Scyelen has no idea how to respond to that, so she just continues on her way to go blow up random rocks.

Meanwhile, back the other way, the secretary Miss Vaux is watching them from the shadow of the tower.

Raafi spots her and gives an acknowledging nod, but continues toward the door.

Miss Vaux intercepts him, and falls into step beside him.

"Raafi," she greets, with a much less formal air than she had previously.

"Hey. Everything all right?"

"You tell me."

"I'm new here, so I hadn't actually met Scyelen before. But now that I have... that girl carries around a cloud of shame thick enough to drown a kracken. It's obvious, if you know to look for it."

"Mmhmm," he nods. "There's more to it than the magic issue but I haven't figured out what, yet, I'm still feeling out the shape of things. Hopefully I'll be able to do something; I'm out of my depth but only by a little bit, I think."

"Why is the obvious answer always the last thing everyone else thinks of?" she asks in a rhetorical tone. She chuckles and gives Raafi a piercing look. "Tell me, has she forgiven you yet for the way you humiliated her back there in the headmaster's office?"

"We talked about it, I think we have an understanding. I wouldn't've described it as her forgiving me, though. I'm - trying not to let this turn into the sort of relationship she thinks it'll be; I know she doesn't like that but... I'm not sure it's workable, to try to do it that way. For either of us, maybe, in the long run, but definitely not for me now."

"So you weren't ignorant of what you were doing to her. I can work with that. What kind of relationship do you think she thinks it'll be?"

"All I agreed to was letting her finish the ritual, staying around long enough to learn how things work in this world, and trying to stay out of legal trouble. But she seems to think that I ought to act like any other familiar."

She shakes her head and chuckles. "That poor girl. No, believe me, if that's what she thought you'd have punched her in the face and fled the country by now. You have to appreciate just how much of a mindfuck you are to these people. A noble familiar? You are an irreconcilable contradiction."

She gives him another piercing look. "Or, so they think. But you're not actually noble, are you. It's nearly as obvious as Scyelen's aura of shame; its just that everyone else around here has their head so far up Brimir's ass that the idea of a human magic-user not of noble blood would break their brittle little brains. Lucky you."

That gets a chuckle. "How'd you notice? I think I do a pretty good impression of one, at least when I'm trying."

"I suspect everyone of everything," she admits, without admitting anything. "Let's talk about Scyelen. Do you, in fact, want to do right by her?"

"I don't know her well enough to give a full answer to that, yet. I prefer it to not, all else equal, so far. I'm not sure which things will or won't end up being more important than that."

"Reasonable of you."

They make a turn, climb a flight of stairs.

"But I wasn't talking about being the left hand of god. I was talking about the reason Scyelen hates herself."

"I don't expect to end up answering those questions differently."

"Is that a no? You don't want to know what's wrong with her?"

"I've been curious. I don't think I'll misuse that information, if it doesn't otherwise affect me; I don't want to hurt her; if there's a problem that bad I'll just leave. I don't know if I'll use it the way she'd want me to."

"Alright. Has she said anything to you about it, herself?"

"A little, nothing very clear." He thinks about it for a moment, pauses as comprehension dawns on his face, glances around to make sure they have privacy - "she's kinky, isn't she."

That gets a smile. "That would be my first guess, yes. That brand of shame is practically a signature. And it would fit with some of the anecdotes I've heard about her from Kirche."

She gives him a look. "It's probably worse than you're thinking, even. They don't really have the concept of kink in Tristainian culture, and Scyelen doesn't strike me as the kind of personality that would like being subversive even if they did."

"She really isn't, no. Well, at home I'd pass her off to the experts, but here... I'll have to think about how to raise the subject, if you're leaving it to me. If I'm even around that long; it doesn't seem like it'd help anything for me to leave in the middle. But I'll have some useful things to say if we get it out in the open."

"I'd help her myself if that wouldn't interfere with... stuff. But if you need advice, please do come find me. A beautiful deviancy like hers deserves to be nurtured."

"Certainly. And I ought to explain to you how my sort of magic works, sometime. At home I think you'd have it already."