recreatable | open post.

Okay; the Wandersail doesn't sound so bad, although he'll undoubtedly get sick again. A small price to pay for returning to— not home. Verso hasn't used the word 'home' in the better part of seven decades. But something close to it, someplace familiar. Someplace where he can lie down in a bed that's all his own and rest.

"The ship is an option." Not the most exciting one, but an option. "But I'm not sure we'd get anywhere with the queen without you."

Jasnah's title means something, but he doubts anyone would care if some random foreigner showed up and started asking for help getting to Urithiru. That makes it less a case of a displaced monarch and more a case of a lost vagrant.

"...And I don't think we need to entertain hypotheticals at this juncture." Whatever Shadesmar is, it doesn't sound like a place he wants to go.

"The ship is a great option," she says in a way that is both agreeable and corrective. Her gloved hand closes in a loose fist, and then she points one finger in the air — like making a single, careful point. "But it does rely on the Wandersail actually being in port. It might be at sea already."

The eternal irony of the capable rhetorician. Even as she made an argument, she could already see its holes. The ship would work wonderfully, but its something of an edge-case. It relies on circumstance aligning.

"We confirm whether or not the ship's here. If it is, grand. If not?" A deflated, uncomfortable sigh. "We fly. Thoughts?"

"You say 'we fly' as if you're marching to your death," he says, trying not to find humor in her obvious distaste for it (and failing). She's the one who brought up the option in the first place; if it's truly so horrible, she should have omitted it. So much to learn, Jasnah.

"All right. We can look for your ship." He gives her a once-over, eyes lingering on her abdomen. "Once you're in traveling shape."

She almost rolls her eyes, having hubris enough to think she could travel now if necessary. By boat, at any rate. And she knows that Rysn has certain accommodations aboard the Wandersail for someone whose mobility might differ from the average sailor. Fascinating stuff, really. Using gemstones to...

Jasnah shakes her head, interrupting her own train of thought. Dragging herself back to the topic at hand.

"Inquiries won't have to wait on my recovery," she argues. "You could go down to the docks and find out. Or Jochi might know someone at the harbour."

But that does raise another problem, doesn't it? She glances around the apartment, thinking about the burden and strain this must be putting on the baker. Maybe the worst of the thread is past, sure, but keeping a foreign queen in your front room has got to be disruptive to one's social life. Not to mention keeping Verso on the floor like this. (Yes, she finally stumbles across this consideration.)

"If we're going to be here much longer, maybe we should look into alternative accommodations."

Verso almost rolls his eyes, too. Of course Jasnah wants to send him to look for the ship he doesn't even want to sail on himself, too impatient to actually recover enough to be able to walk down to the harbor herself. He understands the need to feel independent, but— a stab wound is a stab wound. No amount of self-reliance is going to make it heal faster. Honestly, he half-wonders if taking the walk to the alley to find Ivory was pushing it.

"Alternative accommodations?" he asks. Jochi's place is... fine. Not ideal, and admittedly he'd quickly grown attached to having an actual bed with an actual mattress, but it's tolerable. Then again, he's just glad that it has a roof and a door; the bar is pretty low.

"Does Jochi's not meet the royal standards?"

In some ways, Jochi's apartment is nicer than her rooms back in Urithiru. But Jasnah won't volunteer that information. It does occur to her, a little late, that he'd have no way to know. In the tower, she would always come to him. It's only been these last few weeks — on the ship, and here — where any delineation between his space and her space has evaporated.

"It's not that," she argues, getting just a little defensive. Alethi asceticism dies hard. "Rather, I've put him at enough risk just by being here."

And not simply because of any follow-up attempts on her life.

Maybe he'd know what her quarters look like if only she'd invite him there. 🤡

"He doesn't seem to mind," Verso points out—although, admittedly, he hasn't been around Jochi overmuch. Whenever Jochi returns upstairs for the evening, Verso likes to take the opportunity to stretch his legs, breathe some fresh air. His only complaint (all right, second-to-only complaint; the floor really is hurting his back!) about staying here is that, in order to make sure Jasnah is tended to, he has to coop himself up for a large part of the day.

"Did you have somewhere in mind?" He's not necessarily opposed to the idea, but there's practical considerations to think about. "—We'd need to put on our false identities again."

No, Jochi doesn't mind. But Jasnah can't help but wonder what repercussions there could be for a Thaylan national housing an unannounced foreign ruler. More importantly, however, is what happens to if this detour is found out and their association — both members of the Veristitalians — goes public. Jochi has taken such care to hide his literacy, even in a nation that's slightly less strict about it Alethkar.

