After reading other fantasy books where characters pick up new languages instantly (and annoyingly) it's quite nice to have a protagonist that struggles with their new language. For about half the book. Then it's annoying.

There's still a bit of standard introspection where Alberich dwells on the same problems a few times, but less egregiously than Tania or a host of others. There's less fighting in this than you might expect from the text. His background is referenced a lot but he's in new situations from the first chapter. And the new situation is the Collegium, so it's back to school. Again.

The last third is back out again though and more enjoyable.