The Icicles

Chapter 22

It's been a few days now and in my opinion my ice powers have improved a ton. Though I have been practicing a lot, I've barely had time for anything else, and Hazel and I barely get to see each other. I really want a day to relax, but I know that I can't. As I step out of the shower to see Hunter blocking my path to the closet.
"Hunter!" I plead, "I only have 3 more days until I'm in war, let me go train!" He shakes his head. I grab the bathrobe to my right and tie it around my waist,

"Not today," he states. I shrug putting my hands on my waist,

"And what do you propose I do today?" I ask. He grins and starts to pull me out the room.

"Hunter I'm wearing a bathrobe!" I say, just as we enter a spa. Though it is exactly what I need and want I feel bad that I am not training while all the soldiers I had asked for are. As I enter the first room lies Hazel in a little hot tub of her own. I join her in the one next to her and let myself sink into the hot water.

We sit and talk for the first little while in the hot tubs before moving to a massage. As I feel the rub of the masseuses hands against my back I realize how much I've really needed a day to relax. By the time we are done with the seaweed wrap, I am ready to go back to training, but I know I owe it to Hazel to at least go to lunch with her first.

After the lunch I swear I raced off to training. Maya agrees to meet with me to work on some more difficult skills. She keeps saying that I'm already doing better than most people, but I can't just be average. I have to be the best.

As I enter the ice training room that is empty, due to Maya's position of power here, we sit with our feet in the water. The pool is usually frozen, but I have melted it. I let the water swirl around my feet like a massage.

"So when are you going to freeze it?" Maya asks impatiently. I stand up sighing,

"Right now." With a movement of hands I let an ice sheet cover the lake. I rub my wrist, that now has no cast on it.

"Good, now I want you to step on it, hold yourself up," Maya says. I turn to her, mouth hanging.

"The ice could barely hold a puppy how do you expect it to hold me?!" I exclaim. She smirks,

"You want me to make you the best, now hold yourself up on that ice," she says. She steps on her own patch of ice and with no trouble she stays up right on it. I do the same focusing. I take a tiny step onto the ice and focus on making it strong enough to hold me. It holds. I stay there not daring to move for a few seconds. Sweat beats down my forehead as I weave the ice together, stronger and stronger each time. All of a sudden a burst of ice comes at me, and a water shield of my own making pops up as I fall right into the freezing cold water. I curse pulling myself back up and drying myself off.

"Really Maya!" I say wanting my revenge. I catch her off guard letting a gust of water splash onto her. In the few second her grasp on the ice breaks I take a hold of it and let it break and she falls in. Ice lifts her back steady on her feet, and she attempts to dry herself off, but isn't as successful as I am. I smile playfully and catch myself with ice as I take steps. It seems easier when I'm in the heat of battling Maya. She shoots ice, I shoot ice. I shoot water. She shoots ice. I sink her. She sinks me. It's repetitive, but I think I learn a lot doing this. I think it is mainly my competitive spirit.

After a while, we are both getting tired. I turn around about to sit down, but I see the slight movement of her hand and within moments, my mind reacts without me. The ice I am standing on suddenly breaks off from the huge ice covered lake and lifts me up to the sky dodging her bullet of ice. Like I said this caught me by surprise and I lose balance, resulting in a freezing cold pool catching me. Maya laughs helping me up and out of the water as I dry us both off.