But what’s a man to do when he can’t sleep? When all he thinks of is a certain pair of soft brown eyes? When he doesn’t know whether to betray his own heart or his best friend?

The only cure for his insomnia was to be found at the bottom of a bottle; so that’s where he usually was at day’s end.

Of course the cure had its drawbacks; wretched hangovers, increasingly ill temper, and the distinct feeling that avoiding problems was the coward’s way out. He longed for a field assignment—oh, gods, to get away from the Collegium and Her! But nothing of the kind was forthcoming—and anyway, they wouldn’t assign anything to Kris or him until their current batch of students was fully trained in the use of their Gifts.

Their students—gods, there was another reason to drink.

He finished the glass without even noticing he’d done so, eyes burning with unshed tears.

Poor little Christa. He wondered if anyone else had figured out she had been using her Gift to save the little ones in that fire.

Any time I close my eyes, I can almost see her—

The self-conjured vision was horrific. He could picture her only too easily; surrounded by an inferno, steadfastly concentrating with all her soul—because moving anything alive by means of the Fetching Gift was hard; hard and dangerous—white the building went up in flames around her. And it was all his fault that she’d sacrificed herself that way.

He raised his glass to his lips, only to discover that it was empty already.

I’m drinking this bottle too fast—

And the way she’d died—it was all his fault.

Before Christa had finished training with him she’d asked him if it was possible to move living things by Fetching. Anyone else he’d have told “no”—but she was so good, and he was so infernally proud of her. So he told her the truth, and what was more, done what he’d never done before and and showed her how; how to move live creatures without smothering them, without twisting them up inside. And he’d told her (gods, how well he remembered telling her) that when it had to be done, it was far safer to move a living thing from your hands to where you wanted it to go, than from where it was to your hands.

I am definitely drinking this too fast—the bottle’s half empty already.

That was why she’d gone in to send the babies out, not Fetched them out to her. If only he’d known when he’d taught her what he’d discovered since, researching in the Library—that under great stress it was often possible for someone with their Gift to transport themselves short distances. He’d meant to tell her—but somehow he never found the time.