"Whichever is easier for you to picture."

He thinks about late evening in a tavern, just drunk enough that the world is soft around the edges, surrounded by poets and whores and thieves and actors, half his old friends and half people he wants to know better. They're gossipping and singing and joking and telling stories, and someone's playing with his hair and someone's face is on his shoulder, and his belly is full and the fire is warm and everything in the world is all right.

There's a sense of that tavern and everyone in it, being held in cupped hands, warm and gentle, like something precious worth protecting.

They're surrounded by purple light. 

"You're channeling the Weave." He looks proud. "How does it feel?"

"It's nice. --Feels cuddly."

He smiles. "It does, doesn't it? There's nothing quite like it."

"And then I... say something? To cast a spell?"

"Ah-thran Mystra-ryl Kantrach-Ao. It just makes sparkles. Perfectly safe."

There's a connection through the Weave. It's different than through the tadpoles, there isn't that squirming force. It's like being aware of a thread going through him and Gale, and then out into everything surrounding them. 

They can both feel the warmth of the tavern and those cupped hands. 

He could get used to this. 

...it must be so weird to channel this in the middle of a battle.

He says "Ah-thran Mystra-ryl Kantrach-Ao."

Sparkles!

"-- That's more dramatic than most people manage."

He still feels a little high off it. 

"Why is that?"

"I honestly wouldn't now. Natural talent, I suppose? This exercise is often used as a test for prospective wizards-- it's easy enough for most students to pick up quickly, but you can see differences in skill."

He's still kind of high off the Weave, which is the reason he says, "I think I know but-- you gotta promise to keep a secret."

"I can promise."

"So you know how when people face lethal danger they get stronger and no one really knows why?"

Not how he's used to thinking about it, but sure. "...go on."

"I am-- was, I guess-- very dumb and very lucky."

"I can't say I'm not glad for it."

"The tadpole is-- suppressing it, somehow? I don't know if it's permanent. But... before that I could win a fight with anyone in an average country who isn't a wizard. A couple of people who could beat me on a continent."

Ah. "It must-- hurt to lose that."

"I'm glad for it. Or-- not that it's harder to help people who need help-- but--"

???? Why wouldn't you want to be powerful. "But...?"

"Being powerful just-- warps everything-- people are scared of you or they want something from you and you never get to not think about it-- they start-- sucking up, and flattering you, and doing things just because they said you'd do them-- and suddenly you're not one of us, anymore, you're one of the people that people like us get their money from--"