But Verso has a fair point. Two fair points, really.

"I'll talk to him," she resolves. "Gauge his tolerance for risk. Make sure he understands that there are risks."

It matters to her that Jochi gets a choice.

"You know, putting our false identities back on isn't a terrible idea even if we stay put."

Was Jasnah a big fan of being married and expecting? Not at all. But, as with the Windrunner Option, she can see logic even when it's inconvenient to her.

It isn't? he nearly asks, because Verso's been operating under the assumption that she absolutely hated those identities. It had all been for naught, anyway; Jasnah's true identity had been sussed out very quickly, perhaps from the very start.

He's also, personally, a little less certain about using that story than before. It had been weeks ago, and he hadn't had any particular feeling for Jasnah beyond what he feels for any beautiful woman. Now, though— things have shifted, and he imagines it might be a little more difficult to pretend that they have exactly the sort of relationship that he wishes they had.

"Hm," he says, casual. "You miss Geneviève that much?"

Jasnah shakes her head, clearly uninterested in taking the mantle of wife back up again. Still. An established ruse is an established ruse, complete with boundaries already negotiated and understood. The longer they remain in the city, the more likely it is that someone will start asking Jochi questions. About the man who keeps leaving by the front door.

She shifts slightly on the divan beside Verso, the movement careful but less guarded than it had been days ago. Close enough now that her shoulder nearly brushes his arm.

"Not exactly," she says, answering with a touch more sincerity than the question requires. "But as things progress, it would be good to stretch my legs. Today was...hard," she admits, after a beat. "And I won't pretend otherwise. Still, I can't remain shut in here day after day."

Another pause. Her hand drifts to her stomach, palm light against the healing wound.

"Maybe I should stay put for now," she allows, anticipating protest. "But eventually I need to be back on my feet. If Jochi agrees we can stay, then we should at least provide him with a story he can tell without improvising under pressure. I would rather choose our lie than be caught correcting someone else's."

For someone who claims to hate prevarication, she's oddly adept at planning out her lies.

"You should definitely stay put for now," he says, taking on the sort of authoritative tone usually reserved for sisters and Expeditioners. There's very little he can claim to be an authority on here, but whether someone should be moving around after a stab wound is one of those few things. "If your wound opens up again, we won't be able to get around taking you to the physician."

She doesn't want to involve more people than necessary, and he understands that. But if it's a choice between her exsanguinating on the floor and looping in another, even if possibly untrustworthy, person, he knows which he'd choose. 'Life before death', isn't it?

"You can tell whatever story you want once you're well enough to go out." He'd prefer not to pretend to be the doting husband of someone who couldn't desire that less, but he doesn't know how to express that without being even more obvious than he must already be, so— fine. Whatever backstory suits her.

It's his tone that draws her attention first. Not the words themselves, but the way he says them — clear, decisive, authoritative. Just enough to make her look twice.

Jasnah shifts on the divan, posture reorienting. A shoulder angles in. One knee tucks. She ends half-turned toward him, close in the unremarkable way of people who have been sharing space for some time now. Not closer than they were in the streets, or on the narrow stairs. But close enough to see the fine texture of his scar, the uneven shadow of stubble at his jaw. Close enough to notice...

Huh.

Her head tilts, interest sharpening. Almost absentmindedly, she edges a fraction closer. Then she reaches out, fingertips hovering just shy of his temple. After a brief hesitation, her fingers slide lightly into his hair, careful, testing, easing back the side part with the gentlest pressure. It's an intimate gesture, but not a dramatic one; more curious than anything else. And there, at the roots, she sees it clearly for the first time. Not salt-and-pepper. Pale hair, growing in. She'd mistaken his two-toned hair for something similar to Adolin and Renarin's lineage.

She pauses, studying it, thumb brushing once, unconsciously smoothing.

"I..." Her voice comes softer than usual, like she's trying to land on the correct tone. "Do you dye your hair?"

There's no judgment in it. Only that familiar, incisive curiosity. If anything, it carries a faint note of recognition. Jasnah understands the impulse to curate one's appearance. To control the visible story. She's been without her usual cosmetics, her careful braids, her armor of presentation for over a week now.

Perhaps that, too, makes her small exploration feel a little more permitted.

