Laric grunted. “Different. You know, I’ve been waiting for her to do something different for a while. And between her escape and the fact that we know there are mages on their way to the city, I don’t know how long we have before this becomes a real issue.”
“What are you saying?” Rowan asked.
He wasn’t too sure what he was saying. He didn’t know what to do or what to make of it. The only thing he knew with any certainty was that there was going to be a change coming.
“You can still see what the dragon sees?” Rowan asked.
“Careful,” he said, keeping his voice quiet. “I don’t know how much we want to share that with anybody else.”
“We’re not sharing.”
“Well, you’re not keeping it quiet either, are you?”
She scowled. “Sorry. That wasn’t my intention.”
Laric snorted. “I know. And I’m not saying that to be a problem for you.”
“I know,” she said.
He closed his eyes and focused on Sashaak. The dragon had started to circle outward, and as he had, Laric could see from a different vantage. For one, he could make out the town. That part was easy enough for him to see, even from above. It had taken him a little while to identify why he could observe that from Sashaak’s viewpoint as clearly as he could, but once he recognized the reason, realization swept through him with a sudden, surprising power.
It was because of him. Laric could see his own potential through Sashaak’s eyes.
That was strange and astonishing to him.
And if he was looking at potential, then maybe he could view it in a different way and monitor for other aspects of it. He hadn’t considered that as a possibility, but if he could look from a different angle, maybe Laric could follow it.
“You’re concentrating,” Rowan said.
“I am,” he said. “So just give me a moment.”
She was quiet.
Potential. That was what it seemed to be tied to. And maybe there was something to all of that potential that he could and should have noticed from the very beginning. He thought about what he had been seeing from Sashaak and how he had been observing what it was that Sashaak was trying to do, but Laric did not know everything.
Surprisingly, his potential in the town was not the only one that existed.
“The dragon can see you,” Laric whispered to Rowan.
“I thought you wanted me to be careful saying that.”
“Sorry. You’re right. I see your potential.”
“And that means what?”
“I don’t know. Maybe that means you can do what I do.”
“Don’t say things like that,” Rowan said.
He avoided the urge to open his eyes and look over to her. “You don’t want it?”
“I’m not sure that I do,” Rowan said. “Your sister does. She’s been talking about it with Iveris. The two of them have been plotting what it might be like if they were to have access to one of them.”
Laric snickered. “Why am I not surprised by that. Joselle always wanted to know more about our grandmother. She felt like she should have been taught the spellslips from her as well. And when I went to school and she didn’t have the opportunity, she was jealous. I’ve been trying to help her learn all of them, but—”
“But you’re also teaching others those same spellslips, so they aren’t as unique or special.”
“They are still our grandmother’s spellslips.”
He stared through Sashaak’s vision, noticing the steady sliding of power down below as Sashaak continued to circle. What he wouldn’t give to actually ride on the dragon’s back. Could he?
Malinar certainly had, so it made sense that such a thing could and should be possible, but Laric didn’t know if he would ever be granted such an opportunity. Sashaak would have to permit it, for one, and Laric would have to be capable of staying on Sashaak’s back. All it would take would be one wind gust to rip him free, and he’d go tumbling.
Maybe that was the reason Sashaak had hesitated sharing some of this with him.
“I see other potential,” Laric said, keeping his voice quiet. “And… Wait. There.”
It was north of the city. Quite a ways north, he thought, but he could see it. It was a faint glow, and a little bit of energy.
Laric blinked his eyes open, getting to his feet. “I think I know where she went.”
“What do you want to do?” Rowan asked.
“I want to just leave it alone, but I don’t know that we can do so safely.”
“So do we get the others?”
“How about this. We talk to Malcolm, let him know what we are going to do, and then we decide what to do about her. That is, assuming that she really is out there where I can detect her. But Joselle and Iveris should stay here.”
