Prisoner (The Scarred Mage of Roseward #2) - Sylvia Mercedes Page 0,34
“When we started a week ago, I understood better than I do now. Have I gotten stupider in the last seven days?”
Silveri approached the table. She didn’t look up, but she felt his presence, tall and warm at her back, bending over her chair and observing the mess she’d made on the page. She dropped her hands into her lap and, after a quick glance at the haphazard attempt at a spell, turned her head away, fixing a glare on the wyvern instead. It was lounging belly-up by the fire, its spine twisted at an angle that shouldn’t be possible. Then again, the wyvern itself shouldn’t be possible, so why shouldn’t it sleep however it liked?
The mage was silent for too long. Finally, Nelle threw up her hands and slid out of her chair, moving away from the table. “I wish you wouldn’t hover so!” she muttered. “All looming and disapproving like that.” She paced several steps toward her alcove bed before turning and glaring at him, arms crossed.
Silveri rested one silver hand on the tabletop, still bent over her empty chair, studying her work. His long pale hair hung in a sheet over one shoulder, and light from one of the upper windows gleamed on it in such a way that it almost looked gold instead of white. He had submitted again just a few evenings ago to her barbering skills, allowing her to scrape several days’ growth from his cheeks. The pale stubble that had grown back in edged his sharp jaw and obscured some of the ugly scarring.
There was such unconscious power in his pose—in the set of his shoulders, the way he held his arms. For all he dressed like a crazed old hermit, in moments like this it was impossible to mistake the truth of his lordly heritage.
He looked up suddenly, and Nelle realized she’d been staring. She blinked several times and schooled her expression into a stern frown, ducking her chin. A few strands of hair fell across her face like a veil.
“Just tell me straight,” she growled, “am I stupider than I was a week ago or aren’t I?”
“You are not stupid, Miss Beck,” he replied at once, straightening. “Your problem is certainly not stupidity.”
“Oh. Thanks. That’s a relief anyway.” Nelle shrugged her shoulders up to her ears. “What is my problem then?”
“There is no problem. Not really.” The mage plucked up the quill she’d tossed in her anger, moved to the other end of the table, and took his seat at his accustomed place. He twirled the quill lightly. “Magic does not come quickly for anyone. Not even the fae receive their powers or control of those powers all at once—a young bird is born with the ability to fly, to soar to the highest reaches of the heavens, yet it must wait for its feathers to grow. The more powerful the bird, the longer it takes. A little songbird may leave the nest within mere weeks. The phoenix, however, requires many months.”
He stopped fiddling with the quill and turned the plumy end at her, motioning from her to her chair again. She took the hint and, with a little sigh, moved to sit once more, resting her elbows on the tabletop and propping her chin between her fists. “So. What?” she said. “My feathers need some growing time?”
“To put it bluntly, yes.” Silveri set the quill down on the table. “It is my suspicion that our initial forays into magic were something of a release to your system. Since your arrival here on Roseward, you’ve breathed the Hinter atmosphere, which activated the long-dormant-but-nonetheless-potent potential in your blood. Those experiments of a week ago were like a burst of air escaping from overtaxed lungs. Now you must develop the strength and endurance necessary for proper magic-wielding.”
Nelle sighed. Had she really thought she was going to prove herself some sort of prodigy within a week of study? Boggarts, she’d worked two years at the university, observing the Miphates students from afar. She’d seen the various stages of their educational development—the wide-eyed first-years with their youthful arrogance and great dreams. The harrowed faces of the second-years, all of them crushed with doubts, many of them unable to continue. The dogged determination of the third- and fourth-years, which, over time, grew into the arrogance of the fully fledged Miphates like Gaspard. And like Silveri himself, truth be told.
She hid her eyes in her palms again. What was she playing at anyway? She hadn’t come to