Naomi’s POV;

The first time I held a gun, I thought it would make me feel smaller.

Cassian had argued against it for days.

“Firearms aren’t for you,” he had said, his voice flat as metal. “They make people do things they can’t take back.”

He pictured me fragile and broken and thought he was protecting me by keeping me ignorant.

But ignorance had been how they had traded me like an object with no value. Knowledge of any kind felt like the real way out.

So I asked again. And again. Until his jaw loosened and his patience thinned into a reluctant permission.

“If you want to learn, you’ll...