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Seanan had an angry sense about him. He would not have done well with a bond to the draasin.
    “It has been a long time since someone addressed me with such indifference,” Seanan said.
    “You think that is indifference?”
    Seanan looked over to him. “You simply extinguished my strongest shaping.”
    Tan fixed him with a hard expression. “Then you don’t understand what I did.”
    “Explain it, then.”
    “I asked you to sense fire, and you shaped. I tell you that I did not extinguish fire, and you ask how. Had you sensed rather than shaped, you might understand.”
    Tan pulled on saa, asking the fire elemental to assist with his shaping. As saa so often did, it came willingly, leaping toward Tan with a connection to the shaping and drawn to fire. Tan held the shaping, cupping the flame above his hand.
    “What do you sense?” he asked.
    Seanan studied Tan’s shaping, frowning as he did. “You have exquisite control. How is it that you hold fire like that?”
    “This is not my control. This is saa.”
    Seanan waved a hand dismissively. “Saa is little more than a weak elemental.”
    Tan released saa back to the hearth. It was unfortunate that even a fire shaper felt that way about saa. Tan had met other shapers convinced that saa was useless, but fire shapers should be different. “Without saa, I would not still be here,” he said. “What you think is a weak elemental is quite powerful in Par-shon. Saa rivals any fire elemental there.”
    “Even the draasin?”
    Tan laughed softly. “There are few elementals like the draasin. But there are few draasin remaining. And they have all bonded.”
    Seanan looked over again. “All? Even the younglings?”
    Tan wondered how much to share with Seanan. He didn’t want to say anything that might tempt him to chase the draasin, to try and reach the lower level of the archives. Seanan would be better served simply listening for saa, to see if there was any way that he could understand that elemental, rather than reaching for one as powerful as the draasin.
    “The younglings have been claimed as well,” Tan lied.
    Seanan gripped the armrest of the chair and stood. “If you will not teach, then—”
    Tan stood and faced him. “If you want to have any hope of bonding to an elemental, especially a fire elemental, you will need to learn to listen. Fire is harsh and dangerous, more so than any of the other elementals.” Tan flicked his eyes to the hearth, softening his tone. “If you would learn, then you will listen. Study saa first. Learn the intricate way it dances within fire. When you understand that, then return to me and we can see what else you might learn.”
    Seanan frowned, his brow furrowed as he considered Tan for a long moment, then he nodded, starting toward the door. “I will try this. I don’t know if there is anything that I can learn from an elemental like saa, but…”
    Tan tipped his head and Seanan disappeared behind the door.
    It was a start. Even if Seanan refused to listen to the lessons that saa could teach, having him focusing on attempting the connection to the elementals seemed the best way to reach him. After all, wasn’t that how Ferran had reached golud? He listened first, letting his desire to learn drive him. Tan couldn’t force him to do that, any more than he could force the elemental to bond. It had to happen naturally. If only he could find some way to bring the bond to others.
    Whatever else he did, he needed to help bridge shapers and elementals again. Without sharing a connection, both suffered. But it came down to the same issue he had in trying to teach Seanan: there simply did not seem to be the necessary time for all that he needed to do.
    Tan returned to sit in front of the fire, staring at the flames as if searching for understanding. Tonight he would rest. Tomorrow, he would find Cora, and from there, Incendin.

7
    An Elemental Summons
    F or the first time that Tan remembered, golud called to him.
    He awoke to the