"I think it went okay? The new girls all seemed to think he was a normal sort of pharaoh, anyhow."

"Oh good. That's - good."

"Is that why you were gone - he wanted you while he got ready for it -"

"Yeah. Or, well, sort of he was too depressed to leave his bed and I had to see if I could help him get back up to - not that - but, yeah, basically."

"Well, you did really well." 

"That's good to hear. I guess. I'm - not sure what happens now, really, but I guess I just have to wait and see."

"- was he lying at the dinner, about the baby -"

"Hm?"

"- the pharaoh said you were expecting. At the dinner."

" - oh.

"Seems really unlikely."

Nod. Hug. 

Hug.

"I guess he probably won't need to spend much time worrying about having lied. Lotsa people miscarry."

"Yeah. And in a couple of months things'll be stabler and maybe it'll be true and not too many people will be consulting a calendar to check if it all checks out. I think. 'm sorry, though."

"Yeah. Maybe."

"It'll get easier. I think. It does for most people."

She looks kind of upset about this? And then remembers that Zakiya is probably talking about, like, sex, specifically, and maybe not the part where most of the time she spends around her husband is terrible and draining.

"...yeah. Probably."

"Is there anyone you want to - write to, or anything..."

"...I don't really know anyone? Fazil, I guess. I dunno what Fazil can really do about anything, though. I guess I was supposed to see the clerics about stuff again, at some point? But - I dunno. I don't super expect them to be a ton of help at this point."

Nod.

Sigh.

" - I should do something, before he calls me back. Just - can't think of anything I actually want to do. I should talk to Verita, probably, haven't talked to her in - gods, almost since we got here - "

"Would you like me to go look for her?"

" - yeah. Probably. That's - thank you."

"Of course." She heads off to do that.

She sits on her bed and tries to - think.

Hagan's fine. He's not mad right now. She doesn't immediately have to fix anything right now. The only real problem is that she's incredibly tired, and doesn't really know what to do about this, and can't so much go to Hagan for help about this because asking Hagan for anything is pretty fraught. Probably there are some things she can ask for that will make things actively better, but she has to be able to think about that, and maybe think about how to frame the requests, and right now she doesn't really feel like she has enough energy to reliably figure this out.

She prestidigitates a little one-armed Hagan figurine. She misjudges how much force it can take, and it shatters into dust.

She flops back onto her bed.

Verita has found a semi-secluded corner of the palace and is silently reading a book about magic, occasionally stopping to practice one of her cantrips.