"Oh! I was confused about that too, until this morning when Vanyel told me I was being an idiot and I realized there's exactly one category of social interaction I'm vulnerable to being an idiot about. I have romantic feelings about you. I don't think we should do anything about them but it's annoying being confused and it's probably similarly annoying for you, because I think you do, too, and were missing them for all of the same reasons."

"...Really?" He's certainly been very confused about something but Leareth would not in a thousand years have named it as that. "I - I had not thought that was - a shape of feeling I could have..." 

"Well, I can't read your mind, but the thing that's been bothering me all week is - a sense that something is terribly wrong if there's distance between us even if it's of a kind that objectively doesn't get in the ways of our goals much if at all, and that it's more satisfying to accomplish things if you specifically will be impressed by them even if they're not things I need you for, and a bunch of other things in that genre where I was assigning salience weirdly, and then I was so incredibly thrown off by your murder and am still so upset about it, and so that's what's going on on my end, at least, and usually what is going on when I'm as confused about an interpersonal thing as I've been lately."

Actually, that does seem to make more sense of some of what he's been feeling. Leareth closes his eyes, his head still resting on Khemet's shoulder.

"I - I was feeling as though I had lost something so precious, with this happening, that was related to how you were around me, I could not figure out what it was. Just - you were happy before and then you were - not - and it did not seem I ought have much right to have opinions about that but it bothered me so much. And I - wanted you to talk to me but it felt unreasonable to - place more demands on your time... I was very pleased when you asked me to come here." 

"I felt like - I'd promised you something and if I couldn't do it, then I had no right to - try to make you believe that I could - if liking me was going to be a disadvantage then I shouldn't try to - and  making you like me is very tempting and very challenging and very satisfying and feels so intrinsically worthwhile, but none of that is for reasons that are related to whether I can keep you safe -

Vanyel said that whether or not I should have made you like me I did, and I was just going to hurt you if I tried to back off on it now. Which - isn't want I wanted at all - but I also want you to hold out for somewhere where you'll actually feel safe and be right about it -"

"I do like you. It - hurt, when it felt like there had to be distance between us." Noticing that explicitly is clarifying some of the pain he's been in, recently, and why it's better now; it's not just the fear and feeling unsafe, or the grief and anger with himself at losing his immortality setup after eighteen hundred goddamned years of being careful enough. "I - do not think we need to lose that, I think that is a separate thing from - whether I expect to be safe in your palace. But–" and this part does still ache, "but I do want - that - I had not realized until now how badly." 

"Couldn't've happened in the Dome, summoning doesn't work and also we ask everyone who enters to confirm under a truth spell that they don't intend to harm anyone while they're there. I could've used the Dome for operations, it just - it just would have made it harder to make you feel at ease in the first place and I guess I prioritized that over actually keeping you safe."

"That makes sense."

Leareth shifts a little, lifts his head so he can look Khemet in the eye. It continues to be weirdly hard to talk about what he's feeling here, but he pushes through.

"It - would have made it harder at first, I think, when I was not sure if you were on my - our - side, and so being less able to operate on my own there was uncomfortable. I - think that need not be true, now. You have given some very emphatic and costly indications that you are aligned with my goals and - that you care about me, as an individual, which is - not even something I would have been tracking, before." 

- nod. "Then I think we should operate from the Dome. And I will tell Abadar that even if His usual decision procedures allow for one assassination in the palace per two centuries because this is a perfectly reasonable rate of assassinations, I am a fragile human with fragile human emotional needs and cannot handle another one in the next decade and He should adjust accordingly. And the magical researchers can teach you how to cast through the distortion, it's possible, just takes some practice."

"That is a reasonable plan, I think." Leareth puts his head back down on Khemet's shoulder. For some reason he feels suddenly exhausted again, not physically but in some other way. "It - is not in fact irretrievable or even that costly if I am assassinated again, as long as I can be resurrected, but - I am nonetheless unreasonable scared of this happening." Every time he thinks about it, it feels like the ground sliding out from under his feet. "I think I am still very shaken about what happened, especially losing the immortality setup after all this time. I will probably be more reasonable and calm about it in a week's time." 

Hug. "I am not sure that being very distressed about it is unreasonable! But giving it time makes sense. And ...it seems possible that retaliating will help your mood. I think it will help mine."

"Perhaps. I think to the extent it makes it less likely that this will ever happen again, it will help a great deal." He's shivering again, though. "I - think - right now it is not harming my goals to be very sad, and - I am very glad you are here. Parmida thought I was underhugged and perhaps she had a point." 

"I'm surprised Aroden made - having a wife - work for that. I can't seem to, quite. But - I'm glad I can be here." Hug.

Hug. 

"They are both very convinced I need a wife. Though it - does seem hard to replicate the thing that they have. I am not sure how Aroden did it." 

"I selected really aggressively! All of my wives are exceptionally intelligent and capable people. And I still don't have - that. I don't know why not."

"...Do you have romantic feelings for them? That might be relevant. I had noticed that in Osirion, the assumption seems to be that everyone can have romantic feelings for both sexes, but that is not assumed in most of Velgarth - I know Vanyel is only attracted to men and this has caused him difficulties." 

"No, I don't. It seems kind of stupid to not have romantic feelings about someone just because they're a woman, though. And I don't think that can be all of it. ...I guess it might be a big part of it."

"It - does feel as though romantic feelings ought not be necessary for closeness and trust in general, but - also I have observed this to very frequently correlate. For other people."

The concept still feels like some sort of categorization error when applied to himself, but he isn't sure if that's right. He tries to poke at it, untangling the muddy-feeling knot of emotion. "I...have not for a long time felt I could be close to people, I think. Not only because it made me vulnerable, but - for their sake, because I did not care to make them targets of the gods alongside myself. - And I suppose it was relevant that everyone else in my world dies, sooner or later, and not in a way where afterward one can Plane Shift to the afterlife to visit them. I did not think there was much chance the Velgarth gods would allow me to set up immortality for another person, and - it would have risked giving away too much about my own method." 

"That would - hurt me very badly, trying not to be close to people."

"I think it would be very bad for most people. It - was probably not good for me, but, caring about people and losing them was worse–" His breath catches a little. "I miss Urtho so badly. I would find it difficult to bear missing fifty people that much. Even though I thought that perhaps someday I could bring them back - it was still going to be such a long fight..." 

Nod. "Well. People here won't be lost forever even if you do nothing about it."

"And it is very unlikely that anything bad will happen to you in the next few decades because you are extremely capable and also chosen by Abadar as pharaoh. I - think perhaps that felt important to me."

Leareth closes his eyes. He's so inexplicably tired. Maybe not inexplicably. Letting himself experience all his emotions fully is - a lot. 

He leans in and holds him. "It's very unlikely that anything bad will happen to me. I can look out for myself even against your world's gods, as long as Abadar's helping."

"Mmm." 

Leareth is relaxed and comfortable and warm, and this is Abadar's divine realm where nothing Abadar doesn't approve of will happen, to either of them, and he's leaning into the feeling-safe because it takes the pressure off the part of him that hurts - 

- and the result is that, quite suddenly and without exactly meaning to, he falls asleep. 

Huh. He just lets him sleep on his shoulder, for a little while - he has a Ring of Sustenance and probably won't be asleep very long -

- though he talked to Abadar a bunch recently and probably it's exhausting to be murdered -

- if he doesn't wake up after a little while he will move him over to the bed in the other room, but he's not in a particular hurry about it.