“You’ve never shown me a high order spell,” I said.

“Really?” said Nightingale. “We must rectify that.” He took a deep breath and then, with a curiously theatrical wave of his hand, spoke a spell that was at least eight formae long.
I pointed out that nothing had happened, which prompted Nightingale to give me one of his rare smiles.

“Look up,” he said.

I did and found that above my head a small cloud, about as wide as a tea tray, was gathering. It looked like a compact mass of thick steam, and once it finished growing raindrops began to fall on my upturned face.

I ducked out from under it and it followed me. It wasn’t very fast – you could stay ahead of it with a brisk walking pace – but as soon as you stopped it would drift to halt overhead and bring a little bit of the English summer to a personal space near you.

I asked Nightingale what on earth the spell was for and he said it was a favorite of one of his masters at school. “At the time I thought he seemed inordinately fond of it, though,” he said as he watched me dodge around the atrium. “Although I must say I’m beginning to appreciate its appeal now.”