She smiled then, a full, unguarded smile that transformed her face. "Do you remember," she asked, "the day you mastered the spinning defense? You were fourteen, gangly as a colt, all arms and legs. Practicing until you collapsed from exhaustion."
Aragon nodded, remembering. "You came back and found me sitting in the dirt, trying not to cry from frustration."
"I made you get up," she continued. "Made you show me the move again and again, until..."
"Until I finally got it right," he finished. "The look on your face – that was the first time I felt like I'd truly earned your respect."
"You had it long before that," Freja admitted. "Your determination, your refusal to give up – those qualities were evident from the start." She laughed softly. "Even in your stubborn insistence on hiding by the bathing pools, despite knowing you'd be wracked with guilt afterward."
