Page 151 of Harbinger

“Thanks,” I say lightly to Vessica.

But she doesn’t look up from cleaning the tip of her blade. “He wouldn’t try anything.”

“I doubt that.” I snort.

“He wouldn’t dare.” She lifts an eyebrow in disbelief.

I don’t ask her why.

She doesn’t offer.

“Is this the part where you say you’ll go with me?” This is getting nearly as tiring as my actual training.

But she shakes her head. “You don’t need a chaperone.”

Exactly. I’m about to say so when she hits me with, “You need to get over that fucking mark on your chest.”

My mouth hangs open, the sharpness of her response stealing my own.

“We all have scars,” she explains, tipping her head in the direction Taliesin just went. “All of us.”

I swallow, the dirt under my knees suddenly very cold. “It’s not a scar.”

“I know that,” she says, and for the first time ever, she smiles at me. It’s fucking terrifying. “The question is: do you?”

I miss him again.

My grip fails for a second, just long enough that I almost drop my sword. Every muscle in my arm burns, and I grab the handle with my left hand, too. But it’s not enough. I can’t summon the strength, even with two hands on the hilt, and my next slice is weaker. It’s aimed so low that I nearly take off Bishop’s most important appendage, but he leaps back and easily knocks my sword away.

“Maybe … we should call it a day.” He draws a heavy breath, giving me a look that sends my very limited confidence crashing.

We’ve only been here for an hour. That’s barely worth the time it took to reach the astrolatory. I clamp my mouth shut like if I keep the pain in, I can leverage it to raise the sword again.

But Bishop slides his own in the sheath strapped to his back. A few weeks in, and I’ve learned this is his signal that the lesson is over. “You’re shaking. You can barely lift your sword.”

“I’m fine.” But my blade tips down, wobbling in my trembling fingers before my hold on it slips again and it sticks in a patch of grass growing between the loose stones.

His gaze narrows on it.

“I know. Bad form. Proper weapons handling,” I grumble, refraining from reciting one of his many lectures back at him. “I’ll do better next time. I’m ready now.”

“You’re lying.” He waits like he’s daring me to deny it.

I lift my chin, trying to make a weapon out of pride. Because he’s right, damn him. I can’t lift the fucking sword another minute. “Train me anyway.”

“No.” He doesn’t soften, doesn’t show a single ounce of pity. For some reason that makes it sting less when he adds, “We’re through here.”

Not that I’m about to accept defeat. “If you won’t train me, I’ll find someone else.” I turn to make good on the threat.

I’ve shown up every day for weeks. No matter how hard it rained or how cold the wind got. Even the day the mountain dropped snow on us like it was testing my resolve, too.

I’m not stopping now.

But Bishop’s lips curl into a smile, the one that makes my heart skip a beat for all the wrong reasons. The one that makes me wish he would take me inside and give me a very different kind of lesson …

“Try it,” he says like he’s crossing names off a list, “and I’ll personally come down to explain their options to them.”

That snaps me right out of my temporary daze.