A/N: Thank you so much for checking out this fic! This is my attempt at taking the building blocks we were given with the College of Winterhold and trying to construct a (hopefully) more satisfying story than the one we were given in game. I've borrowed elements from canon, but it would be more accurate to call this its own story which sometimes crosses over with the one in-game. I have bent lore occasionally in my worldbuilding, but in a way which I hope still feels 'lore-plausible', and like it fits the TES setting-note too that I've taken Ancano in a different direction from the moustache-twirling villain in-game (which can either be interpreted as a warning or a promise, depending on your perspective!).
A Fistful of Stars is primarily a coming-of-age story, with a dash of mystery, some romance, and strong themes of friendship, identity and self-acceptance. The fic is fully written, comprising 23 chapters plus an epilogue, at ~115k words. Updates three weekends per month (crossposting from AO3, my main site-you can find me there under the same username if you prefer that platform).
Thank you so much for taking the time to read Myfanwy's story, and I really hope you enjoy it!
Myfanwy's three least favourite things were heights, the cold, and people mispronouncing her name, in that order, and somehow she'd ended up in a place which was nothing but cold things up high. Around every corner of the aptly-named town of Winterhold deceitful snowbanks hid treacherous drops onto cold grey rocks or cold grey water so far below that Myfanwy felt dizzy just thinking about it. The whole place seemed designed to trick visitors into taking one wrong step and plummeting to their deaths, or if that failed, freezing to death instead while vainly searching for somewhere warm and out of the wind. Even the little log houses huddled together as though afraid they might fall off the nearby cliffs, which given the history of the place was a pretty reasonable concern. It was like someone had rummaged around in Myfanwy's head, taken her worst nightmare of somewhere to live, and made it a reality.
As for her third least favourite thing, well, that was always just a matter of time.
"Miffany, were it?" the portly innkeeper said, scratching his stubble. "Haran and me've been trying to figure out how to say it for weeks. We thought it were Miefanwee. Our Eirid were convinced it were a made up name."
"Yes, well, it's real, and it's pronounced Miffany," said Myfanwy. She tried to keep the testiness from her voice. It wasn't his fault her parents had an unhealthy obsession with ancient Breton everything, including names which looked like they'd been invented by a power-drunk toddler who hadn't learned about vowels yet.
"Aye, I can see that now. Eirid will be thrilled. She's asleep, or she'd be here hassling you about it herself."
The innkeeper bent over for a moment behind the bar, and straightened with a very new-looking leatherbound notebook, a quill and pot of ink in hand. He laid the book on the bit of the bar that seemed the least sticky, opened it to a page with a single line written, and began carefully unstoppering the jar of ink.
"But aye, I got the letter weeks ago, and the room's been booked for you ever since. Dunno why your pa bothered, really. Ain't like we're overrun with business." He chuckled and drew a neat line through the sentence: Myfanwy Caldevwin, 2nd of Hearthfire, 1 night.
"Wayrest's a long way away. My parents wanted to make sure I didn't travel for weeks and not have a bed at the end of it."
In fact, her mother had been in hysterics at the thought that they'd already be too late in writing, every spare bed in the inn would be taken by all the other new first-years starting at the College the next day, and Myfanwy would be sleeping in the stable with the horses and chickens.
Privately, Myfanwy had rather doubted the inn would be overrun with new students, even if she'd thought the idea of curling up to sleep with a bunch of farmyard animals sounded rather fun. Skyrim's College of Winterhold was the lowest ranked magical university on the continent. Its entry in this year's copy of Tuition in Tamriel had only been two words long: Don't bother. Even if it weren't for Winterhold itself being the last place on Nirn Myfanwy wanted to spend any more time than it took to say 'no thank you, can we turn around please', the College of Winterhold was hardly where she herself would have chosen to study.
Then again, it wasn't exactly like she was spoiled for choice.
"Aye, makes sense," the innkeeper said, closing the book and tucking it back under the bar. "Well, the room's ready for you—it's that one on the left there. Haran's set a warming-pan twixt the sheets for you already."
