Eventually he asks if she has any updates on her microbe research. 

"I've been doing basic research type stuff. I don't need a whole lot of my brain to be behaving in order to look at a microbe or a cell from a bigger living thing for a while and write down what it's doing and draw a picture of it till it dies or I need a rest."

"I would like to see your pictures but I am guessing you did not bring them from Rethwellan." 

"No. I had a bag packed, if you came back and wanted me right away I wanted to be able to hurry, but I didn't keep all my sketches and my microbe-spying notes in it."

"Well, we can figure out how to bring your things over from Petras, I think." 

"Yeah. My assistant knew I might want everything packed up and shipped off."

"I can send someone to arrange that, then." 

Nod. "Rana knows too. I moved back in with her."

"Right. ...I hope she took good care of you while I was not here. I was hoping I could take good care of you once I was back but the part where we are not even lifebonded again makes this hard." 

"Rana looked out for me. And Amshalan."

"I am very glad you had Amshalan. I have not tended to approve of the Companions but she is a very good one." 

"The very best."

"Well, she would have to be, since you are great." 

"I love you."

"I love you too." He cuddles up against her, wishing he were a more reasonable size. 

"...I wish I understood what the various gods here were thinking," he says eventually. "It is very concerning, not knowing." 

"Apparently talking to them doesn't even help that much. Did you know Vanyel could do that?"

"I think he mentioned once that he had spoken to the Shadow-Lover before? It did not occur to me that he could do it on purpose, much less that he would do so for these circumstances. Probably it should have, though." 

"Well. It was very kind of him."

"He was definitely going above and beyond to be helpful, and he was claiming in the letter he sent me after Savil's letter that it was not very risky for him, since the Shadow-Lover always sends him back. I am a little dubious of this but at least he ended up being fine." 

"Well. He knows what it's like, I guess."

"True." Sigh. He hugs her. 

Hug hug hug. She checks him over with Healing, though he's had weeks to be looked over by his own people.

He's doing all right physically at this point, though he's clearly inherited a body that wasn't previously in the best condition, and he's still trying to catch up on eating enough. 

Poor Essi. She doesn't say that. She pets his hair.

Leareth is kind of thinking it too, but doesn't say anything either. He half-dozes for a while; he seems to need a lot of sleep in this body, right now. Maybe mostly from the sleep deprivation he accumulated while traveling alone and in secret. 

"Do you feel anything different?" he murmurs finally. "With the lifebond? I - do not think I can feel anything."