

"And the anchor? How do I reach it?"

Alaric stares at me for a few seconds before turning away. "I suspect you already know, Freya."

"What do you mean?"

He settles on the edge of a fallen log, glancing at me over his shoulder. "You've used it many times before to escape the cloud."

Samu rises in my mind. "I already told you that I just told myself it wasn't real."

"I believe you," he says. "But without an anchor, you wouldn't have been able to do that."

I stay very still, steadying my breathing. I still do not know what gifts Kinjri possesses. I'm used to the way the shifters can detect the beat of my heart, the rise of my pulse, but I don't know how much of that extends to full blooded Kinjri. I certainly can't.

Instead of responding, I settle on the far end of the log, tucking my frozen fingers between my knees.

"I understand that you don't trust me," Alaric says. "And I wouldn't expect you to, given the circumstances. But I know when you're lying to me."

My breath catches. I meet his eye. In the dark of the night, the dark blue turns to black. There's no underlying threat to his words, and if there's any sense of frustration, I cannot detect it. Only the truth.

"How?" I ask. "How do you know?"

"I just do."

"And you expect me to believe that?"

"Believe whatever you like, Freya," he says calmly. "I won't push you. But just know that I can't help you if you don't tell me everything."

I stare out at the forest stretching in front of us. If it weren't for the fact that I ran into it full force, I could almost believe the forcefield isn't there, a silent threat keeping me in.

When I first met Alaric, he'd seemed cold and ruthless, standing over me and Lei as we lay writhing on the ground from his forcefield. But in Hana's absence, his edges are softer, his words feel more genuine.

Something inside of me wants to tell him about Samu. But he is the guard to my prison, no matter how genuine his smiles are. And I've been burnt too many times to blindly trust my instincts.

Killian floats through my mind, the memory delivering with a painful twist. Nothing about him was trustworthy, not like Alaric, who hosts no illusion that he is not my captor. I always felt an air of secrets around Killian. Ambiguity. And yet I fell for him anyway.

And the fall was much farther than expected.

Even now, after he kissed me in the cave, after his whispered words in the shadows of the waterfall, I do not know if he ever intended to catch me. But I miss him all the same.

"What's your anchor?" I ask, turning to face him again.

Alaric leans back on his forearms, seemingly unaffected by the ice in the air. "My grandmother," he says honestly. "I think it's because she taught me to use my gift. And when its power threatens to overtake me, and I feel lost, it's her voice that urges me from the dark."

"How often does that happen?" I ask. "That you feel overtaken?"

"Only when I'm using my gift for an extended period of time."

"Like holding two innocents captive in a village for days on end? I imagine that must be exhausting."

He glances at me, expression soft. "You'd imagine right."

"So why do it?" I ask. "Why do you do whatever Hana tells you? Wouldn't it feel... free to do what you wanted?"

He raises a brow at me, a smile tugging at his lips. "I know what you're doing, Freya. And it won't work."

"And what's that?"

"Trying to turn me against my own."

I bite the inside of my cheek. It was worth a shot. "You already turned against your own when you rebelled against Sanaa."

The humour evaporates from his face at my comment. "Don't speak of things you know nothing about."

"Killian told me about Hana's group."

"And you so blindly believed him?"

"Why shouldn't I?"

"This conflict is much more complicated than you could ever understand." He shakes his head, letting out an exasperated sigh. "Of course you believed him. He hasn't changed a bit."

I halt, my next words freezing halfway out. "You... what're you talking about?"

A shadow casts over his face as he turns away, staring at the ground. "Forget it."

"Did you know Killian?" He doesn't answer. I shift closer on the log, forcing him to look at me. "Alaric."

"Yes," he says eventually. "I knew Killian. For most of my life, actually. We were friends, real friends, believe it or not."

"And what happened?"

"It doesn't matter," he says. "All you need to know is that there are two sides to every battle. The one you hear first is not necessarily the right one. You, of all people, should know that."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"It means, Freya, you're not the first one who's been tricked by Killian Li. And you won't be the last."

My heart hammers in my chest. I can't seem to break our gaze, my mind racing at a million miles a second. Killian knows Alaric, they were friends. And the expression on his face, the bitterness to his words -- I recognise the bitter hurt. It's so familiar it burns in my chest.

I don't know how much of what he's said is true and what is a lie, but the betrayal in his eyes is not something that can be forced.

"So you know how hard it is, then," I say, trying to speak with an even voice. "To trust. After you've been burned."

"I do."

"And yet you blindly expect me to trust you."

He hesitates. "I... I wish for you to try."

I let out a shaky breath and rise to my feet. The sudden movement sends blood rushing to my head. I stumble backwards, immediately righted by Alaric's steadying hand on my shoulder as he shoots up beside me.

His touch jolts my skin, an energy humming up to my chest. It shocks me momentarily, but I know what it is. My body recognises the hum of energy before I do.

Kinjri.

"Trust is a two way street, Alaric," I say, my voice shaking. "And I certainly don't feel trusted when the person asking me to trust them holds the key to my cell."