A kind-faced woman looked up from stirring a pot on the open stove behind the bar. Myfanwy had never been in an inn so small it didn't have a separate kitchen before, but she had to admit it was nice to feel the warmth from the cooking-fire at her front as well as the hearthfire at her back. The inn might have been called the Frozen Hearth, but the innkeepers had clearly taken pains to make sure it didn't live up to its ominous name.
"Let me or Dagur know if you're not warm enough, dear," she said. Myfanwy supposed this must be Haran, and the innkeeper Dagur.
Dagur chuckled. "Haran here's been out her mind with worry about how a wee Breton lass would handle our weather. Winterhold's a bit nippy for most Nords, even."
Myfanwy smiled and hoped it didn't look too much like a grimace. "It's um, certainly not warm. Thanks for making the effort for me." She directed her words at the woman, who was now tucking some flyaway hairs back into a loose bun. Myfanwy had always heard the Nords were a hospitable people, and they'd certainly seemed friendly enough as she'd travelled across Skyrim, but she'd never expected this much consideration for some foreign nobody teenager. Especially one who was here to study magic. "It was really nice of you."
"It's nothing," Haran said with a smile. "Dagur will help you get your things settled then I'll bring you some stew. Ever had horker before, dear?"
Myfanwy started to shake her head, then startled so badly she nearly fell over when a voice came from what sounded like directly above her head.
"I can help with her trunk! No need to bother yourselves."
Heart racing and cheeks aflame, Myfanwy wheeled around to see a dark-haired, ruddy boy about her own age, so tall and stocky and blue-eyed that he had to be a Nord. He wore a friendly, open smile and his hair in two little braids, and seemed completely oblivious to the fact that Myfanwy was trying to decide whether it would cause less of a fuss to try and stuff herself into her trunk or throw herself into the enormous stewpot to escape her embarrassment.
"That's a good lad, Onmund, ta," called Haran over her shoulder.
The boy flashed Myfanwy another smile then bent over to pick up her trunk. It took him three goes to lift it, and Myfanwy winced as he grunted, his face turning red and the veins standing out.
"Sorry," she muttered. Dagur was chuckling behind the bar.
He managed a very forced-looking grin. "What's in this, rocks?"
"Books." The stewpot looked more and more appealing by the moment.
Following Dagur's pointing finger, the boy set off towards Myfanwy's room, step by torturous step. "Could've…fooled…me," he choked out, while both Dagur and Haran, and from the sound of it half the inn, stifled their mirth. Myfanwy wasn't sure whether to laugh or not. Was the boy making fun of her?
The trunk landed with a dull thump next to the narrow bed in the sparsely decorated little room. "Thanks," Myfanwy said, while the boy caught his breath.
"No problem." He stuck out his hand. "You're starting at the College tomorrow, I'm guessing? Me too. My name's Onmund."
Myfanwy gingerly shook it. "Myfanwy."
"That's an unusual name."
So's Onmund, where I come from, Myfanwy thought, but instead she said, "Yeah. My parents picked it."
He looked her unselfconsciously up and down, and Myfanwy very selfconsciously flattened her hair over her ears.
"You'd be from High Rock, then? That's not a Skyrim accent."
"Yeah. Wayrest. You?"
He jerked his head over his shoulder. "About a mile that way. My family owns a farm just out of town. Not that there's much you can farm up here. Pigs, mostly."
"Why're you staying at the inn tonight, then, if you're a local?" Myfanwy asked, then immediately wished she hadn't at the look on Onmund's face. "Oh, um. Sorry. Forget I asked."
"It's fine," Onmund said, shrugging. Myfanwy only noticed how full of light and life he'd been now that he was all flat and still. "Anyway, once you're settled feel free to come join me and J'zargo by the fire to eat, if you like. He's in our cohort too, I met him before."
"Thanks. I might."
Myfanwy sank onto the bed once Onmund had pulled the door shut behind him, a smile hitched onto his face once more. She knew she should have felt a bit guilty, after he'd been so nice, but it was hard to single out any one emotion in the confusing mess of them swirling around her head.
