"No," she answers — sharp and corrective, but no less pleased. Reaching out, she even dares to tap the back of her fingers against his arm.
"You'll swap with me, won't you?" The brioche? Entirely forgotten. Even the spanreed, which she'd been keeping a careful eye on even since he'd returned, stands ignored while she talks him through this admittedly very simple plot. "Wherever we go, whatever they serve, you and I should swap bowls."
Storms, she must be bored out of her skull if a little bit of restaurant table sleight of hand provides this much excitement.
It doesn't matter what she's asking. Jasnah could be proposing that he jump into an active volcano for her amusement, and he'd say yes, so long as she did so with her fingers brushing against his arm, that delighted lilt in her tone. Despite being perched on the edge of the seat so as not to take up her personal space, he leans involuntarily toward her, pulled inexorably toward her orbit.
Pragmatically, he can see this for what it is. Physical attraction, compounded by the intimacy of close quarters and how well they get along. An idle yearning spurred on by the safety of wanting what he can never have. There is no world in which a romance between them is anything but a chimerical daydream. All the same, it's difficult to look away when her eyes are bright with delight and her dark hair is tumbling over her shoulder.
"A cloak-and-dagger operation," he teases, corner of his mouth twitching up. "Very devious."
(Fun fact: Jasnah could never ask him to jump in active volcano because she doesn't know what a volcano is because Roshar lacks tectonics. But the point is taken.)
"Precisely," she responds.
Storms, but this woman loves a little scheme. It enough to suggest that if the weight of Alethkar — of all Roshar, perhaps — wasn't on her shoulders she might actually have something of a mischievous streak.
Cahoots. It's a fine word. Jasnah mouths it silently as she considers his offer — then, leaning forward, she takes his hand with her right one and gives it a firm shake. Confident and familiar. It lingers a little longer than might be considered customary, but soon after she retreats back to her carefully delineated portion of the divan.
Nodding, as if an important piece of business is concluded, she turns back to the desk. The spanreed.
"Before we go anywhere," she taps the table, "I have to make good on last night's agreement. It's time to let Urithiru know our plans."
...Oh, she was ready for this fight. Jasnah leans an elbow onto the table, cupping her chin in her palm. It's not the most composed posture to take, but she finds she does need a bit of extra help staying upright.
"It was a full week yesterday — but you had me wait until the morning, so now it's six days."
Verso pauses. Squints. Contemplates. "You mean— six days and..." It was the middle of the night, and although he's not certain of the exact time, he was awake for nearly all of it. It can't have been that long. "Sixteen hours."
A small, small nod. Jasnah's lips press together in a tight line — suppressing a smirk, maybe — as she watches him. One brow raised just a fraction. She'd wondered what tactic he'd take in reply to her obstinance, and negotiation comes as a slight pleasant surprise.
"Correct," she acknowledges. "The facts are on your side, this morning."
Ah. He's surprised, too, by her easy acceptance of his rebuttal. He'd thought it would be harder to get her to acquiesce. Sometimes, although he doesn't dare say it, it feels as if she disagrees solely for the sake of disagreeing.
"We should probably round up just to be safe, then."
— Acknowledging that he's correct isn't quite the same as agreeing to his timeline. But she's curious for how this might play out. Jasnah reaches out and twists the spanreed to transmit. A helpful, cutthroat little time pressure to the conversation.
"You'd quibble over a handful of hours?" She asks, quibbling over a handful of hours.
Of course she would. And of course he would—he's inherently competitive, and even that aside, it makes him feel like he has some modicum of control over what is actually a somewhat scary situation. Not for him; he'll be fine flying. Even just taking a walk with Jasnah feels like she's at risk of bleeding out all over again, though, and there's no way that flying wouldn't be ten times harder on her.
So: "You probably don't remember, but you were actually stabbed recently."
She bites back the first, second, and third retorts that rise in the back of her throat. Swallowing them down, she turns her attention off Verso and onto the spanreed. It does occur to Jasnah that she could simply...write the message. Windrunners, six days. There's nothing that obligates her to even hear Verso out — nothing apart from the thickening bonds of whatever-this-is. Would she have entertained this much negotiation with anyone else?
(Well. Maybe someone else. And the thought makes her frown, deeply.)
"There's no harm in the Windrunners arriving in six days, even if we don't take flight until the seventh."
If, maybe, perhaps. She leaves some space in her sentences to slip between at a later date.
