:The goddess has an - agreement of some kind with the Tayledras, no? And they’re Her followers.:

:Mmm-hmm.:

:...If a human king ordered something like - all of that - I would definitely call it an act of war.: 

:....And?: 

:I hate war and if I've been dragged back here specifically because Valdemar needs to go to war with the Star-Eyed Goddess, I'm going to be so peeved.: 

:...You being here at all is almost certainly a godintervention.: 

:I had that thought too! I'm at a loss. ...Well, They probably aren't actually a monolith even if we can't tell the difference from way down here. If Valdemar is being dragged into a war between some gods, that's even worse.: 

...Enara turns back to Blai. 

:I'm fairly sure he just doesn't have whatever - mental block - we usually come with. I'm really confused - it's not because he came out of the Grove directly, Rolan is Groveborn and seems to be even worse - but it...does make this look friendlier...?: 

:I guess! Thank you for - checking that - I suppose if nothing else I've mentioned is an impediment either like my having business on another planet then I can - fail my save or whatever the next part is? -:

:Nothing you've said is an impediment.: Going to explore another world and advise Blai on his political duties there sounds vastly better than trying to figure out whether it's even possible for Valdemar to go to war with a goddess. 

He's slightly concerned by how Blai seems to be thinking about it, though. :All you need to do is look at me and be willing. But you can take more time to think about it, if you need to, I'm - not in a hurry.: That is very debatably true, sitting on the Call is actually a bit painful at this point, but he's not going to make that Blai's problem. 

:I'm sure I'm missing scores of possible things to think about because I've known your species existed for less than a week, but I don't know what things they are or if any of them are material to the situation!:

:Unfortunately I'm also not sure what you don't know that every Valdemaran would. ...Enara, is it obvious to you that he hasn't fully accepted the Choosing? If it's not going to be a problem with the other Companions, then there's even less reason to rush.: 

do they have to call it that

Squint. 

:Nnnnno, I don't think so? Rolan could tell, I think. ...You know what, Blai, you should talk to Vanyel, if - that ends up even being possible, and he's up for it. He didn't even want to be a Herald, at the start. There were reasons it had to be rushed in his case, but - I agree it's better not to.: 

Blai is uncomfortable about something to do with how they're discussing this and Seldan has NO IDEA WHAT because he continues to not be reading Blai's mind.

This would be so much easier to navigate right now if the bond was two-way but it's not urgent, Blai isn't in imminent life-threatening danger that Seldan can only help with by being in full rapport or able to send him energy directly - 

(He's just noticed that he can see nodes now and could probably tap them if he wanted, and is fairly sure that's not a standard-issue Companion ability, neat!) 

- anyway, if it's rushed and pressured while Blai is still uncomfortable with it, then he can't ever redo it under better circumstances, and ignoring the Call is unpleasant but so would be sharing his head with someone who's upset about it. 

:Should I know who Vanyel is?: 

Is he sure about that. Blai's so Chelish, you see. It would be easy to be mistaken about whether he was inexplicably uncomfortable.

Oh, he wouldn't be able to tell at all just from body language. He just can't actually turn off his Companion senses, and Blai doesn't shield against Empathy and is very, very attention-grabbing for Seldan right now. 

(Continuing to not straight-up read his surface thoughts is actually somewhat effortful, now that Seldan has his own shields open for the constant Companion background chatter.) 

Where do you even start with explaining Vanyel? 

...Enara is just going to pull Seldan into rapport and start shoving information and memories at him, that's a lot faster and easier than putting it in words and including Blai, and means she doesn't need to worry about leaving out things that Vanyel might be self-conscious about Blai knowing. 

And a harried-looking Melody has a chance to catch up to them in the barn, which is now reasonably warm thanks to being sheltered from the wind and containing two Companions both radiating body heat at it. 

(She's fine. Really. She was locked in a shielded room for the entire day with no idea what was happening outside, but it was a perfectly comfortable room and they let her have a book. It's no one else's business whether she's still coldly furious and repeatedly stomping on the urge to say "I told you so.") 

:Blai? Oh, good, they did actually let you out as well, I wasn't sure if they'd just stuck you in with Enara. Did you know about Vanyel yet?: 

She notices that there's another Companion with Enara now but doesn't otherwise register it. 

:What about him?:

:He's in Waymeet. Offered to come down here on - a few conditions - that's what I'm needed for.:

Pause. :And my granddaughter sent me a letter. I haven't the faintest idea how she ended up tangled up in all this, she did not explain, but she was with the Mindhealers' station in Waymeet. Anyway, I realized once I opened it that it's more or less just a note from Vanyel, but in my cipher. Reckon they didn't want all of it on the Mindspeech relay just yet.: 

She tugs the note out of her pocket and unfolds it. :I can read it to you and Enara, though, you ought to know.: 

Except for the section which is just a Mindhealing-notation description of VANYEL'S BROKEN COMPANION-BOND. To be clear, the issue isn't including that in a letter; that's what the cipher is actually for, and why she taught it to all her students. The issue is who thought it was a good idea to have a trainee handle that!!! 

The woman is Mindspeaking privately to Enara and Blai and not including Seldan. Which is probably fair, she has no idea who he is. 

Seldan examines the woman for a while before it clicks. Ohhhhh. She's a Mindhealer. That's probably what the yellow trim on her robes means. He really should have made the connection sooner, given what Gift was used to block Blai's magic. It was just not obvious because last he was aware, there were two Mindhealers in the entire kingdom, they weren't even slightly in the Heralds' chain of command and were only loosely affiliated with the Healers' Collegium, and even on the off chance one of them was in Haven rather than out on circuit at the time, everyone would think you were insane if you tried to pull them off their actual duties to handle an interrogation. 

:What are his conditions?:

:That I block his mage-gift. That part was on the relay, I believe it's mainly so he can't be cornered into Final Striking at any problems that come up, but as a side benefit, it should placate anyone who's still worried he's been suborned by Leareth, regardless of whether that even makes sense. And - this is the secret part - that I pass a private message to Herald-Mage Savil asking her to revoke Brightstar's access to the Web, preferably in a way he won't notice if he's elsewhere in Haven.:

Her hands dart to her hair like restless birds. :Fortunately that seems to be redundant, because someone here hasn't been a complete idiot. Savil reported to me that last night, after I woke everyone with the report from questioning you, she couldn't get back to sleep anyway, and decided to go add some of the usual safeguards to our Heartstone. Now it would need the 'signoff' of every active Herald-Mage in Valdemar to modify anything at the level required to destabilize it on purpose. If anything is worth her having to handle today on two candlemarks of sleep, it's that.: 

:........as a third circle spell I can prepare Nap Stack which makes an area in which two hours of sleep is as effective as eight. It requires a - ridiculously expensive pillow - and if no one here can cast it I don't know why anyone would have one, but if someone wanted to sew a ridiculously expensive pillow, which they would not get back afterwards, and there's nothing else I need the slot for tomorrow...: