The tea is indeed better today; he followed her advice.
"Good!" he says. "I'm glad it worked. So... how much do you know about this island?"
"Because it's amazing," he continues enthusiastically. "It's the most cultivated wilderness I've ever seen. I have no idea how it happened, but I want to meet whoever did it. And maybe kiss them. It's just so—" He opens his hands in a helpless shrug.
"I -" She rubs at her eyes. "It's only - yes, the island is amazing."
"It's amazing but I wasn't expecting you to cry over it," he says. "What's wrong?"
Softly: "I have a co-Bonded. He made it. He is in the other world, with my dragon."
"And they - are so close as to be one person, one mind, they have been together so long and began so similar," she says shakily. "And I miss them so much."
He already has enough clues to guess. The island took thousands of years; no Wildmage or High Mage lives that long, and Isibel is obviously the Elfmage in the group.
He thinks about it for a while.
He doesn't stop hugging her.
Hug.
"They lived together on this island, alone, for thousands and thousands of years. He did not know he was the last until I told him."
"He is himself, instead. It may have to do with the template. But he is free of taint; he is not even burned by the touch of a unicorn's horn, anymore."