Leareth waits. He's very confused, which is not usually how he feels around Malduoni. 

"- Well. She is not wrong. And - I had hoped we might speak again, someday, when I knew enough to judge it safe." 

Is he going to say what he could possibly have done? 

"So you will go to her and apologize, then?" 

"If she is willing to come to Azir, that is of course ideal, but if not, I suppose another Gate to the winter palace is not too hard on you." He lets out his breath. "And - I could use a few moments to gather my thoughts." 

Leareth nods, waits respectfully. When Malduoni acknowledges that he's ready, he contacts the pharaoh again to ask if Nefreti Clepati is willing to transport herself to Azir or if she would prefer that Malduoni Gate over to the shielded room in the palace they used before. 

" - a minute before you contacted me she walked right out so I think probably she is willing to transport herself to Azir. Even she will have to leave the Dome first, so you'll have a little time, probably."

"Ah. Thank you. She is - disconcerting, that way." He's relieved not to have to do a Gate; he's very efficient, and he's got a lot of mages across now who are trained in Gates and doing the brunt of the troop transport, but he's still using magic a lot and it adds up. 

"You could say that, yeah."

"Well. Should I contact you to confirm once she has been and gone, here?" 

"Sure. Thank you."

"You are welcome." And he goes to alert Malduoni of this. 

"Of course. I suppose there is no point in going back to our work when we will be interrupted again shortly, so." He sits down. Doesn't make any offer to invite that Leareth do the same, but he doesn't have to. "Tell me. Have you ever had a student of whom you were very proud, and who also frustrated you greatly, and - the tides of events in the worlds pulled you apart..." 

"...Vanyel. A little. Then we - made our own tides, I suppose. Or were doing our best." He can't help but smile. "Though if reality is trying to hint that Vanyel will grow up like Nefreti, I am rather dubious." 

"No, no, I think theirs are still different stories, as it seems Nethys would put it. But - I did miss her. And wondered, sometimes, if I were being very foolish, afraid of my own shadow. I - could not afford to take the risk and be wrong, given the circumstances, and by the time I was strong enough to be difficult to threaten, it had been such a very long time..." 

Nod. Leareth understands what he's pointing at, even if not the exact analogue. 

They wait in comfortable silence, occasionally making asides to each other that would sound very non-sequitur to anyone listening, which no one is because Malduoni's office is EXTREMELY SHIELDED. 

And then there's a knock on the door.

Malduoni rises to let her in. "Nefreti." He does not say 'you've grown' even though this is very tempting.

"Aroden. You know, there is a world, not this one, where I went to Heaven every Fireday to have tea with Iomedae, and Arazni, and Milani, and complain about you."

He closes the door behind her. "No, I did not know that." 

"What were your complaints?" 

She pays Leareth no attention. "In this world I never told anybody. I figured it out when I was twenty-three and I never told anybody. I don't know why. Sometimes it was because it seemed like it'd be such a shame, if they killed you before you got to do anything, if your grand denouement came in some other lifetime, after I die - I'm not old, not yet, but with them forewarned it'd have taken you ages...sometimes it was because you would have been right to fear me, if I told anybody, and were only definitely and decidedly wrong as long as I didn't. Sometimes it was because I loved you, maybe. There are a lot of stories that always take the same route, for different reasons. It feels cheap to me. But I never said a word." 

He ducks his head. 

"- I had hoped I was wrong to fear you. That is by far the better world to be in. I am very grateful that you kept my secret. And - I am sorry. For being wrong. For hurting you when it accomplished nothing. I...could not have taken the risk before I knew for sure. You must know that." A crooked smile. "Of course you know that. It does not exactly seem to have held you back, that I left when I did. I know it means little now, but - I am very proud of you. And you figured it out, too, I am so curious what clued you in. Though of course it would serve me right if you never told me." 

"I know everything. I am a cleric of Nethys. - he chose me for me. It had absolutely nothing at all to do with you."

"Of course. You deserve each other. I hear you levelled the temple once." 

"I invented a new ninth-level spell! The way you do it - I wish you'd told me you were cheating, I wouldn't have been so angry with myself for needing so many tries to get them all to work."