Jasnah shifts closer, and he holds his breath. He can feel the heat of her fingers as she reaches out, hand close enough that he could turn his head and press his mouth against the palm of her hand if she gave even one indication that she might allow it—

Do you dye your hair, she asks, and he visibly deflates, laughing softly and a little ruefully. At himself, really. A little you fucking idiot. What did he think, that she'd been suddenly overcome with desire for him in the last five seconds?

He doesn't lean into the touch; he doesn't let himself enjoy it at all. He interlaces his fingers in his lap, an alternative to sitting on his hands. "Yeah," he admits, gaze drifting to the side. "I guess it's grown out since I got here, huh?"

She hums. A quiet, thoughtful hmm lodged low in her throat. Curiosity carries her a fraction further, fingertips combing through the stark white threads against the black. She catalogues the contrast with a scholarly instinct, even as she deliberately swallows the questions that follow. Immortality complicates appearances. Does his true age manifest selectively? Was the white somehow the truth all along, even before his condition? A memory surfaces, too close and too pointed, and she lets it sink back out of reach.

"A little," she confirms. "As hair tends to do."

Then the moment shifts. Her curiosity resolves into something more practical, more controlled. She replaced her exploratory touch with something neater and more purposeful — carefully smoothing the side part she disturbed, setting the strands back where they belong. Her thumb grazes the shell of his ear as she tucks a wave into place, the contact brief but precise, as if restoring order was the natural conclusion of...whatever this was.

Her hand falls away at last, palm settling flat against the cushion between them. Jasnah studies him with a slight tilt of her head, expression composed and untroubled. Whatever just passed between them doesn't register as transgression or awkwardness. After braids plaited and bandages changed, after days of shared space and quiet dependence, the boundary has already shifted. Blurred by trust.

The boundary has shifted for her. It's still where it's always been for him—casual touch from another human being is exceedingly rare in his life. It feels good, of course, but only for a moment. After that, the feeling quickly sours. It's confusing and unpleasant to be treated this way when it's obvious there's no meaning behind it.

Carefully, he scoots to the far end of the divan, creating space.

"The gestrals used to do it," he explains as he does so, self-consciously patting down the strands she already arranged. "I haven't had the chance to find someone in Urithiru who can take care of it yet."

Concern flickers briefly across her face as he so demonstrably moves out of her reach. The social calculus is almost visible – and while she can't pinpoint why there's been a misstep, she understands that it's been made. Lesson learned. She watches him retreat, nodding once to herself.

Her fingers drum dully on the cushion. A sip of air, wishing she could taste stormlight on it, and investigate the very axi of his hair as it presents in the Cognitive Realm. On that side, people are more like flickers of fire — one mass, undifferentiated from its constituent parts. Could she distinguish strands of hair? It would be an interesting research project. Although, even if she had stormlight to burn on it, she should probably start elsewhere. It wouldn't do to accidentally transmute a whole man into a puddle of blood or a puff of smoke when you're only trying to change his hair. Storms, could he survive being soulcast? The idea pins in place, somewhere in the back of her mind.

"Fair. The tower lacks all manner of conveniences," she admits. Adolin is always complaining about how no one in Urithiru can match the quality of his old tailor in Kholinar. Jasnah has privately bemoaned the fact that they haven't yet figured out how to activate the plumbing and heating fabrials to supply what must have been great, luxurious bathing facilities. But...

"But I know there are dyes available in the Breakaway Market, even if you'd have to do the work yourself."

😬 Don't ask how she knows about their availability.

"I might turn it green," he jokes, although that is, in fact, a real concern. There's a reason Verso depended on the sentient paintbrushes to do his hair instead of doing it himself. The barber's apprentice is of questionable talent, but he's still better at doing hair than Verso himself. Even the most specialest boy has to lack some talents. "But thanks. I'll take a look when we get back."

He taps his fingers against his thigh, a restless little movement. "Do you mind if I take a walk?" Jochi's not back yet, but she has Ivory now, so she won't truly be alone. He could stand to clear his head after too much time spent in close quarters with her. "I can go ask around the harbor, if you like."

Jasnah doesn't answer immediately. Instead, she shifts back against the divan, testing the angle of her weight with the careful economy of someone who has learned reluctantly where her limits now lie.

"I'll manage," she says at last, calm and even. Factual. "You'd do well to check the harbour and I'm not so delicate even now that I require supervision."

Which is true. Mostly.

She doesn't think about how the borrowed apartment already feels emptier at the thought of him gone. She doesn't think about how her irritation has less to do with pain and more to do with the enforced stillness of recovery, and how his company has become part of the scaffolding holding her upright. She tells herself, firmly, that wanting company is not the same as needing it.