His words sounded in her mind. Feel free to come join me and J'zargo by the fire. Had he meant it, or was he just being polite? He'd seemed sincere—maybe she could, after all, make a friend?
She squashed the rising bubble of hope back down. There wasn't any point. He might have meant it, but tomorrow they were starting at the College together, and he'd soon change his mind about being friends with Myfanwy. Better not to get attached.
But he seemed so nice. Maybe he won't care. Elinor didn't.
Myfanwy drew her knees to her chest and rested her forehead on them, letting her hair fall forwards in a fine brown veil. It wasn't the same. Elinor wasn't a mage. There was no way that Onmund would think of her the same way once he found out, and Myfanwy didn't blame him. Even if he was enrolling at Tamriel's Worst Magic School, just like her.
He was still bound to be ten times, a hundred times the spellcaster Myfanwy was. She'd never met a single mage who wasn't.
Myfanwy had hoped Winterhold might be less cold and miserable when the sun was coming up rather than going down, but those hopes were dashed as soon as she stepped out the front door of the Frozen Hearth the next morning. The cold hit her with the force of a slap to the face, and she let out an involuntary gasp which immediately flooded her lungs with ice.
"A bit nippy, isn't it?" said Onmund beside her, grinning. "It's called Winterhold for a reason."
Myfanwy scowled and rubbed her nose so hard she thought her freckles might come off. Though she hadn't left her room again the previous night, Onmund had called a cheery hello to her when she'd emerged in the morning, and there had been no way to avoid eating breakfast with him without seeming hopelessly rude. She hated how much she liked him.
Her other about-to-be-classmates were another matter entirely. The J'zargo Onmund had mentioned was already sitting with Onmund when he'd hailed her over, and Myfanwy had recognised him as the grey-striped Khajiit who'd laughed at her when she dropped her trunk on her foot while dragging it across the inn the night before. The entire time they were eating breakfast he'd bragged about how good he was at magic, and it had taken every ounce of restraint Myfanwy possessed to stop herself from asking why he was stuck with them at the College of Winterhold, if that was the case. Luckily he'd left before Myfanwy's self-control cracked entirely, saying he wanted to be ready and waiting early, and scoffing when Myfanwy didn't want to do the same. It was all right for those who had a thick coat of fur, Myfanwy had wanted to say, but he'd already left with a swish of his long grey tail.
Sure enough, as Myfanwy and Onmund walked through the frozen, half-collapsed town of Winterhold (or rather, Onmund walked, Myfanwy trudged, her hands tucked into her armpits) J'zargo's furred form appeared up ahead, silhouetted against the grey sky. He wasn't alone; a taller figure seemed to be in conversation with him, while a shorter one with arms crossed stood a few paces away. Myfanwy wasn't looking at them, though, because just past the group was her very first glimpse of the College of Winterhold.
Her first thought was, Oh no, it's up high.
Her second thought was, Oh no, it's really up high, and that bridge is falling to pieces.
She'd read that the College of Winterhold was on its own little island, that everything around it had fallen into the Sea of Ghosts during the Great Collapse eighty years ago, that it was connected to the once-city-now-town of Winterhold with only a narrow stone bridge. She'd even seen pictures. But it was one thing to gaze wide-eyed at an inked illustration, and quite another to be faced with the reality of a town just…ending, as though someone had got bored halfway through drawing it in real life, too, and decided to switch to empty sky over iceberg-studded ocean. Even worse was how beyond the cliff, hundreds of feet above the icebergs, perched a huge university all of stone on top of a spire that clearly wasn't remotely wide or strong enough to support it. It defied all probability. And as if that weren't enough, there was no way to get there other than via a pockmarked, nonsensically zig-zagging bridge hanging in thin air that should, by every natural law, have crumbled into the ocean years and years ago.
Myfanwy froze, her eyes wide as saucers, her heart suddenly thumping far too fast, barely able to breathe. They wanted her to walk across that?
This was a mistake. This was a mistake and I'm going to die, and it's going to happen exactly the way it does in all my scariest nightmares. This is my punishment for thinking I could become a mage.
