The following afternoon Seth was on his way to the Wind Tower for his first official instruction in how to use his talent. Or at least he would be on his way if his familiar would cooperate.

  Seth had decided to work on training her to follow him and stay nearby. He told her what he wanted, and then put her on the ground. He walked a few steps away, and she stayed sitting where she was.

  "No, Mau. Come. Follow me. Come on." He turned around and went back to stand her up. She y on her stomach. "I know you understand me, so stop it. You need to stay with me. Follow me by my feet. Walk next to my heels, okay?"

  She yawned and closed her eyes.

  He picked her up so only her feet touched the ground and started walking with her. "Walk next to me like this, Mau. Follow me. Do you understand?"

  She went completely boneless.

  "There's nothing like trying to train a cat, huh Seth?"

  "Oh, hey Bise." Seth tried to get a good grip on his seemingly liquid cat. "Somehow I need to teach her to behave."

  "The only method I know of training animals is the carrot and the stick. Reward good behavior and punish bad behavior."

  "I don't want to punish her or she might smother me in my sleep. She is a cat."

  Bise chuckled. "Oh, it doesn't need to be much. Like right now, is she behaving badly?"

  Mau lifted her head and narrowed her eyes at Bise.

  "Uh-huh. You know you're giving your buddy a hard time, don't you?" Bise smiled at Mau. "Bad kitty." She flicked her fingers and a spray of water hit the cat. It hit Seth too, but mostly Mau.

  Seth squeaked in startled pain as Mau suddenly ran up his arms and behind his head. Mau gred at Bise from her perch on Seth's shoulders.

  "Oh! Did she scratch you?" Bise asked. "I'm sorry. I didn't think she'd hurt you."

  "She didn't do it on purpose. Her cws weren't out, but they're so sharp she got me anyway." Seth lifted a hand to scratch Mau's head. "I think that's enough for now anyway. Are you heading to the Wind Tower now too?"

  "That I am! I'm going to learn to blow dry my clothes every two minutes."

  "That's… a lot of mana. I suppose you've got plenty to spare though."

  "Do I. I haven't been dry in almost a year now. I'm sick of my clothes being salty all the time too."

  Seth turned in surprise. "It's not fresh water you produce? I thought you were getting it right out of the air."

  "Nope. Seawater. It's not even useful water." Bise sighed.

  The double door entrance to the Wind Tower was wide open. The tower itself looked like it was sculpted by wind out of white sand. Inside, the foyer led into a center atrium that was open all the way to the top of the tower. As Seth watched, an iris in the roof opened the tower to the sky. The floors going up had balconies open to the interior column of open space.

  It was bigger inside than it should have been. Seth hadn't noticed that with the other towers, but in thinking about it, it was probably true that all the towers were expanded internally. That was some impressive, and old, magic. To the best of his knowledge, no one knew how to do that to a building any more.

  He followed Bise into a rge auditorium. It had benches and narrow tables simir to the Structured Magic cssroom. The front of the css had a series of six pinwheels set up. There were probably about fifty students in the css. Seth noticed that at least some of them were second year students.

  He sat down next to Bise and put Mau on the empty desk next to him. He hung his bag from the back of his chair so it wouldn't sit in the puddle Bise generated. Bise was busy setting up her towels.

  The teacher walked into css a few minutes early and waited for everyone to get settled. He was a slender man on the short side with bck hair and a closely trimmed goatee.

  "Good afternoon," he said and smiled at the css. "I am Professor Armand. I am the Wizard of the Wind Tower. I am very pleased to meet you all."

  There was a smattering of "Good afternoon, Professor," from the css.

  Professor Armand smiled and rubbed his hands together. "Excellent. We'll get to know each other during css. How this will work is I will be presenting spells to you, and expining the theory behind them, and then we'll get right into practice. Most of the css will be practical. All of the spells presented will be wind based structured type spells. We have a number of people here without a wind affinity. Never fear, you'll be able to participate fully. The first spell we are going to be working on is called 'Breeze'. It is one of the most fundamental uses of wind and …" the professor continued to expin the spell and how it was structured.

  Seth listened to the professor and was reminded of csses he'd taken with his father as the instructor. His father loved teaching. These spells were probably the exact same ones he had taught Saben when Saben first got his wind power. Seth remembered how happy their father had been when Saben got the same talent their father had. His father never got the opportunity to teach Seth.

  Seth pushed the thoughts away. A crowded cssroom was not the time for that. Just don't think about it, Seth told himself as he rubbed the affinity bracelet. Focus on the lesson.

  This spell was the structured form of what Saben had tried to teach him. Seth had used a variant of this to move the banners during the Gauntlet. The one Saben had taught him had a little more oomph to it, but this one sounded simpler.

