Bringing her finger up to her lips, she silences the next impending question.

Her companion groans but thankfully complies.

It’s not Nova’s fault that Ward asked for this. A lesson on how to fight like her.

It begins with stealth. Because a quiet fighter is a deadly one. When you don’t see someone coming, it gives you a valuable advantage. One that you must act upon in the real world. That would be called dishonorable in Ward’s royal guard training, but this isn’t on the training grounds. And she isn’t some knight.

Right now, Haze is pretending to be an enemy. Nova knows well enough that she can protect herself even without her magic, so she’s more concerned with how Ward will fare.

Bringing his hand in a downward motion to where Haze is walking along the path that they are hidden by the bushes and trees, she understand that he wants to go in for the attack. She vigorously shakes her head, making an ‘X’ with her arms.

The edges of his lips quirk up, amused by her adamant response.

She doesn’t smile back.

This is a training exercise. You cannot get distracted.

Nova points upwards, but when his eyebrows raise, she lets out a noiseless sigh. She guesses she has to lead by example.

Without a single sound, she climbs the tree with practiced ease. He scrambles to mirror her. The noise from his boots scraping against the bark has her cringing. The leaves rustle with the wide movements.

Haze is very close.

When she glances to the side where they once were, she doesn’t see anyone.

Good. Most people would expect an attack from the ground. Which is why they are in the trees.

Ward softly snaps his fingers to get her attention. He points to Haze. She shakes her head, but he becomes impatient. Doesn’t trust her process. He jumps down, in front of Haze, with his weapons drawn. Rolling her eyes, Nova scoffs. The whole point of the higher vantage point is to come from behind. Not the front.

He swings at Haze, albeit a bit hesitantly. Why he thinks he’ll ever get a scratch on her is beyond Nova.

With one wave of her hand, his blade freezes. Struggling, eyes wide, he tries to tug it away. Even without any hands on it, the outline of purple keeps it in place, suspended in the air.

She jumps from her branch and joins Ward and Haze.

Her glare sends Haze into laughter and Ward into shame, his eyes and head downcast.

They’ll just have to do this again until he understands it.

When he looks up with a small smile, Nova can’t help but feel a tug at her heart.

Maybe she doesn’t mind the extra training.

———

(I really wanted to challenge myself with this prompt since I recognize that I tend to lean heavily on dialogue. Sometimes, I write down only dialogue and fill in the rest later when I can clearly picture what I want my characters to say. So I hope I did this ok!)