CHAPTER 17: WEIGHT OF STEEL

The practice yard behind the west tower was empty, the way I wanted it. No instructors barking orders, no students laughing to prove they belonged. Just stone, dirt, racks of battered blades, and the whistle of wind that always seemed to find its way through the broken arch at the far end.

The dirt circle in the center was carved with old scars—cuts, scuffs, and heel marks left behind by years of sparring. They had seen triumph, humiliation, and blood spilled in accidents no one admitted to in reports. Today, they would see only me.

I shrugged off the academy coat and folded it onto a bench. Without it, the air hit my sweat-damp shirt, cool enough to sharpen me awake. My boots pressed into soil that remembered every duel. The earth felt honest.

’No audience,’ I thought. ’No nobles pretending they care, no lackeys hanging around because of the name. Just me, the current, and the work.’

I began with Anchor Step.

Four in, hold two, roll out on three. My breath ran smooth, the cold current in my chest sank to my heels. The first step landed heavy—too heavy. The ground clung to me, timing broken. I reset. Second step came late, hips stumbling. Reset again.

"Placement, not volume," the Compass reminded in its patient, dry voice. "You keep trying to drop the entire river into your heels. The ground doesn’t need a flood. A drop will do."

I nodded once, focused smaller. Another breath. Another step. This time the cold settled into my heel and released before it turned to mud. My feet moved with me, not against me.

Anchor. Step. Release. Again. Again.

By the tenth pass across the yard, I no longer thought about the motion. The rhythm wrote itself into my muscles. Breath and foot and floor agreed to cooperate.

Sweat tickled down my temple. My shoulders loosened. For the first time since waking in this body, the ground trusted me enough to lend itself.

’Better,’ I thought. ’Not perfect. But better.’

Next came the sabre.

The blade felt alive, balanced between my fingers. I drew it in a single clean motion and began the first form. Entry, guard, exit. Anchor at the heel, pulse only on contact. Over and over until my arm throbbed and my lungs burned.

The dirt grew new scars. The air hissed at each cut. My back straightened, my guard stopped wandering. The blade no longer felt borrowed from a stranger—it felt like mine.

Old-Armand had practiced to show off. To win applause from girls who whispered behind fans and boys who measured each other by flourish. I had practiced once for survival, and I found myself doing it again now. My forms weren’t pretty. They didn’t need to be.

The Compass approved quietly. "Form connected. Steel remembered. Catalogue growing. Don’t admire it. Continue."

I continued.

Second form. Third. Fourth. I linked them until I was no longer swinging a sword but stringing sentences together. A boxer’s slip became a sabre thrust. A judo hip turn flowed into a guard break. Knife tricks from alleys turned into sabre feints that would have earned disapproval from any noble tutor. Steel wasn’t an art anymore—it was a language, and I finally remembered how to speak it.

My arms trembled from fatigue. Sweat ran in sheets. I switched to constructs.

"Marrow, out," I said.

The hound rose from Shade, pale bones catching the dim light. He sat at once, tailbone twitching like a dog waiting for a command.

We drilled. Heel. Stay. Scout. Return. Shade. Out. Shade. Out. Over and over until the leash between us stopped feeling fragile and began to hum like rope braided strong. Each time he obeyed more smoothly. Each time my voice grew steadier.

Then Hollow. The bone bird unfolded from shadow, wings clattering like dry branches. He circled the yard, dipped low at "scout," returned at "here." His movements stopped rattling. He learned.

The hard part was both at once. Rotating commands without overlapping. "Hollow, scout. Marrow, heel." Then, "Marrow, stay. Hollow, return." The first attempts were clumsy—the leash buzzed, the bird stuttered, the hound hesitated. But repetition sharpened it. Slowly, the fuzz cleared. By the twentieth run, both obeyed without stumbling.

For the first time, I didn’t feel like a juggler trying not to drop knives. I felt like a commander. Two lines, braided. One voice.

I exhaled slowly, staring at the dirt underfoot. ’This,’ I thought. ’This is what old Armand wasted. He had strength, heritage, training—and he spent it on arrogance and cruelty. No wonder nobody cared for him. No wonder they only followed the name.’

The thought made my throat tight.

I remembered Ariadne’s eyes, sharp with anger. Liora’s steady voice telling me to keep my summons under control. Cael’s calm presence, a mountain already standing taller than me. Even Ren, the duelist who had nodded yesterday, had offered more respect in a glance than most had given the old Armand in years.

They didn’t care about him. They never had. Only Seraphine pretended to, and she used him like a knife she could point at enemies. Even his lackeys—parasites clinging to a noble name—would vanish if the Valcrey crest lost its shine.

I gripped the sabre tighter. ’Then I’ll rebuild it. Not for them, not for applause. For myself. For Ariadne, one day. For strength that can’t be doubted.’

The Compass was quiet for once, letting me push.

Hours bled by. Shadows lengthened across the yard. My shirt clung, soaked through. My palms blistered. My chest heaved with every breath. But still I moved. Anchor Step until foot and floor were the same word. Sabre forms until my arm felt carved from stone. Constructs in and out until the leash hummed steady as a bowstring.

At last, I slid the sabre back into its sheath and leaned against the rack, lungs dragging in air like water. Marrow sat neatly at my side. Hollow landed light on the rack and folded his wings, waiting.

For the first time, the leash felt less like a chain of commands and more like something alive. Not puppets—companions.

’This is only the start,’ I thought. ’Tomorrow more. Next week more still. Until no one remembers the fool I replaced. Until I can stand eye to eye with Cael and not falter.’

The Compass spoke softly, almost kind. "Progress: commendable. Tone: grim but sustainable. Two lanes, remember—strength and people. Don’t neglect the second."

’I won’t,’ I promised.

I grabbed the coat from the bench and shrugged it back on, heavy with sweat. My body ached, but it was the good ache—earned, not inflicted.

That was when I heard it.

The click of heels on stone. Measured. Certain. Not the shuffle of a student, not the stride of an instructor.

I turned.

Seraphine Duskveil entered the yard as though it were a stage she owned.

Her hair was pure white, a curtain of snow tumbling down her back. Amethyst eyes caught the last threads of daylight, glinting with sharp calculation. Her academy coat was immaculate, silver trim gleaming faintly with each step.

She stopped three paces away, gaze sweeping over me, then Marrow, then Hollow, before returning to my face. A faint smile curved her lips, polished, practiced, the kind that had once convinced Armand to follow her without question.

"Armand," she said softly, like my name still belonged to her.

The leash hummed taut in my chest.