She came to herself at the touch of something warm and heavy on her shoulder. "Myfanwy? Are you okay?"
"I'm okay." A few deep, calming breaths and it almost wasn't a lie. She could do this. She would make her dream a reality. Hadn't she dealt with far worse already, just to get this far?
Worse than your two least favourite things rolled into one? said Elinor's voice in her head, but she ignored it, and pushed forward through the snow.
As they approached the arch that marked the start of the bridge and the end of the town, the two forms that weren't J'zargo resolved themselves into a young Dunmer girl and a less-young-but-not-old Altmer woman. The Altmer Myfanwy didn't recognise, but the Dunmer had been in the Frozen Hearth overnight too, and Myfanwy was so disgruntled to see her that she almost forgot her fear of the bridge.
While waiting for Dagur the evening before Myfanwy had been shyly eager to meet the pretty, sharp-featured elf girl reading a very thick book in the corner, but that had changed when Myfanwy had taken a step towards her, craning through the hearth-smoke to see what it was the girl was reading. At the approaching footfall the girl had glanced up from her book, and the look in her strange red eyes had made Myfanwy first stop in her tracks, then falter, then retreat. She hadn't bothered trying to talk to the girl this morning, and had secretly hoped, when she'd left before Myfanwy and Onmund, that it wasn't for the College.
As ever, though, Myfanwy had no such luck. The girl wore the same look of bored disinterest she had in the inn, and after a glance at Myfanwy and Onmund tossed her gleaming black hair over her shoulders and returned to examining the towering stone structures of the College.
The Altmer woman, however, stepped forward with a smile. She was very beautiful, Myfanwy couldn't help noticing, tall and willowy with golden skin and copper-coloured hair that shone like the sun amidst all the dull grey. Myfanwy tried very hard to keep all her attention on her, and not the terrifyingly abrupt way the cliff ended just a few feet behind her back.
"Ah, and here we are at last. Onmund and Muhvanwee?"
"Miffany," said Myfanwy, feeling a bit awkward and flattening her hair over her ears. The only thing worse than people having no idea how to pronounce her name was people knowing exactly how it should be pronounced. It usually led to all kinds of embarrassing questions, but to the woman's credit, she took it in stride.
"I apologise, Myfanwy. I am Faralda, Master of Destruction here at the College. Welcome, all of you, to your new home." Her smile invited all four of them in and it, too, shone like the sun. "I hope you'll all be very happy here for the duration of your stay, whether that's just the three years of your Apprenticeship, or far longer."
Myfanwy heard J'zargo let out a sort of stifled snort from her right, and shot him a glare. If he was so clever he could swan right back to Elsweyr, or wherever he was from, and inflict his horrible personality on some other set of students.
The woman—Master Faralda, Myfanwy reminded herself, such a pretty name—continued as though she hadn't heard.
"Now, before we get inside to the warm, we've just got the Bridge Test to get through—"
This time it was Myfanwy who made an unidentifiable noise, somewhere between a strangled choking sound and a suppressed scream. All the terror that her irritation at J'zargo and the Dunmer girl had briefly suppressed came roaring back to life.
"T—Test?" she spluttered. "What do you mean, test? I thought we'd already been admitted?"
"It's just a formality," Master Faralda said in a soothing voice, while Myfanwy tried very hard not to hyperventilate. "Not even that. Your places are finalised, it's just a little tradition; a holdover from a time before we had admission forms and applications and the like. Don't worry."
And if we fail the test? Myfanwy wanted to ask, but was too scared to, so she stayed silent and pretended Master Faralda's words had soothed her anxiety. Onmund patted her on the shoulder again, and Myfanwy was too pathetically pleased by the tiny comfort to shrug his hand away.
She desperately wished Elinor were there.
"Now, who'd like to go first?" Myfanwy heard through the ringing in her ears, and she was unsurprised when it was J'zargo's silky voice that answered.
"This one will take the test, and show just how well it can be done." He stepped forward and stood very tall, chest puffed out, preening under the attention of his imaginary adoring fans. Or so Myfanwy assumed.
