“I have done nothing,” the Grand Mage said. “I’m waiting for you to deal with what I have told you to deal with.”
Talia glowered at him. “I can feel that you are causing something to happen here. I do not care for it much, so if you wouldn’t mind, please stop.”
Laric ignored them and continued to push. “Use the key,” he said to Rowan.
Talia didn’t know this spellslip. At least, Laric hadn’t taught it to her. She might’ve pieced together ways of getting in and out of the shed, and in and out of the chamber, but Laric hadn’t given her the secret.
And now, he had a very distinct idea about what that key could do here.
He felt it in a way that he had not felt anything else. He felt the power as it echoed, seemingly bouncing off the walls, and then it began to change, rippling upward. When it did that, Laric felt a weird surge inside himself.
Potential.
The glyphs, and the key, seemed to activate some of his potential. That was strange, but not nearly as strange as realizing that his key, the one that his grandmother had taught him, could activate those glyphs. It truly was the key to all things.
“Keep using it,” he said to Rowan. “And see if you can’t add that key to something else.”
“Like what?” she asked.
“I don’t know, like this.”
Talia turned her attention back to them, but he ignored her and focused on the glyphs, then used a spellslip he had played with in the past to cause an explosion of sparks in the air. Talia staggered back and moved away. The Grand Mage did the same thing, but not nearly as far back as Talia had. Still, he had moved enough, giving Laric the opportunity to finally stand up.
He and Rowan both got to their feet, and then Laric turned and looked over to the headmaster. They couldn’t leave her here. He didn’t know what Talia, or the Grand Mage might do, but he had to stop this, here and now.
But he didn’t know if he could.
“I need your help,” he said again to Sashaak.
And again, Laric didn’t know if Sashaak would answer, but he needed him to respond because he couldn’t help but feel as if that was going to be the only way he would be able to find an answer here.
The power continued to build around him, and Laric focused on what he could feel, struggling to understand if there would be a way that he would be able to stand that magic.
As he focused, he continued to probe, drawing on that connection. It was the key, after all. That was what his grandmother had given him. She had been placing glyphs all around the town, and she had given him the key to understanding the purpose behind them.
The Grand Mage turned to him, and there was a look of rage in his eyes.
Laric needed to go. But more than anything, he needed to find his sister and the others.
He did the only thing that he could think of—he turned the sparks that he had been using, mixed with the key spellslip, on the Grand Mage. A part of him thought that was all it was going to take to make the Grand Mage back away from him, maybe make him feel afraid or overpowered. But it seemed as if the moment he released that power, there was a sensation of something else. It was coming from the same artifact that he had seen Mr. Galinar wielding.
For her part, Rowan had turned to face Talia. Laric noticed that she was using a modification of one of the earth-based spellcraft forms, and it was similar to the one that Laric had learned from Talia, but he doubted that was going to be effective. If nothing else, at least Talia was paying more attention to Rowan, seeming to watch her with a measure of wariness that she had not had before.
“You are quite troublesome,” the Grand Mage said. “Tell me where you learned to do that.”
“It was his grandmother,” Talia said. “As I told you in our previous discussion.”
“You didn’t tell me anything.”
“I told you that there was a sense of unease here, and you thought you could overpower it.”
She regarded Laric with a bit of caution.
What could he do? The Grand Mage was blocking his way out.
“This will go much better for the both of you if you choose to come willingly. I can make it easy, or I can make it difficult,” the Grand Mage said, motioning to either side of him. “You said that you saw what took place in Korthal.” He cocked his head, regarding Laric for a long moment. “If you are aware, then you are aware of what we can do to those creatures. I would much rather not, as they are useful. We have started to see that now. We would be in favor of taking advantage of those creatures rather than destroying them. But I will destroy if needed.”
“Because that’s all you know,” Laric said.
“You don’t know what you speak of. And I’m afraid that it is long overdue that you find out what I will do.”
Laric began to feel the buildup of the Grand Mage’s spellcraft form. He didn’t know if there was going to be anything that he could do, and he had no idea if he would be strong enough to withstand it, but at this point, the only thing he could think about was trying to resist it.
Then an image appeared in his mind with a sudden ferocity. It came from Sashaak, a spellcraft form that the dragon had shown him before. Within that spellcraft form came a sense of power, and Laric knew what he needed to do.
Fire.
He focused on the walls, which were all paneled in wood. He had the key active, working on the glyphs, and Laric added a hint of the power within him so he could feel some of that energy as it flowed. He allowed the fire to burn, and it quickly took hold along the paneled walls, consuming the wood. As it did, he felt the heat rising, and there was a massive surge of energy. And then nothing.
That wasn’t exactly true—the flames began to work their way along the walls, quickly eating up the paneling.
As they did, Laric began to feel something else. More than just a sense of pressure. He wasn’t quite sure what it was, just that the energy continued to consume the room around them. While the paneling burned away, he saw the glyphs beneath, gleaming and blazing. Once the glyphs were freed from the paneling, Laric could feel something else from them. It was almost as if they were meant to draw upon fire. They were meant to hold it.
Laric turned his focus to whether he could try anything else. As he did, he began to feel that pressure working, and starting to course all around him. Finally, however, that energy began to build, and the flames worked upward and consumed the walls.
“I don’t know what you’re doing,” Rowan said, getting closer to him, “but I don’t want to be burned alive in here.”
“I just started it,” Laric said. “The rest isn’t me.”
