Flashback ( PDFDrive )

“He said to wait until morning,” Sophie reminded Fitz, bracing for
a long day of stressing and second-guessing—and an even longer
night.
But Silveny broke the worry cycle when she reached out a few hours
later.
The motherly alicorn insisted on sorting through Sophie’s recent
memories, catching every single one of the doubts and worries that
Sophie was trying to bury. And instead of the usual flying dreams, she
filled Sophie’s head with images of them galloping through the whitecapped
rapids of a surging river—cold water crashing into them. The
currents tried to drag them under, but they kept their legs moving,
kept their heads above the surface because they were stronger and
faster and more powerful than anything the river could throw at them.
For a sparkly winged horse, Silveny gave a pretty awesome pep talk.
And when Fitz held up his Imparter the next morning and asked,
“Should we tell Magnate Leto?” she didn’t hesitate to agree.
Magnate Leto took the news better than she’d expected. No lecture.
No questions. No noticeable reaction, really. He’d simply nodded and
told them, “I’ll let the Council know to start making arrangements,”
before his image flashed away.
“Arrangements for what?” Keefe asked, striding through the doors
to the Healing Center.
“And please tell me it involves extra ooze!” Ro added.
Fitz groaned. “I forgot about the next Ooze Fest.”
Ro grinned. “Good thing we didn’t!”
“But getting back to my question,” Keefe said, stopping at the foot
of their cots and putting his hands on his hips. He studied both of
them for a beat before his eyes settled on Sophie. “What arrangements