Stealing Sorcery by Andrew Rowe Page A

locations.
    “Nothing. He sent a letter to Erik’s family in Velrya to ask if they know anything, but it will be weeks before we hear a reply.”
    Taelien nodded sadly. “Thank you for looking into it, at least.”
    “It’s nothing. Any other questions before we begin?”
    Taelien shook his head.
    “Alright, then. Anything unusual to report?” It was her standard opening question, but she didn’t expect much of a reply.
    “ Apparently , Velas is a motion sorcerer. Explains how she throws me around like a rag doll.”
    Lydia rolled her eyes. “I already knew that. Anything about your own abilities?”
    He shrugged. “Still stuck at four runes most of the time. Occasionally, I can get up to five, but it’s extraordinarily difficult. I’m not sure why. In the past, whenever I managed to reach a certain degree of control over the sword, repeating the process got easier – that doesn’t seem to be the case anymore.”
    “I’m pretty sure I know why, but we’re going to more information today. If it agrees with my previous findings, I’ll let you know about my hypothesis.”
    Taelien raised an eyebrow. “Finally filling me in? You must be pretty confident, then.”
    I was pretty confident five months ago, but I hate being wrong.
    “Yeah, I’m getting there.” She put a hand on his exposed arm. “Okay, you know the process. Anything else before I start?”
    “Don’t think so. Ready as I’m going to be.” He took a deep breath. “Go.”
    Lydia closed her eyes, picturing an outline of Taelien’s body in her mind. “Dominion of Knowledge, measure the flow of essence within his body.”
    Within her mind, Taelien’s body began to glow. Networks of lines illuminated a multitude of sorcerous connections. The brightness made it difficult to examine any individual line, but she knew that the spell was attempting to illustrate each of the dominions within his body in a form that she could comprehend. Each line was a different color, allowing her to distinguish between the dominions they represented.
    Most humans had about two dozen visible lines of color within their bodies, representing each of the prime dominions and a series of deep dominions that were essential for the functions of the body. In an ordinary human, these lines typically displayed similar levels of brightness, although there were exceptions. Athletes often had strong lines of motion or stone, scholars often had powerful lines of knowledge, and artists frequently had brilliant lines of deception.
    Sorcerers displayed stronger lines for any dominion they practiced, and spells similar to Lydia’s were often used to evaluate the potential for talent among students at sorcerous academies. These lines would grow stronger through use, like working a muscle – but, much like with muscles, they could be torn and ruptured, damaging both the ability to use that form of sorcery and other bodily functions.
    Rethri typically had a single dominion that was particularly dominant, and their other dominions were frequently less pronounced than those in humans. After a Rethri received their dominion bond during their coming of age ceremony, they developed a visible pool of dominion essence of that type near their eyes. If Lydia’s measurements on Aladir were any indication, this pool grew stronger over time even when the dominion was not being actively used – making Rethri extremely potent at their own particular sorcerous specialties.
    When Lydia had first examined Taelien’s dominions while he had been jailed in Orlyn, she had detected what appeared to be two dominion bonds. Initially, she had assumed this meant that he had been bonded with a ritual similar or identical to the ones the Rethri used. Having two bonds was rare, but not entirely without precedent – she had heard of cases of powerful Rethri developing bonds to a prime dominion and one or more of the deep dominions connected to the prime.
    A more thorough examination had displayed problems