The Journey's Fourth Day

Our friend Fassamus has delivered unto us that promised boon! A finely crafted whip, menacing with spikes from that terrible beast we slayed together. Frostbreath wields it rather well, cutting the figure of a hero wielding an eponymous weapon.
 
Additionally Fassamus delivered unto us their waste. Whether that was a declaration of dissatisfaction with us being inaccessible as we were, or merely a matter of leaving droppings wherever they might fall is anyone’s guess.
 
Our journey today paled in comparison to how it began. Things of small note here and there. An unusual landslide, Frostbreath triumphing over a plant which intended to make him its prey despite his injury. So on, and so forth.
 
Now, what is truly of interest to me, perhaps even moreso than Frostbreath’s weapon, is my slowly growing understanding of my tome.
 
More of the words are beginning to make sense. Before, when I would gaze upon them, nothing tracked. On occasion it would feel as if the words themselves wanted to baffle me, or as if it were choosing to allow me to understand certain parts. But now,
 
Now, it is like hearing a whisper through my eyes. Hearing a voice from outside of a building. Hearing the soft, conspiratorial muttering of a friend.
 
I begin to distantly understand more and more, as if it answers me. I feel the tome’s hunger again, but now it feels as if it is beginning to become my hunger.
 
Before, it felt as if I were doing business with it, as I’ve said before - a deal, an exchange where we come out on top. But now, it feels as if I am clasping hands with it. Perhaps I’ve fundamentally misunderstood the nature of our deals.
 
Winning, losing, coming out on top. Thinking in terms of exchange. No, I am beginning to suspect this more than that. A cooperation. Shared goals, shared appetites. Knowing more of what the tome has to offer slowly becomes less like an interrogation and seems to almost approach conversation.
 
Or perhaps I am delusional, losing my senses in the excitement of growing to understand more.
 
I suspect I will find myself sleepless, tonight. I have a lot to read.