If Jasnah had recognized his offer to go on a walk as what it was—a bribe—then he recognizes this, too, as the sort of ridiculous negotiation tactics he and his sisters used to engage in as children. Meaningless trades that changed nothing materially, but made them feel as if they had won something.
"You're right," he concedes. "There's nothing wrong with them coming a day early."
Aside from the power struggle that's likely to occur when Jasnah inevitably decides that they should just go ahead and leave when the Windrunners arrive, but they'll cross that bridge when they get to it.
Whatever it is, whatever the tactic, it's settled enough that she quickly pens her requisition: Too early yet to fly — send Windrunners to arrive in six days' time.
The pen pauses. Jasnah taps one, twice. They'll need to agree on a meeting place but it occurs to her she'll need Verso's buy-in. And right now...well, right now isn't the best time for it. If she can show significant improvement over the next few days, if she can still draw stormlight even in dribs and drabs. Yes. The conversation can wait. Jasnah at least has a rendezvous point in mind.
"—All that remains is to wait."
She sets the spanreed aside, uncertain whether her patience will hold three days — let alone six. Let alone whatever additional time is required if her hypothesis proves flawed and her recovering doesn't speed up as Ivory too recovers.
"I suppose you're right," Verso agrees, because 'waiting' is pretty much what they've been doing for the past week. Waiting and recovering, in Jasnah's case. She strikes him as the sort of person who doesn't do well staying put for long; it's not difficult for him, having decades of boredom under his belt, but it must be for her.
A pause. He taps his fingers against his knee.
"—Your hair looks nice that way," he offers. Very nice. Dark, shiny even now, spilling down her back. It's probably wrong how appealing it is to see her loose, unbound. He clears his throat. "Do you need help putting it back before we go?"
More reflexive than self-conscious, her hand reaches to touch her loose hair — fingers combing through waves that threaten to coalesce onto almost-curls. Leaving it down like this is nearer to the Veden style. And Jasnah much prefers the careful, curated approach. It's not safe to wear her gold hair pins, but she misses them. And the slight, grounding tension of at least one braid. Like this, she feels so — unstructured. Unmoored.
She cards her fingers up against the nape of her neck and combs the length of her hair out — fighting briefly between the compliment (your hair looks nice that way) and her inclination to bring it back to heel.
"Yes, actually. I think I could manage," she goes as far as testing her range of motion, shadowing the movements necessary for a good braid. It hurts, but she knows not to push too far. "But it wouldn't be neat enough."
Verso fetches a hair tie, then settles back on the divan with Jasnah in front of him. He doesn't use the brush this time, instead combing his fingers through the length of her hair; he tells himself, as he works out a tangle with his index and middle fingers, that it's more efficient than using a brush. Deep down, though, he knows it's an excuse to touch her in a way that she would otherwise never allow.
Despite that little bit of self-indulgence, his work is dutiful and expedient, fingers not lingering anywhere that he doesn't have an excuse for. The braid is neat and taut, as requested, and when he ties it off he shifts back, feeling—
A little hot and bothered, honestly. There's something seriously wrong with him. It's the proximity, getting to be so near her in a way he's usually only ever been with another person with his clothes off. Or, well, partially off. It's kind of a waste of time to take them all the way off.
He scoots back further, creating more distance. "All done."
It's...nice. And not simply because she's accustomed to being attended to. Rank and station have ensured a lifetime of hands nearby, once upon a time. Fewer now, by choice. By age. By paranoia. Even then, this moment is something different entirely: the rare, fleeting permission to let someone else take care of her without obligation or hierarchy attached. A sensation she both resents and craves, and has never quite learned to balance.
This morning, she lets herself enjoy it. Trust itself is invigorating. And it's less what he's doing, and more that she allows it. As if a thread has been drawn through her sternum and anchored gently to his presence. A quiet, steadying bond. When his fingertips brush her scalp, gooseflesh rises along her neck. At one point she exhales a short, surprised laugh — quick reassurance following, soft and monosyllabic: she's fine, yes; no, he hasn't pulled too hard on that tangle.
Her head begins to bob almost unconsciously with the practiced over-under motion of the braid taking shape. She offers the smallest resistance, holding still, knowing it's her part of the work to be steady, to give him something firm to braid against.
And when it's finished, her shoulders drop. Her right hand traces the pattern, familiar and new all at once, before she flips the tail over one shoulder.
"Well done," she says, measured but warm. "I daresay they're getting better." And because she's learned some of his patterns by now, she adds: "And they started out good."
