"Well, don't worry about it Konrad. We're spending one season out of three to harvest vis anyway so there's always a lab that wasn't use at it's full potential. Also there's a rudimentary lab in the cottage, so we'll probably end up using it when we're collecting vis. Of course we're not exactly delighted to share labs this way but we're not keeping any grudge against you. We'll find a solution, the simpler being to make an additional lab...
If you don't mind me asking, what are your magical interests."
"I'm particularly interested in transformation" Konrad replies, "Self-transformation, to be most specific. I have a talent for that. But I also have an interest in healing magic. My sister died of the plague when I was an apprentice, and I'd like to be ready if I'm ever faced with dire health issues for those I care about again. Beyond that, I'm fairly flexible. I'm most adept at the forms of Animal and Corpus, and to a lesser degree, Vim."
"Self transformation..." he stops for a moment, struggling against the prejudice his house has against this speciality. After that break in the conversation, out of ideas he adds "I see".
"I'm interested in aquam mostly, being a wading bird certainly gave you an hint."
Konrad knows that his specialty would upset the Bjornaer. But better to have it out in the open from the get go than dance around it for months or even years. Being a magus on either side of the disagreement meant having to respect the other position. He certainly harbored no grudges against the Bjornaer magus; he hoped that Renatus Ibis could say the same about him.
"My Aquam is not very strong, I'm afraid," he says to keep the conversation flowing. "Though heaven knows there are times I wish it had been better."
"Well, we do have an Aquam summa here, for the short term, so that's at least one of our few amenities that you may find useful," Ludovicus pipes up. "Oh, my name is Ludovicus, and I too am of House Bonisagus. Also, I'll second Ibis' comments on lab space. We'll make it work." He gives Konrad a quick smile.
"Pleasure to meet you, Ludovicus." Konrad replies. "Or would you rather I just call you Renatus to make things simpler?" He smiles.
"I was going to ask about the library here - such as it may be. I was hoping that we can borrow books from the main Fengheld library as well, though I'm not sure whether my status as peregrinator allows that."
"The library at Fengheld has let us borrow some books, but they don't allow the best texts to leave the premises. Right now, we've got Rego, Intellego, Aquam, and Mentem summae, none of them advanced texts. I think both Ibis and I are pretty much straight out of Gauntlet, so we can find some use for them. Fengheld library might allow copies of the better sources to be made, which I've already done for an intermediate Vim summa, but all copies must be sanctioned by Magus Horst. I've yet to figure out what he won't allow to be copied, as I've only asked about the Vim summa, and he allowed its replication. As a peregrinator, I'm sure they'd let you head back to Fengheld to study for a season, when you're not distilling vis."