Garlan stood knee-deep in grass, arms stretched forward, eyes narrowed.

  He looked focused—hands tracing invisible circles through the air.

  Around him, tiny rain rings appeared one by one.

  Some too wide.

  Some off-center.

  But each one was clearer, more precise than the last.

  Slowly, the rain tightened.

  It softened.

  It narrowed to a fine mist—waist-high, gentle, suspended like a breath.

  Tharion, chewing on the last of a stolen root, raised an eyebrow.

  — “Well now…”

  He straightened slightly.

  — “Didn’t expect that from the kid.”

  Not far away, Marenna crouched with her palms pressed to the earth.

  She was trying—hard.

  But nothing came.

  No stem. No thorn.

  She clenched her teeth, slowed her breathing, and stood.

  Then she walked toward the Carniflora—still strangely docile whenever they passed it.

  She knelt before it.

  One hand resting near its roots, the other on her chest.

  She closed her eyes.

  She didn’t want to control the plant.

  She wanted to understand it.

  Understand its branches, its reach.

  What made a simple flower protective—or deadly.

  Maybe if she could sense that,

  she’d find the feeling again—

  the memory that had summoned the brambles the first time.

  Tharion watched them both—

  quieter than usual.

  Then his head snapped toward the horizon.

  A dust cloud.

  It was rising fast—kicked up by something moving at speed.

  Tharion squinted, stepped forward, his ears twitching slightly.

  He recognized them.

  Or at least, he thought he did.

  A herd of struthas.

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  Half ostrich, half duck, half dinosaur, and somehow still too optimistic.

  They ran like lunatics—high-legged, scruffy-feathered, honking like broken horns.

  Tharion grinned, all teeth.

  — “Perfect practice.”

  He turned toward the teens.

  — “Marenna, I want you to catch one of those struthas with your brambles.”

  Marenna opened her mouth to protest—but didn’t get the chance.

  — “Garlan, use your lightning spell like you do with water. Focus on stunning one of those birds. Not roasting it.”

  The two teens exchanged an uncertain glance.

  Then the herd came crashing down on them.

  Panic.

  Frozen by the noise.

  Feathers flying.

  Hundreds of feet pounding the ground.

  Garlan snapped out of it first.

  He grabbed Marenna’s hand.

  — “I really hope you know what you’re doing,” she muttered, already channeling her spell.

  — “Don’t worry. I’ve got you. Focus on the brambles. I won’t let go.”

  He cast a joint levitation spell.

  They rose slowly—just above the tall grass—high enough to dodge the stampede.

  Garlan focused.

  Lightning spell.

  He split it.

  Again.

  And again.

  Too fast.

  Too strong.

  Instead of spreading out in soft arcs, the energy slammed into a single, blinding bolt.

  Barbecue for a year—served instantly.

  Half the herd exploded in a cloud of charred feathers.

  Marenna, jolted by the magical backlash, finally managed to summon her brambles—

  but in every direction.

  The vines snapped up like snakes—grabbing wrists, ankles, torsos.

  They both crashed to the ground with a wet thud, tangled in their own chaos.

  — “We look like sausages wrapped in barbed wire,” Garlan groaned, face half-buried in a bush.

  Tharion, still chewing his root in the distance, didn’t even blink.

  He stared, unimpressed.

  — “Great. Now what do we do with all this meat?”

  He shrugged.

  — “Come on. There’s a village nearby. Let’s call it a gift.”

  —

  Night fell.

  The fire crackled gently, casting its glow across their faces.

  Smoke and roasted meat scented the air.

  Burnt feathers still drifted here and there.

  — “I may have gone a bit overboard,” Garlan admitted, chewing on a strutha drumstick.

  — “A bit?” Marenna raised an eyebrow. “You fried the whole flock. Two of them turned to coal.”

  — “Well, at least they didn’t suffer… right?”

  — “I suffered. I was stuck to you, remember? I caught the rebound shockwave!”

  He raised his hands in mock surrender.

  — “Okay, okay…

  I get it. Not a master elementalist yet.”

  Tharion, leaned back against a rock, munched calmly.

  — “You both obliterated your targets.”

  He swallowed and added:

  — “And yourselves along with them. Pretty solid average for beginners.”

  They laughed.

  The moment softened.

  Silence settled in—light and warm, crackling with the fire.

  Garlan glanced at Marenna, then up at the stars.

  — “Think we’ll ever be able to do this stuff without blowing everything up?”

  — “I think blowing things up is how you learn control.”

  He nodded slowly.

  Then grinned.

  — “Next mission: raze a whole flower field. Just for fun.”

  — “Try it, and I’ll make you eat a bramble,” she replied, deadpan.

  Tharion raised his wooden cup.

  — “To brambles and lightning.

  And to the rookies who survive their own messes.”

  The two teens raised their imaginary cups—

  and toasted in the firelight.