The book had spent five months holding up the left side of my desk.
That was not what Headmaster Theoran had intended when he gave it to me. In my defense, the desk had been uneven, and the book was exactly thick enough to fix it. Everyone benefited, mostly the desk.
I stood in the middle of my room and looked at it. The cover was dark brown leather, plain except for a few faded words pressed into the front.
Recorded Paths of Core Advancement
And underneath, in smaller letters:
Compiled Cases, Failures, and Comparative Notes
The second line had always seemed unnecessarily threatening.
I crouched, and the desk shifted slightly. I stopped. This was already becoming inconvenient.
'Do I actually need to read it?'
[Yes.]
'You answered too quickly.'
[You have asked me this twelve times.]
'That seems excessive.'
[It is.]
