Chapter 231: Magic & Spells (Part Three)
The silence stretched on for a while, long enough to make Annalise both uncomfortable and anxious but she still kept her eyes closed and remained standing in her place without speaking at all.
It was only when she was almost assured that Valerius had probably left the library to attend to some other work while she was busy learning to be patient, she felt her bond with him suddenly coming back to life which made her realize that he was still there with her, standing not too far away from her. But what really caught her attention was the proud feeling that was emitting through the bond, coming directly from him.
A small smile bloomed on her lips as realization hit her, she just passed his test and that was why he was feeling so proud of her.
"You are doing great, Annalise. Let’s now head further." Valerius finally spoke in an encouraging voice before he started giving more instructions. "Now, tell me... can you recall all the other candles that are present in this section of the library?"
Annalise took her time to recall if she could remember all the candles that she can’t see while searching for her one particular candle but no matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t seem to be able to recall all of them. Hence, she shook her head in negative as a response to his question. "I can’t."
She didn’t feel any sort of disappointment coming from him through the bond despite her failure of being able to recall the positions of all the candles. Instead, he seemed really soft and happy at that moment.
"Since you can’t recall the rest of the candles, you can’t obviously light them all up just like you did with that one candle you chose. So, let’s try another method for doing what you think you can’t." His voice was still as encouraging as before and it made Annalise curious to know what he was about to teach her.
"Concentrate on the light of your candle, Annalise, and try it to spread across all the candles present around this section. But..." Valerius’ voice became serious all of a sudden as he reminded her of some really important rules of his game - "... you have to make sure that only the candles of this particular section should be lit and that the fire only spreads to other candles and not to the books. You are fully aware of just how important these books are."
Annalise suddenly found herself not really eager as she finally realized the real risk if she failed in her attempt. They were in the most important area of the library, the section of the oldest and most mysterious data collection in the entire library. If she lost her control over the fire and it ended up spreading into the books, it would be nothing less than a complete disaster.