Exponential
Location: Issa and Oshisyth's Weyr
Time: Wee hours of Day 8, Month 11, Turn 2, just after Issa returns from the island.
Players: Issa, Roa, Oshisyth, Tialith
Scene: Issa returns with some bad news that cannot wait until morning. A plan is formed.
Sorry to interrupt. Oshisyth's mindtouch is sudden, if apologetic, not slipping gradually into being the way it normally does. Issa needs to speak with the weyrwoman, she flings across to Tialith with a subdued urgency, threaded with images of an angry J'lor ruffled by a tropical breeze and the sneaking sense that under it all lies something much more disturbing. We'll be on our ledge in minutes. We'll wait there. Whenever you can come. And here the green's normal acquiescence shines through, and she fades to no more than a featherlight touch that remains in contact should the gold need anything more of her.
The queen is curled up, inside, on her couch, but Oshisyth's images and message jars her away quickly enough. Tialith's eyes open and her head lifts slowly to peer over at the bed where two shapes sleep, tangled together. Roa. Her thought is gentle at first and only strengthens as bits of the rider's mind stir to consciousness. Roa. Oshisyth's wants to see you, now. It is important. Much like her dragon, the goldrider's eyes open and she blinks at the ceiling. The first part will be untangling. This is done slowly and carefully, and it seems, at least, as if she manages to slide away without waking her bed partner. Bare feet touch icy floor and she moves about, gathering up clothes and pulling them on in the quiet dark. Hair is braided, but left to hang once it is, and Tialith is mounted without straps. The queen slips out onto the ledge and then takes to the air. She settles briefly on the green's ledge with a soft rumble as Roa dismounts. Then the gold makes for the spire to wait and Roa slips inside. "Issa?" her voice is a whisper.
Absent is Oshisyth's normal fluted greeting, but in it's place is one from Issa. "Come in," she says clearly, the strain in her thoughts slipping out to pull at her words. The greenrider sits on the edge of the couch upon which Oshisyth curls, sitting just far enough back so that her toes dangle inches from the floor. "Sorry to wake you. If I did." Blue eyes pass quickly out past the open curtain to the darkness of the sky before dropping down to the weyrwoman. With a sigh, she leans forward to place her elbows on her knees, hands left to dangle in the space between. "I went to visit our friends. She then instructs, "Sit down," tossing a sideways nod at the open space of stone to her right, her left taken up by the sleek green muzzle and those wide, yellow-tinged green eyes.
"Mmph," Roa murmurs, finally slowing down long enough to swipe the sleep from her eyes. "It's all right. Don't worry about it." She watches Issa for a moment before moving to seat herself on the gestured spot beside her. "Sit down," the little weyrwoman repeats wryly. "This is going to be bad, isn't it. What..." she closes her eyes and shakes her head, "have they done -now-?"
"Surprisingly enough," Issa says on the exhalation of a deep breath, "it's not them. Sit." She repeats the directive as a warning of sorts, but she begins whether Roa's taken her advice or not. Her gaze falls away from the goldrider's face, following along the edge of the rug in front of her instead, as she asks, "Do you remember hearing about that greenrider of theirs? That was found returning one of the boys?"
"I...vaguely." Roa looks down at her own hands, and then lifts her gaze to Issa's profile. "I heard something about Greenfields. I thought it was something made up. It, uhm..." the weyrwoman clears her throat faintly as the mental tally of riders begins. "It wasn't?"
Issa slowly shakes her head, her eyes flying along the woven pattern that edges her carpet, riveted, as if it were the first time she'd seen it. But the vague glassiness held in her gaze would suggest she's not really seeing that pattern at all. "It wasn't," she confirms. "The stories say she was spotted and grounded, but it's all hushed what happened from there. At least in the versions I heard. Well, apparently, she was taken to Telgar. Questioned. Tortured. For two sevens, he told me. And then they sent her back." The whole story spills from Issa's lips blankly, an emotionless report delivered to the equally passionless floor. But slowly, as it progresses, her fingers knot together tightly across her lap, gripping white-knuckled as she awaits a response.
