Reluctantly, the mage let Sonder into his house.
He stepped aside and said. "Fine. Don't just stand there. Get in."
He dragged out the words like they pained him.
Sonder went inside.
The door shut behind her with a slam.
Inside, the house was far less decorated than Sonder had expected.
No books, parchments, or trinkets that it was assumed that mages had.
The mage crossed the room and drooped back into the same chair Sonder had forced him out of.
It creaked slightly under his weight, and he leaned back far enough that Sonder briefly thought that it would tip over.
It didn't, and neither did he say anything to her. He didn't gesture at anything or ask her to sit.
After a moment, he finally adjusted his posture, though only barely, and not that it had anything to do with Sonder.
He reached up with one of his four hands and tugged at the brim of his large, pointed hat until it covered his eyes completely and then most of his face.
Then he leaned back again, further this time, the chair still in danger of tipping over.
Something clinked.
A small teacup went to the table, from where Sonder didn't pay attention. It stopped neatly in front of her. A spoon followed, settling into the cup. A bowl of sugar drifted after them, and then a kettle lifted itself from the hearth, tilting just enough to pour steaming hot tea into the cup.
The spoon took two spoonfuls from the bowl of sugar, went back into the tea and stirred itself thrice, and then went still.
"…Thank you," she said, though she didn't know if it should have been directed towards the cutlery or the mage.
She picked up the cup carefully. The tea smelled nice, and there wasn't anything obviously wrong with it.
She sat down opposite the mage.
She looked at him relaxing in his chair, paying no attention to her.
Sonder tried to remember the last time she met a powerful mage.
Not for quite some time, she thought.
Lady Thiliel had felt like a powerful woman, but she wasn't sure if that strength extended to her magic.
And the lord of the dark lands hadn't felt like a real mage at all. He was something adjacent to wizardry, but not it in itself.
This mage didn't stand out much.
By her senses alone, he didn't feel particularly strong.
When she had brushed over him, there had been no great well of power or roaring currents of mana.
But that wasn't all there was to it.
Looks, she reminded herself, could be deceiving.
The mage folded two arms over his chest. The other two rested limply at his sides.
If he moved any less, he'd be asleep.
"Well?" he said at last, voice muffled slightly by the hat. "You got what you wanted. You're inside."
He didn't look at her.
He didn't ask her name.
He didn't ask why she was there.
He just waited.