"I think it'd be different if we were clearly being attacked by the, er, 'supervillain' who he's already investigating." 

"Hmm. Randi?" 

Randi pinches the bridge of his nose. 

After nearly a minute of silence, he sighs heavily. "Before we do anything else, I want Vanyel back here." 

"But he's–" 

"I'm aware we were hoping to give him a break. But I want him here. I need his advice." 

Savil sighs as well. "...And we probably shouldn't ask Cam to bring him over, if Leareth has spies in Haven - he grabbed the drone-thing somehow, we can't take the risk of him grabbing Cam." 

"I know. I don't want to ask him to Gate either, but..." Shrug. "If you warn him with the communication-spell, and then raise the Gate from this end, it shouldn't knock him out too hard, no?" 

"I know, I know. I don't like it either, I wish we didn't have to ask it of him, but... I need him." 

"I'll pass the message along to him." 

Vanyel, when he gets the message from Savil, is alternately pacing around the Vale and sitting hunched in one of the hammocks, memorizing the summoning and dismissal instructions that Cam left for him.

And worrying. 

Cam won't tell him what's going on. Moondance heard a little more, but he seems oddly reluctant to talk about it with Vanyel. Yfandes is being weirdly cagey too. And to make matters even worse, his mind bounces away when he tries to think about his own (probable but mostly-forgotten) conversation with the Star-Eyed Goddess, years ago now. 

- to be fair, Vanyel has to admit that he's also being secretive. He could be telling Cam a lot more about Leareth, and he's not sure why he can't bring himself to. He's also not sure if Cam - assuming he at some point learned Leareth's name - will remember that Vanyel, much earlier, asked if he had ever heard the name. In which case Cam will presumably guess that Vanyel knows a lot more than he's saying... 

He doesn't know how to think about it - about any of it. Why Vkandis apparently tried to set Cam on fire. What the priest Saw. Why the Goddess was interested in talking to Cam in the first place. 

He's scared, and he doesn't even know what he's scared of. 

Compared to that, being asked to urgently Gate back to Haven is almost a relief. At least it'll be a distraction. 

And, while all of that is happening, Princess Karis is sitting alone in her guest room, hugging her knees, wishing someone would just tell her already what's going on right now. King Randale and the other Heralds are clearly stressed about something - Randi left in the middle of a planning session with her - but it sounds like the King is currently ensconced in a tiny private meeting, excluding not just her but most of the Senior Circle. 

She HATES feeling left in the dark. 

...And then a sudden noise wrenches her out of her pointless fuming, and she twists around, reaching for the sheathed knife that she always wears now, despite the guards outside her door - 

:Karis: 

Karis nearly jumps out of her skin. 

"Ack– what are you– oh, are you a - a -" It doesn't seem possible. 

:I am a Suncat, yes. And I am here for you, to offer guidance: The cat stretches, then sidles over to the bed and rests her head on Karis' lap. :You have travelled such a long way. You have been very brave - and the need for courage is not passed, there will be difficult work ahead - but it is all right to be afraid: 

Karis hasn't spoken to anyone about her feelings in months. Mostly she's tried not to notice that she was having them. But she is afraid - and lonely, and tired, and she misses her family so much... 

She bends over and rests her cheek against the cat's silky fur. :I am not sure if I can be good enough. For what my Sunlord will need of me: 

:You can, child. You will be: 

Leareth is currently spending an exorbitant amount of his mages' time and energy on using his ward system to watch Valdemar closely, focusing especially on Haven, and about ten seconds after Savil's Gate to k'Treva starts to go up, he knows about it. 

He would have preferred a little longer for books to be brought in - he's still waiting on a more complete set of weather-reference maps covering the far south - but timing his own underground-and-shielded Gate for while a second, bigger Gate is active will make it much harder for the Web to detect. 

He raises a very small un-scaffolded Gate, just wide enough to drop a satchel of books through, with the other end anchored on the map-location of the underground saferoom, his knowledge of the magical shields - which he laid himself, but two lifetimes ago - and very hazy Farsight image relayed from his agent on site. Almost no one in the world would be able to Gate from that alone, but Leareth is unusual. 

He doesn't quite hit the mailbox, though; the satchel of books plops to the ground beside it. 

When Cam notices this he has a drone pick up the package and the other drone open the mailbox for it. He already has copies, though.

The promised books are there - a detailed guide to weather magic on this continent, and an impressively thorough address book for several hundred minor temple orders that run orphanages and such in various countries - and there are some bonus books as well! One about magically-genetically-engineering crops for higher yields, several describing ideas for public health initiatives. 

Leareth's agent waits for a reply. 

Thanks! says the next response. It comes with a salted caramel but he expects it to be ignored.

He locates the competent minor temple orders and drops care packages on their doorsteps.

While he does this, Vanyel is sitting in a meeting-room with the King, the King's Own, and Savil. (Also Shavri, but she's not participating much.) Hands wrapped around a cup of willowbark tea, he tries not to shiver or grimace visibly. He hates Gating. 

"He hasn't done anything hostile to us, though?" Vanyel asks, once Randi finishes catching him up on what little the Heralds know. 

"Stealing Cam's technology is pretty hostile! Don't you think?" 

Vanyel shrugs uncomfortably. 

In the privacy of his own head, he's thinking that the Leareth he knows must be dying of curiosity. He's almost certainly heard spy-reports of Cam's food dropoffs, by now, and of course he would be desperate to know HOW Cam is accomplishing this - and grabbing a drone to study is one avenue for him to get answers. It's not like he has many other avenues. 

But Randi and the others don't know about the conversations; to them, Leareth is just another warlord blood-mage building himself a pocket empire. Taver knows, but many years ago he advised against even telling Lancir - and right now Yfandes is being stonily silent in the back of Vanyel's mind, and Taver hasn't said anything to clarify what he should do, and Vanyel can't THINK because his head is pounding violently after the Gate. 

Randi rubs his forehead. "It's not fair to Cam to leave him working in ignorance when we could share what we know with him. Right?"