She is focused as soon as Issa begins speaking, but Roa's brows rise a bit as her original Weyr, and Tialith's birthplace, is brought into it. And then, at the word 'tortured' there is a faint but audible intake of breath. Those brows, so recently lifted, jerk downward as Roa stares at her knees, eyes darting back and forth as she sees nothing but her own thoughts. Her hand has lifted, fingertips pressing against her lips. "Who..." Again, Issa is looked to for information. "S'lien?" It is a genuine question: quiet, wounded, and yet somehow unsurprised. "What was the rider's name? Did he say?"
A nod suffices as the answer to both sets of questions, but it's only the second that Issa gives any elaboration. "Cassiel," she pronounces, the name coming easily from her memory of their visit. Tilting her chin ever so slightly to the side, her blue gaze lifts finally to Roa, viewing her from the corners of her eyes. "Now a very damaged Cassiel, from the way they talk."
The little goldrider's eyes close as of the ten faces flitting through her head, one solidifies. "Cassiel? They...oh, Faranth." Roa sits like that a moment, eyes closed, one hand curled into a fist in her lap, the other with fingertips touching her mouth. Then she draws in a sharp breath and opens her eyes, hands finding one another and lacing through. "He couldn't have gotten anything from her that he wouldn't already have gotten from Chiavelth. So. He wanted them to know. To see her. To hurt." She shakes her head slightly. "Cass is steel. She'll pull through," Roa murmurs faintly.
Issa continues to watch, carefully now, turning further to allow a more in depth scrutiny. Curls bounce as she nods her agreement and she says, "A warning, courtesy of S'lien himself. And such an effective one." A bitter bite jumps into her voice, a shaky showing of feeling that's quickly squelched below more immediate concerns. "You know her?" The question is less surprised and more curious, treading carefully across ground she didn't know she'd have to encounter. Telling of the torture of a friend is, after all, in quite a different league than bringing the same news of some random greenrider a world away.
Roa's smile is a tiny and bitter one. She studies her fingers as she speaks. "I knew them all, Issa." The fingers of one hand twist over the pinkie of the other. "Cassiel was kind of...who I wanted to be. When I was older. All these things I admired. I, uhm, I've learned, recently, this won't be the first time. That they were tortured." Roa lifts her head and draws in a slow breath. "We can't allow this to slide. He can't get away with it."
"Wait." Issa unknots one hand to lift and stay Roa's progress, a frown beginning to brood above her gaze. She has to pause herself, though, eyes wandering as she sorts out what she's been told Roa has learned. "Before?" she questions, then, the frown fully formed. "For the trials?"
There is a tiny nod, blue gaze again dropping to Roa's hands. That pinkie goes twist-twist-twist in her fingertips. "Yeh," she says softly, nodding faintly. "Before, actually. Caught in the second month. Tried in the fourth. Did you ever wonder why the biggest names were tried last?" She laughs softly, "Turns out it wasn't for theatrics after all."
Issa listens in peace to Roa, one corner of her mouth pulled in as she chews on it, the only break from her normal, neutral expression. When the weyrwoman is done, she nods slowly pulling in a deep breath and turning her head to cast flicking glances across her weyr. A single whispered word is uttered on the exhalation. "Sanctioned." A bit of silence is allowed for her to mull it over, only a few beats before she circles back from the tangent they've taken. "Our hands are tied, Roa. He's Telgar. And you're not now. Remember?" There's a subtle hint of prodding sarcasm hidden in that last questioning word. But it quickly slips away, replaced by a weary helplessness that shoots minute tremors through a few of her words. "And while there might be ways around the autonomy, that doesn't change the fact that we're not supposed to know. Don't you think it would be suspicious for you to bring up grievances of secret torture only after she's been returned to the island?"
