Bruce dispelled the floating open. He examined his hand. The ink had returned cleanly to him; the energy spent on the word was significant but not catastrophic. He estimated, from feel, that he had used about ten percent of his reserves on open. A small word, single concept, applied to a small target. The cost scaled with the size of the word and the size of the effect, almost certainly.
Writing die on an alpha would probably empty him.
Writing die on a city would probably kill him before the word completed.
But within those limits, between the small useful words and the impossible words, there was an enormous middle ground he had not yet begun to explore. Words like bind, hold, quiet, sleep, strong, slow, break, seal. Each one a potential construct, each one with a cost, each one with applications he could not yet name.
