The Living Tower

Chapter Fifteen: Hunter and Prey

Valerianella knew she wasn't supposed to think of her food as cute—Ellias had given her a dozen lighthearted but genuine lectures already—but it was hard not to spend a minute too long just watching the rabbit. Flakes of snow drifted around it as it nibbled at the low branch of a bush, unaware of the danger lurking nearby.

It's your dinner. This or nothing. Ellias expected her to be self-reliant now that she was getting older. She'd be fifteen come spring, after all.

And he was watching.

Val forced herself to lift a hand and release a beam of her magical energy. The kill was quick, at least. Clean. Less painful than dying at the hands of a fox or a wolf or a hunter's trap.

"Good job," Ellias said as Val moved forward to grab the body. "Your aim is nearly perfect—"

Val beamed, momentarily forgetting her sorrow for the rabbit.

"—at this distance, anyway," Ellias finished.

Right. Always room for improvement.

Val held up the rabbit and felt bad again. "Circle of life," she muttered. "Still, I hate to do it."

Ellias' head tipped to the side. "If you're going to make any real change in the world, Val, you need to be prepared to handle more than small animals."

Like...people?

"You'll get used to it," Ellias continued. He took the rabbit from her and placed it in his bag. "But we're done with living things for the day. We'll cook that up when we return to the tower. In the meantime, I have a new challenge for you."

Val followed Ellias through the woods up a steepening incline. Her hair was long enough that it would have dragged behind her, even in a braid, forcing her to clip the end back up to the base of her skull. She found it hard to believe Ellias couldn't build a better way into the tower and let her cut the new length off at the end of each day. But he claimed he was too busy to sort something out anytime soon. Even when she pointed out fighting would be easier if she could keep it short.

The two eventually reached an open space at the bottom of a small cliff. In this part of the forest, large boulders—left by ancient glaciers, according to Ellias—scattered the landscape.

"These boulders will be your next challenge," Ellias said. "See if you can muster a powerful enough blast to split one in half."

Val sized up the stones. "All right," she replied, lifting her hands. Here goes nothing...

Ellias' head snapped to the left, distracting her. "Did you hear that?" He rarely sounded unsettled, but something had sent concern creeping into his voice.

"I didn't hear anything." Val followed his gaze and saw nothing.

"I'll be right back. Wait here."

Val's brow furrowed as Ellias walked off into the trees. He never left her alone outside the tower. In fact, no matter how many times she'd begged over the past couple of years, she was forbidden from leaving without him. It made things difficult when he was gone for days or even weeks at a time, off gods-knew-where doing whatever witch work it was he did. And when he wasn't around, he put a spell in place that would let him instantly sense if she snuck out.

While she appreciated his fears for her safety, she was growing sick of being treated like a child.

"You are a beacon of magical energy. There's a chance someone attuned to that energy could come looking for you. Part of my spell on the tower masks that, and I keep us hidden when we're together," he'd said.