"Well, certainly, it will have to be done carefully," Roa agrees slowly. "But in this instance, not being tied to S'lien might give me more power. I still have contacts at Telgar. Those who might help, and I don't know what would happen when the weyr learned what their Weyrleader was, but it would certainly be something. I...the dragons had to know. They had to sense something, even if a queen kept Chiavelth silenced. So perhaps one of them leaked something? All we need is a rumor. Something to give us a reason to press for more."
"Rumors." Issa's mouth twists around the word and its distinctive 'of course' tone, as if chiding herself, practiced as she is at creating them, for not having thought of it sooner. Her left hand is brought up to brace her forehead, fingers smoothing her mild frown lines. "It would need to be air tight," she muses. "From what I've heard of S'lien, he's anything but stupid. If there's a hole in what we say, he'll find it. Pick at it." She's thinking aloud now, barely paying attention to Roa as her eyes skip about. But then she returns, addressing Roa directly, though her gaze remains elusive. "If you ask Telgari riders for help, make sure they're completely trustworthy," she stresses.
"I'll ask one," Roa says quietly. "And he is. Completely. Especially...he'd want to know about this. His dragon can listen for any undue distress in the others. Hopefully some of the riders will be fretting that the dragons were upset and there will be a sort of feedback. Otherwise, I suppose they'll all have forgotten by now. But where could he have hidden a green dragon? I don't think he could have entirely. And that..." she sits up straighter again, "that might be all we need. If S'lien had an exile and didn't notify the Council? That's enough. That's enough right there to have the other Weyrs wanting to know about Telgar."
If Issa listens now, she gives no sign of it, vacant and staring. Until that idea that strikes Roa is voiced; then her attention is given wholly to the goldrider, even after words have ceased to come. A beat or two, and she mends the brief silence that had fallen between them. "That's enough," she mutters, then repeats, stronger, "That's enough. Roa, that's... brilliant. I... It's so simple." Her hand falls away from her forehead, tracing a light path down past her temple as she stares past Roa's shoulder to a dimming glow to one side of the entrance, eyes flicking as she considers problems, pitfalls. "Find out if anyone saw anything first. See if any notice some distress. Dig for information. If we don't have to fabricate a story, it'll help. And it will help to know how she was kept, if she was quieted, if we do."
Roa is nodding now, bottom lip nibbled as she thinks. "I'll send word to my contact in the morning. He'll get back with what he's found. And if you have any friends who transferred from Telgar and have friends or family there, well, now might not be a bad time to encourage them to go visit. If you trust them enough. Truth is best. S'lien can twist it if he likes, but we can untwist it right back again. If we make something up, we play his game. He..." she shakes her head. "Not this time. This time it's too much."
"I wouldn't mind playing his game, if it's the only way," Issa comments darkly, reweaving her fingers together between her knees. "Sometimes it takes a lie to get to the truth," she mutters down at her hands before turning to face Roa once again. "But you have the lead," she concedes. "I can't be of much help. The only Telgari connections I know are E'sere and Lexine, and... well... family ties, and such." And if criminality is in any way genetic, they can hardly be trusted.
"And sometimes one lie is all it takes to kill the truth. I wouldn't bring Lexine in on it, no," Roa chuckles and shakes her head. "Criminal or not, I think she'd rather cover it up than spread it around. And E'sere...well..." she only snorts softly. "The Weyr Council is in couple days. If we're lucky, the rumors can start spreading when they're all here to overhear them and we can see what each one will do. J'cor, at least, will want to know more. If he doesn't right off, I'll help with that."
"Mmm," Issa offers, the tuneless humming coming after Roa's had her say, the vagueness of it unclarified. "Work quickly and the rumors will spread themselves," is her advice, then she adds, with an extra sour note, "especially one of such a gruesome nature." No more than a beat is spent in thoughtful silence before she says, voice still carrying some of that jaded sourness, "They thought it was approved by the Weyr Council, you know."