Hard to imagine they were both squabbling over hours just moments ago.
Verso rubs his hands against the fabric of his trousers, palms gone a little sweaty. Flustered from the mere experience of being close to a beautiful woman. Clearly, it's been way too long. A decade, at least. More. After getting so far with the 58s, after watching Renoir slaughter them, he'd distanced himself. Doing the same thing over and over again without different results is insanity. 25 years, then, of loneliness. It's really no wonder that he can't keep his feelings on a leash.
"Uh," he says eloquently. "I'll go looking for a place that we can eat."
...Disappointment crowds onto her face. He'll go looking? Yes, alright, when she plays the conversation back in her point-form recollection, she can understand how that must have been his original intent.
Still.
Jasnah flattens a hand on the end-table and uses it to push herself to her feet. Look, she's steady! Look, she's stable!
"I thought we'd go together," she tells him — ignorant of why he might want to escape alone for a time before lunch.
"Hey," he scolds, standing up an instant after she does, hands hovering a few inches away from her to catch her if she falters. "I thought we'd both agreed on no sudden movements."
Or maybe he'd just assumed they did, because that's common sense.
"...It might take a while to find somewhere." Yes, he'd like a moment alone to disgustingly yearn and then maybe slap himself and psych himself up for being normal and platonic on this lunch absolutely-not-a-date, but there's also pragmatic reasons behind it, too. "You might get tired."
Oh, how she wants to snarl at him that she is not made of glass. Except, except, except — she kinda is, just now. More fragile than she's ever been in years. More fragile right now than she was curled around the knife, on the deck of the Wind's Pleasure, the last time she'd been stabbed. At least then all she'd had to do was wait the assassins out and heal once she'd made it to Shadesmar.
Now — hmm. Jasnah doesn't knock his hands aside, but she does intervene by sliding her palm against where her wound sits. The tick in her jaw suggests the movement was indeed too sudden.
Ah, yes, she reminds herself. Here comes the resentment after the craving.
His hand lingers there for a few beats—not quite touching but close enough that he can feel her body heat radiating—before it drops. She isn't Alicia, small and delicate and in need of protection. She isn't an Expeditioner, either, bound to die in one horrific way or another in front of his eyes.
"Okay," he says after the silence stretches a little too long. "You're right. We'll go, then."
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"You'll swap with me, won't you?" The brioche? Entirely forgotten. Even the spanreed, which she'd been keeping a careful eye on even since he'd returned, stands ignored while she talks him through this admittedly very simple plot. "Wherever we go, whatever they serve, you and I should swap bowls."
Storms, she must be bored out of her skull if a little bit of restaurant table sleight of hand provides this much excitement.
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Pragmatically, he can see this for what it is. Physical attraction, compounded by the intimacy of close quarters and how well they get along. An idle yearning spurred on by the safety of wanting what he can never have. There is no world in which a romance between them is anything but a chimerical daydream. All the same, it's difficult to look away when her eyes are bright with delight and her dark hair is tumbling over her shoulder.
"A cloak-and-dagger operation," he teases, corner of his mouth twitching up. "Very devious."
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"Precisely," she responds.
Storms, but this woman loves a little scheme. It enough to suggest that if the weight of Alethkar — of all Roshar, perhaps — wasn't on her shoulders she might actually have something of a mischievous streak.
"You get what you want. I get what I want."
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Nodding, as if an important piece of business is concluded, she turns back to the desk. The spanreed.
"Before we go anywhere," she taps the table, "I have to make good on last night's agreement. It's time to let Urithiru know our plans."
So.
"Windrunners, in six days' time."
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"Are you actually trying to wriggle out of waiting a full week?"
As previously stated, she's impossible.
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"It was a full week yesterday — but you had me wait until the morning, so now it's six days."
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"Correct," she acknowledges. "The facts are on your side, this morning."
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"We should probably round up just to be safe, then."
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"You'd quibble over a handful of hours?" She asks, quibbling over a handful of hours.
Yep.
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Of course she would. And of course he would—he's inherently competitive, and even that aside, it makes him feel like he has some modicum of control over what is actually a somewhat scary situation. Not for him; he'll be fine flying. Even just taking a walk with Jasnah feels like she's at risk of bleeding out all over again, though, and there's no way that flying wouldn't be ten times harder on her.
So: "You probably don't remember, but you were actually stabbed recently."
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(Well. Maybe someone else. And the thought makes her frown, deeply.)
