The High Tower

When I first saw her, walking through this land I spread out for her, I thought I wanted her to be free, to be able to walk these hills and valleys and wander down to the stream to bathe each morning. I thought I had created the perfect world for her, that she could have the perfect life here.

After a while, though, I found she was wandering afar, going right to the edges of this world I’d made for her, constantly scanning the hillsides and searching the skies for something.

I realised then that she was alone. I thought I would be enough for her. That the obvious care and consideration I’d shown in building this landscape would be enough to show her that I loved her and wanted only her happiness.

I did not expect that she would turn away from all I‘d made and given to her, to go searching for someone else, to look around for someone like her.

I thought of going down there myself, stepping into her world, becoming the one that she searched for endlessly. Something stopped me. I was scared that maybe she would reject me, turn on me, see this paradise I had built for her as nothing more than a prison that she must escape.

Eventually, after watching her as she wandered further and further away, as she became more and more desperate to escape, I had no choice.

I built the castle.

Even then, she would wander restlessly from room to room; clamber up on the battlements to search horizons, to long for and to hope.

Now, she sits all day in that room I created for her at the top of the tallest tower, staring out of that small window, hoping that one day her rescuer will come.