Guardian Last (Lords of Syon Saga Book 2) by Jordan MacLean Page A

means of concealing those threads even
from other mages…it was all accurate enough, certainly, but very little of what
he’d skimmed told him anything he hadn’t already learned on his own.  He had
begun to lose hope of finding the one thing he’d hoped to find:  the secret to
controlling his strange power, and, of course, what this stupid needy rock in
his rucksack had to do with it all.
    In one corner, tucked away in an unobtrusive crate under a
table and looking more like a scrap of rubbish than anything else, he found a
small crumpled bit of parchment.  It had not a word written upon it, and he
nearly ignored it.  But when he lifted it from the crate into the red glow of
the mountain’s heart emanating from the walls and floor around him, he saw a
vision mark very like the one he’d created for Gikka, only far more intricate
and far more intense.  His heart raced.  He doubted it would allow him to read
it since vision marks are usually keyed to one person, but he could not resist
trying.  As dangerous as reading a vision mark meant for another might be,
especially one of this intensity, he knew he had to try. 
    By the time he’d finished, his head was in agony, and his
nose was running with blood.  It seemed the vision mark had been meant for him,
strangely enough, but in spite of that, the intensity was so great, so
overwhelming, that even his own strength could not completely protect him from
its power.  He’d never experienced anything like it in all his life, and in
spite of his pain, he was elated.
    He watched the vision mark fade into nothingness.  This was
the real treasure of Galorin’s Keep, and for all that he had succeeded in
finding the keep itself and even in finding this chamber, he’d come terribly
close to failure, to walking right past the unassuming crate without a second
glance.  He might never have found this legacy but for a bit of luck. 
    “Luck, nothing, it was your damned curiosity.  I was
counting on it.”
    If someone, even another mage, had asked him what he’d found
in the vision mark, he could not have said entirely.  A life, perhaps, but that
was not quite correct.  The vision mark did not contain every moment of a man’s
life from the first time his nurse set him at her teat to his last breath, nor
did it record every sordid assignation or other human foible, but instead, like
a deeply detailed memoir, it held every nuance of brilliance, every observation
on the nature of the Art, every subtlety, experience, anecdote…literally every
moment of one man’s magic. 
    In this case, of course, that one man was Galorin.
    What Dith hadn’t counted on was that the unique combination
of his unusual strength and Galorin’s had caused him not only to absorb his
knowledge and his power but what seemed his very essence as stored in the
vision mark.  Not that he had actually absorbed the ancient mage’s spirit or
soul into his mind, not exactly.  At least he hoped such was not the case. 
Surely even for someone of his power, bearing the soul of an immensely powerful
mage would be too much and might push him to madness.  He dabbed worriedly at
the drop of blood at his nostril.
    “Did you absorb my spirit?  An interesting question. 
Most likely the ‘me’ that speaks with you now is but a copy, and a damned good
one if I do say so myself.  The real Galorin is no doubt off chasing through
the stars on a cloak of night with one god or another.  Yes, that’s a much more
comforting thought, certainly.  At least to me.”
    Dith wiped the blood away from his upper lip and rode on,
trying to ignore the babbling from the voice in his mind.  Had he known he
would be so cursed––
    “Cursed, oh no, no, you’re not cursed, boy.  No, cursed
are those poor sods who laid waste to my keep and found nothing.  I wonder that
their masters even let them live.”
    Masters, Dith mused.  Mages of sufficient power to destroy
Galorin, even in an army—an army!—submitting to