Vanyel suspects that he's correctly reading the subtext there and it's that Aziza's brother is worried about boorish foreign men bothering her? She probably is pretty, though it's not really the first thing he notices. Maybe it wasn't blatantly obvious earlier that he doesn't even like women that way, and it's not like there's any non-terribly-awkward way to say out loud that he's not going to harass his sister because he's shaych. 

:...I wanted to ask your advice: he starts. :I think Leareth is - having a bad time - and Nayoki had to leave to go be in command until he's back, and I - sort of want to go see if I can do anything to help - but he hasn't really given me any indication that he wants me to? And I don't want to bother him if he doesn't?: 

"Hmm. Well, what I'd do is I'd stick my head in and go like, 'hey. Bored, or overwhelmed?'"

Vanyel spends a few seconds trying to figure out how he would react if someone came to check on him when he was having one of his bad times. He...would probably say "I don't know!" and cry! Wow, he must have made it so frustrating and awful for everyone who cared about him and was trying to helpful over the years. 

...It does feel different imagining Leareth saying it to him, if he assumes some bizarre hypothetical where Leareth is hovering being worried about his wellbeing for some reason. It feels like it would just be a question. 

:Thank you. I'll try that.: 

"D'you want me with you?"

:...Can I Mindspeak you from there?: For whatever reason, talking to Aziza about it makes him feel less like he's doing something bizarrely rude and intrusive that's obvious inappropriate to the actual working relationship he has with Leareth, but he probably shouldn't just drag in a stranger from another world whose main recommending feature to Vanyel is being a cleric of the same god. He hasn't even explained to Leareth that he is also a cleric of that god now and he's not sure anyone else has either. 

"All right! I'm not used to that yet so you'll have to tell me if I'm not thinking loud enough."

:All right.: He could probably get Yfandes to relay if it turns out to be hard, but he has a Mindspeech range of two hundred miles in his own right, it really shouldn't be a problem across the hallway. 

He heads to the end of the hall. 

Leareth is sitting on the edge of one of the cots, apparently very intent and focused on trying to remove the pillowcase from a pillow. 

(It's probably pointless to practice doing anything with his hands when he's going to have the problem fixed tomorrow, but what else is he going to do, lie there and stare at the ceiling for the next twelve candlemarks until he's actually tired again and can sleep?)

(Sera made a valiant effort to stay awake for about three minutes, and then told Leareth he could wake her if he needed anything and passed out in the other cot.) 

:Hey: Vanyel says. :I wanted to come see you before I left. ...Are you more bored or more overwhelmed?: 

Leareth manages to fumble the pillow and accidentally drop it on the floor. He flails for several seconds on why Vanyel is even asking him that, it doesn't make sense for it to be the kind of test Jisa was doing before, because they already decided which way to use the spell first? Presumably Vanyel has some use for the information and it makes sense for Leareth to just...tell him the answer to the question...even if he has no idea what Vanyel intends to do differently with one answer versus the other? 

The answer to the question is surprisingly non-obvious.

:...I am not sure? I think I might be bored in the sense that I maybe want to be doing something that is distracting, but maybe all of the things that would be distracting are overwhelming, and maybe being bored is also overwhelming?: Leareth has decided to patch his baffling inability to tell by thinking about it whether he feels confident of a statement by adding as many 'maybes' as possible. 

Vanyel definitely knows that feeling! It's very weird that Leareth is having it, though!

...He bounces it to Aziza. :Would be less boring or less overwhelming if I stay for a bit?: he asks Leareth. 

That's an explanation for why Vanyel cares about the answer to the question, at least!

:I think it would be a higher strategic priority for you to help with the emergency?: Leareth says, mostly because that's easier than figuring out the answer to another question and then adding in all the necessary maybes. 

Vanyel isn't really sure what to do with that! 

