"Nope, can't tell you about it.  Won't tell you.  Whatever I noticed will only bring suffering if it becomes more widely known, and I can't be dealing with that on my head."

There's a faint bit of surprise, but...

The Force has asked stranger things.  "Very well, then, I sha'n't press the matter."

"...Rafiik.  Is there something you'd like to talk about?  Either one-on-one or with the group."

Ries is good at that, not too surprisingly. "Not urgently, but yes, sir. In private, please."

"Very well.  Is there any other business...?"

Nope.

"...Then, if there's somewhere suitable for that conversation here, it may as well happen now."

"Yes sir, Lord Pradnakt gave me the room across from hers." He leads the way, grabbing his duffel as he goes, mostly for the sake of having something to do with his hands.

The room is mostly the same as it was when Lord Pradnakt turned it over to him, except for a few empty candy wrappers left in the candy bowl. The bed is neatly made, though, and the poem is still on the nightstand. Rafiik sits on the bed, leaving the chair for Master Ries.

"I don't think I'm going to be going back with you, sir." He twists the handle of the duffel as he speaks. "These last few months - they were the first time in a long time it felt like I was doing the right thing with my life. Maybe the first time ever. I'm not asking permission to stay - I know you can't give it, Master Chenk couldn't either - but I wanted to let someone know, that I'm doing it on purpose, and I thought you might have some advice."

...A very important conversation to have, this.

"...The Order," Fynn'che Ries is quite dreadfully careful to state, "does not hold the unwilling.

"I cannot, officially speaking, sanction your staying here.  Not without your promotion to Knight, which the Council would likely fight me on - and not without reason - and your completion of several nonstandard training modules.  They will likely take more time than we have.

"But.

"The Order does not hold the unwilling, and neither, then, will I drag you back to the Temple against your will.

"I would like to know more, about why you feel you mustn't return."

"Somebody should have told Master Chenk that," he says, sourly and half under his breath. "- that's not fair of me. He knew I was unhappy but I never said - I never put my foot down about it. It's just - I've been - I never figured out how to explain it very well. It's just - I'm not meant to be cooped up. I'm not meant to have an itinerary. I'm not meant to sit in little rooms reading about things. I'm meant to go see."

"I see."  And, amazingly enough, it's possible that Master Ries does.

"Have you ever thought about the Explorer Corps?  Or, do you need to see people as well?"

"I was planning on trying it, at least," he shrugs. "But it'd take years to get in."

"I can put in a word, if you'd like.  Given the situation...  You'll still have to learn a lot more astrogation than you know, but you could.  And as long as you do learn those things in a timely manner it will not take years."

"I - mm - it would have been enough, maybe? And I still think I'll want to come back someday. But the Sith said I could stay with them, and that's - like - nobody gets to see that. I still - if you really think it's a bad idea I'll listen, I asked for advice for a reason, but I don't regret Tuscias. Not, like - I wouldn't do it again given the choice, obviously. But the risk was worth the reward, and it's the same risk again."

"...Well.  Given my own mission history, I'd be rather a hypocrite if I tried to stop you.  May the Force be with you, Padawan Vidarra."

Rafiik smiles, and it's clear that a weight has been taken off of him. "Thank you, sir. With you as well."

As if on cue, Pradnakt's terror echoes through the Force. She's not projecting, as such - she's actually trying not to, in the moments she's lucid enough to think of it - but it's still very loud.

Oh dear.

Darth Kalbetis' Force presence flares out to intercept and ground the terror in itself, nigh-immediately, but even so, her presence is rather - worried, if determined.

That's certainly...  A novel technique.  Do they need --

"Absolutely not.  This droid may be blind to the Force, but this droid is extremely confident that Darth Kalbetis was invited to handle this and you were not."

-- right.  How is a noncombat droid model radiating that much well-controlled danger, again?  ....Nevermind, she doesn't actually want to know.

"I have comms, ma'am; they're fine, but it's not recommended that anyone open the door."

In the other room, Rafiik's head jerks up to look toward the source of the distress. "That's, uh, new."

"...It is?  A reaction to our presence, then?  I was under the impression that she's been using the same technique prior."

"Or to that extra thing she was doing when we got here, that was new too." He heads for the lounge; maybe Nine will know what's happening.