Page 46 of The Sorcerer's Alpha

She shook her head, frowning. “No. Temur says I’m a true earth wizard. Rocks speak to me, but nothing else.”

Well, that was a problem, but they could try anyway. Sycamore demonstrated the process for her, the few simple steps of sprinkling and focusing and looking, then joined his awareness to hers to show her how he brought his magic to bear on the bowl and used the catalyst powders to call a vision through the water.

When Sarangerel tried, nothing happened. The ash and lapis sat on the surface of the water in an inert film. She closed her eyes, cradling the bowl in her hands, and Sycamore could sense her great exertion of effort, the magic rippling around her as she tried and tried to make some vision appear. Sycamore had told her to find Marut with the children, thinking that the nearness of the target would make the process simple for her, but she strained and sweated without success.

“Hm, well,” Sycamore said, when she finally sat back, visibly frustrated, and pushed the bowl away from her. He was good at scrying and found it effortless and wasn’t sure what further advice he could offer. “Let’s have a break and try more later.”

She went out, scowling, followed by the cat. Temur, who had been sitting on his bed through all of this, appearing to darn a sock, rose and joined Sycamore at the table.

“I’m not a good teacher for her,” Sycamore said ruefully.

“Maybe not. You have more talent than you realize, and she’ll be a dedicated and hardworking village wizard and nothing more. You don’t know how to struggle with magic and can’t guide her as she does.” Temur shrugged. “She’ll learn or she won’t. It’s worth trying, and frustration won’t harm her.”

“I’ve struggled, too,” Sycamore said, remembering all of his failed attempts to use magic in the way a sorcerer should, the lengthy chanted spells he never quite managed to memorize, the sigils that seemed to change shape each time he attempted to draw them.

Temur waved a dismissive hand. “Elemental magic isn’t lesser than the magic you Chedai refer to as ‘high.’ You were mismanaged. But that isn’t the issue at hand. You and Sarangerel will do well enough together.”

“If you’re sure,” Sycamore said. “I don’t want to discourage her.”

Temur shook his head. “You won’t. She knows she’s good at what shecando.”

That, Sycamore believed. Temur was a good teacher, supportive and encouraging. His high expectations for Sycamore had never been unrealistic, and he praised effort rather than outcome. Sycamore had left his tutelage confident that he could learn whatever he needed.

They sat in silence for a minute. Even after a week in Twin Rams, Sycamore still felt somewhat awkward when left alone with Temur. The shadow of their former closeness hung between them, reminding him of how much everything had changed. He had been a child when Temur knew him, and a chasm of more than two decades separated that boy from the man Sycamore had become. Once almost a father to Sycamore, Temur was a stranger now.

Temur sat forward in his chair. “Let’s walk down to the river.”

The sun was a pale disc behind the thin clouds as they made their slow way to the river, walking at a pace that Temur’s painful hips and knees could tolerate. Temur’s primary occupation, aside from teaching Sarangerel, seemed to be monitoring the thickness of the river ice. The encampment was so close to the river that the spring floods posed a serious threat. At the first signs of thaw, Twin Rams would pack up their tents and move on to their summer pasturage.

As they walked, Temur said, “Banuri is a long way from here. Have you thought of transporting yourselves back in the same way you arrived?”

Sycamore shook his head. “Of course I have, but I told you, I don’t know what I did. How can I do it again when I don’t understand how it happened?”

“That’s a bad answer. If you did it once, you can do it again. It sounds to me that you haven’t tried.”

“You want to be rid of me,” Sycamore said, a childish response he couldn’t bite back. Temur knew how to nettle him and seemed determined to do for some reason.

Temur didn’t look at him as he steadily stumped ahead with his walking stick. “You know that’s not true. It’s only that I thought—well, you won’t be pleased to hear this, but I’ll say it anyway. You have such power and such capability, and I expected that by now you would bend the elements to your will as easily as the legendary sorcerers of old. Instead, you constrain yourself.”

Sycamore breathed in and out a few times until the urge to defend himself faded. “I’ve disappointed you.”

“No,” Temur said. “You are the farthest thing from a disappointment to me.” He sighed. “It’s how you were taught. I don’t blame you. It’s how those sorcerers taught you. You confine your magic and limit yourself to what you know is possible.”

“You think I should instead do what’s impossible,” Sycamore said, unable to keep the irritation from his voice.

“No.” Temur stopped and turned to him, frowning. “I think you should question how you know that something is impossible. I would have said it’s impossible to move yourself through space the way you did. But you managed it. What else can you do that you haven’t thought of?”

Sycamore stared at him. “I don’t know,” he said finally. Temur began walking again, and Sycamore went with him, staring down at his boots crunching through the dead stalks of grass clipped short by grazing sheep. “You have a higher opinion of my abilities than anyone in Banuri.”

Temur snorted. “I’m sure. It’s not in anyone’s best interest to let you think yourself more than modestly capable.”

“What do you mean,” Sycamore said.

They arrived at the bank of the river and stopped there. Ragged chunks of broken ice rode up the bank, remnants of an early freeze and thaw before deep winter set in. Temur raised his knees one at a time to crack his hips and said, “Chedi is a beautiful country. The people are warm and cheerful. I was happy during my time in Banuri. But you sorcerers, the way you peck at each other like birds in a cage—that’s no way to live.”

“Is that why you left?” Sycamore asked, the words bursting from him before he could stop his tongue: the question that had been aching in him for so many years.

Temur’s mouth tightened. He looked out over the frozen river. “No. I left because the king asked me to go.”