The two chatted over fruit tea, sharing their experiences since becoming One-Ring Wizards, before Varin rose to take her leave. Those Combs were already growing restless. They were intelligent, but Varin was not their owner; they were merely familiar with her after spending so many years together. Faced with Ruger, a temptation neither great nor small, the Combs were already close to losing control. It was only a moderate temptation because the spirit furs were not on him yet. Otherwise, things would have spiraled out of control long ago. Ruger had seen the Combs play tricks on Varin and mess up her hair, so he had no expectation that she could order them around.
Even as she was leaving, Varin kept looking over the little island, seemingly quite taken with an island of this size.
After seeing his distinguished guest off, Ruger immediately opened the Storage Pocket Jillian had sent and took out the wooden box.
He wanted to see just what that esteemed Wizard was up to.
Varin's arrival also proved something else: no strange person had come to take her teacher away during this time. The things Jillian had promised had taken so long to arrive that Ruger had even wondered whether the Fluffy Enthusiasts Association had hauled her off for some reason.
As the wooden box opened, a somewhat battered Spellbook appeared before him.
This was a book too, but it was certainly not covered by their agreement. It was an extra reward.
Whenever Wizards lent books to one another, Spellbooks were excluded by default, unless they knew each other very well and specifically requested a particular spell they knew the other possessed. Ruger's previous exchanges with Kurt and the others had worked that way. This was not merely a question of a book's value. It could