He's a technical Bonisagus, but he has a bit of social stuff, due to starting as a Tytalus apprentice
Oh! Okay that makes a lot of sense. What are your long term goals with him out of interest?
I am still sorting them out. Was considering having him join the Magoi of the Stars as a possibility.
He is willing to play dirty, and find out secrets of others, to be used against them.
irony would be if we had the same Tytalus master- bonisagus takes you as an apprentice so they challenge some Jerbiton to certamen for theirs.
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We can do that, but I envisioned my Tytalus master was killed in Wizard's War, for spying on the Bonisagus that claimed him as part of the spoils.
Am I the only person with a positive relationship with their parents? 
does any Tytalus have a positive relationship with their parens? The teaching methods are like the definition of child abuse.
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His Bonisagus Parens and he have a good relationship. Am considering taking the Hermetic Patron flaw for the Bonisagus.
Lengthy tytali- philosophy discussions seem to be in our future then, which is always fun.
So, do we have any ideas about how we might get a starting library? Or if we are even going to have one (as much as it hurts to type that)
Probably the usual way for spring covenants. Some gift, some inferior copies, some books in promise of future services and some purchased. All our magi probably came with a little of this and that. I suggest later that we split some of the buildpoints among us to represent these contributions.
We should likely collaborate between us what we're getting.
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Given the nature of our covenant I suspect the starting library will be small- in the past when I have run a Roman Tribunal game I have had a tribunal library at Harco (which helps to standardize books and improve the efficiency of commentaries) that magi could come and copy (or send an appropriately trained scribe to copy) for a pawn of vis per season (plus you cover your own materials). I don't know if others like the idea as well.
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So the covenant seems to be shaping up from our discussions, please please correct and discuss of I am off base:
A master mason (need to make and noty pc as the gift will make negotiating awkward) and his crew of workers.
Our stuff would be in wagons (?) and the workers will include labourers who stand in for our turn by being rough and ready lads.
We have our negotiators and business getting staff in the form of some of the PCs.
There also seems to be a budding faerie cult happening, which I feel we should explore and explain.
We roll up to a quarryable site, set up a semi permanent work camp, which will include the various craftworkers buildings and the covenant and then get a commission to build something as a cover for searching the city for magical stuff while the Dominion is weaker?
Also, re: library.
Should we do a thing where we all brought a couple of books? Then we pool them to make the library?
The faerie cult seems to me a matter of synergetic opportunism- a faerie aura is easier to establish than a magical aura and where a divine aura is receded is a great opportunity to create a faerie one in its place should there not be an emergent magical aura.
Finding an unclaimed quarriable site near a city might be tricky, but as a general plan find somewhere to set up ad then begin work on construction and exploration seems doable.
As to library it is an issue which is both essential and at the same time to me a bit absurd, the idea that a group of newly gauntleted magi would have access to a large number of invaluable books just doesn't make sense, at the same time it is ey to being able to advance readily. I would suggest we each have one sound book of our choice which we can then swap with each other or seek to trade for other books (or buy other books if we do well) as the game progresses.
I agree that its technically a bit strange that spring covenants gets too valuable books. Magi aren’t really known as super generous. But on the other hand, spring covenant do form – especially by young magi - and they have libraries. I guess its probably gifts from Gauntlet and seasons spent copying books with parens permission or something.
I am not super against the sound book suggestion, but it does bring a problem in my mind. We don’t have vis sources. We probably don’t have much in terms of vis stock nor money. We probably can’t drag around a lot of specialists. We are limited in our options for lab texts. Hell even an aura won’t be reliable. So what resources does the covenant have? I would rather we take at least a standard or slightly above standard spring library and take a hook to be indebted in some manner.
Part of my thinking is we will be in civilized areas and right in Harco's back yard, getting even a small selection of books traded out as necessary shouldn't be a significant problem.
I thought with the books it could be that our new covenant might be something that was being made with support of our paerans or older covenants, possibly for some political goal and so we were able to do a bit of copying before we left our old covenants.
Re: quarryable sites, sandstone is super common, making up 20% ish of the crust. Getting a site you can quarry it from is pretty simple, especially in Italy which is also heavy on sedimentary rocks. We will have to buy marble to face things, but that is pretty much standard.
I have been doing a bit of a deep dive on stonemasonry in the period and the impression I have got (without any specific sources to back it up, mind) is that getting some usable stone within like a mile of the site was considered both neccissary for the job and the easiest part of the job. Whoever is paying will probably have suitable resources on their land. Obviously fancy rock and marble will require being bought in.
Also, I had an idea for why people are investing in us, but we will need a specialist for it.
Our tribunal is specialist and skill heavy but vis super light, I imagine it is a massive massive vis importer, with trade being touted from say Verdi via harco.
The problem here is it means even archmagi are having to trade time for the resources that a Hibernian covenant would get just springing up. Part of the cost of being in the home of Catholicism.
But... As the Dominion drops in the interdict there can be areas where the divine aura either retreats or weakens. Magic and faerie auras can be actively fostered in that weakness.
So we would get hired by another, richer and more established covenant to roll into an area nearish them, set up a quarry a mile out of town in the already weaker Dominion aura. While we are there for a few years we build a site they can use as an outbuilding of the covenant (forgotten the term) and we then foster a faerie and magic aura in it. By time the interdict is over we have built a site with strong enough magic and faerie auras to overcome the Dominion in the fields and outlaying lands.
We get paid for a service and a place to live for a few years. The other covenant get a magic site with small labs and probably a faerie aura that they can use to be close to another city in Italy. In the long term Italy becomes a bit more magical and less Dominion focussed.
Why this is good for the campaign:
It gives us a reason to get paid and exist
It gives us default goals of finding tethers and suchlike
It means we have a tradable service
It keeps the episodic nature of going in in the interdict then moving off
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