Flights of Fantasy discussion

I'm trying to find the title of a couple of books I read many years ago (well probably a decade at least). I can't recall the titles or authors but if anyone can remember from the following clues it would be a great help:

Book 1:

All I really recall is that it was a fantasy world with magic. A person who was actually some form of spirit trapped in a stone in a circlet ended up permanently living in a recently deceased body. They later tried to join a mages guild where they were required to remain virgins before passing a test. This character passes the test (which involved some kind of dream journey involving flying over an ocean) in an unusual fashion of not going into the sea or flying away but flying close to the sea getting wet (yes I'm starting to realise how off this entire thing is sounding). Basically the man had been dabbling in sex but not with a human to get this result.

Anyone got any ideas - what I described as a small part of a much bigger book but this bit was memorable (for some reason!)

Book 2: (may have been sci-fi or fantasy)

It was a different world (I think in a sci-fi way in that it was colonised by space travellers way before the events in the book but not in the way originally planned so different cultural groups that were supposed to have a planet each ended up on the same planet together) there was a guy who secretly worked from some form of (religious?) secret society who had some kind of photographic memory skill which was forbidden (as a sign of genetic meddling or something?). He later tried to tell some of his friends what he had been doing and ended up having some form of fit in the process and it was discovered this was encoded in him during his initiation to the secret society if he ever tried to tell them about it.

There was also a thing about a nomadic tribe where the horses were all owned by the women.

Anyone with a clue?

I don't recognise either of these two stories, so regrettably I can't help you, but did you ever figure out what either book was since?

No, sadly :(

One parameter that might help is if you can remember what year you read those books because it would rule out any books published after those dates.

secondary school age so before 2008 thereabouts? not a hard number though.

OK. That might help somebody narrow down the possibilities.