Sif followed Falthejn out of the School of Conjurers, blinking in confusion. “Didn’t you know that was going to happen?”

“I thought it would go another way,” Falthejn replied.

“How often does that happen?”

“More than you might think.”

“‘No, we cannot train the girl,'” Sif said, deepening her voice and waving her hands pompously. “‘She does not have the manner of a conjurer.'” She shook her head. “It seems like his mind was pretty made up.”

“Maybe,” Falthejn allowed, turning down a side street. “I have something else in mind, though.” They turned onto another of the High Quarter’s broad avenues, and walked into a sudden fog. “They’re at it again.”

“Who?” Sif said, then stopped in her tracks. A spire rose from the mist in front of them, the largest building Sif had ever seen.

Obligingly, Falthejn let her stare. “The Akademi der Luftsmagiker,” he said, after some time had gone by. “The tallest structure in den Holm. From its peak, the luftsmagiker sweep rain and snow from the sky and push storms back out to sea. Without them, this patch of land would be little more than a tiny village clinging to barren tundra.”

Finally fighting free of the entrancing sight, Sif looked up at him. “Why did they put the guild here, then?”

“The Twelve knew the dangers of magic. They founded the guilds here, in a town in the middle of nowhere, to keep people safe from magiker trainees.”

“Where’d the city come from, then?”

Falthejn smiled. “You haven’t been outside the city yet, but trust me when I say that it’s much more pleasant within than without.”

Sif’s brow furrowed. “How is nice weather worth that much to people?”

The diviner shrugged. “There’s no accounting for taste.”