Phoenix's POV.
The moment Phoenix realized she would be sharing a room with the men, her stoic mask didn't slip but inside, her stomach knotted. As Annette distributed the room assignments, Phoenix folded her arms tightly, as though holding herself together.
She curtly nodded, masking the unease simmering beneath her cold exterior.
Sharing a room with anyone was unsettling enough. Phoenix valued her solitude, it was her armour, the space where she didn't have to keep up the facade of indifference.
But sharing a room with men? That was uncharted territory.
She had never shared a room with a man in her life. Growing up in the Valeria Kingdom, her interactions with men had been limited to sparring, combat training, and battlefield commands.
All rigid, impersonal, and carefully controlled.
She had never allowed herself to be vulnerable around them, and she wasn't about to start now.
