Freya's rapier is too light in my hand.
Not weak. Light. There's a difference.
Eventide carries weight even when the blade isn't active, as if the hilt held a bad promise inside it. The rapier doesn't. The grip is narrow, the balance pulled toward the point, and the thin blade seems made to find openings rather than force a path. It's a weapon of patience, arrogance, and a steady wrist.
I look at Kellan Rook across the arena.
He's still smiling.
That's what irritates me. Not the insult itself. I've heard worse things in worse alleys, said by people who died without learning to pronounce my name. The problem is the distance between his mouth and reality. Rhayne just took an arrow to the lung, nearly swallowed the whole plaza with Void Monarch, and woke up in my lap apologizing for something she didn't even remember. Kellan looked at that and decided to call it theater.
I could pretend it didn't land in me, but I'd be lying to myself.