So, confidently: "But before you go, set the spanreed out for me. I'm steady enough to sit and write. Maybe we'll get a response, this time, without having to find a different pen routed through Tashikk."

She leans back, composed, giving him the clear, unambiguous permission he asked for. Even as she reminds herself that she does not get to keep people near simply because they make the waiting easier.

Write to your mother? he doesn't yet ask. That's a conversation best had later, he thinks. Perhaps when they're lying in the dark and trying to fall asleep. Discussions feel easier to have when they can't see each other.

So, instead, he just says, "All right," and gets up to root through their things for a second time today. He pulls the end table over in front of the divan, setting her up with the spanreed, paper, and yes, her glass of water, lest she's forgotten.

"...Don't let me catch you on the floor when I get back," he says, expression pointed, before he makes his way out the door.

Tracking down the right person to speak to at the harbor ends up taking longer than he'd expected, but he doesn't want to return to Jochi's without answers. It's dark when he finally gets back, Jochi having already come up from downstairs—with a couple savory pastries in his hand—and conversed with Jasnah over supper before retiring to his own quarters.

"I spoke to the harbormaster," he calls as he opens the door, fatigued from having to chase down the aforementioned harbormaster but mood improved nonetheless; a little distance from Jasnah has done him good. Stupid little feelings seem less important from afar.

"Anything back from the spanreed?"

In his absence, the end table becomes a makeshift command center. At first, Jasnah reads. Then she writes, including a short, clinical note where she commits to paper what she can recall of the assassin: Short. Broad-shouldered. Right-handed. Moved confidently in close quarters. Smelled faintly of tar and citrus oil—dockside. No visible glyphs. Darkeyed. Below it, underlined once: Do not trust appearances. Lightweavers exist.

Just before sunset, Jochi returns upstairs. They talk. She tells him — selectively — about having interviewed a Herald. Two, in fact. He asks whether Taln truly resembles his statues, and she does not have the will to explain how centuries of torture erode a man without touching his flesh.

Also, she explains the risk of staying: not only what it means if the attack wasn't isolated, but what consequences Jochi himself might face for sheltering her. Even social ones matter. Jochi agrees it's unwise to linger but insists, stubbornly, that hospitality is the one small contribution he can make against Odium. The explanation of what Odium is takes the better part of an hour.

They agree on one thing: she cannot move without alerting her mother. One way or another. Together, the two scholars devise a solution. A relay station in Tashikk — where both maintain accounts — can serve as a middlewoman. A spanreed there can receive a message and retransmit it onward, provided one accepts that the intermediary will read it. It's inelegant, hardly private, but effective. They route a warning to Navani, urging her to check Jasnah's private spanreeds.

At no point in the evening does Jasnah mention Ivory. She does not glance toward the drawer where the spren is hidden, wrapped and protected. Trust, to Jasnah, has compartments. Even old colleagues are not guaranteed full access.

Eventually, Jochi retires. Jasnah reads a little longer. Then fatigue overtakes her vigilance, and she drifts off propped against the arm of the divan, head tilted back, knuckles tucked beneath her jaw.

So — enter Verso, stage left.

The end table is still pulled close, exactly as he left it. The water glass is empty — perhaps refilled more than once. One pastry remains on the plate, torn open and forgotten. The apartment is dim but not dark, pale stormlight glowing softly from trapped spheres.

Oh, and the spanreed. It rests upright in its stand, paper neatly aligned beneath the tip. The gemstone cap blinks once. Then again. Soft. Patient. A message is waiting — it only needs someone to twist the mechanism to let it be written.

Ah.

Verso quiets the moment he sees her, leaning down to remove his boots to soften his steps, leaving them lined up by the door. He pads further in after, socks on the wooden floor he's come to be know intimately over the past week. His first course of action is to retrieve a blanket and lay it atop Jasnah as she sleeps. His next is to perch on the very edge of the divan, light and careful so as not to stir her, and investigate the blinking spanreed.

It might not be his place to receive a message on her behalf. But he is part of this, too, an extension of her will in many ways, and— sue him, but he's curious what a message from her mother might be like. After casting a silent glance her way, he twists the cap.