Her smile is small, fleeting, bitter. "Well," Roa says softly, "why wouldn't they?" One hand lifts to rub at her eyes, shoulders slouching. "I should get up early to send word. You should get rest as well. Thank you for telling me." The other hand lifts, both rubbing at her face. "Nothing for eleven turns," she groans, "and now barely a seven goes by, before there's something new."
"Exponential," is Issa's comment for that observation, a word that, perhaps, she learned from Reyce. To illustrate her point, her right hand separates from her left and flattens, forming an upward swooping curve in the air. "No end." But this she doesn't elaborate; instead, she lets her hand fall back down and lowers herself down to the empty stone behind her as if she intended to obey immediately Roa's order to get rest and fall asleep right there. "I'm sorry to throw this on you," she says, sounding quite awake, despite her actions. Sighing up at the ceiling, she then offers, "Well, sleep well. In spite of it all." A twist of humor for her farewell, even if it is of a bitter variety.
"No end," Roa agrees softly as she straightens into a stand. "I'm sorry you had to hear it from them. I don't get the impression they were overkind in the telling of it." She rubs at her face a final time. "We're not innocent here on the mainland. We just hide our guilt better. Sleep well, Issa, when you get around to it." In the distance, Tialith is winging her way from the spire to Oshisyth's ledge.
Issa has no keen observations or well-worded wisdoms to impart on Roa in return, a mere, muffled, "Thanks," sounding from her before she falls silent once again. Oshisyth, deathly still throughout the whole of their conversation, though her eyes gradually returned to a more normal, sparking green, moves to slide her head up against Issa, then falls motionless again, watching the weyrwoman retreat while her rider has eyes only for the stone above her.
Time: Wee hours of Day 8, Month 11, Turn 2, just after Issa returns from the island.
Players: Issa, Roa, Oshisyth, Tialith
Scene: Issa returns with some bad news that cannot wait until morning. A plan is formed.
Sorry to interrupt. Oshisyth's mindtouch is sudden, if apologetic, not slipping gradually into being the way it normally does. Issa needs to speak with the weyrwoman, she flings across to Tialith with a subdued urgency, threaded with images of an angry J'lor ruffled by a tropical breeze and the sneaking sense that under it all lies something much more disturbing. We'll be on our ledge in minutes. We'll wait there. Whenever you can come. And here the green's normal acquiescence shines through, and she fades to no more than a featherlight touch that remains in contact should the gold need anything more of her.
The queen is curled up, inside, on her couch, but Oshisyth's images and message jars her away quickly enough. Tialith's eyes open and her head lifts slowly to peer over at the bed where two shapes sleep, tangled together. Roa. Her thought is gentle at first and only strengthens as bits of the rider's mind stir to consciousness. Roa. Oshisyth's wants to see you, now. It is important. Much like her dragon, the goldrider's eyes open and she blinks at the ceiling. The first part will be untangling. This is done slowly and carefully, and it seems, at least, as if she manages to slide away without waking her bed partner. Bare feet touch icy floor and she moves about, gathering up clothes and pulling them on in the quiet dark. Hair is braided, but left to hang once it is, and Tialith is mounted without straps. The queen slips out onto the ledge and then takes to the air. She settles briefly on the green's ledge with a soft rumble as Roa dismounts. Then the gold makes for the spire to wait and Roa slips inside. "Issa?" her voice is a whisper.
Absent is Oshisyth's normal fluted greeting, but in it's place is one from Issa. "Come in," she says clearly, the strain in her thoughts slipping out to pull at her words. The greenrider sits on the edge of the couch upon which Oshisyth curls, sitting just far enough back so that her toes dangle inches from the floor. "Sorry to wake you. If I did." Blue eyes pass quickly out past the open curtain to the darkness of the sky before dropping down to the weyrwoman. With a sigh, she leans forward to place her elbows on her knees, hands left to dangle in the space between. "I went to visit our friends. She then instructs, "Sit down," tossing a sideways nod at the open space of stone to her right, her left taken up by the sleek green muzzle and those wide, yellow-tinged green eyes.
