"Well, I can copy more books in the next day. But presumably not enough for all of us."

"Don't think that even gets us totally paid off for all the previous stuff, yeah."

"Well, are we talking an extra day to pay upfront, or a lifetime, because right now I've only got the one."

"I don't know if six people are six times as expensive as one. We should ask."

Nod.

"I'm scared that - you'll be gone for hundreds and hundreds of days and we won't figure it out and we'll just have lost those days -"

Hug. "Yeah. I - guess we can ask your father whether he really thinks it's possible or whether we're just - being foolish."

Nod.

"I'm - maybe a little bit worried that it'll look like it's possible, but it'll take a long time, and I'll be gone for five years, and for you it'll be thousands, and then eventually you'll - forget, maybe, and stop wanting me back. Whether it works or not."

"Five years is - that's my whole life, and I'm not very new."

"I'm... twenty-eight, now, I think? Twenty-six winters slow. I probably have thirty more, all together. So if it can be done I think you'll have time to figure it out. But I don't know whether it can be. And I don't know how long it'll take."

"You guys could go - tonight. I could stay behind however long it takes to pay that off. Which will be a while, but not - not thousands of years. And then I could join you, once it's paid for."

" - yeah, I guess you could. If you wanted that."

"Seems smarter than wandering around waiting for ages."

"Yeah, I just - you have a family, and stuff. But I would like that. Obviously."

"They'll just have to hurry up and fix you."

"I suppose so."

Now that it's morning they can head back and drop off the books and her sketches. And ask his father some questions.

"I don't know how to do it. I'm pretty confident it's never been done before. But I don't really think there are any things that I can't do in twenty winters."

"All right. Well, if you really think so, then I think we'd like to see you at sunset. And then again in however long it takes."

"You should go to someone else at sunset, I don't like slowing people down. It's tedious."

"It sounds it. All right then. In a long time."

"Stay out of trouble. Pick up another language."

"I'll do my best."

Well. Sounds like they have one more day ahead of them.

"Tell them some more stories and head out again? We could go north and try to figure out where the emperor is."

"Yep, I can do that. Though I think I'd just as soon stay clear of him until we know what else we're doing about him. Unless there's a way it'll help right now that I'm not thinking of - "