Chapter Twenty-Two
Caulder
My fingers thrummed on my desk as I let my thoughts wander to my mate.
I should have been grading papers or dealing with the endless requests from the two houses I was assigned.
Instead, my mind was focused on the problem of Bechora’s magic.
She was a conundrum, with the way her magic seemed nonexistent at times while granting abilities she shouldn’t have.
I’d gone so far as to seek out the mage who’d determined that Bechora was a fire mage, but she was adamant that only fire had revealed itself on orientation day.
A light rap against the frame of my open door drew me from my thoughts.
Mrs. Fiodh, the Academy’s librarian, stood in the doorway with her cart.
Though she looked no older than forty, the small fairy had been with the school for centuries—possibly even since it came into existence; nobody was actually sure.
“Professor Thrackborne, I have the files you requested,” she smiled, pulling three folders and an ancient-looking tome from her cart.
“This was provided when I made the request.” She tapped the tome.
“I’m not sure it’s quite what you’re after, but the Academy deemed it important to your search, so I’ve brought it along. ”
“Thank you, Mrs. Fiodh. These should prove helpful,” I smiled, taking the stack from her tiny hands.
There were times the school seemed sentient—the way it decided, without input, which students to invite, and now with the strange tome.
They seemed like such minor things that it was easy to forget they ever happened, that the magic fueling the Academy was older than anyone living could recall.
Part of me wondered if there wasn’t more the school could do that it simply chose not to.
“If you need anything else, Professor, you know where to find me,” Mrs. Fiodh smiled, fluttering her small wings as she strolled back to her cart.
I called out my thanks again as she pushed her cart out of sight before turning my attention to the three files in my hand.
In my search for answers about Bechora’s magic, I’d decided to look into past cases of students who came from the human realm and seemed to be magicless.
I had a sneaking suspicion that being from the human realm was the key to solving her inability to call upon her magic on demand, but I needed something solid to be sure.
Setting the tome aside, I dropped the files on my desk and opened the one on top.
There wasn’t much information beyond the students’ grades and trial scores—just a single mention of having come from a non-magical family in the human realm and presenting as a mage.
Based on the grades alone, something had changed from the beginning of their first term that allowed them to improve significantly, though that could have been something as simple as taking the time to study and practice outside classes.
There wasn’t anything documented to say otherwise.
The second and third files were almost as empty.
Had I not been paying such close attention to detail, I’d have missed the notes scribbled in the margins of their personal information.
Neither student had grown up around magic.
Whoever had scribbled the note had taken the time to explore the depth and fullness of the students’ magical wells, finding them completely devoid of magic.
“It’s as if the lack of magical exposure in their home realm has left them with a deficit in their well,” was scrawled in barely legible writing.
Further down, a smeared note in the third student’s chart read, “intense magic exposure successful,” with no clarification on what that meant.
With the new information in mind, I thought back to the handful of times Bechora had been able to summon her abilities.
Our meetings were after her final class of the day, which happened to be combat.
Rumlock was known for throwing students off the deep end, starting them on training that utilized their magical abilities right away.
The pieces started to click together in my mind as the realization dawned on me that Bechora most likely needed to be exposed to more than just the ambient magic in the realm to fill her well properly, at least for now.
It was also something easy enough to test.
Smiling to myself, I reached across my desk, intending to make space to bottle a bit of my magic.
My hand brushed against the tome Mrs. Fiodh had given me when she brought the files, and I hesitated.
While I was certain I’d already found the answers I needed to help my mate access her abilities, regularly, and keep herself safe, I couldn’t snuff out my growing curiosity.
My plan temporarily forgotten, I grabbed the tome and studied it closely.
The binding was clearly ancient, but the tome seemed well intact.
Carefully opening the cover, I was surprised to see a language I recognized.
Ornate Elvish scrawled across the front page, denoting the tome as a historical account from someone named Thaliondil.
A faded portrait sat center of the page, displaying a male with long, pointed ears dressed in ancient Elven garments.
Shock rolled through me at what I held in my hands.
I’d been taught as a hatchling that Elves had long abandoned the realm, taking with them their histories and magic and leaving the Fae to fill the power vacuum left in their place.
My people became the history keepers after that.
Each dragon was taught to read Elvish, should we ever be lucky enough to stumble across anything the ancient race had forgotten during their exodus.
