"The one scared of the dark? - bit late for him to be just starting his shift if he's scared of the dark."

"And pretty weird to sleep with a candle on a ship no matter how scared you are."

"It was a candle? That's even weirder than if he had a magic light and left it on because he might as well. Fire hazard, cargo space."

"Yeah." Frown.

"I don't have a normal sounding guess. Abnormal sounding guesses - his shipmates tolerate this because he has some indispensable ability. Candle is in fact magic, safe, reusable, etcetera, and just looks like a candle for aesthetic reasons. His girlfriend has a crystal ball and likes to watch him sleep. He has some oddball magic that involves waking up in the middle of the night with useful dreams he has to write down right away before he forgets them. He is a quarter some nocturnal species and can't sleep in the dark. The idea is that if someone storms the ship the candle gets knocked over on no prep time and ignites a keg of explosives and they all wake up in a temple with their benefactors with the evidence sunk to the bottom of the sea."

" - not impossible."

"- a girlfriend looking in with a crystal ball - if he's expecting to be scried on and doesn't know when -"

"- right, yeah, it wouldn't have to be a girlfriend, it could be anybody."

"There wasn't a note laid out next to the candle or anything but could be that the clothes he had laid out meant something."

"Or that they can wake him up with a message through the scry."

Nod. 

"Did the Osirian government have marching orders for you, Fazil -"

"The answer was just 'acknowledged', which is pretty typical, they'll presumably have to inform someone who can decide what to do."

"We can't be conscripted if there's not an actual war."

"I find it hard to imagine we'd get orders I didn't wholeheartedly approve of. They'll want to prevent a war in the Inner Sea, and so do we."

"I'm all for preventing wars on the Inner Sea but supposing your orders somehow result in us needing to part ways what becomes of the magic carpet while we are over the sea?"

"You might have to stick with us until we reach land but that's only a couple hours. I guess you could sneak aboard the ship if you'd rather."

"I was wondering about the case where you are ordered to do something that continues to be over the sea for more than a couple hours, if you'd be recalled straight home no problem."

"I'd be really surprised if they asked us to stay out here with a Sending's worth of instruction doing something weird enough that we'd reasonably have reservations."

"Fair enough."

"I'm not going back to Sothis to be talked to by politicians."

"We can store the two of you in Mahdi's purse."

"I don't mind talking to politicians, or potentially even doing jobs for 'em, I just don't want to be drafted!"

"I don't think you can be, you're not Osirian. - Hagan can."

"Only if they catch me."