"Okay. ...can sorcery be taught to humans?"

"Yes."

"How? Are there books?"

"Yeah."

"...I don't suppose you'd show me where to find some. Later."

"I had books in my tree but I can't go there, Thorn'll expect it."

"Your tree?"

"I started in a tree and I lived there till Thorn caught me and I miss it."

"'Started'?"

"Began to exist."

"...out of nowhere?"

"No, in the tree trunk."

"Oh. I didn't know fairies appeared from trees."

"Not all fairies, just leaflets."

He nods. "I'm sorry about your tree."

"I'd only need to be there long enough to get a cutting but that's still too much to risk. Maybe after long enough that it'd be crazy for him to still be staking it out looking for me."

"I could help with that."

"How?"

"I can see magic. Unless there's some kind magic that blocks me completely, I can see any magic in this world. And I can—manipulate it, shape it, make it stop—when I said I thought metamancers could counter sorcerers that's what I meant, I think I could effectively be immune to sorcery—and with my kind of magic I could go there and get a cutting without them ever noticing I was there."

"Couldn't he still notice a cutting being taken?"

"Not if I leave an illusion there before I take it and mess with the harmonics to make it look like everything's alright at least until I'm too far to be tracked down. Or I could just turn the whole tree invisible just to rub in his face what he's lost but this is petty and spiteful and most of all probably not very smart."

"Not very smart."

"Get a cutting of your tree undetected, though, that I most likely can do."

"It'd be nice to have my tree again."

He nods. "I can't do anything without some mana, though, so after you make my gate I'll need to—get things, build a mana base again, that's much harder from a cold start, should've grabbed my stuff when we were running away—I expect you'll continue fleeing somewhere after you make the gate?"