when he looked down at his hand, all he saw was the ground. He looked at his feet…dirt. Even the staff in his other hand was missing. It was the ultimate disguise.
“How did you learn to do that?” Silas asked.
“It took a long time to get it right, but once I learned to do it, it was easy,” she answered. “I call that particular magical power shadow.”
“That’s appropriate,” Silas said. “How long can it last?”
“The more I concentrate, the longer it will last, but at the most I can only do it for a few minutes.”
“This is incredible!”
And as quickly as it had come, Silas’ disguise disappeared.
“I’m glad you think so.”
“Do you think you could teach me to do that sometime?”
“I think we need you to master the shield first,” she said with a wink.
“I’m probably the slowest person you’ve seen at learning magic, aren’t I?”
“No, no,” she said with a laugh. “I taught Alric to move things around and make a fireball once. It took him a month to even get a spark.”
Silas grinned at the memory of Alric showing him the magic. That was exactly what he had done to make a campfire in the middle of the path, showing Silas for the first time that magic existed in Marenon.
Inga led the way around the city, asking various people about the root of dwelling. Some people just gave her a strange look and shook their heads, while some would look at Silas standing with his face half-covered, holding his staff, and they would nervously walk away. They soon decided it was best that he stand farther away from her so people didn’t get anxious by his ominous look. It didn’t help, however, because no one seemed to know anything about the root of dwelling. Silas thought about the term a little bit. It was an odd phrase and didn’t seem to fit anywhere. What could Jessup have meant by it? It sounded like a place, but such a vague description was leading them nowhere.
The hour went by quickly and the two had come up with no answers. They asked someone how to find The Birchwood Pub and were directed to it. The inside was smoky and full of people who had finished working for the day and wanted to get some refreshments. They looked around in search for the other two, but neither Lorcan nor Kaden had made it in yet. Silas and Inga snuck into a small booth in the corner across from each other.
“I envy you,” Silas said. “Your powers, I mean.”
“Is that so?” she asked with an eyebrow raised.
Silas nodded. “It looks like it comes so easy for you when I can barely move simple objects around.”
“It wasn’t always so easy,” she said, scratching at her hands on the table. “It took years of studying and long days of training.”
“With Silandrin,” Silas said.
Inga didn’t hide her surprise. “You remember well,” she said. The two of them had not spoken of the Sorcerer that had instructed her since the day in the forest after escaping the Anwyns. That one small conversation revealed so much about Inga and her past, yet left so many more unanswered questions. He had asked her how she died, and she responded by telling him that it was too intimate of a question to ask. He vowed to himself never to ask her again. If she wanted him to know, she would tell him.
“Have you felt him?” Silas asked. “His presence, I mean.”
“I felt something at the old house today,” she said. “It was sort of like feeling Silandrin, but much more powerful. I can’t really explain it. It was as if he was there, or had been there recently. It did nothing to me physically, but it wrecked my concentration.”
“Could it have been the Gatekeeper’s magic?”
“Maybe,” she said. “It didn’t affect any of you, but only me. I would imagine that means it had something to do with magic.”
Silas nodded. He wondered what it was like being so attuned to magic. The power that one could possess was unlimited. Inga had more power stored within her that she didn’t even use. She could take just about any man down with her abilities, but she respected her magic. She knew it was a tool to serve a greater purpose.
Inga lifted an arm in the air and gave a slight wave when she saw Kaden and Lorcan walk through the entrance of the pub. They spotted her and made their way beside them.
“Any