Signy was no theoretical enthusiast. She knew this, firsthand, because she knew theoretical enthusiasts. Dagna was one, had been one once, at least, hypnotized by information about magic without any real palpable ambition to do it. At least, she had been when she left Orzammar, although Signy had not known her very well, back then. (Of course, Signy had been still in pigtails and riding around on her father's shoulders at the time, which made any detailed knowledge of other people difficult and patchy at best.) Something had changed her, on the Surface––at the Tower, where Sydni Tethviel came from, most likely. Had it been jealousy at seeing what elves and humans could do just by being born with magic? Had it been merely opportunity, realizing that she could, that made her need to make herself a mage so keen that she'd risked so much?
Signy wished, now, that she'd asked when she'd had the chance.
But she, herself? No, theory bored her for the most part, even when (as she had been doing with the book earlier) she tried to force herself to slog through it. She took bits and pieces, but it was never easy to remember the whole point: from the chapter on spirits she took away that valor was another word for bravery; from the books on Entropy she took away tidbits about clouds, and how a room smelled after you cast a certain kind of spell.
The elf in the chair across from her didn't seem keen to volunteer a great deal of information; Signy was full of questions but a little too nervous still to start spilling them in every which direction. But she was supposed to ask questions, not just sit here biting them back. "What sorts of things…" No, that was a silly, broad question; she felt silly, flighty, and took a breath. "What did you specialize in, there?"