  Professor Armand then called a small group down to the front to cast the spell at the pinwheels, including Seth. Seth gnced over at Mau. She was sitting attentively on her desk, absolutely focused on the professor. She stayed put on the desk when he got up and he felt he didn't need to worry about her. Good.

  Professor Armand asked each student in the group their name as he coached them. The first had no trouble and the pinwheel spun briskly. The second had a little more trouble getting the spell right, but within a minute or two had his pinwheel spinning.

  Then it was Seth's turn. All right, Seth thought to himself. I can do this. This is normal, structured, magic. I don't need to hear the wind to make it work. He concentrated and shaped the spell in his mind, and did the incantation and gesture.

  The wind resisted him. It didn't want to move the way he wanted it to, just like always. So he applied more energy to it, like he usually did, to force it to do as he wished.

  All six of the pinwheels spun, but slowly.

  "That's quite a bit there, son. Seth, right? Let's try that again on a smaller scale. Keep to the structured form, and don't try to alter it." He gave Seth more advice on narrowing the focus of the spell by adjusting his concentration. "Intent is an important part of spellcasting," Professor Armand advised Seth and also the rest of the css. "Magic will often reflect what your true intent is. If you are not specific enough in your intent, some types of magic will fail entirely. Now, try again."

  Nervous that the whole css was watching him fail, Seth tried again. My intent is to spin that one wheel. He did the spell again. He fought the wind again. This time only three pinwheels spun, but still slowly.

  Seth looked at Professor Armand who was gazing at the pinwheels with his eyes half shut.

  "Hmm," the Professor hummed thoughtfully. "Try this. You see where that pinwheel is? Hold that location in your mind. Now close your eyes. Cast the spell again without looking. Just the spell as structured. Don't try to add anything."

  Seth took a deep breath to calm himself. He tried not to gnce at the rest of the css and tried not to think of everyone watching him. This wasn't failure, this was training. He looked at the pinwheel and then closed his eyes. Not being able to see it made it hard for him to focus on it the same way. Nervous, he cast the spell. He didn't feel nearly the push back from the wind as he did the first two times he'd tried to cast it. He released the spell and then opened his eyes. One pinwheel was spinning rapidly. He'd cast it fwlessly.

  "Good job," Professor Armand said, patting Seth's shoulder. "All right. That's three examples. Now you three, all give it a go together and we'll get the next group down."

  Seth headed back to his seat and puzzled at the Professor's solution. Casting with his eyes shut worked. He could cast with his eyes open too, but it wasn't as effective. What was it that made casting difficult? Was he too focused on his target? Was closing his eyes making it easier to 'listen to the wind' like Saben always told him? How did having your eyes shut help you hear better?

  It didn't sound different to him though. He did feel a difference in focus, and he did feel more… connected wasn't the right word. Aware maybe?

  Well, he'd practice with it. He could cast with his eyes shut for a month or two while he sorted out his ability to use his wind. Casting blind would be a disadvantage, but he figured this would be temporary. And the structured form was so much easier than the unstructured form Saben had tried to teach him.

  He watched the other students practicing, and noticed some ways he could improve more. Bise got hers the first try. And there wasn't much water in the stream of wind she created either.

  "Alright. Any questions before we move on to our next spell?" Professor Armand asked.

  Bise held her hand up and when called upon she asked, "Why is this spell so much easier than the copy spell?"

  "The copy spell you are learning in Structured Magic is actually considered a medium difficulty spell. The academy chooses to teach it as the first structured magic spell for several reasons. One, it's a very useful spell. Two, it utilizes several aspects of spellcasting that you will need to master. By having a spell you're working on to rete those concepts to, it makes using and understanding those concepts easier in the long run." Professor Armand nodded to Bise. "And the breeze spell is cantrip level. It's one of the most basic forms of using wind and is usually the first thing unstructured elemental mages learn to do with it."

  Seth wrote down the basics of the spell, but didn't think he'd need the notes. He considered writing some of his thoughts on how his power was reacting but decided against it.

  "All right," Professor Armand said. "Let's start on the next spell. This one is 'Whisper'. It will allow you to send a very brief message to someone a short distance away."

  This one was a beginner level spell. It was more complex than the cantrip, but still not too complicated. The spell could only send about five sylbles worth of a message, and the range was less than a mile. It was also not secure, as anyone who could 'listen to the wind' could hear the message being carried on the wind.

  Most of the rest of css was each student practicing sending their name to the professor in a whisper. When he got it, Professor Armand wrote the student's name on the board. Seth was really pleased with himself when he managed it before Bise did, and not everyone succeeded by the end of css. Seth felt he was finally making good progress and Professor Armand was an excellent teacher.

  It wasn't until css was dismissed that Seth realized Mau wasn't sitting on her desk anymore.