"Not immediately. It runs perfectly fine on its own. But if you were permanently broken, someone would get cocky eventually and want to make a bid to be Emperor, and presumably you wouldn't be around to swat them. That would be a problem."

He snorts, and ruffles Eselle's hair, because she is adorable.

She recovers from her giggling and smiles fondly at him, then gently scoots away and fixes her hair. Her brother's here, cuddling Sekar in front of him would feel kind of weird. And she suspects that she doesn't want to test her self control in regards to not being affectionate towards her Emperor. So: gently scooting away. Sorry, Sekar.

"Cards?" she offers. "Unless either of you have any better ideas."

Zeothe shrugs.

—he glances after the retreating Eselle with a hard-to-read expression.

Zeothe spots the expression.

He considers that perhaps affairs between his sister and the Emperor would not benefit from his presence. He trusts his sister to be able to defend herself at least as well as he could, and his presence looks like it might have accidentally unbalanced something. She doesn't need him hanging around and getting in her way.

"Might be better if I went and found a place to sleep for the night. Besides the one I'd been staying in, anyway."

Eselle blinks at him, mildly confused.

"Okay," she says, a little hesitantly.

She looks at her brother, then at Solekaran, concerned. The hard-to-read expression is predictably hard to read, and so she is still pretty confused.

The Emperor blinks, and looks up at Zeothe. "Uh, okay? Where do you want a portal to—?"

"Uh - park where I did my dedication?"

Can she get a hug from her brother before he mysteriously flees into the night because Sekar made a face? She is so confused.

Hug.

Portal.

Extra hug. "You seem like you have some things to work out. Didn't want to get in the way of it," he murmurs to his sister.

...?? Okay?

"Sorry," he apologizes. "I'll see you later."

And then the brother is gone.

...

She's going to get a hug from Sekar because, uh. What.

...yes, hugs, hugs seem like a good plan.

"I am," she declares, "so confused."

"I'm kind of confused too, honestly!"

"Okay, well. That's great." Hug. "... You made a face, earlier, do you think that was it?"

"...a face?"

"Uh. I do not know how to describe the face. It was an unhappy face? I think? ... Did I do something wrong...?"

"—I... I don't know."

It is now time for a return of the confused face. Look at her, so confused.

"... Okay?"

"I don't really remember - you moved away and I felt weird about it and then before I had time to think about what I was feeling your brother suddenly got up and left and I was feeling confused instead."