exaggerating for emphasis.”
Will ran his fingers through her hair. He couldn’t not touch her, even for a moment. I’m like a man dying of thirst, he observed. “This first phase could last a long time. Has she given you a candle to watch?”
She held up her right hand. There was a gold ring there with a small, clear stone set in it. Will could see an intense knot of turyn hovering over it, and after studying it a moment he could make out the faint lines tying it to her source.
He was surprised. “How did I miss seeing that?”
“You were looking at other things,” she said with a sly smile.
“Your face for the most part,” he admitted, “to see if you missed me.”
“You know better than that. So, what is this ring supposed to teach me? The old hag was emphatic I pay close attention to it. It seems to read my mood but I’m not sure why that’s important.”
Will thought carefully about his answer. Arrogan hadn’t explained that point very well until he was ready to move on to the first compression of his source. Was there a reason for that? Would it be better for her to be left in the dark until she came to her own conclusion? “I’m not sure how much I should tell you,” he said at last. “It isn’t reading your mood, but your mood affects it.”
“Then it reflects the state of my turyn?”
He nodded. Damn, she was quick. Then again, she’s already a fully trained sorceress, so it isn’t as though she’s completely ignorant like I was, he consoled himself.
“How is that important?” she asked.
And yet she still missed the point completely, thought Will, fighting to hide a smirk. “I’m sure you’ve noticed how it changes, when you’re tired, angry, excited, sleepy, and so on.”
“Or when we kiss,” she said with a smile.
“Your current lesson is observing it, so you learn to understand what your inner turyn is doing without needing to look at a candle, or in your case a ring. If you want to get ahead of the game, learn to change it.”
Selene frowned. “A person’s internal turyn doesn’t change.”
“You’ve seen it change already.”
“I mean it isn’t something a person can control. It’s like your heartbeat, it regulates itself.”
“Remember our bet about whether I could take your spell from you?”
She nodded.
“This is part of it. You have to master the turyn within before you can master someone else’s. Here, watch.” Will had long since learned the candle spell that Arrogan had used on him, and though he didn’t have a candle, the spell didn’t actually require one, since the flame was illusory. With a second’s effort, he cast the spell and linked his own source to an illusory flame at the end of his finger.
“Impressive,” Selene remarked sarcastically.
He ignored her obvious lack of belief. “This is basically the same spell that you have on your ring. The flame reflects my internal turyn. Now, watch.” A second later the flame changed from a forest green to a bright red, then it flared, tripling in size. He kept it that way for ten seconds or so, then shrank it down until the flame was a tiny ember, barely visible.
“You aren’t using a second spell, are you?” muttered Selene, obviously puzzled. “Is that real?”
“Would I lie to you?”
She narrowed her eyes. “In point of fact, you have lied to me on several occasions in the past.”
“Not maliciously!”
“No, you always thought it was for my own good, which made me even madder.”
Will held up his hands as a sign that he wanted a truce. “Guilty as charged, but I don’t have any reason to lie this time.”
“So you claim.”
He kissed her before she could make any more accusations, but this time she pushed him back. “Tell me more before we run out of time.”
“That’s it really. Try not to make the flame larger; that’s counterproductive. When the next stage comes it will be important