"Very well," said Master Faralda, with a hint of exasperation. "Though you should know that there is no such thing as showing how well it can be done. You pass, or you don't. That's all." She cleared her throat and adopted a very formal, sing-song voice.
"Welcome, J'zargo of Rimmen, to the College of Winterhold, a place of wisdom and arcane knowledge. Why do you seek entry to this ancient stronghold of magic?" She looked expectantly at J'zargo. "Give me a true answer, and the seal will start to glow." She pointed at her feet, where a large metal circle was set into the stone of the bridge, a bit like a manhole cover. It was hard to make out, but Myfanwy thought the raised design might be the eye-and-star that was the insignia of the College of Winterhold—the Eye of Magnus, God of magic and the architect of the mortal plane. Myfanwy offered up a quick prayer.
J'zargo smirked. "J'zargo just wanted to see whether it was falling apart as much on the inside as the outside."
Master Faralda seemed to be working hard not to roll her eyes. "A true answer, Apprentice. An honest one."
"Very well. J'zargo wishes to enter the College because he wishes to become an important and renowned sorcerer, feared and respected by all."
Myfanwy blinked. The seal was still the same as ever, an unassuming circle of heavy black metal.
"But that is the truth!" J'zargo said, outraged. He looked at Master Faralda. "Why is it not glowing?"
"Dig deeper," Master Faralda said with a secret little smile. "Why are you really here?"
J'zargo crossed his furry arms across his chest and lashed his tail, muttering to himself with his ears folded back. Myfanwy would have found it very funny if she hadn't been so terrified of her own turn. She glanced sideways at Onmund. He wore a hard, determined smile. The Dunmer girl still just looked bored.
"Eh—Master Faralda," J'zargo said at last, after a good thirty seconds of non-stop muttering. "Must this one…This one's answer, must he announce it to—" He gestured at the other three students, and Myfanwy was shocked to see him looking anxious.
"No. Just so long as it is spoken aloud, and it is the truth. No others need hear but yourself."
J'zargo's posture instantly relaxed. He muttered something that Myfanwy couldn't hear, no matter how hard she tried, and to her annoyance the circle on the ground began to faintly glow. It was the Eye of Magnus, she noted.
"Good," Master Faralda said, nodding. Her voice took on the sing-song cast again. "Now, young mage. You have shown you have the will, but have you the way? Cast a spell at the primed seal, that the College may know the touch of your magic, and recognise you as its own." Her voice returned to normal. "Any spell will do, but it's traditional to choose one from the school in which you intend to specialise."
Myfanwy's palms grew sweaty even as J'zargo laughed in triumph and aimed a wide plume of flames at the seal, which glowed brightly and chimed like a bell as the fire washed against it. She hardly noticed Master Faralda's robes catch fire, so violently was her stomach churning, or the very loud and angry dressing-down J'zargo received after the fire had been put out.
No. No. Not this. Not so soon, and in front of everyone. Please, not this.
The Dunmer girl was looking at her strangely, and Onmund was saying something she couldn't hear, but all that existed for Myfanwy was the black circle in the ground just a handful of paces away, now returned to normal; to all appearances just a boring piece of metal, rather than Myfanwy's new biggest fear.
"Onmund, you're next," called Master Faralda, and Myfanwy wrenched herself back to reality. This would be bad enough without falling to pieces in front of her new classmates on top of it. She worked hard to calm her shallow breathing and her racing heart, and instead tried to focus on the familiar way Master Faralda greeted Onmund and was greeted in return. He'd grown up in Winterhold, hadn't he—perhaps they already knew each other? Myfanwy imagined a much younger Onmund storming up to a slightly younger Master Faralda, demanding to be allowed to take the Bridge Test, and the image was so sweet and funny all at once that it made her feel just a little bit better.
When it came time for Onmund to announce his purpose in coming to the College he spoke without hesitation in a clear, carrying voice.
