[Training] life sucks sometimes

Noah

Noah let what she said pass over him without visible reaction. He didn’t rush to defend himself, didn’t snap back. She needed him to be simple. Cruel or hypocrite. He shook his head once, faintly. He did not need to convince her what he had done in his life—the things he had faced, the lines he had crossed and survived. Beasts and monsters. Dragons in burning skies. Cannibals in frozen wastelands. He had stood against ancient demigods and lived through it. He had walked through divine illusion and helped bring an end to war. 

His gaze drifted over the blood on the crystal floor, the ruined set of her arm, the stubborn fire still lit behind her eyes. Leaving her here would have been easier. Cleaner. No risk, no argument, no second-guessing. Mercy was the heavier lift; it always had been. "If I wanted a clean conscience," he said as he half-turned away from her and back from where he came, "I’d have walked away and let the cave finish it."

The flask still rested within her reach, untouched. He made no move to push it closer again. The choice mattered more if it stayed hers. Her judgment did not weigh on him. When fully he turned to leave, and make his way back through the Climb looking for signs of Tanau, he would carry the same measure of himself either way.

FIN

Am I a prisoner to instincts or do my thoughts just live as free
And detached as boats to the dock?