The Lost Dragon (Cycle of Dragons Book 3) by Dan Michaelson (good summer reads .txt) 📗

She shook her head. “I suppose not, but I have a better place for us to go, and besides, it is more suited for the kind of work we will be attempting.”

She guided me along the hall, away from the main entrance. I wondered if she were going to lead me up into one of the upper levels of the Academy. Seeing as how I had never been there, I didn’t know what to expect. Instead, she led me out the back of the Academy into a massive garden, where the fruits and vegetables that fed the students were grown. We made our way past a pair of gardeners who both briefly nodded to Eleanor before moving on. The scents of the garden filled me—the aromas of flowers and plants and life all vibrant near me.

“Do you need proximity to the dragons in order for you to reach for that connection?” she asked.

“I don’t,” I said.

“I did not think so. If you had, this would not have been effective.”

“You don’t need proximity?”

She paused, looking over at me. She had her hands clasped in front of her as she strode through the garden, looking almost as if she were floating. “I have found that maintaining a connection at all times benefits me. It permits me the ability to use the dragon magic at any point. When I was first learning, I had to hold on to that constantly, but over time, I finally began to recognize that such a thing was not necessary.” She smiled slightly. “As you are no doubt aware.”

I’d never spent all that much time with Eleanor, and her mannerisms and the stilted way she spoke were both so strange that they caught me a bit off guard. She twisted her head as if a bird watching her prey.

“Where are we going?”

“Not much farther,” she said. “I find that being out in the sunshine, feeling the warmth of it shining down upon me, makes it easier for me to perform some of these patterns. Perhaps you don’t need that, but not all of us have your predisposition.”

“I’m not so sure that it’s a predisposition,” I said.

“No? The rumors must be false, then.”

“What rumors are those?”

“Probably nothing,” she said, waving her hand again.

We made our way down a gravel path, moving past a row of shrubs, then we veered off. I hesitated for a moment as we headed deeper into the shrubs, the shadows drifting around us. I made a point of focusing on the dragons, holding on to the power of that cycle, making sure I could pull it through me if she were to try something, though I didn’t have the sense that she intended to.

She stopped in front of what looked to be a rocky cave opening. It was set into a small cliff at the back of the garden, a ledge that swooped off on either side. I had no idea where the cave opening led, but I had my suspicions. I had encountered something similar to this before, and had barely made it out of the Academy with the dragon at that time.

“What is this?”

“A place I like to practice,” she said. “There are places like this all around the outskirts of the city, but this one has been fortified by various instructors over the years. Think of it as similar to the training room in the Academy, only stronger.” She waved her hand. “This is from a time long ago, from before the kingdom ever existed. Probably from a time when the Djarn occupied these lands. It would explain why this structure is so well designed.”

I would have to ask Natalie. There were parts of the city I didn’t understand, though from the time I’d gone through it with her, I had to think there were parts that she would know as having originated with the Djarn.

“Why here?”

“I have already told you. This is where I like to have students practice. It’s a bit more practical than doing so within the Academy’s walls. You can use much more energy here than you can in other places.”

“Practice what?”

“I call them protective seals.” She smiled at me and took a step back, motioning for me to follow, then swirling her hand around in a steady loop.

Flames drifted from one hand and shot off to the other, connecting to each other, but they spiraled in the air as she moved her hand. It was similar to the way Thomas used the flames, but different enough that I recognized how she was doing it, though not the purpose behind it. Thomas pushed power out from one hand to the other, using that connection to create crackling flames that could form intricate patterns, but also could be used to attack and hold. In this case, however, the way Eleanor spiraled her hand seemed to create increasingly complicated patterns, then she pushed her hands away from her. When she did, the flames separated.

I expected them to dissipate, to disappear, the way they did when I did something similar, but instead, the flames looped around the opening in the rock. And then they held.

I had seen something similar to this before with Thomas just the other night, but in his case, it was something he had placed and then separated. They were parallel lines, bands of flame that crisscrossed, sealing the opening of the pit. This was a spiraling sort of pattern.

“How is what you did different from a crisscross pattern?” I asked.

“The other is weak. Why don’t you demonstrate?”

“Why don’t I demonstrate what?”

“Perform the crisscrossing pattern you mention.”

She stepped forward and traced her hand around the outside of the rock opening, and when she did, the flames were pulled back, disappearing once again. The control she displayed was almost as impressive as what I had seen with Walter. The pattern wasn’t nearly as complicated, and it left me thinking that perhaps there wasn’t nearly as much complexity to it as Walter’s had, but even without that, she certainly had