Curled up in a ball sobbing, apparently. 

Well, he was pretty miserable before but something seems different about this. 

"Brightstar?" she says tentatively. "It's Jisa. What's going on?" She's not really expecting an answer, or any acknowledgement at all. 

This time, though, he lifts his tearstained face and actually meets her eyes. 

"I - Jisa - I cannot -" 

Huh. Something is definitely different. 

Jisa starts to reach for her Sight, and then hesitates. It does go against an awful lot of the lessons that Melody drummed into her, to use her Sight – let alone active Mindhealing – on someone who isn't even slightly agreeing to it.

It really didn't feel like she had much of a choice, before, and she doesn't think Melody would argue with that, but - it's been over a day. The situation isn't exactly stable, but things aren't moving especially quickly either. 

She lets out her breath, and cautiously crosses the room to sit down next to Brightstar, not quite close enough to touch. Does he seem to react to this at all, either well or badly? 

He whimpers faintly, but not really in a way that seems like he wants her to go away. He maybe leans slightly closer to her. 

Well. There could definitely be worse reactions than that. 

"Brightstar, can you talk to me and say what's going on? ...If that's too hard, I can use my Sight, is that all right?" 

Jerky nod. 

Sight. 

....Wow, okay, that's a. Something. Brightstar's mind was already in fairly disturbing shape, but whatever that is looks recent. From minutes ago, maybe. 

"Your Goddess talked to you?" she guesses. It seems like it has to be either that or a different god, which would be even less explicable. 

Brightstar's shoulders relax slightly, in apparent relief. He nods. 

No wonder he's having a hard time explaining, then, he's probably still pretty disoriented. Jisa wants to avoid pushing him too hard, in the immediate aftermath, but it does seem important to know details. 

He's engaging with her at all, when he wasn't before. He's not less miserable, but - differently miserable? 

He wanted her to know what had happened. That feels like it should be informative, though Jisa is still struggling to guess what exactly the Star-Eyed Goddess might have said to produce this result. 

"...Did the Goddess say it was all right to talk to me?" Surely that can't possibly be it. 

Frustrated headshake. 

And indeed that wasn't it! 

"But, um, She...said something else that made you decide it was all right to talk to me?" 

Brightstar seems to take a while to process this, and then nods. 

Right. 

Jisa is just going to sit here for a bit trying to think of hypotheses before she makes him process anything else, while keeping her body language as reassuring as possible.

Featherfire speculated that the Star-Eyed Goddess had done something to Brightstar's head. Or - maybe not exactly that, but that the Tayledras pact had a stronger effect on him, because he was a Healing Adept? That he literally couldn't question what She had asked of him when he apparently went and spoke to Her directly, and that was why he couldn't engage with any of it. 

...surely She wouldn't have - would She have - 

"Brightstar," Jisa says carefully, "did the goddess release you from the pact?" 

That gets a reaction: a strong flinch and look of horror. 

"No, no, no, no -" Brightstar curls up into himself. "Still Hers. Always." 

"Right. It's all right, I didn't– that's good." Jisa is not at all sure she thinks it's good but it's clearly important to her brother. "...Can you tell me what She said?" 

It takes him a long time. 

Jisa doesn't interrupt. It's a very effortful not-interruption, she wants to knoooooooow, but she still has Sight up on him and, while it doesn't let her see his thoughts - he's not really shielding, with his Gifts blocked, but she didn't ask permission to use Thoughtsensing too - she can tell that his mind is busy. 

"She - She said, that...

...can you...just read me...?" Brightstar seems to be finding it very difficult to speak. 

Huh. Jisa is relieved, obviously - she can't exactly say 'pleased', the situation is still too upsetting and downright confusing for positive emotions - and also really surprised. What did the Goddess say to him to prompt this entire comprehensive change in attitude?

(Maybe it shouldn't be as surprising a shift as it feels. It's really just rolling things back to the way Brightstar trusted her implicitly a week ago. But still.) 

Fortunately, apparently she's about to find out. 

"Of course, if you'd rather– if that's easier." 

Thoughtsensing? 

The path I chose might have been a mistake, the Goddess said to him. What I asked of you might have been a mistake.

That's all. It's a very distant note, behind all of the confused exhausted misery, but Brightstar could really have used more clarification. 

Where do you even go from there. It's - he can't even think about it, it's too big and too terrible and even just the edges of it hurt too much - but Jisa is there and so he has to, the Goddess wouldn't have spoken to him directly unless it was important... 

He. Did things, for Her. Things that She wouldn't have asked of him unless it were incredibly important and the only way, he does believe that - he has to believe that - but. She might have been wrong. There might have been another way, and maybe it was, maybe it was all– he can't quite finish that thought, not yet. 

There's nothing left. That's a thought that he can finish; it hurts, but in a familiar way that he's almost too tired to feel. He burned everything he had - the Star-Eyed burned everything She had - in a desperate last-ditch effort, and now it's. Gone. His family. His friends. Jisa and Father are alive but they're not, they're not... 

....he doesn't expect Vanyel to forgive him. He doesn't expect Jisa to forgive him. That's not why it's important that she knows. It's important because...because... 

Oh no. 

...Jisa catches herself before she can give into the temptation to say whatever first comes to mind - that of course she forgives him, that of course Vanyel will forgive him - that might stop him from being so sad. He's not being upset at her. She doesn't know if what he needs most right now is someone trying to make him feel better, which is probably a doomed endeavor anyway. And - she doesn't know, yet, if any of the things she's so tempted to say are true. She hasn't thought about it. Her feelings really weren't the priority, and of course it's not up to her how Van feels. 

She also ignores a brief urge to rush out of the room and figure out the fastest way to contact Leareth Vanyel Nayoki, given that the first two people on her list are out of contact, and anyway, it can keep. Jisa bolting out of the room ten seconds after getting his permission to read him is definitely not what Brightstar needs. 

She'll just sit with him for a minute, being with him, and thinking. She doesn't love that a conversation with her brother feels like one of her most fraught patient sessions. She could always just say what she was thinking with him, before.

"...Some of it is fixable," she says, quietly, after a long time. "Blai's world has resurrection. We can bring back the kyree. And - I wouldn't've been sure - but if the Goddess -" It's coming out all disjointed, and she gives up. "- I think we can bring back your parents. I - it won't make everything all right, I know there are things that can't be all right - but it's something." 

Brightstar tenses, and then sags back against the wall. 

(His thoughts are still a muddy, despairing tangle. He's only half hearing what Jisa is saying, and only a quarter able to think about it. It's hard to find any hope, in all of that. But there's, maybe, something that isn't just pain.) 

(He's so tired.) 

Featherfire is still there, and giving Jisa a very confused look.