A brief, wordless conversation passes between the two sisters; this leads to Metis visibly doing magic to something he somehow can't see.

"You're going to wash up before you sleep," she says, leading him to a well-appointed, but surprisingly unostentatious, bathroom, with hot running water.

"You'll have to make do with our spare clothes for the night unless you're particularly attached to yours; we'll set up a bedroll for you in the kitchen.  You have the run of the place, except for our bedroom which is warded."  There are ward panels over the relevant doors; they don't look like they bite but they do look like they're harder to shift.

They're just going to let him...be in their house...while they're asleep???

...well, they probably have no idea how dangerous he is. And - it's not as though he actually intends to abuse this. It might be an opportunity to leave, but - he's not going to risk trying to break into the cellar and from there to where he thinks the records cache has to be, not when their wards do that.

(And when they've taken him in and fed him and cared for him, he - has some kind of feeling about that - and one of the elements of the feeling is that he very much does not want to make their lives worse for having offered it.) 

He hasn't ever experienced bathing in hot water in this body. It's - wow - it's an incredibly intense sensory experience, but...in a good way...? It makes it nearly impossible to hold himself tense and alert. He's trying, but when this body runs out of energy on him it runs out hard, and he is having a very hard time keeping his eyes open. 

Yes, they are.  And yes she does, at least somewhat.

And while Metis is going to hang an additional layer of wards on the doorways to their bedroom while he's in there, given this information, just to be sure...she expects they won't be tested.

Ophelia did say he has the run of the place otherwise, and that would include the cellar - such as it is - but she rather thinks sleep will take him quite quickly given even half a chance.

This is why, when Zaril exits the bathroom, he finds a bedroll unrolled, and a message on a stele laid out for him - "If you are going to run off, at least get a decent night's rest and breakfast first.  We won't be put out by it.  --Ophelia"

There's also what looks like it could be one of their shirts, which is surprisingly well-suited as a robe on his frame with some impromptu pinning and rolled-up sleeves; there's also underthings that Metis made her best guess at the sizing of - preferring to not ask, when she did the aforementioned pinning-up - and warm woolen socks.

He does not actually fall asleep in the bath but it's a near thing. 

The guessed-at-size underthings are somewhat too big - after two weeks of barely eating, he's even more underweight than he looks while dressed - but the shirt-robe is warm, and he manages to get into it. The bedroll beckons, but he makes himself stay on his feet, it's the only way he can stay awake long enough to cast some very basic wards around himself.

(Basic, but still shockingly sophisticated for something cast by a seven-year-old.) 

And then he curls up with his warming blanket, and is asleep within seconds of closing his eyes. 

Oh no, the Concerningly Tiny Baby is cute and he wasn't just lucky with their wards.  Ophelia has already adopted him; is she going to be next?

And so the night passes, and the morning sun rises.

Metis Aderiel is not usually an early riser.

On a day like today, though, when there's clearly something hinky happening, it's a wonder she sleeps.  She wakes erratically when stressed, and it's often bright enough that she just doesn't bother trying to go back to sleep afterwards because she honestly can't.

So she's the first, of the three people within their dwelling, to awaken.

...Right.  She's awake.  Now what is she going to do with the child inside her house?

...

Nothing comes to mind about the long term.  What can she do in the short term?

...

...Make him a hot breakfast.  And herself, and Ophelia, for that matter.

What can she do to make breakfast happen...

Well, first, she'll do her chores, and top up the house's artifacts from the ley-line.  She's been looking for a way to get them to do that themselves for years now; as it is, she's mostly just made improvements in energy storage.  It's not nothing, but it's not enough; mage-hours continue to be a limiting factor this day, as they have on many others.

Anyway.  Breakfast.

Eggs will do; she'll get out a pot of honeyed apples from the cellar, as well.  It's chilled, for extra longevity, but she'll bring a warmer to the table for the boy - not that he couldn't do it himself, but she hardly wants to do it herself either.  Cut up a loaf of bread for toast; the remainder will end up containing her lunch, she bets.  Possibly the kid's lunch too.

...She doesn't know his name.  Huh.

She wonders, while the eggs get scrambled practically on automatic, about what in the absolute fuck could be driving - a combat mage, a seven year old child, both in one - to be like this.

Because he's - so competent, and so scared, and - he said he intended no harm - like he expected there was something they'd want to harm him about, which - she thinks it's not about the break-in.  He would have said if it was about needing food for whatever reason he was wandering out here; she trusts Ophelia's assessment, such as it is, and he's not the sort of person who makes up secrets just to have them.  But no, he has - some sort of secret.  And he thinks they'll hurt him, or he'll get hurt, or maybe they'll get hurt, if they know what it is.

