A Court of Flame and Reckoning

Twenty

—
Nyx
—

Anya has been avoiding me the past two days.

Or maybe I'm overthinking it. She's been training harder, which is good, but every time I start to walk over to her she finds something else to do.

I can't make sense of it.

At least she's doing better with group fighting. Jerome and her make a good team as they take on the opposing humans. I ignore the flare of annoyance in my chest at the thought, because I need her to be good at this—I need them to work well together.

Though, I'm afraid she might be pushing herself too hard in training. She winces whenever she angles her sword a certain way, making me believe she's strained her wrist at some point today. Her ribs are fine thanks to Aunt Gwyn's invoking stone, but if she doesn't correct her movements and fights like this in the last challenge...

When they break for water, I approach Anya to tell her just that, but she sets her tin cup down and starts to walk away.

Before she can get too far, I grab the crook of her arm to stop her. "Anya, what's going on?"

She avoids eye contact, looking over at Kari when she responds quietly. "Let go of me Nyx."

I frown. "Don't walk away from me and I will."

A glare more sharp than I've ever seen from her is directed my way. "Let. Go."

Blinking in shock, I pull my hand away. "Human—"

She walks back over to Kari before I can ask her if I said something wrong. My chest aches as I watch her leave and something loosens deep inside of me.

What did I do?

She was acting strange two nights ago when Azriel brought Kari, Elessa, and her to the room...they all were, but I just assumed they were nervous about the last challenge. Then yesterday when she didn't speak to me I thought maybe she just needed to focus, so I let her be. But now...now I know I've done something to truly piss her off.

What did I say?

She was laughing at me two days ago when I couldn't stop thinking about what it would be like to kiss her. To pull those lips between my teeth and run my hands down her body until she was writhing against me.

Did she think about it later and hate me for the way I blushed?

Fuck.

"Ouch. What'd you do now?" Kadyn says with a wince as he comes to stand next to me.

"Fuck off." I glare at him before walking away to join Uncle Azriel by the weapons rack.

He sets a wooden sword down with the others before turning to me. Uncle Azriel just raises his eyebrow at me, but doesn't vocalize his question.

I don't want to answer his question. "Hey."

"Hello?" He says before crossing his arms.

"What's next?" I ask, tilting my head to the side to gesture to the group of humans as they return to the mats.

"Mind-stilling before we get back into training." He responds, the question still lingering in his gaze.

I nod and let my gaze fall upon Anya. She's sitting down with Kari and smiling at whatever the child is saying.

"Are you really going to make me ask?" Uncle Azriel says a moment later, following my gaze to the two females. When I don't answer, he pins me with a narrowed eyes. "Why is Anya mad at you?"