"I love magic. I've always loved it," he said, addressing the metal seal. "It's beautiful, and dangerous, and exciting. I've dreamed of studying at the College since I was a little boy because I want to learn how to master it." When the seal remained dark he squared his jaw. Master Faralda met his eyes—Myfanwy thought she read sympathy in them, but it was hard to be certain—after which he muttered something at the ground that caused Master Faralda to reach out and squeeze his shoulder.
A faint glow lit the seal. Myfanwy watched Master Faralda curiously, but she'd released Onmund's shoulder and was instead offering him an encouraging smile. He, too, cast a Flames spell at the seal—managing not to set Master Faralda's robes alight, to her evident relief—and after the seal pronounced his offering of magic accepted, returned to Myfanwy's side.
"See? Nothing to worry about," he said bracingly. His voice shook a little.
Myfanwy didn't reply. She thought if she opened her mouth she'd throw up.
"Brelyna Maryon," called Master Faralda, and Myfanwy was confused for a moment before realising that of course, presumably the scary-eyed Dunmer girl had a name, and presumably it wasn't 'scary-eyed Dunmer girl'. The girl—Brelyna—stepped forward, and for a third time Master Faralda asked why a young mage wanted to enter the College.
Like J'zargo, Brelyna crossed her arms, and stood for a long time staring at the seal, though unlike J'zargo, her emotions were impossible to read. Finally she lifted her head and blinked a few times. The wind changed just as she spoke, and the words 'my family' were faintly carried to Myfanwy's ears on the chilly air. Master Faralda cast Brelyna a sharp glance.
Despite her panic Myfanwy felt a flutter of curiosity. Her family? What about—
But then Brelyna cast her spell, and Myfanwy forgot her curiosity; forgot, even, to be terrified of how big an idiot she was about to make of herself in front of everyone.
It was a type of magelight, Myfanwy could tell, but of a sort she'd never before seen or learned. Unlike the Candlelight spells taught back home, it wasn't a uniform warm glowing yellowy colour. It was instead like Brelyna had reached into the sky and grabbed a fistful of stars. The dusky indigo of midnight, overlaid with a hundred shifting, twinkling lights; Myfanwy couldn't tell whether they were moving or just softly shimmering. It was the most beautiful thing she'd ever seen.
Brelyna flicked her fingers and her ball of starlight drifted slowly to the seal, into which it dissolved. The seal lit up and chimed, but Brelyna had already turned her back and was returning to the patch of bare earth she'd melted for herself in the snow.
Myfanwy stared. What had that been? She had to find out. The Dunmer had some weird magical traditions, she knew, but—
"Myfanwy Caldevwin."
Myfanwy came back to herself with a start and a renewed flood of panic. It was time.
The six paces to Master Faralda's side felt like the longest she'd ever taken in her life, longer even than those to face her parents after that time she and Elinor had burned down Madame Deveraux's henhouse. She was too scared to look at the seal. Her eyes flickered from Master Faralda's encouraging smile to the imposing stone buildings of the College to the steely-grey waves far below to Brelyna's folded arms to the line of footprints in the snow, and how in Oblivion had she ended up somewhere where there was snow even in Hearthfire, Elinor was right, she had gone mad…and then there she was. Trembling from head to foot, she looked up at the tall, burnished Master of Destruction and waited for her doom to be pronounced.
"Welcome, Myfanwy Caldevwin, to the College of Winterhold, a place of wisdom and arcane knowledge. Why do you seek entry to this ancient stronghold of magic?"
Myfanwy swallowed hard. What was the honest answer? She didn't think the seal would accept 'because nowhere else would take me', and besides, she didn't want to be rude to her new university.
Because I need to live up to my heritage. Because my ears are pointy enough that I'm clearly descended from the Direnni. Because everyone expects me to be a brilliant mage.
No. Those were all true, but they weren't the truth.
"Because I'd do anything to be a mage. Anything," she said at last, in little more than a whisper.
The seal glowed with a faint blue-white light.
Myfanwy's breath caught and a little burst of warm hope exploded in her chest. She'd got the first part right on her first try. Maybe, just maybe, this wouldn't be a complete disaster after all?