Ophelia trails in later, and starts her morning routine after confirming that she did not have an excessively weird dream last night.

...There is still a child in her bedroll.  He still looks half-dead, but that's much better than full dead, which - if he hadn't found this place, he might well have ended up all the way there, and that would be a crime, because - even his half-broken mind is positively brilliant.

The tiny child is very sleep deprived.

He nonetheless stirs at the sound of her footsteps, extending mage-sight enough to check the wards - 

- safe -? 

Warm and comfortable and indoors and his wards are intact but he has no idea where he is. Which means wake up and orient to decide if he is, in fact, safe. 

He doesn't move or open his eyes, but his mind ripples through a quick pattern that has no business being in a seven-year-old's head, as he extends mage-sight further and then focuses on retrieving his exhaustion-blurred memories of the night before.  

Oh, that's...very.

That is - such a worrisome reaction to be capable of having, she thinks; who hurt him like this?

"...You're in my house; you broke in looking for something you haven't yet found, last night, and my sister's wards caught you, but she and I don't believe you're going to hurt us, and we don't want to hurt you, so since you're here, we're at least giving you a warm meal and camping supplies before you continue on with whatever you're doing, if it's trekking about in this weather.  You need more sleep than you've yet had.  You should go back to bed.  The food will still be warm and there for you."

Her voice is a gentle murmur, and it's backed up with a soft Empathic sincerity.

...Right. Mindhealer. He remembers that from yesterday. 

It's improbable, all of this is improbable, and that means - coincidence - he's pretty sure coincidence is nearly always bad. But being warm is good, and now that he's stopped moving he's noticing how drained and weak he feels. He really does need more rest, this body has very little in the way of reserves to fall back on in an emergency, he needs to be - in better shape than this, before it stops being a stupid idea to go try to find and break into a different records cache. 

(Now that he's awake and uncompulsioned, he's shielding against Thoughtsensing and Empathy, rather well, but not against Mindhealing Sight. The pattern in his mind is much less purely scared than before, much more coherent, there's - suspicion, situation-analysis, the clockwork-balancing motion of weighing the pros and cons of a decision, in the calm analytical way that a skilled military tactician might.

...He'll stay.) 

"Mmm," he manages, and is very quickly asleep again. 

There we go, that's better.

She gently restrains her maternal instincts from doing anything rude.

Metis has to call in and cancel Ophelia's appointments; one thankfully-dodged assassination attempt on her unattended sister is two too many, and while she trusts her sister's judgement, she's not leaving a kid around here unattended however absurd their instincts.

He was up very late, and is going to sleep until past noon before he's anywhere close to rested. He's also very easily startled, but if they arrange not to walk near him, he'll mostly sleep through. 

When he wakes up, he's - more lucid than he's been in days and possibly since he woke up in this body at all. He hadn't realized how little of himself was functional, before, how much he was running purely on instinct while most of his proactive planning wasn't working. 

(It shows in the clockwork of his mind; it's still a mess, but at least the incomplete mechanisms are less gummed up with exhaustion, and moving more quickly and smoothly.) 

- he's incredibly confused and confusion nearly always means danger, but, now that he's emotionally on more of an even keel, he doesn't think he's in immediate danger from the people who took him in? It would be bizarre for them to feed and clothe him and give him a bed to sleep in and then outright murder him in the morning. Also he's ravenously hungry. 

He scrambles up and pulls the blanket over his shoulders like a cloak and looks for food. 

The food's there!  In a little weather-barrier that's keeping it warm.  Metis is also present, tinkering with something idly.

"Welcome back to the world of the living, sleepyhead.  ...It just now occurs to me that we never got your name after all that; shall we do introductions?  I'm Metis Aderiel."

...he's not giving them his 'real' name, whatever 'real' even means in this rather complicated situation. It's...probably far enough away that it's not a risk to give his newly-inherited name, if he leaves it at the first name only?

"Zaril," he says, and a polite "may I?" about the food even though it's very tempting to dive in with both hands. 

"Zaril.  It's nice to meet you, Zaril.  Yes, that's for you; go ahead, please do eat."

It's really good! He's still not used to rich food, and can tell that eating too fast will make him sick, but it's taking a lot of willpower not to. 

When he's done, he...holds still, and waits, unsure what the confusing strangers are planning to do next. 

"...so, do you have...any plans for what you're doing next?  And would you be amenable to a shopping trip where my sister hovers over you like a broody hen -- okay, she isn't actually going to be doing that, but she has basically written out the writ of adoption already.  She really wants to - see you flourishing.  You're very impressive.  If also somewhat concerning."

She has a funny feeling that she doesn't know the half of it.