"Huh. Are we answering these or saving them for when we are bored."

"I am hardly desperately bored yet, but I do still like talking to you? And it will help break up the day a little more. You could just tell me about the magic you were working on, though, if you want." 

"I'm making another copy of my shirt, which makes the wearer considerably more powerful - for a wizard like they were two circles stronger, I don't know what it'd do for a Velgarth mage, but once I've finished it we can find out - and does magical defenses, and also can kidnap people to an extradimensional maze for ten minutes once a day. 

My father was a merchant in Corentyn. My mother used to be one too but the years before she died she had actually switched to writing advice for people getting into merchant venture funding. I had a sister three years younger than me and a half-brother eight years older. Sister was in the army too. Brother was going to inherit my father's company."

"Your shirt can kidnap people?" Ma'ar looks amazed. "...Wow." He shakes his head. "And, I should have thought of a different question, I suppose, since my answer is not especially interesting. I - have not had a family for a long time. Both of my parents were dead by the time I was thirteen." 

Nod. Offering people condolences on their parents' deaths is an odd thing to do, it's sort of implying that they cared for them more than is strictly decent, but - "do you want to resurrect them, someday? If we figure out a way?"

"- What?" Ma'ar's shoulders twitch, and he lifts his head to look at her; something in his expression is suddenly wide-open, naked, like a window unshuttered and flung wide in front of her for the first time. "I...never thought about that. Since it is not as though I could muster the resources for it myself." 

"I don't know what it takes to make it possible on your world at all. But once it's possible - 's just a big diamond. Apparently Vanyel makes them."

"I did hear that. There are - probably more important people to bring back, is what I think Leareth would say about it."

"I would expect him to be nicer than that but you're the, uh, him."

"I keep trying to tell you that I am strategic, not 'nice.'" 

He looks kind of unhappy about it, though, in a confused distant way. 

"I am aware that Mhalir personally tortured a guy for twenty years because it was a useful body to be able to wear! I just - every occasion I can think of that he, or Aroden, erred, it was on the side of - giving people things they needed or wanted to be more independent, even if they weren't likely to pursue Aroden's or Mhalir's goals, even if they were opposed to them - and I would've expected that Leareth would resurrect your parents, if you wanted, and - I can stop calling it nice, if you want, but there's something there."

"Mmm, maybe." 

Ma'ar mostly just looks very tired, now. 

"- sorry."

"You did not say anything wrong. I am just - pointlessly sad about very many things, right now." 

- hug?

Ma'ar will accept a hug, and lean on her shoulder. He's still very quiet. 

Probably she screwed up somehow but he's going to have to clarify how because she doesn't really have a guess. She is going to stop trying to convince him he's nice, though.

Ma'ar is not currently thinking about this at all. He has no idea if she said anything wrong and if so what and that doesn't really feel like the point. 

After a couple of minutes, he takes a deep breath and tugs free. "I had better go back to navigating." 

It's something of a relief, knowing that Ma'ar and Carissa are safely out and their arrival and departure seems to have gone unnoticed, but Leareth is still finding it almost impossible to relax, even when he knows he needs to.

He's seriously considering visiting Khemet again and offering to spend an evening tied up in Khemet's personal magic-blocking demiplane, just to have a few hours of not. making. decisions. However, there's a lot to do and some of it is time-sensitive and he doesn't actually feel caught up, yet. 

As discussed, he checks in unobtrusively with the network of agents and spies he inherited from Aroden, to get a sense of whether anyone has noticed that anything at all unusual is going on in Cheliax, even if it's just unrelated-seeming rumours. 

Most people haven't heard anything. A few have. There've been a lot of meetings rescheduled and projects delayed since Ma'ar and Urtho came back with a story about a distant ghost in the Void, and some parties (probably Asmodeus, but not directly or openly, not anymore) desperately want to know what's going on. There might be someone on the palace staff reporting to them. 

There are almost certainly people on the palace staff reporting to Asmodeus, or to agents who report to other agents who, far enough down the chain to be plausibly deniable, let things slip to Him. And if other parties get curious enough, which might already be happening, they could be willing to take more risks. 

...Increasing the palace security is a tradeoff, of course, because if they do it in a visible, way, that's its own kind of information leak. 

Leareth thinks about it from as many angles as he can, and talks to Aroden, and then decides not to make any obvious changes to their staff screenings.

He does, however, quietly inform every Velgarth Thoughtsenser who incidentally spends any time in the palace that he would like them to start reading everyone's mind that they can manage, as a matter of course. 

Vanyel is one of the strongest Thoughtsensers. Also he haaaaaaaaaates doing this so so so much. He can't disagree with Leareth about the stakes, though. And he's keyed to the shields on his usual Work Room, and can skim surface thoughts without appearing to do anything out of the ordinary, during the mandatory rest breaks he has to take anyway. 

Yfandes is also a strong Thoughtsenser! And the palace staff are used to her being around the gardens; she can pick up a lot without changing her routine in any way. 

This turns up one person who is sending information on Leareth's movements to Taldor for a lot of money, and nothing more suspicious than that.

They are not going to do anything about that person. Knowing who it is means they can do some nudges to make sure he hears about perfectly ordinary unsuspicious Leareth-movements. 

It's not like there's all that much to do, right now, except wait for the Yeerk-Andalite force to return. And even then, Leareth isn't personally the one with any experience commanding spaceships in battle; Aroden is leading on developing their various plans. 

Going to meetings and signing off on infrastructure plans as though everything is normal is hard, but Leareth has many, many years of practice at operating under pressure, and it's not like his usual demeanour is very expressive. He can manage. 

It's draining, though, and by evening he's reliably too exhausted to do anything except complain to Carissa.