In my two centuries of life, I’d never heard even a whisper of anything left behind, and now, if my eyes were to be believed, I was holding one of their forgotten ancient texts.
Gently turning the page, I worked to recall everything I’d been taught about the ancient language.
It was slow work translating the text with how little practice I’d had since childhood.
My office was nearly submerged in darkness, my eyes straining against the lack of light, when I’d finally worked out enough of the translation to read a few pages.
Pausing long enough to turn on the lights in my office, I returned to the first page.
It was titled “I eri o i tinu nall,” which translated to “The rise of the Starcaller.” I frowned, trying to work out where I’d heard that name before.
The few pages I’d managed to translate so far spoke of an imbalance in the realm and the rise of a champion meant to right the scales.
The tinu nall, or Starcaller, was said to call the power of others into themselves, granting them whatever abilities they needed to combat the darkness threatening to unbalance the realms. They had no true power of their own, relying primarily on the power of their bonded.
I worked well into the night and the wee hours of Sunday morning, translating the short tome.
While I didn’t see why the Academy had deemed it important to my search for answers on Bechora’s behalf, I found myself fascinated with the history it told.
Thaliondil was a skilled storyteller, weaving the tale of the mad Elven king.
He’d set about ripping power away from every being in the realm, only to find himself up against the Starcaller.
Using the power of her bond through their connection, she was able to subdue the mad king.
The Elven queen begged for his life, her love for him more powerful than her hatred of what he’d become in his quest. An agreement was struck: the Elves would leave the realm, never to return, and take with them the knowledge and power the king had used to steal gifts from his subjects.
If the tome were to be taken as fact, Thaliondil remained behind, relinquishing his gifts to the realm so that he could write down the history should it ever repeat itself.
My eyes ached from the strain of an entire night translating, and my body was stiff.
Closing the tome, I tucked it into the top drawer of my desk as I let my mind work through what I’d learned.
I couldn’t help but note the similarities between the story of the mad Elven king and King Evarian.
Vallynn hadn’t been able to determine what his father was doing with the power he drained from the people he slaughtered, but we knew beyond a doubt he was draining it.
I couldn’t help but wonder, after what I’d read, if the king hadn’t happened upon another forgotten tome that might have provided him a way to absorb the stolen magic for himself.
The thought caused me to shudder. It was terrifying enough to know he was murdering people and stripping their power.
If he had managed to discover a way to take it for himself, he’d be unstoppable.
Rubbing my tired eyes before stretching in my seat, I forced the thought aside.
I refused to accept the possibility that we wouldn’t be able to end the king’s quiet reign of terror.
After what he’d done to my clan, I needed to believe he could be brought to justice.
I shook my head to further push thoughts of failure away and caught sight of the files I’d left forgotten as I dove into the Elven tome.
Their presence was an instant reminder of why I’d ended up with the tome in the first place.
I was supposed to be finding a way to help my mate access her magic, not getting lost in what may or may not have been a fictional account of history.
Growling softly at myself, I reached into another drawer and retrieved a small vial meant to contain magic.
It had been created to hold even a dragon’s flame without shattering under the heat, while being small enough to wear on a chain around the neck.
I’d only managed to recover three of them from my clan lands after I’d found them slaughtered and our home decimated.
They’d been tucked away in my desk drawer, serving as a reminder of what I’d lost, but now I had a new use for them.
Calling my dragon forth just enough to breathe our fire, I uncorked the small vial and pressed my lips to the opening.
Smoke curled from my nostrils, and I let out a gentle puff of flame, filling it with violet flames.
I quickly replaced the cork before attaching the glass vial to a delicate golden chain as it transformed itself into a discreet pendant.
Dragon fire was potent magic that couldn’t be put out by anyone other than a dragon.
Contained within the vial, Bechora would be able to absorb the magical properties of it without fear of getting burned or using it up before her well was filled.
Snagging a blank sheet of paper and a pen from my desk, I quickly scrawled a note instructing her to wear the necklace and keep it concealed.
I placed the vial and note in an envelope before grabbing a bottle of the restoration potion I’d been sending her every morning, and then stood from my chair.
Glancing toward the window of my office, it was still just dark enough that I could make it to her dorm and drop the envelope without being noticed.
A pleased smirk tugged at my lips with the knowledge that I was caring for my mate, even if nobody else knew it.