Emril immediately puts down her book. "You're awake. How are you feeling? Do you need anything - should I get Leareth -" 

"Um, isn't it - the middle of the night right now? Please don't wake Leareth. I'm just– listen, I'm not going to try - that - again, you don't need to stress about it all night. ...I could use a drink of water." 

"Oh. Yes, of course." She gets him a glass of water, and helps him sit up so he can sip from it. 

Vanyel is not an invalid and would be entirely capable of sitting up by himself, but he just sighs and doesn't protest; there's never any point in telling Healers not to mother-hen you, it's just what they're like. 

While he's awake, would he be up for eating something as well? He's clearly not been feeding himself enough in the last few days. 

Vanyel grits his teeth and reminds himself not to snap at the poor Healer and consents to eat a bowl of soup.

And then very pointedly lies down and pulls the blankets up to his chin and turns the other way. 

Emril is capable of taking hints. 

It takes Vanyel a long time to fall asleep again. 

He doesn't dream. 

Yfandes paces. Breaks into a canter, eventually, up and down and up and down and up and down the same section of road; she doesn't want to worry the paladins by running off. 

Everything hurts. She's so tired and confused and none of the concepts feel real anymore and she doesn't know what anything means. If it means anything at all. Maybe it just doesn't. 

The moon rises, and sets. 

...The eastern horizon is just barely starting to lighten by the time she finally slows to a halt, lathered, flanks heaving. She stands, frozen on the spot, staring up at the stars. 

Lights in the world. 

Worth saving. 

Too late for some. 

Not too late for all - 

Leareth's words. Words that comforted her Chosen, when he was so incredibly alone. 

She can't move. Everything is sideways and inside out and nameless and broken and the only thing she knows, anymore, the only thing that still feels real, is - is what's in front of her, what's all around her. No direction - no right answers - 

She's so lonely. 

Ignasi brings her apples and combs her with a polished wooden brush.

After a while, she lifts her head. 

:- How do you - live in the world, just - not knowing, if you're doing the right thing - if anything will be all right -: 

- well, we hope to win, but it doesn't have to end well to have been worth beginning, and it's - not hard to do a good thing - to be good to a person in front of you, once - to ask who needs help, and give it - and you don't have to have the whole route planned to start...

:...It feels hard. All - of this. The war. Helping Leareth. It's - some things are simple and clear but some things are just...messy...and hard, and I don't - know - how do you decide, if, if this time it's worth it: 

..I mean, personally, if it's a very hard question, I ask Iomedae.

:Does Iomedae...usually tell you?: 

Sometimes. Sometimes by the time I've asked I realize I know.

:How. How do you know. What does that feel like: 

Like - do you want to read my mind -

:....Um, sure? If you don't mind? I don't know if it'll help but - maybe: 

So, there are a couple different kinds of not knowing what to do. There's knowing what the best thing to do would be, but being really tired, or really scared (if you're not a paladin) and not sure if your tiredness and your scaredness mean something, or change what you should do, or if you should push through them. Prayer often solves that even if Iomedae doesn't weigh in, because the answer is in you somewhere, you just have to find it.

And there's realizing you've made a mistake, which prayer is often great for, because again the answer is inside you somewhere - you start by just trying to ask from a different angle than you've been asking, and you see what surfaces.

There's having to decide what to do under pressure when it's unclear what the best thing is, which is a skill, and you improve at it by trying it, and watching people who are good at it, and you might lean on Iomedae to substitute for the skill if there's a real emergency and you haven't got it but prayer isn't better in general at teaching 'deciding what to do when it's unclear' than at teaching horseback riding. You have to just do it, and see what happens, and get better. 

:That doesn't feel like knowing? It feels like...guessing. Is that - just - what it's like, all the time: 

...yes. I guess so.

:It didn't feel like guessing before. It felt - like there was a right answer, always, and I just had to find it: 

Yfandes stares unhappily at the fading stars. 

:...It's hard. It's so hard: 

Yep. It wasn't - really - any easier before, though. The easy answers weren't true.

:...I know. I - wish... I don't know what I wish. I wish I'd - been stronger. I shouldn't have left him. I promised him that no matter what happened, we would do it together, and I broke that promise and I - I don't know how to make that right: