"Silence can endure a wound, but it cannot heal one."
Months had passed in a blur. The days had rhythm now — classes, training, quiet meals, study by lamplight. Yet even with routine there were shifts I couldn't ignore. Melinda stayed close, but I felt her slipping further from me with each passing week. She didn't smile as much. I tried everything I could to coax her back: hugs, my attention, even my greatest treasure — honeyed bread pressed into her hands. But no gift brought her warmth back. Her silences felt like walls, and behind them something dark grew. The classes themselves grew harder. After the first incident in training, the Warden never struck us again — but his presence loomed, simmering just beneath the surface. Melinda's face always seemed to harden whenever he was near. One afternoon in lessons, I found myself blurting words I hadn't meant to. "Melinda seems to be… having a hard time." Kris glanced at me from his desk beside mine. After his recovery, he'd surprised me by choosing that seat — close enough to keep the two girls who used to needle me at bay. I half-expected him to drift back to safer company, but instead he had claimed the space at my side. "What makes you think that?" he murmured, eyes flicking between me and the dense formulas on the page. "She isn't smiling anymore," I admitted. The ache in my chest twisted tighter. Was it my fault? My grades? The other maids whispering about her? Every time I asked her if something was wrong, she painted on a false smile like a mask. Kris sighed softly, his shoulders sagging. "I'll ask my butler. He might know something — no promises." I exhaled, defeated but grateful. Kris was gruff, distracted, often irritated — but he had become someone I could lean toward, even just a little. Lessons pressed on. Staples drilled us with problems: If a troop stands one hundred meters away, how much energy to drop fire upon them? How much to poison their air? My brain throbbed under the weight of numbers. Kris, by contrast, answered every question with sharp precision, basking in the teacher's approval. By the time the bell released us, I felt hollowed out. I gathered my notes and drifted into the hall. That's when I saw her. Melinda, walking ahead. A bruise bloomed purple across her cheek. She didn't look at me. She didn't look at anyone — just kept walking until she disappeared through a side door, her eyes shimmering with unshed tears. My throat tightened. I wanted to call after her, but the words stuck. Instead I turned away, heart pounding. Linette stirred inside me, restless. She was no longer a single ember but a whole tree, branching through every part of me. Her warmth was constant now, her emotions bleeding into mine — sudden tears, wild anger, confusing tides. I had learned, barely, how to separate myself from her currents, but the balance was fragile. Still shaken, I hurried toward the training yard, the sandpit where the Warden would be waiting. I arrived first, chest still tight, stomach sour from holding too much in. And then I heard it. A voice. Melinda's voice, thin with strain. I followed, steps slow, until I rounded a corner. The Warden's hand clamped hard around her arm. His face bent low, his mouth at her ear, words too soft for me to hear. But in the angle of his shoulders, in the way his shadow loomed over her, I saw another man — a memory from long ago. My blood went cold. I froze, breath locked in my chest. The Warden's grip on Melinda tightened until she winced. For one suspended heartbeat, I thought he might strike her. But then the sound of approaching footsteps made him release her arm. His expression hardened into a mask of command. "Get back to your duties," he growled. Melinda lowered her gaze, murmured something I couldn't catch, and hurried away. The bruise on her cheek caught the light once more before she vanished. By then, the other students were filing into the yard. Kris among them. He arrived with his usual straight-backed confidence, and the Warden's eyes tracked him like a hawk spotting prey. "Boy," the Warden barked, tossing him a weighted staff. "Show me how you've improved. Attack." Kris caught the weapon, adjusted his grip, and moved into stance. For a few breaths the two circled each other, sand crunching beneath their boots. The class stood silent. I could feel Linette coil inside me, tense, wary. Then the clash began. The Warden struck without mercy, his blows sharp, punishing. Kris parried, stumbled, recovered. Again and again the Warden drove him back, until the boy's arms trembled from the effort. He was no match — and the Warden wasn't training him, he was testing how much punishment Kris could endure. A final strike knocked the staff from his hands. It clattered to the sand. Kris dropped to one knee, chest heaving, sweat dripping into the dirt. The Warden loomed above him. "Pathetic." His boot lashed out, catching Kris in the ribs. The sound made me flinch. Something in me wanted to cry out — but the memory of Melinda's face, his grip, kept me silent. My throat burned with swallowed words. Melissa, who usually smirked through these exercises, didn't laugh. She shifted uncomfortably, her eyes darting between Kris and the Warden. And when the Warden turned to lecture the rest of us, her hand brushed a kerchief from her sleeve and flicked it onto the sand beside Kris. "Wipe your face," she muttered, just loud enough for him to hear. Her expression was tight, almost angry, but not at him. Kris picked up the cloth, confusion flickering in his eyes before he masked it with his usual pride. For the first time, I saw Melissa not as my tormentor but as someone else trapped here — someone who knew what it meant to survive under watchful eyes. The rest of training blurred into a haze. The Warden barked commands, made us sprint the length of the yard, drop into push-ups until our arms shook, then forced us into sparring rounds. My body obeyed, but my mind was still caught on the sound of Kris hitting the sand. Every time the Warden's gaze swept past me, I felt my insides shrink. Linette pressed warmth into my ribs, steadying me, but she couldn't erase the memory of that grip on Melinda's arm. Of the boot driving into Kris's side. Of the way Melissa had tossed him her kerchief, her jaw tight with something that wasn't cruelty. I wanted to scream. To do something. But the air in my throat stayed locked and silent. When training ended, the others drifted off toward the barracks, muttering complaints about sore muscles. Kris walked slower than usual, stiff, one arm hugging his ribs. He refused to let anyone see the wince in his step. Melissa, a few paces behind him, kept her eyes on the ground. I lingered. My stomach twisted as I spotted Melinda again at the far edge of the yard. She was carrying a tray of water jugs for the staff. Her bruise looked darker now, swelling against her pale skin. Our eyes met for a flicker of a moment — and then she looked away. That hurt more than the Warden's blows ever could. I knew she was slipping from me, inch by inch. I'd tried to hold on with honeyed bread, with smiles, with every small piece of myself I could offer. But the distance was growing, and I couldn't cross it. Linette stirred again, a restless shifting beneath my skin, as if she could sense the way my heart was breaking. I clenched my fists, the words I could never speak crowding my chest. If I couldn't protect Melinda. If I couldn't protect Kris. If I couldn't even protect myself— Then what good was I? That night, I couldn't sleep. My little room was still, the kind of stillness that pressed against my ears until I could hear nothing but my own heartbeat. The sheets felt too tight around me. The air too close. Kris hitting the ground. Melinda's bruised face. The Warden's hand, closing around her arm like a shackle. I pressed my palms against my eyes, but it only made the images sharper. Something inside me cracked. Not loud, not visible — just a hairline fracture that widened each time I remembered the sound of Kris's cough. The way Melinda looked away from me. The Warden's laugh. I hated that laugh. Linette stirred with me, her warmth no longer comforting but searing, licking like fire up my arms. I curled tighter under the blanket, praying no one could hear the shallow hiss of my breath through the thin walls. Tomorrow would come. Training would come. The Warden's shadow would fall over us all again. But as I lay awake, staring at the black ceiling, I realized something with cold certainty: One day, I wouldn't just cower. One day, I would stop him. And when that day came, there would be no turning back.