"There's no harm in the Windrunners arriving in six days, even if we don't take flight until the seventh."
If, maybe, perhaps. She leaves some space in her sentences to slip between at a later date.
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"You're right," he concedes. "There's nothing wrong with them coming a day early."
Aside from the power struggle that's likely to occur when Jasnah inevitably decides that they should just go ahead and leave when the Windrunners arrive, but they'll cross that bridge when they get to it.
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The pen pauses. Jasnah taps one, twice. They'll need to agree on a meeting place but it occurs to her she'll need Verso's buy-in. And right now...well, right now isn't the best time for it. If she can show significant improvement over the next few days, if she can still draw stormlight even in dribs and drabs. Yes. The conversation can wait. Jasnah at least has a rendezvous point in mind.
"—All that remains is to wait."
She sets the spanreed aside, uncertain whether her patience will hold three days — let alone six. Let alone whatever additional time is required if her hypothesis proves flawed and her recovering doesn't speed up as Ivory too recovers.
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A pause. He taps his fingers against his knee.
"—Your hair looks nice that way," he offers. Very nice. Dark, shiny even now, spilling down her back. It's probably wrong how appealing it is to see her loose, unbound. He clears his throat. "Do you need help putting it back before we go?"
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She cards her fingers up against the nape of her neck and combs the length of her hair out — fighting briefly between the compliment (your hair looks nice that way) and her inclination to bring it back to heel.
"Yes, actually. I think I could manage," she goes as far as testing her range of motion, shadowing the movements necessary for a good braid. It hurts, but she knows not to push too far. "But it wouldn't be neat enough."
Neat enough. Because neatness matters.
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Despite that little bit of self-indulgence, his work is dutiful and expedient, fingers not lingering anywhere that he doesn't have an excuse for. The braid is neat and taut, as requested, and when he ties it off he shifts back, feeling—
A little hot and bothered, honestly. There's something seriously wrong with him. It's the proximity, getting to be so near her in a way he's usually only ever been with another person with his clothes off. Or, well, partially off. It's kind of a waste of time to take them all the way off.
He scoots back further, creating more distance. "All done."
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This morning, she lets herself enjoy it. Trust itself is invigorating. And it's less what he's doing, and more that she allows it. As if a thread has been drawn through her sternum and anchored gently to his presence. A quiet, steadying bond. When his fingertips brush her scalp, gooseflesh rises along her neck. At one point she exhales a short, surprised laugh — quick reassurance following, soft and monosyllabic: she's fine, yes; no, he hasn't pulled too hard on that tangle.
Her head begins to bob almost unconsciously with the practiced over-under motion of the braid taking shape. She offers the smallest resistance, holding still, knowing it's her part of the work to be steady, to give him something firm to braid against.
And when it's finished, her shoulders drop. Her right hand traces the pattern, familiar and new all at once, before she flips the tail over one shoulder.
"Well done," she says, measured but warm. "I daresay they're getting better." And because she's learned some of his patterns by now, she adds: "And they started out good."
Hard to imagine they were both squabbling over hours just moments ago.
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Verso rubs his hands against the fabric of his trousers, palms gone a little sweaty. Flustered from the mere experience of being close to a beautiful woman. Clearly, it's been way too long. A decade, at least. More. After getting so far with the 58s, after watching Renoir slaughter them, he'd distanced himself. Doing the same thing over and over again without different results is insanity. 25 years, then, of loneliness. It's really no wonder that he can't keep his feelings on a leash.
"Uh," he says eloquently. "I'll go looking for a place that we can eat."
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Still.
Jasnah flattens a hand on the end-table and uses it to push herself to her feet. Look, she's steady! Look, she's stable!
"I thought we'd go together," she tells him — ignorant of why he might want to escape alone for a time before lunch.
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Or maybe he'd just assumed they did, because that's common sense.
"...It might take a while to find somewhere." Yes, he'd like a moment alone to disgustingly yearn and then maybe slap himself and psych himself up for being normal and platonic on this lunch absolutely-not-a-date, but there's also pragmatic reasons behind it, too. "You might get tired."
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Now — hmm. Jasnah doesn't knock his hands aside, but she does intervene by sliding her palm against where her wound sits. The tick in her jaw suggests the movement was indeed too sudden.
Ah, yes, she reminds herself. Here comes the resentment after the craving.
"I will only know my limits if I test them."
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"Okay," he says after the silence stretches a little too long. "You're right. We'll go, then."
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