One day, his condescension might get to her; it's not today, though, and she's willing to put up with a lot for someone with as interesting a mind as he clearly has buried under the rudeness.

So she settles into the next chair and gamely takes the magically summoned wine. "I can totally sketch you a diagram, as long as you don't mind using the parchment on it. I'm not a microscope maker myself, obviously, but the principle's probably easier to explain with some visual aids."

She has a brief flashback to 7th grade intro biology, and enjoys the brief thought of making him label a blank diagram to test his comprehension of her explanation. (She won't, but it'd be funny.)

"So, to start - do you understand the basic theory of using curved lenses to magnify things? Sorry if that's insulting, but I don't know what common knowledge we're starting out with."