Phoenix

Combat

Despite her objections, Gus insisted on walking Ash back to her room. He lingered awkwardly by the door, as though expecting something more and when she thanked him and said goodnight, he pulled her in for another kiss. But the adrenaline she'd felt after firing the gun was gone, replaced by a nagging guilt. She told him she was tired and extricated herself from his arms, closing the door before she could see the disappointment on his face.

After he was gone, Ash buried herself under the sheets. She didn't have any experience in these sorts of things, but she was sure she should've felt differently after kissing someone she respected as much as Gus.

It was another restless night and, in the morning, Ash woke feeling as though she'd been tasered. Her head hurt, her limbs dragged like lead weights and all she wanted to do was stay in bed. But it was their second day of battle training and she knew she couldn't hide in her room all day.

Once again, all of Phoenix house was gathered on the training field. Gus and Eli were already arranging people into groups. Gus smiled and waived, but she kept her head down and pretended she hadn't seen. It went that way all morning, with Gus trying to make an approach, and her running away. She felt like a magnet stuck in an empty box with a metal pin. Everywhere she turned, Gus was there, trying to stick to her.

Eventually, he got the message and ceased his hopeful approaches. But the puppy dog eyes he kept sending her afterwards were worse. She'd never been in such a position before, and she hated it. She never should've kissed him back. And now, she might lose someone who could've been a potential friend—something she didn't exactly have an abundance of.

Eli was his usual businesslike self all morning. In the last twelve hours, he'd managed to get Gunner to produce over forty chains of different lengths, each custom fitted to the height of each Phoenix house member. He began the lesson by pulling Gus to the front to the group and asking him to demonstrate his technique with the chains from the night before. Gus stepped to his mark confidently, but turned white when he realised Eli was the one who was going to fire Miki's gun at him.

Eli drew the gun with much more confidence than Ash, and fired three successive shots. Gus, who'd only been expecting one, deflected the first on a downwards swing, missed the second, and only just nicked the third, which came so close to his arm the Phoenix crowd stepped back and gasped.

When it became clear he hadn't been injured, the crowd cheered Gus for his bravery. While Gus accepted the praise with enthusiasm, his gaze kept returning to Eli. There was something nerve-racking in the way Eli had fired Miki's gun.

Ash seethed. Everyone seemed to have forgotten the chains were her idea, and as morning drew into afternoon and more people began picking up the technique and praising Gus for his ingenuity, the angrier she got.

When Eli switched their focus to close combat sparring, Ash used it as an opportunity to blow off steam. She threw herself into each drill with such tenacity that her first opponent, a girl about her size and weight, went away crying, clutching a blood nose.

Eli shook his head. "You weren't supposed to hit her hard."

"I didn't do it on purpose."

He gave her a long look that said he didn't believe her in the slightest.

"If she can't hack a blood nose, there's no way she'll survive a real fight," she said.

Eli gave her a reproachful look and partnered her with a bigger, much older boy, who looked robust enough to take a hit.

He wasn't.

"You didn't need to groin him," Eli said. "This is a practicespar."

"It was an accident."