Savil pours him tea and shoves some toast at him and then doesn't otherwise bother him too much, until half a candlemark later: "We'd better start heading over." 

Abras pours the tea into his face and shoves the toast likewise and nods and follows Savil.

Savil brings him first to a Work Room he hasn't seen before, it's not the big one at the centre of the Palace but it's nearby. Herald Jaysen is waiting for him outside, and nods stiffly. "Trainee Abras." 

"Herald Jaysen."

Jaysen opens the door and jerks his chin at it without saying anything until Abras follows him in. The room has been equipped with a bucket of random objects – at the top, some wooden balls of various sizes. "All right, let's get started. Barrier-shield, please." 

Being able to stop waiting and act is a relief. Center, ground, barrier-shield. As power-efficient as he can make it, because he has no idea how long this test will go or whether he's being tested on efficiency.

Herald Jaysen pelts his shield with a few wooden balls – it's actually a lot easier than Starwind chucking rocks at him. "Next," he says flatly. "Energy-shield..." 

They go through about a dozen different types of shielding, including privacy-barriers against sound and Thoughtsensing, then Jaysen has him demonstrate some offensive spells and wards. All of it is what Starwind would consider 'very basic', and Jaysen's mage-energy attacks are also a lot less powerful, so Abras doesn't need to use as much force. Still, it's a lot of magic in a row, and without being able to tap nodes from inside the Work Room, he'll be kind of tired at the end of it. 

He does all the things, one step at a time, focusing enough on the task of the moment that he doesn't think about anything else. And then it's time for the question and answer bit, right? It would be nice if he could sit down for this bit but no way is he going to ask.

It seems like they do not think it's necessary for him to sit down, or at least no one spontaneously offers it to him. Herald Keiran is running this part; Jaysen drops her off in a random different room in the central wing, and Keiran, who looks kind of bored, asks him a number of questions about the law, division of responsibility between the Heralds and the Guard, how Council votes work, and then five different case studies for scenarios a Herald on circuit might need to deal with. Two involve gnarly diplomatic matters at a border-crossing. 

The stuff that's just memorization he has memorized; the case studies are much harder. He feels simultaneously like he's talking complete nonsense and like he's doing way better than he would be if he had to actually had to talk to the people in the scenarios.

Keiran gives no indication of whether she thinks his answers are good or rubbish or just boring. "That's all," she says after the last one. "You stay here. We're going to discuss." She heads out and leaves the door the room he's in slightly ajar. 

He stays there, and tries to focus on the book he brought, and is filled with dread of at least one of passing or failing. Maybe both. He ends up doing more pacing than reading.

Lancir is the one who comes to collect him. He's smiling slightly. "Well, lad, how do you think you did?" 

Ack, it's the Queen's Own Herald, gotta say some words. This question feels like a trap. If he was a reliable judge of that sort of thing there would be no need for the tests now would there. Words, with mouth, now. "I did my best."

Wider smile. "You did very well and the Senior Circle's vote was to graduate you and give you your Whites now. How do you feel about that?" 

"Nervous. But also glad that I know more than I used to. And that I'll get to do useful work." Glad that his teachers' investment in him paid off. 

Lancir nods. He reaches out to grip Abras' arm. "Congratulations. We're glad to have you." A pause. "...If it's all right, I'd like to speak with you in my office for a bit." 

Oh no he fucked up somewhere. "Sure, of course. Now?"

"If that works for you." Lancir doesn't really wait for a response, just starts walking Abras in the direction of his office. It's a fairly short walk.

Lancir's private office is - messy. He clears a stack of books and papers off a chair and gestures for Abras to sit. "Something to drink?" There's a decanter of well-watered wine on his desk. 

He accepts, but stops at one swallow; his mind really does not need to be working any more slowly right now.

"So, um, what did you want to talk about?"

Lancir looks intently at Abras. His piercing blue eyes are oddly Companion-like. 

"I actually wanted to meet with you in my capacity as a Mindhealer, not as Queen's Own," he says slowly. "You lost a lifebonded partner. That's...a pretty big deal, to go through. I've done some research and I don't think anyone's survived it before, not for longer than a few months. You seem to be holding up surprisingly well, I imagine Yfandes is helping, but – I'm worried, all right? And I want to know how you're doing, so that I can help." 

"Yfandes has been helping a lot. Savil too. It's--I appreciate it, that you want to help." He probably shouldn't lie and say he's doing fine, even if that's what all his instincts are pushing for. 

Lancir nods, sympathy and warmth in his face. "I'm glad. I imagine it must be harder, coming back here. How have you been finding that? I - know it's not easy to talk about, and it might feel embarrassing, but I'm not here to judge you, and it's going to be easier for me to help if I know what's troubling you now." 

Abras realizes that Lancir has noticed the obvious fact that, test scores or no test scores, he doesn't have the emotional stability to be a Herald right now. It's good that he wants to help fix it instead of just being annoyed at him about it. He shouldn't make that harder by trying to pretend the problem doesn't exist.

"It's been. Harder. Yes. A lot of things remind me of--I just need to get used to it."

"It sounds like you're being quite hard on yourself," Lancir says quietly. "It's not your fault that reminders are difficult - it's very understandable. You may 'get used to it' someday, but it's normal for that to take years, and - I honestly don't know how it'll go, your situation is kind of unprecedented." He pauses, sips his drink. "One of the things I can do with my Gift is to block those associations a little, so it's less distracting to you. I think that could help a lot for now."