"I'm glad I could give you a little peace."

She takes another bite of her sandwich.

"Did you ever have a hound? I saw how you acted towards Crin's wolves and that speaks to liking animals."

"I had a dog as a child, and when I was older my younger brother had one of his own as well. Both retrieving dogs, and- incredibly friendly. They were both far too friendly to people to have been useful as guard animals. My father used to joke that if there were ever an attempted burglary our dog wouldn't do anything so useful as bark but would instead wander towards them, tail wagging, and demand to be petted. The dog my brother had later was the most cowardly animal I've ever seen. He used to startle when he walked on sufficiently dry leaves for fear they would attack him. For all that cowardice though he would get between anything that frightened him and my brother, to keep him safe."

Ishaza nods. "Crin became a much better person when she started having wolves to care for. Before she had wolves to treat as pets, she used to... play stupid games with her servants because she wanted them to care about her personally. Having the solid, unconditional love of Grey and the rest of them helped her heal a little, I think. It's surprising what even one source of comfort like that can do."

Oh, huh, something that- negative about Crin actually kind of viscerally feels like evidence that Ishaza and Crin are on the up and up here. Strictly speaking if she wasn't in doubt about all of that that'd be a substantial negative update, but apparently in some wordless part of her she doubted enough that instead this is on-net rather substantial good news.

She can feel- something in her head, something that's automatically nudging her mental posture so she can avoid projecting her doubts, suddenly have noticeably less work to do.

"I'm glad they helped her. And it really is crucially important to have- something like that. People don't usually do well on their own. I was something of an outlier there, and I still wouldn't want to live through decades without something like that."

"Crin's possessive by nature. It's double-edged. She cares deeply about her people. On the other hand... she cares deeply about her people. She spoils those she's close to if they'll let her. That, I think, is part of why Nikola eventually moved to Liechenberg. She knows it's easier for Crin if she builds a separation in her retirement."

Nikola really does sound- kind of incredible, honestly. Also. She just noticed that if Ishaza knows about Crin's games- well, most likely Crin told her about the fact that she used to do things like that. Probably in a moment rather like the one earlier today where she told Alethia that she had a problem with possessiveness.

"Nikola really is sounding like quite the exceptional person. You know Crin rather straightforwardly mentioned that as a flaw of hers to me earlier today while you were briefly absent, actually."

"She's learning," Ishaza says. "Having people acting as safeguards for her helps."

"I am- new. And so I don't really know how much vampirism- pushes on you, over time. You hear, of course, that anyone turned invariably becomes a being of perfect evil, but, uh, I and Crin both put lie to that."

"Vampires are as human as anyone else. A little colder, perhaps, but within variation for people. It's really a question of perverse incentives. You're naturally good at necromancy, you need to feed on blood to survive, the one who turned you tells you you're better and stronger than humans and you can see it, you're cut off from normal company by being unable to stay out during the day, and you cannot sleep even if you want to. It's no wonder vampires end up forming a separate society that thinks of itself as better than their human subjects."

"Mostly good news there, I think. The bit about necromancy pushing on you quite a bit over time- I think I can see that, just looking at the magic animating the undead."

Ishaza nods. "Crin has relatively weak effects from necromancy. It mostly... suppresses her empathy, makes her even more logical and ruthless and less inclined to care about things or people. She noticed it early on, and so she's conserved her usage, and spaced it out as far as she can. And so she remains herself, thanks to the natural resilience of vampires. A human necromancer would have long since fallen to corruption by now."

"I'm glad she noticed it, and I hope I will never have cause to notice what it would do to me. Fortunately I will likely consistently have other options. Crin has many wolves, and you, and also I can punch very hard."

She would be worried about that revealing information, but, uh, Crin was there to see the end result of her fight with the vampire, so that particular cat is already out of its bag.

"One certainly hopes so." 

Ishaza finishes off her sandwich and smiles. "And yes, Crin has told me what happened. You have surprising strength for a newly-turned vampire. Yet another mystery." She shrugs. "Let me see, backpack of unknown items, unusual beauty and strength, finely made clothes, needs no sleep nor food... clearly you are a secret elf."

Ishaza called her pretty! She desires to bounce with happiness.

She will not do this.

"You have solved it. I am Aenarion the Defender come again, this time notably cuter."

"And you know the name of an elf lord from centuries ago but have never seen a ghoul before. Curious."

Ishaza leans back in her chair. "I apologize if I'm being rude with my speculation."

"Oh, it's fine. If I were keen on leaking absolutely no information, being- the kind of cautious I might be in other circumstances- I would simply be responding to everything like that by simply saying I can neither confirm nor deny just about everything you asked. No dog anecdotes either."

"I would be completely bereft of your dog anecdotes, and the poorer for it. I'm glad you're willing to share a little, even if not everything." She sighs. "Crin would be better at fitting this together into a complete picture than I am."

"She would, uh, not in fact have an incredible amount more luck than you're having, there's context you're both missing that would be needed for- large portions of it, I think. It's part of why I'd have to do something to demonstrate the stranger bits of the story were true, but any particular demonstration would be- revealing of perhaps too much, if either of you were poorly intentioned."

Honestly even there with the literal narrative mostly on her side it wouldn't be- outsized to her. Which is most of why she's being as sloppy as she is. There's only so far things are going to be pushed, here. And she can cope with the places the narrative would be likely to make things go. Which makes it largely a question of- what makes her move fastest in the long run. She doesn't quite feel like she knows just what that is, though. Whether she should move quickly so if they aren't trustworthy she learns faster, or whether that wouldn't work. The time where they know less feels more likely to be the one where they slip up, if there's a way for them to do so.

Ishaza nods. "Well, if you're not yet confident of us, that's reasonable, but I'm not sure that there's much I can do about that in the short term. Is there anything I could do for you in the next few hours that would be helpful, or should I leave you be?"

"Well, the longer term is- made up of individual moments, conversations like the one we've been having. It's more measured in interaction than time, since that's how I learn more, and can divine whether there's- something substantial that means working with you both would be a bad idea in some way. If you've got something else to do certainly don't let me keep you, but I also don't want you under the impression that talking with you so far has been anything other than pleasant. And it's certainly not unproductive."

"To be honest, I don't have a lot more to do, but neither do I have good ideas for what to converse about."

"Ah, the perennial problem. We are both now Doomed. Hmm. You've probably used Hysh on every bit of the castle that needs it already, public or private, so the option of simply following you and listening to you describe exactly how it works isn't really an option. A tragedy, Hysh is so beautiful. It would have been nice to have an excuse to watch you work with it."

"Crin said you watched some of her shaping exercises earlier; I could demonstrate a few for you as well? There's even a target range outside the tower fort I could demonstrate a few offensive spells on."

"I am definitely not going to turn down an offer like that!"

Magic! More magic! She can see magic things!

"Then let's head outside, and I'll employ a guard or two to set up the range."