During my training with the Jackal, I’d been subjected to torture. There was no other word for it, no pretty little name that changed what happened into a useful lesson. I’d been taught how to withstand extreme levels of pain without screaming. The side effect of that training was that now I couldn’t hear my own voice, screaming or singing, without the bone-deep fear of the consequences the Jackal had set for me. I had the scars to show for the punishment I was dealt, and the thought of going through that again made my brain switch firmly into fight-or-flight mode. It was one of many reasons I
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