"Well done," said Master Faralda, looking pleased. "Now, young mage. You have shown you have the will, but have you the way? Cast a spell at the primed seal, that the College may know the touch of your magic, and recognise you as its own."
Heart pounding, Myfanwy pulled to mind the form for a flame spell. Not Flames. Not the proper, official Novice-tier fire spell that was every child mage's first foray into the Destruction school.
Myfanwy didn't cast Flames because no matter how hard she'd tried, no matter how many years she'd spent straining and studying and trying every possible method she could think of to make it work, she just…couldn't. A lack of aptitude, one tutor had called it; a stunted magicka pool, another had said. Myfanwy had never truly understood exactly what deficiency of hers had led to that which she wanted most in the world being so far out of her reach, but whatever the reason, she'd never been able to manage even the simplest spells that most Breton magelings could cast in their sleep. Oh, she'd learned the forms, could recite the underlying theory and principles backwards. But the magic just wouldn't come, no matter how badly she wanted it, no matter how hard she tried, no matter how much she cried.
Myfanwy called for fire, and rather than J'zargo's wild blaze or Onmund's controlled stream, all she received was one little flame. A tiny flicker like a lit candle, dancing on one fingertip.
Refusing to look at Master Faralda, refusing to listen to the whispers behind her back, Myfanwy poured everything she had into her little flame. She willed it to grow bigger, to jump from her finger to the seal at her feet. When that failed, she knelt on the freezing cold stone that was strangely free of snow and pressed her finger to the seal.
Take it, she begged. Take my magic. Recognise me as your own.
She tried to make it bigger. She tried to modify the form to move the flame off her finger and into the waiting metal. In desperation, she even tried to use the fingers of her other hand to grasp it, push it, flick it. Nothing worked. The tiny flame danced merrily on her fingertip, and the seal resolutely refused to accept it, refused to light up properly or chime like a bell like it had for everyone else.
Tears welled in Myfanwy's eyes and dripped onto the faintly glowing metal, then froze like little glittering gems. The heat of her spell wasn't even enough to melt them.
Eventually Myfanwy felt a hand on her shoulder. She nearly toppled over, her knees gone numb with cold.
"Let's, er, let's leave it there, shall we?" Master Faralda said. Myfanwy detested the pity in her voice, but detested herself even more.
"But, the seal—"
"It's only tradition, dear. It's fine."
"But—"
"Come on. Let's get you into the warm."
Then Master Faralda's arms were under her own, and she was being lifted onto her feet, and Master Faralda had cast something to bring the life back into Myfanwy's legs. A modified fire spell rather than the more typical warmth cantrip, Myfanwy noted in a haze of shame and despair. Master Faralda's control must have been legendary to take all the fire out and leave just the heat. No wonder she was a Master.
Master Faralda led them across the bridge, and Myfanwy was too lost to humiliation to even be afraid of the dizzying drops on either side. She hung back behind the others, placing one foot slowly in front of the other, not wanting to feel their scornful stares or hear their whispers.
"Hey," said a voice. Myfanwy looked up from her boots. It was Onmund.
"That was amazing," he said brightly. "I didn't know it was even possible to make a Flames spell so small."
If that was meant to make her feel better, it had failed miserably.
She didn't hear Onmund's excited prattle as they crossed the bridge and passed the guardian Atronachs with their bodies of living lightning, didn't gasp like the others when the towering wrought-iron gates swung silently open to admit them, could barely pay attention to the several-hour-long tour of the College's towers and walkways and twisting corridors given to them by Master Ervine, the College's Master Wizard. The College's many wonders failed to delight her. Her first meal as a student of the College of Winterhold stayed untouched on her plate until it was cleared away. She couldn't even be excited when they were shown through the College's Arcanaeum, the largest and most incredible collection of books she'd ever seen in her life.
None of it mattered. The College seal hadn't accepted her magic. It hadn't recognised her magical touch, and welcomed her as one of its own.
The College of Winterhold was the worst school of magic in all of Tamriel. Yet even it had announced to everyone watching, and everyone they'd later whisper to, and probably everyone who'd ever come to the College from now until the end of time, that Myfanwy didn't belong.