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‘Relax child.’ Erebus sent calmingly, entirely unsurprised as this produced the opposite response, Alec instinctively trying to remove the intruder from his surface thoughts. It was lucky he hadn’t delved deeper, or both of them would be facing at least minor brain damage.
‘Calmer now?’ he enquired politely. The second expenditure of magic was much smaller but still enough to raise the ambient temperature of the air.
‘I’m calm.’ Alec replied, at last, figuring out how to thought-send intuitively. ‘Sorry… I just wasn’t expecting it.’ The message heavily overshadowed by guilt.
‘It’s a normal reaction,’ Erebus assured him. ‘We can talk like this for a while if that helps.’
‘Okay. What did you want to talk about?’
‘It’s your mind kid, you decide,’ was the phlegmatic response. Erebus struggling to stop secrets hidden from the world for years from leaking across the mental link. ‘Too old and too out-of-practice,’ he chided himself, cursing the ravages of time upon his mind. To his horror Alec replied, the errant thought travelling across before he could stop it.
‘What’s wrong?’ the boy asked, concerned at his mentor’s doubt.
‘Just age,’ Erebus reassured. ‘Though magic has conquered decay of the body, the mind is not so easy; we can prevent mental illness, for the most part, but that doesn’t prevent centuries of memory from weighing you down.’
Why’s that a problem now?’
‘Have you ever tried, really, really, really hard not to think about something? Right now, two centuries of secrets are all but begging to flow across the link, and it’s mentally exhausting, like being engaged in a form of mental combat against yourself.’
‘Then how do professional telepaths cope?’ Alec asked, aiming unerringly for the pertinent question as the monk, and now the necromancer had taught him.
‘Decades of constant practise and meditation, alas, I am but a mere dabbler in the arts of the mind.’ Somehow Alec knew that wasn’t entirely true but did not press further as Erebus continued with the conversation proceeding at the speed of thought; it was hard to believe that a mere handful of seconds were all that had passed thus far. One of the reasons for holding the conversation with eyes shut, neither of them could grow disjointed by the difference in the time they felt had passed and the time actually passed. ‘Now, are you feeling comfortable enough with this mode of communication to allow me to delve beyond your surface thoughts?’
‘I suppose so,’ the boy sent deliberately, though he lacked the discipline not to send his true thoughts across as well; a boiling mass of doubt and fear.
Suppose is insufficient I’m afraid. When you’re certain, let me know.’
‘Okay.’
‘Do you want to take a break?’ the necromancer asked kindly — it was little less than a miracle that Alec wasn’t bleeding from the eyes, though doubtless, his bond to Holly was providing some insulation from the strain. ‘We can try again in a couple of hours.’
Yes… please, Alec replied, finding the presence of a second set of thoughts in his own mind more disconcerting than he could put into words.
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If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.
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“ ?” Saiko asked, trying to recall the long fluid string of syllables.
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far too young to have to understand these things.” There was a pause, “Scrap that, I’m too young to have to understand these things.”
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