The conclusion struck deeper than Valeria expected.
Irritation came first, clean and immediate. Beneath it lay wounded pride, sharpened by something she had less interest in naming. She had chosen him because he was among the few capable of understanding what her swordsmanship had become.
He had been the one to expose the flaw within her perfection. Her forms had once been exact enough that their correctness became prediction; every transition carried the certainty of doctrine, and Lucavion had repeatedly turned that certainty against her. Everything she had rebuilt since then had begun with that lesson.
She had wanted to place the result before him in the only language neither of them could dispute.
Instead, Lucavion had entered believing he already possessed its grammar.
The anger did not disturb her stance. It settled it.
