Chapter 028Draconic CrossfireMarcus had some misgivings about leaving his students alone for large stretches of time. After all, they had only gotten the ability to cast spells recently, and were still at the stage where they had far more power than common sense. Helvran, although quite powerful, was not the sort of general spellcaster that Marcus was, and might be unable to handle some of the odder ideas his students could think of.Then there was the matter of outside threats, of which there were many. Being part of the Great Sea Academy was supposed to ward most of these off, but… well, he’d already seen how that turned out recently.Still, while Marcus had some misgivings, it wasn’t too much of a problem. He’d had even less supervision when he’d been their age, and he ended up just fine. They would just have to manage without him for a month. As for outside threats, he doubted anyone would really try something – he had recently demonstrated a level of power which few could match, and the memory of it should still be fresh in everyone’s mind. It was also winter. While snow and cold weather weren’t an insurmountable obstacle for powerful adepts, they were an obstacle, and most powers avoided starting things during winter if they could avoid it.“I could always have some of my clansmen move into your tower while you’re away to keep an eye on things,” Beortan offered. “Or you can ask Titus for some guards and stewards. I’m sure he’d be happy to lend you some.”“No, there is no need for any of that,” Marcus said.In truth, Marcus felt that this would cause more problems than it solved. Any help Beortan and Titus would send would consist of low-level adepts and regular people that would do little for security, but would be tempted to steal things from his base. There were quite a few valuable things scattered around the base, largely unsecured (...)