"Are you even hearing yourself right now? This is why we believe you're fully competent for this initiative. Whatever you've gone through has been training you for these moments. You don't ever stop fighting, there's always another threat. A threat...
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"Come on, Selene," I whispered to myself in encouragement. "Concentrate."
I stood among the darkened trees and held my hands out in front of me. The moon above me poured out a silver light, the starry stream lighting my way through my late forest hunt. It guided my path like a mother sings a soft lullaby to ease their children into a star-filled slumber. Only it was my mother, sitting in the moon. Father always told me it was her watching over me, knowing she couldn't meet me just yet.
I felt the glowing light cover me and I let it encompass me, sinking into my very being. I snapped my stormy eyes open as my ears twitched at the sound of the rustle in the leaves on the muddy ground. I moved my fingers slightly, creating those sparkling, silvery wisps that were still an unnatural phenomenon to me. As they slid and glided in between my long fingers, I spotted the bushy-tailed squirrel that I had heard moments before. In a smooth movement, I twisted my hands around and snapped them upwards.
A soft CRACK sounded despite the gentle howling of the winds. I smiled in victory as the squirrel dropped from the tree into the pile of green cedar leaves on the forest floor. Bending over, I examined my accomplishment. I definitely felt guilty, shoving an innocent creature down the jaws of death but I didn't really have a choice, I had to practice some way.
"Happy Birthday to me," I hummed, satisfied with my abilities and made my way back from the ticket of trees to the house under the rising sunlight of the cold December air.
I started down the narrow cobble road in the village, looking out to the snowy slopes of Mount Olympus. Old Panteleimonas was an oasis of serenity. My father's family had a long history of life here but it was not always the idyllic mountain village that it was now. After the Second World War, my father's grandparents helped lift the village out of decay with the remaining villagers, transforming it into the historic and picturesque place that it is today. The village was one of the luckier areas in Greece as we haven't fell into poverty due to the influx of tourists we get all year round.
"Good Morning, Mrs Kalista," I greeted the elderly lady holding a hand-woven wicker basket full of fresh loaves of bread.
"Ah Selene, happy birthday my dear," she said, stopping by the side of the road to take my hand in her own wrinkled one.
"Thank you," I smiled while moving her near a bush of small-flower tamarisk as a bike peddled by.
"Here, take one of these for you and your father. It'll be nice to take for lunch," she said, replacing my hand with a powdery loaf.
"Ah Mrs Kalista, you don't have to," I said, trying to put it back in her basket.
"No, no, it's fine. It's the least I can do with all the free meals your father gives me at the restaurant." She said pushing my hands away.
