ELRETH

A couple hours later, an exhausted Elreth sat at the dining table, only one lantern lit so there wasn't too much light seeping into the bedchamber where Aaryn slept. She'd left the door open so she could hear and smell him if he woke.

At her urging, they'd both had a cup of tea and gone to bed after they bathed. Just as she had expected, Aaryn fell into a deep sleep almost as soon as his head hit the pillow.

She'd laid with him a while, but she was wide-awake, her mind spinning with questions and concerns, things she didn't want to forget to bring up the next morning. So eventually she'd snuck out of the room and come in here.

Now she sat, papers spread around her, lists she added to as new things came to mind. She kept shaking her head and re-reading them, finding new questions, or new avenues she needed to explore.

What was Gahrye's role?

Who had been the first to take a human mate and stay on the other side?

How did they know those anima weren't actually a threat—organizing the humans to return and take Anima for themselves?

She knew she would learn where and how their training had been happening all these years, but who had been doing it before Gar and Aaryn? How had they developed the skill?

Who else in the Tree City knew what the disformed were up to?

Obviously someone had told her father, the elders. Had those investigations been done at the time?

What was she missing? What could come back to bite her in the ass, to steal the lives of Anima, before she'd even know it existed?

Elreth's head pounded, the questions spinning and spinning, her speculation about what the answers would be. She scribbled more questions that she would ask depending on the answer to the first…

But she already had six different sheets of questions, addressing different sides of the issues, and she felt like she'd barely scratched the surface.

How the hell was she supposed to catch up on twenty years of training, organization, planning, and plots in just days?

And how the hell had this human with her weapons, gotten into Anima without being noticed? The humans just weren't that good. Someone had to have helped her!

Around and around… rage against her brother and his secrecy rose more than once, but then she'd think about the things Aaryn had said, and she'd have to swallow it back. She was going to throttle Gar for not warning her about this! He'd seen the human female!

Then one of her father's lessons came to mind and Elreth sank back into the memory like she was begin sucked back in time.

She was fifteen, almost sixteen, and coming into herself. As her body strengthened, she and Aaryn had been training with her father several times a week. But he never missed an opportunity to train her mind as well.

He'd had them sparring—Aaryn taller, his limbs longer, kept being able to block her jabs and thrusts, and he'd almost caught her arm and thrown her more than once. She was getting frustrated, letting her anger bleed through—her blows becoming harder, faster, but also more erratic.

Aaryn thought it was funny and had begun grinning at her, dancing out of range of her blows just when she was about to break and take him down. She growled in frustration and rushed forward again and again.

They'd circled each other several times, her father standing to the side, his arms folded over his chest, frowning. But he didn't say anything, just left her to it. She'd taken that to mean she was doing something right, so she'd unleashed, powered ahead, almost taking Aaryn's palm in the face, but ducked just in time, gotten under his arm and hooked his ankle, pulling him over her thigh, so he twisted and fell.

He rolled and was on his feet immediately, but Elreth was grinning.

"Don't be too pleased with yourself,

" her father had growled from her right.

She and Aaryn had both dropped their guards and turned to listen to him.

"But I got him down!

" she said, pointing to Aaryn.

"And he's so much taller than me!

"

Her father shook his head, beckoning Aaryn over to stand at his side. Aaryn, hurried to do as he was bid, and Reth leaned into his ear, murmuring something so low even Elreth couldn't hear. She frowned. What was he up to?

Her father stared down at Elreth, some kind of anger burning in his gaze that she'd been confused by.

"He was playing with you, El. Enjoying himself. He wasn't fighting. He was toying with you.

"

Elreth's own anger burned then.

"You've got me fighting males that are bigger and stronger and taller and… and it's not enough when I get one of them off his feet?

"

Her father strode forward to loom over her.

"Every enemy is bigger! Stronger! Taller! Every one! That's why they're an enemy. The only ones who will ever come against you are those who believe they have the strength to win—and believing is half the battle already won!

"

"But—

"

She'd been about to tell him that if she believed in herself, that meant she was stronger, right? Except just when she spoke, her father's hand flashed out, straight for her chest and Elreth only just got a block up in time to catch it and divert the blow that might have cracked her rib.

She blinked and her eyes went wide.

"Dad, what are you—

"

He thrust with his other hand, right for her sternum, and she darted back, throwing a block only just in time, so his blow glanced off her rib instead.

"A true enemy either doesn't have time to play with you, El,

" he said, his voice tightening as he threw punch after punch and Elreth dodged and blocked desperately, trying to keep his hands from her.

"Or if they do, then you're losing,

" her father hissed.

"Anger is either an arrow in your quiver, or a weapon used against you.

"

"But—

"

Their arms thwacked and smacked as his blows became shorter, sharper, harder. Elreth could feel her muscles bruising as she threw every defense she knew into keeping her father's hands from her—but he was stepping forward, and she was giving ground.

"Let anger fuel you,

" he growled.

"Let it sharpen your senses. Let it give you energy and make you disregard pain.

" Then his eyes burned bright.

"But never.

" Thwack.

"Ever.

" Thwack.

"Let it turn you into a joke.

"

"I wasn't—!

"

"C'mon, El, you know I had you!

" Aaryn chuckled from the side.

Her rage flared and she turned her head, the alarm bells clanging in the back of her mind the moment she'd done it. But it was too late.

Faster than she could see, her father dropped and spun, taking her legs out from the back. She snarled her frustration as she tumbled to the ground, already rolling, turning, trying to get unhooked from his leg so she could stand and face him again, but he was too fast, too big.

She ended on the ground—not as hard as she should have hit, because her father caught her elbow and took some of her weight just before she landed—half on her side, her face in the dirt as he rolled her and pinned her, one of his knees in her back.

Her father yanked her head back by her hair so her throat was exposed and while she growled and hissed, fighting, threatening to shift, he ran a finger across her neck as an enemy would with a blade.

"And never let it make you lose your focus,

" he growled.

"Your enemy does not forgive. Choose your weapon. Choose your battle. And fight it until you win.. Never, ever, let anger turn your path.

"