I turned seventeen and buried the last piece of softness I had left.
It didn't die loudly. Just… disappeared. Folded itself into the corners of my bones, where it would no longer be a liability. I didn't miss it. I couldn't afford to.
Magda noticed before I even did.
"Your hands don't tremble anymore," she said one morning, watching me cut dried wolfsbane with a knife too sharp to be safe. "That's how tyrants are born."
I didn't answer. Just kept slicing, clean and even, as the dust stung my eyes.
There were no tyrants in the apothecary. Only survivors. And even if there were, I didn't mind being one if that was what it took.
The shop grew busier. Magda whispered of things best left unsaid — the old bloodlines stirring again, of rogue witches selling wolfbone powder to alphas desperate to cheat the mate bond. We served them all. Quietly. Efficiently.
I became her shadow.
