POV: Ryker

The training room is freezing, a sharp, biting cold that clings to the ventilation ducts and seems to seep directly into the concrete floor, but I don’t feel it. I don’t feel anything except the rhythmic, heavy, jarring thud of Ayla’s feet against the mat.

We started at four in the morning, long before the sun had dared to peek over the jagged horizon of the compound, and I haven't let her stop for a single second.

No warm-up, no polite check-ins, no patience for the delicate, fragile girl she was when we first brought her into this world. I want to see the threshold of her endurance....