The Betrayed Dragon (Cycle of Dragons Book 2), Dan Michaelson [best books to read all time .txt] 📗

that filled him, and as I felt that, I could feel the way that he was using that power, along with how he was forcing that energy out from him.

I still couldn’t tell what it was that he did, though—only that I could feel it.

Suddenly, there came a blast of heat. The dragon, whichever one that Thomas had gone to, along with Thomas himself, launched into the air, taking flight.

I could practically see him flying away, drifting into the distance, though I could make out nothing other than a blackened shadow. It was more that I could feel him and the energy he radiated, growing ever more distant as he retreated.

I sat there, focusing on the dragon energy. That was what he wanted me to do. I needed to gain control over it. It was going to be difficult for me, but I had to think I could. He’d proven I could.

I lost track of how long I was there, and how long I pulled on that power. The only thing I was aware of was the flow of power through me. Every so often, I caught voices near me, but those voices faded, disappearing again. I lost myself in the connection, in the way the power flowed through me, and continued to push it into that buried part of me, cycling the energy out. At some point I made the connection the power I cycled out through me also cycled through the dragon. It was as if the connection I formed to the dragon was a part of something more. Something greater.

“You’ve been here a long time.”

I opened my eyes, realizing only then that they had been closed, and looked up to see Natalie standing over me. Her black hair was pulled back and bound with a slip of silk. She had on a simple, light yellow dress, one that practically reflected the sunlight around her.

“I’m trying to test for a connection to the dragons,” I admitted.

She frowned, settling down on the ground next to me. “Really? What’s it like?”

“I don’t even know how to describe it,” I said. “It’s profound. Powerful. I can feel the dragon energy as it flows through me, and my instructor asked me to try to learn to gain some control over it today.”

She glanced behind us toward the Academy. “Which instructor are you working with?”

I turned back to the dragon pens. It had gotten quite a bit lighter in the time that I had been here. From the position of the sun, I suspected it was midmorning, which meant I’d been sitting here for hours. All that time, and I had no idea if I were any closer to gaining an understanding of the connection to the magic. I could feel it flowing through me, but feeling it flowing and having some access to it were different things. At least now I recognize how that power cycled out of the dragon and through me. I could control it, pushing it down into me, but I had no idea what purpose there would be in doing so.

“All of them are trying to teach me, but today it was Thomas,” I said, still staring at the green dragon at the far end of the pen. He was resting, curled up, but through the connection that I shared with him, I could feel that power throughout him, and recognize that he was there, along with recognizing his awareness of me.

“Thomas? As in Thomas Elaron?”

I glanced over, nodding. “You know of him.”

She laughed. “I think everybody in the city knows of him. They may not know him the way those within the Academy know him, but everybody has seen Thomas standing alongside the king.”

“I didn’t recognize him at first.”

She laughed again. “That’s wonderful,” she said, clapping her hands together. “You didn’t know Thomas Elaron.”

“As I said, I—”

“Aren’t from the city. I know. It makes you so delightfully ignorant. Perhaps blissfully?” She frowned, shaking her head. “I don’t really know. Maybe both.”

“I know who he is now,” I said.

“I suppose that’s good. If you didn’t know him, he’d probably be disappointed.”

A shadow drifted across the ground, and I looked up. There was no dragon. Just a cloud. “That’s not the sense I have of Thomas.”

“No? What sense do you have from the king’s chief dragon mage?”

“Only that he has a different connection to the dragons than what I’ve been learning at the Academy.”

“I should say so. He’s worked within the Academy for longer than most. At least, he’s worked within the city for longer than most. As far as I know, he doesn’t instruct very often at the Academy.”

“No. I haven’t seen him before he suddenly appeared.”

“There are rumors he’s been out of the city. Hunting the Vard, as it were.”

“Really?”

She shrugged. “I don’t know if that’s true or not. He and the king keep private counsel.”

I found it strange that she would know anything about the king and his counsel, but movement at the far side of the dragon pen caught my attention. The green dragon started getting up.

I leaned forward, looking at the dragon, trying to see if something had startled him, but I couldn’t detect anything. There was the energy coming off of him, but nothing more than that. The energy seemed to flow between us, shifting, though it wasn’t nearly as potent as it had been before. As I detected that power, I attempted to reach for it in a different way. There came a surge of power between the two of us, a connection from the dragon that bonded me to him, but it dissipated once more.

Natalie watched me. “What’s going on?”

“Nothing,” I said.

The dragon moved along the pen, coming toward me. As he did, I could feel the energy within him surging a little bit more. It was as if he wanted me to be aware of the power coming off of him, radiating away from him and moving toward me.

I held on to that, focusing it within myself, letting it roll