"I know her," Gela echoes quietly, thinking. Thinking, of the golden College of Magi visible from the Cumberland markets, knowing from a young age that she wasn't supposed to go in there, or even near, and wondering what went on inside anyway. There was a lot of gossip about it; she speculated darkly with her friends when she was young. Marcus went to a Circle when he was nine. He was there for fourteen years.

A pang of sympathy draws her brows together momentarily.

"You've come a long way."

And he doesn't want to go back, ever. That much is obvious, and that's a feeling that Gela understands very well.

"When did you know you could do it?"