All these things reminded her that she was not at home in Emelan, at Winding Circle temple with its stucco buildings, simple furniture, and many gardens. She was far from the Pebbled Sea, and she couldn’t expect to meet her three foster-siblings or their teachers around the next corner. There was plenty to see and do as she traveled, plenty of occasions for excitement, activity, even fun. But every time strong emotions faded, she longed for her foster-family. No one else would talk to her of fashions, constellations, diseases, skin creams, staff fighting, or the art of miniature trees. She even missed their dog Little Bear, big, galumphing, drooling animal that he was.

Even if she went back now, the others weren’t there. Sandry lived with her great-uncle, Duke Vedris of Emelan, in Summersea. She had given her room away, she’d written Daja, to a terrified novice thread-mage. The last time Daja had heard from Briar, their lone foster-brother, he and his teacher Rosethorn were on their way east. They might not return for two years. Tris and her teacher Niko had gone so far south that Daja fully expected them to return from the north.

It was Frostpine’s idea to travel as well, to show Daja the ways of other smiths. She knew it was in part to take her mind off the absence of Briar and Tris. It was also true that she had learned a great deal in smithies that ranged from tiny crossroad places where the specialty was horseshoes, to elegant goldsmiths’ forges where she learned to put designs composed of tiny gold balls on metal. Here in Kugisko she studied with Teraud Voskajo, who Frostpine called the greatest ironsmith he knew. It seemed unfair that she had to go so far to learn so much. At least they had settled for now in a comfortable place. They were not wander-mages here. They were honored guests of the head of Kugisko’s Goldsmiths’ Guild, which controlled the city’s banks.

She wished she could have this learning and her Emelan family. A break from her foster-siblings had been a fine thing at first. After mingling their powers, they had kept a magical bond that allowed them to know what the others thought and felt. When they’d left Emelan Daja had thought she could go months, perhaps a year, without knowing three other people inside and out, as they knew her. She had lasted two whole weeks, she thought ruefully.

One thought brightened her mood: she’d had a nice talk with Bennat Ladradun. A sensible talk, about useful things. Smiling at this simple pleasure, Daja hung up her indoor coat. Bennat had mentioned something that tweaked her imagination: gloves spelled so the wearer might handle fire. Could she make gloves that someone with no magic might use? If such gloves could be made, what about an entire suit? With a fireproof suit, someone like Bennat wouldn’t have to rely on the scant protection of a water-soaked blanket.

She thought until she realized that she daydreamed with no purpose. She set the ideas for gloves and suit to heat in the back of her mind and turned to her current project: matching jewelry sets for each of the Bancanor women, even eight-year-old Peigi. For Kol and his five-year-old son Eidart she had already created matching gold neck rings and wrist cuffs, jewelry favored by Namornese men. They were her Longnight presents, her thanks to this openhearted family.

Daja labored over her gifts, shaping the women’s jewelry to be as fine and ornate as lace. The cost of the gold was nothing. The strange, unique pieces she made with the excess living metal she took off her hand daily-if she let it go unchecked, she would be coated in it by now-had made Daja wealthy.

She was shaping a sign of health when someone rapped on her door. “It’s open,” she called, twitching a nearby piece of cloth over her work to hide it.

Jory danced in, followed by her twin. Nia sat beside Daja, while Jory wandered the room, chattering. “Anyussa says cook-mages study from books. They put spells on sauces and draw symbols on pots and pans. They shape magic signs in bread, and strengthen herbs and spices to use in spells. They can make people fall in love with a cup of tea, except they’d get caught and arrested for magicking people without permission. She said Olennika Potcracker, who used to be the empress’s personal cook, was so powerful that if someone put poison in the empress’s food? It all turned green.”

Daja crossed her arms and waited for Jory to get to her point. It was a tactic Daja had learned over the last two months.

“And Anyussa says cook-mages are found by magic-sniffers and they all get a license from the Mages’ Society here or a medallion from Lightsbridge University or Winding Circle that says they’re proper mages and have read all the right books, just like Olennika Potcracker.” Jory plumped herself down on a footstool. “So I couldn’t be a mage like that. The magic-sniffers said we weren’t mages. Twice. It’s in Papa’s family, but not in us.”

Daja touched the medallion she wore under her clothes. Frostpine had made one for each of the four at Discipline Cottage eighteen months before, and given them out at a supper attended by them and their teachers. The front of each pendant had the student’s name and that of her or his chief teacher inscribed on the outer edges. A symbol for that student’s magic was at the center; Daja’s was a hammer over flames. On the other side of the medallion was the spiral symbol for Winding Circle, where they had studied.

The medallions were spelled so that usually the wearers forgot them unless someone asked them to prove they were accredited mages. Winding Circle’s mage council had granted the medallions the four had earned only after Frostpine promised to ensure they didn’t brag about a credential that most mages studied for years to get. He didn’t tell the council that the four weren’t likely to brag-the council would not have believed it. Sandry wore her medallion like her nobility: it was so much a part of her that she rarely thought about it. Briar might once have used it to boast, but no longer. Tris wanted the world to forget how powerful her magic was. For Daja the forgetting spell was useless. Not only did her own power tell her what she wore, but the disguising spells on the medallions were Frostpine’s, whose magic she knew as well as her own.