a distant kinsman from the far north working there. His name was Kethlun Warder, they told Tris, and they described the man that Tris had met. They also had never heard of anything like the glass dragon, though all of them were fascinated by the creature and insisted on giving it a thorough examination. From the way the glass dragon preened, it enjoyed the attention.
Tris would have talked to the city’s glass mages as well, but found only their students in the workshops near Achaya Square. The mages themselves were at the same conference as Niko, since glass magic was often used in order to see things or to make a problem clearer. Talking to the students did teach her one thing: while glass mages were as common as dirt in Tharios, a glassmaking capital, for the most part they were academic mages, people who worked with charms, spells and signs worked on to the material. Tris knew, since she had seen the dragon shape itself, that in all likelihood this Kethlun was an ambient mage, one whose magic came from something in the world around him. Tris had always thought the balance between academic mages and ambient ones was equal, until Niko explained that it only looked that way to her, because she had been schooled at the single greatest centre for ambient mages in their part of the world.
For every ambient mage there were four academic ones, not counting those with ambient magic who could also practise academic magic. Moreover, some types of ambient magic were more common than others: the magics for stones, carpentry, healing, cooking, thread and needlework, pottery, fire and the movement of weather in the air. Ambient glass magic, one of the mages’ journeymen told her, was “middling rare”, though Tris had no idea what that meant.
With such a scant amount of information, Tris returned to Heskalifos and Jumshida’s house. If memory served her, Jumshida’s private library held a number of books on magic. Tris might learn more there.
Inside the house, she banished Little Bear to the inner courtyard and carried the glass dragon to her room. Jumshida had granted Tris and Niko the whole of the first floor on the east wing of the house, rooms for each of them, as well as a workshop they could use during their stay. Tris put the dragon in her room, freshened up, then went downstairs.
Jumshida’s cook welcomed her. Preparing supper for an unknown number of mages was always a tricky business. Even with the help of a maid hired for the length of the conference, there was still plenty for Tris to do. She chopped, grated, washed and peeled, soaking in kitchen scents and listening to the servants talk about their lives and the schedule for the week. Muscle by muscle, Tris relaxed. Kitchen life comforted her. It was a place where she knew the rules and knew how to act. Since the staff only knew her as Niko’s student, they didn’t watch themselves around her as they would around a fully accredited mage. Tris could be ignored as long as she made herself useful, and she could hear about the university and the people who lived on its grounds.
The bell that marked the closing of the city’s gates had just rung when the front door of the house burst open, admitting a flood of chattering men and women. The maid picked up the waiting tray with its pitcher of wine and many cups; the housekeeper gathered the tray of fruit juice and cups. “Tell my husband I will greet him in the next world,” the maid said drily as she walked out.
Tris snorted with amusement as the women braved the guests. “Is it that bad?” she asked the cook.
“Girl, there is nothing worse than a crowd of hungry mages who don’t have to pay for the food,” the cook informed her. “I’d as soon be hunted by wolves. Aren’t you going out there?”
Tris shook her head. “I don’t like parties,” she confessed. “I never fit in.” If older mages knew her as Niko’s student, they treated her like an idiot, not fit to converse with adults. If they’d heard of her, they treated her with distrust and suspicion. Her own talents, so broadly distributed over forces in the air, ground and water, intimidated those who actually believed she had them. Many chose instead to think Tris lied about the extent of her power to make herself look more important. Tris preferred to stay with