Spontaneous hugs are a surprising response to being asked a favor, but as surprises go it's a pretty good one. "Great, thanks. And, um, I'd be happy to help out with your research at some point if you run into anything that would be easier with Mage-Gift."

"Really? That would be neat if I can think of anything, I'll see!" Shavri beams at him some more and then runs off to greet Mardic and Donni. 

It's finally starting to sink in that he graduated, that he's learned a lot and earned the chance to do important things with it.

(And Tylendel should be here to share it with him, should be reminiscing about his own graduation tests months ago, should be alive and laughing and happy and not DEAD)

He goes over to where Lissa is standing and tries to focus on the present rather than the past and what might have been. "How long are you in Haven for again?"

"Just a few more days, unfortunately. I'd love to take you out to town to celebrate, though. We could go to a tavern or something, it'd be fun, right?" 

Going to a tavern sounds like a pretty miserable time, actually. Too much noise and people to relax, but not enough actually happening to be absorbing. "Maybe if we can find one quiet enough to talk in? You can tell me all about what you've been doing with the Guard."

"Sure. Might be boring for you, though, mostly doing lots of drilling and learning about tactics a bit." She makes a face. "I didn't realize how much Lord Corey would want me to learn from books. I'm no good at that, not like you. Though Seldasen on tactics is all right." 

"That's kind of ironic; they're mostly having me learn from watching demonstrations. But Seldasen is good, yeah. Very clear explanations, and you get the sense he thinks really clearly too."

Lissa nods. "Demonstrations make sense for magic, I'd think. For actual fighting techniques I mostly learn it that way, it's just that Lord Corey decided I'm officer material and says I'll make captain within five years." She makes a face. "I don't know that I'm even any good at the higher-level strategic things, but I guess he thinks I've got it in me to learn." 

"I bet you'll turn out to be amazing at it," he says sincerely. Military command is worth being nervous about, but Lissa has never been scared of anything.

"I hope so." She bounces on her heels a bit. "...I'm getting more wine, can I get you some too?" 

"Hmmm . . .sure. More water in mine than in yours, please."

Lissa gives him a slightly dubious look, but nods and heads off to the sideboard. 

Savil drifts over. :Doing all right, ke'chara? I know you've had a long day: 

:I think I might be pretending to be able to enjoy the party by mimicking everyone else doing it, but I've got myself fooled too? I'm having a good time but as soon as everyone else leaves I'm going to fall asleep. Maybe sooner.:

That gets him a slightly concerned look. :You don't have to stay. I think everyone's excited at the excuse for a party and getting to see each other, but if you're tired, you should get some sleep: 

:. . . Thanks. Sorry for ducking out of my own party early. I do appreciate you throwing it.: He makes his apologies to Lissa and the others and goes back to his own room to collapse.

Yfandes is immediately there, hovering nearby (mentally speaking, physically she's cozy in the stables) and sending affection along their bond without intruding too much.

The part of Abras that needs to not be around people decided long ago that Yfandes doesn't count; he's immediately both less crowded and less lonely. He sends affection back at her as he falls asleep. 

And Yfandes will be there again in the morning, whenever he's awake. 

Which is good, because his lessons don't start for a couple days and he's kind of at loose ends. He can go to the library, and try out the obstacle course with Yfandes, and get food at the cafeteria, but he can't do any one thing for very long. Sooner or later (usually sooner) the memories catch up to him, and it becomes obvious how incapable anything is of being okay, and he circles back to hiding in his room, trying not to cry with mixed success.

Fortunately, late on the second day Savil hunts him down and gives him his new schedule. He'll be doing the Mindspeech relay with Herald Tantras first thing every morning, and usually a block of routine mage-work in the afternoons, and three days a week he has some kind of lesson – Healing, Bardic, and continuing to learn magic with Savil. He's also on call for emergency magic and for Farsight checkpoints as needed. 

Having something useful to do first thing in the morning is helpful for having a reason to get out of bed. And he's vaguely curious about what the traffic over the Mindspeech relay generally looks like, though it's probably mostly routine stuff. He's a bit worried about what he'll do if he gets called for emergency magic during a hiding-in-his-room period, but he's too embarrassed to bring this up to anyone and risk it sounding like he's asking for lighter duties.

The next morning, Yfandes can poke him if he's not already awake at the time he has to get up in order to make it to the relay room on time. 

Good news: he's already awake. Bad news: it's because he woke up from a nightmare about wyrsa an hour ago and has been up since and definitely needs a poke to get out of bed. He slouches to the cafeteria for some bread and cheese to eat on the way, and is feeling marginally more human by the time he gets to the relay room. Five minutes late and apologetic about it, because he needed to detour around a courtyard he spent too much time with Tylendel in.

Herald Tantras is there already, and seems weirdly delighted to see him. "Abras! Sorry about the early start, but I'm really delighted they've assigned you as well, it'll be so much less boring. Tea?" He has a pot steeping on the table. "Here, let me show you the relay book..." 

It has a page with today's date on it and a number of short messages, in various different people's handwriting, each titled with a point of origin and a destination. Most are, in fact, pretty boring. Herald A on one circuit wants Herald B a few circuits over to know about an unusually high rate of Pelagirs incursions along the northwest border. Soap is in short supply in the southeast because the landholding that makes and sells most of the soap had half of their livestock die of pox, pass it on to any merchants who want to make a killing. There are also announcements originating from Haven that need to be sent down every leg of the relay.

Next to the book, Tran has a map that shows the relay stations and the names of the Heralds assigned to them. He seems to consider both the book and the map to be self-evident, and doesn't offer any explanation unless Abras asks.