Under another circumstance, under another auspice, Jasnah would have woken at the faint shift of air around her makeshift bed, at the soft scrape of movement or the subtle change in presence. Tonight, she doesn't. The day has hollowed her out. Even as the blanket is settled over her shoulders, she lies unmoving, mouth parted just enough for a quiet, unguarded sound to escape her. Barely more than breath. Unmistakably a snore.

For once, the world turns without her watching it. And the spanreed begins to move. Letters form. Then sentences. The strokes are neat, controlled — too controlled, the way handwriting becomes when one is gripping the pen a little too tightly.

Jasnah—

The tower remains secure. Your absence was noticed immediately when you didn't return to Urithiru as expected. I am telling myself, repeatedly, that you are exercising your usual judgment.

Even so, Jasnah, you might consider the strain placed on others when you vanish without explanation. Could you not have taken Colot, or some other member of the Cobalt Guard? By the Almighty, I had not anticipated being put through this again so soon.

We dispatched members of the Unseen Court to Kharbranth within a day of your absence. Looking for you or for the foreign man last seen in your company. I understand now why your trail went cold. And when you return the Coalition will insist on a conversation about your choice to withhold knowledge of an off-worlder from all of us.

—N. (Dalinar is pacing nearby and wishes me to add that he is not cross, merely concerned. I wish I could say the same.)

It's quite... cold. Nothing like the sort of letters Maman used to write him after he'd moved out to attend the Conservatory. My darling boy, she'd address him. Lumière de ma vie. Mon trésor. If he'd gone missing after an outing, she would have been even more effusive. She'd always been afraid of losing him, and ignorant fool that he was, he'd never understood why.

Another piece of Jasnah's puzzle clicks into place. If even her mother, the person who's supposed to be the most warm and affectionate to her, is like this with her, then maybe that explains a little bit of her withholding nature.

He cringes a bit at the mention of a 'foreign man', concerned for the very first time that he might somehow be in trouble for this. She'd disappeared in his company, after all. It would be understandable to question his motives. —Ugh. Something to ruminate on and face at a later date. Verso gives Jasnah one last lingering glance before he gets up off the divan and settles down onto his pillow on the floor, leaving the message for her to find when she wakes.

For the first time in a while, she wakes with a start. A sharp inhale, a lurch upward like being shoved off some internal, spiritual ledge. Mishim, the third moon, still hangs in the sky, visible through the corner of a window she never meant to leave unshuttered before bed. Damnation. She forgot to have Jochi close it. For a moment she tangles with the blanket she doesn't remember pulling over herself, rubs at one eye as she yawns, disoriented and faintly irritated, only to realize...

It's still night. All the dozing and forced rest and exhaustion have thoroughly scrambled even the threadbare sleep cycle she'd possessed to begin with. She lets the dim room swim back into focus and...?. Verso is on the floor. Asleep? Awake? Impossible to tell. She sits excruciatingly still, listening for any pattern in his breathing, any telltale shift. Nothing she can confidently identify.

Well. Just in case. Jasnah proceeds slowly, silently, as he eases herself upright, and — oh.

Not only is the spanreed is blinking, but there's already a message recorded. Her frown is immediate, comprehension arriving all at once: he must have returned, set the pen to write, and now there's a second message queued behind it.

Leaning forward, she exhales thinly and resets the fabrial. And with a muted scratch, the pen writes: Reaching out via Tashikk and then not even replying? Really, Jasnah. Be decent and give us some sign of life.

She mutters a curse under her breath (storms!) but still doesn't rush to answer. Instead, she turns the pen carefully to standby and reaches for a mundane, non-fabrial pen and scrap paper. She scratches out a line. Rewrites it. Crosses out half a sentence, stares at the remainder like it's personally offended her. Tells herself this care is practical — that any message might be read aloud in a council chamber and that precision matters. All true. None of it quite sufficient to explain how long she lingers over each word.

If Verso is asleep (or awake and wisely choosing not to involve himself) she'll eventually settle on a reply and send it. But otherwise, she's interruptible.

Yeah, he's awake. Verso never sleeps particularly deeply, but most nights spent in Jasnah's company have been even more sleepless than usual—he has things to worry about, plans to make, the sensation of her thumb grazing his ear to play over and over in his head.

When he hears her stir, he does nothing. Doesn't even move. Just lies there, facing away from her, eyes closed. He can hear the scratch of the spanreed—another message?—and then Jasnah's muttered storms, remarkably quiet but still easily decipherable in the silence of night. A moment later, and he hears the flutter of paper, the scratch of writing again.

"And you were doing so well at besting your insomnia," he mutters (hypocritically).

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