Free Dragon Magic: Book 3: Prophecy of the Dragons by E. J. Krause Page B

hints?"
    "None except do your best."
    With that, the resurrection master snapped his fingers, and Ben felt himself blink out of existence for a split-second. He feared at first that he'd again be separated from Andi's emotions, but he felt her as strong as ever. In fact, she still stood right next to him, but he couldn't see her.
    Couldn't see anything, really. He stood in a pitch-black room, or whatever this was. The air felt the same as in the resurrection master's chamber. He guessed his spirit, his mind, had been sent somewhere for the trial. Right inside himself, if he was reading everything correctly. So what was the trial, and how was he supposed to complete it if he couldn't see anything?
    "Duh, that's easy enough to solve," he muttered. A quick spell brought light to the room. He found he stood in a small place that looked exactly like Cassie's training room. He held his sword and shield in his hands, but no clue as what to do next fluttered into his mind. Was figuring it out the trial itself? What did that have to do with resurrection?
    Before he could puzzle anything out, a presence appeared behind him. He spun and found himself face to face with…himself? They stared at each other for a second, and then he said, "Are you a figment of my imagination?"
    "Funny," the other Ben said. "I was going to ask you the same thing."
    As soon as the words were out of his mouth, three huge spells exploded out of the other him. It was a destructive weave of dark energy that Ben barely got a mystical shield up in time to block. Wow, could he figure out how to shoot three spells at once, especially such strong ones? He taught himself how to weave mystical powers together, but that's not what his mirror image had done.
    He shook his head to focus. He could experiment later, but if this him could, he should be able to, too, right? He started to admonish himself again to keep his head in the game when the other self shot out a dark energy beam. This time he deflected it with the shield on his arm. He gave it a quick once-over and saw there wasn't even a slight scorch mark on it despite such a powerful bolt. How many times had he wished he'd asked Cassie what it was made of? It wasn't standard steel, but that didn't mean he knew what it was.
    He shook his head again to clear it and whispered, "What's wrong with me?"
    "You're making it easy for me," the other said, a smirk on his face.
    Maybe not easy, but he wasn't being a difficult opponent, either. Ben built up a baseball-sized sphere of energy in the palm of his hand and hurled it at his other self. Instead of following up with a physical strike as he should have, he watched the dark energy bomb explode around the other him's mystical shield. He hung back and wondered how Andi had spent her days while stuck in the Stronghold. She said she'd gone flying, read at the library, and watched the TV system, which sounded like the best mix of cable, pay-per-view, and Netflix Instant ever. How had he not found it when he was there? Other than that, she hadn't felt like talking about it yet. Which he fully understood. If she ever did, he'd be there for her.
    As he pondered this, his other self lunged at him, sword-first, and only his quick reaction brought his own blade up in time to parry it away. They sparred for a frantic few seconds, both intent on ending this as soon as possible, but they proved as evenly matched as could be. Which made a lot of sense, but that knowledge didn't make this any easier. They backed off, sized each other up. Or, at least, the other Ben was sizing him up. He was lost, wondering if it had been the resurrection master or the Dragon Council who decided Felix shouldn't be allowed to have both a dragon lifespan and the power to raise himself from the dead.
    "You can't win," his other self said. "Not that you should want to. I'll take us to the greatest height of the multiverse so much quicker, so much more efficiently. I don't even have to kill you since we're much