His jaw clenches, but he doesn't say anything. Releasing my arm, I step back. "I'll see you tomorrow."

And as I walk away, my mind reels with his revelation. He knew Killian. Much longer than I have.

_

The following two days tick over like clockwork -- a predetermined schedule. Wake up, share breakfast with Lei -- some pastries Harris leaves outside our door -- head to the marketplace, and then meet Alaric in the forest after the sun has gone down.

By the time I get back to my shared room with Lei, I'm mentally exhausted, ready to collapse. But Lei waits for me to return every night, no matter what time it is, dissecting my interactions with Alaric, looking for any inkling that we can somehow break the barrier and escape.

But her attempts are about as successful as my training.

"You had another nightmare," Lei says to me in the morning as we walk to the marketplace, smiling forcefully at the villagers we pass by.

My dreams are filled with memories of the past. Late summer evenings with Cadence and a reluctant Casimir by the lake, bedtime stories with my father, fleeting touches of Killian's skin against mine.

But the ones that wake me up in gasping breaths are the dreams of Samu. Those are the ones even Lei cannot ignore.

I shake my head. "I don't remember what it was about."

She casts a doubtful glance, but doesn't press it, wrapping a coat tighter around her shoulders. The sky has permanently retired its blues for grays, the sun making a rare appearance on occasion.

I always hated this time of year. Before the first snowfall, where the forest and sky lost all its vibrance and warmth. As a child, it signaled the true end of autumn, and with it, the harsh reminder that the Red Moon was now only two seasons away.

Lei and I make few sales as the weather gets colder.

In the afternoon, Alaric greets us. I rarely see him in the village outside of training times. A thick, fur coat adorns his shoulders. He brushes the hood back, his blonde curls softening his sharp features as they fall over his forehead.

"Lei, Alice," he greets, slender fingers slicing through the pile of books at our store front.

Lei casts me a sideways glance at the fake name. I've gotten used to it, even managing to respond when somebody uses it in the village. "How can we help you?" she asks fakely.

Alaric glances at her briefly before shifting his gaze to me. "I wanted to ask that you meet me somewhere different later."

"Where?"

"Outside The Rose? I'll walk you the rest of the way."

I nod in confirmation.

"Now that you mention it," Lei chimes in beside me, "I'll come along, too."

Alaric's expression remains neutral. "If you'd like to."

He doesn't say anything before wandering off. I let out a shaky breath in his absence. There's something about him, an energy humming from his body, that hangs in the air. Not necessarily bad or good, but it's there. It scares me that I can feel it.

"Did you know him? Before all this?" I ask. "Like you knew Hana."

"I already told you no." She shakes her head. "Why?"

I bite the inside of my cheek, thinking of my conversation with him last training. He said he knew Killian, perhaps for longer than I did. And what he implied... whether what he was saying was true or not, the betrayal Alaric felt as he spoke was real.

"He knew Killian. At least, he said he did. He said they were friends." Lei follows after him with a shift in her gaze. "He also said that Killian tricked him, too." I swallow. "Like he tricked me."

Her eyes flash to mine, settling with an emotion I can't recognise. I know we didn't always see eye to eye about the situation. Lei could never understand why I'd been so betrayed by Killian's lies. I almost expect her to shoot down Alaric's claim, to label him a liar.

"It's possible," she says. "That would explain partially why he's with Hana, I guess."

"You mean you believe it? I thought Killian is your friend."

"He was, Freya. I loved Killian. He was family." She sighs. "Look, the reason why Killian was such a good soldier was because he was willing to do anything to achieve a goal. It didn't matter who got tricked or hurt along the way, because the goal he was striving towards was always for a bigger purpose, the greater good. He never thought of his own desires and alliances; he'd cast them aside and focus on the goals of the collective. A weird sort of selflessness most of us don't possess."

"Some would call that disloyal."

"No, it's different," she disagrees. "Sure, I didn't always agree with how he got what we needed, but he got it. Every single time. That's what set him apart from the rest of us."

Always for the greater good. Like kidnapping a girl who'd fallen in love with him, lying about his identity, because he thought I could save his country. 'A weird sense of selflessness' Lei called it.

"Sorry," Lei says, voice softer, "I know that probably hurts to hear. Even now." She pauses. She can see right through me. She knows how I felt. How I feel. "He did care about you, I know that. Just... things had to be bigger than how he felt."

And yet, I can't help but remember the moment when we were trapped in the cave. He told me how desperately he tried to be like his sister. Selfless and kind. How he failed, turning out just like his mother.

Letting you go was the most selfish thing I've ever done in my entire life, he'd said. And I'd do it again and again and again.

Letting go of me, of the greater good, of the potential to save his entire country and family. I press my lips together, turning away from Lei so she doesn't see the blurriness in my eyes.

"Maybe if I'm there," Lei says, mind back on the training, "I might spot things you don't. Two eyes are better than one, right?"

"Right."