:...I think I'd usually take that as a hint that someone doesn't want me there?: he sends to Aziza after relaying Leareth's answer. :But I'm pretty sure Leareth would just - say that, if it wouldn't help, I don't think he does the - saying a thing that isn't really what you mean because you're trying not to hurt someone's feelings, I don't - think - that's something that would change if he's impaired? ...He's also kind of not wrong but nothing's going to catch fire if I spend half a candlemark here, it just means I might not have time for a bath.: 

:I certainly hope you have time for a bath, clerics don't get Prestidigitation even though I ask sometimes just in case. But hanging out with him isn't something you mustn't drop if you're called elsewhere, is it? Less so than a bath:

:No, I should be interruptible here, and I haven’t actually been summoned for anything yet.:

Aside to Yfandes, :- no one’s trying to find me? You’d have said something, right?:

:Of course, love. Savil's in a meeting and it wouldn't be especially efficient for you to drop in halfway through, you might as well join up with her once she's headed to the Web-room.: 

That makes a lot of sense. Catching up on what they're keeping an eye on via the Web will be a lot faster than catching up on the logistics planning, let alone the Council meeting politics. 

:I'm far enough behind on all the context that there's nothing I can just jump into: he tells Leareth. :I'll be needed for mage-work later but no one's called for me yet. ...I want to be here, unless you'd rather I leave you alone?: 

Leareth tenses up very slightly. It would be nearly impossible for most people to notice at all. 

But Vanyel has spent twenty years regularly staring at Leareth in the ice-dream trying to read every hint he possibly can from the man's face, and Leareth might as well have jumped and shrieked or something.

It's still not obvious what was alarming - maybe it was a reaction to Vanyel admitting how out of the loop he is, just delayed by a second because Leareth needed time to parse it - but Vanyel's guess is that it was in reaction to the last part, and that Leareth very much does not want to be left alone right now. 

:...Are you feeling like it would help to have someone stay with you, but you're worried it would be a distraction from handling the emergency?: he asks Leareth. (And goes on bouncing that, plus a quick sense of his read on Leareth's reaction, to Aziza.) 

There's a long pause while Leareth tries to do the hard part, of generating an answer to that question and trying to check that it's actually how he feels and not completely made up. 

:- I am worried that it would be a distraction from the emergency and I do not - have a model - of the specific ways that it would help or be better if you stayed: he sends. :I...have no idea what to - ask for - and I do not think it is reasonable to expect you to - just guess.: 

See, that also sounds like a soft request to be left alone and from anyone else Vanyel would interpret it that way! If he said that it would be because having someone in his face trying to be helpful was more exhausting that just being miserable, or because if someone hasn't seen him on a bad day before then it's also upsetting for that to become - part of how they think of him - he has a very friendly working relationship with Treven, for example, but he would rather keep that between Functional Vanyel and Treven and not bring Sad Useless Vanyel into it.

But Leareth is very - careful - about what he communicates, and 'I do not think it is reasonable' is not actually the same as 'I would find it tedious and unpleasant' or 'I'm embarrassed about you seeing what I'm like on a bad day'. Leareth being embarrassed about something feels very uncharacteristic of him, but so does Leareth having a bad day and finding it upsetting to be left alone!

With a lot of people he would just say 'of course it's not unreasonable, I want to help' or something, but this is actually really stressful and he would enormously prefer if it was somehow unnecessary and with Leareth in particular he really tries to avoid being sloppy in what he communicates. 

...What would Aziza do here? 

:Hmmmm. Is there anything you do straightforwardly want to do with him? Stuff to catch up on? I don't get the impression you're hugging friends...:

Vanyel pictures going in there and hugging Leareth and it's a picture he literally cannot get his mind to form. 

:- I mean, there are really a lot of things I want to catch him up on and get his advice? That's normally the kind of friends we are. I kind of think it's not a good time? Because he's really impaired? I just...whether it's fun for me to be here isn't the point? I don't want him to be having a worse time than he has to and I don't want to - be the kind of person who ignores his friends if they're having the kind of bad time that isn't fun to be around and it's a little inconvenient for my schedule to see them?:

Mental shrug. :We're not hugging friends, I don't think he - has those, or especially wants to? But he's - tried to say things that helped when I was sad, before, even though I'm sure he would rather have been having more interesting conversations.: 

:It doesn't seem like an advice time, but it could still be a catching up time? He's missed stuff. You could also tell him just exactly that thing about what kind of person you want to be: