Ragnora opened her eyes. They were dry, but Cassius could see the pain swimming in their golden depths.
"I didn't blame them. I still don't. They were just soldiers being soldiers. Rough and rowdy and thoughtless, the way soldiers are. They didn't mean to hurt me."
"They probably thought I'd laugh along with them, smack the recruit on the shoulder, tell him he'd done well to be so brave."
"But...you didn't."
"No." Her voice was barely a whisper. "I didn't."
She pressed her palm against her chest.
"In that moment, standing there while my soldiers laughed and cheered about how 'impossible' it was to actually be in a relationship with me, how confessing to me was the 'scariest challenge anyone could face'—I felt something inside me...shrivel."
"Every hope I'd nurtured. Every dream I'd held onto. All of it just...collapsed."
Cassius wasn't even the one who went through the experience and still he felt a hopeless feeling
"And it wasn't even just the rejection."