"Mmph," Roa murmurs, finally slowing down long enough to swipe the sleep from her eyes. "It's all right. Don't worry about it." She watches Issa for a moment before moving to seat herself on the gestured spot beside her. "Sit down," the little weyrwoman repeats wryly. "This is going to be bad, isn't it. What..." she closes her eyes and shakes her head, "have they done -now-?"
"Surprisingly enough," Issa says on the exhalation of a deep breath, "it's not them. Sit." She repeats the directive as a warning of sorts, but she begins whether Roa's taken her advice or not. Her gaze falls away from the goldrider's face, following along the edge of the rug in front of her instead, as she asks, "Do you remember hearing about that greenrider of theirs? That was found returning one of the boys?"
"I...vaguely." Roa looks down at her own hands, and then lifts her gaze to Issa's profile. "I heard something about Greenfields. I thought it was something made up. It, uhm..." the weyrwoman clears her throat faintly as the mental tally of riders begins. "It wasn't?"
Issa slowly shakes her head, her eyes flying along the woven pattern that edges her carpet, riveted, as if it were the first time she'd seen it. But the vague glassiness held in her gaze would suggest she's not really seeing that pattern at all. "It wasn't," she confirms. "The stories say she was spotted and grounded, but it's all hushed what happened from there. At least in the versions I heard. Well, apparently, she was taken to Telgar. Questioned. Tortured. For two sevens, he told me. And then they sent her back." The whole story spills from Issa's lips blankly, an emotionless report delivered to the equally passionless floor. But slowly, as it progresses, her fingers knot together tightly across her lap, gripping white-knuckled as she awaits a response.
She is focused as soon as Issa begins speaking, but Roa's brows rise a bit as her original Weyr, and Tialith's birthplace, is brought into it. And then, at the word 'tortured' there is a faint but audible intake of breath. Those brows, so recently lifted, jerk downward as Roa stares at her knees, eyes darting back and forth as she sees nothing but her own thoughts. Her hand has lifted, fingertips pressing against her lips. "Who..." Again, Issa is looked to for information. "S'lien?" It is a genuine question: quiet, wounded, and yet somehow unsurprised. "What was the rider's name? Did he say?"
A nod suffices as the answer to both sets of questions, but it's only the second that Issa gives any elaboration. "Cassiel," she pronounces, the name coming easily from her memory of their visit. Tilting her chin ever so slightly to the side, her blue gaze lifts finally to Roa, viewing her from the corners of her eyes. "Now a very damaged Cassiel, from the way they talk."
The little goldrider's eyes close as of the ten faces flitting through her head, one solidifies. "Cassiel? They...oh, Faranth." Roa sits like that a moment, eyes closed, one hand curled into a fist in her lap, the other with fingertips touching her mouth. Then she draws in a sharp breath and opens her eyes, hands finding one another and lacing through. "He couldn't have gotten anything from her that he wouldn't already have gotten from Chiavelth. So. He wanted them to know. To see her. To hurt." She shakes her head slightly. "Cass is steel. She'll pull through," Roa murmurs faintly.
Issa continues to watch, carefully now, turning further to allow a more in depth scrutiny. Curls bounce as she nods her agreement and she says, "A warning, courtesy of S'lien himself. And such an effective one." A bitter bite jumps into her voice, a shaky showing of feeling that's quickly squelched below more immediate concerns. "You know her?" The question is less surprised and more curious, treading carefully across ground she didn't know she'd have to encounter. Telling of the torture of a friend is, after all, in quite a different league than bringing the same news of some random greenrider a world away.
Roa's smile is a tiny and bitter one. She studies her fingers as she speaks. "I knew them all, Issa." The fingers of one hand twist over the pinkie of the other. "Cassiel was kind of...who I wanted to be. When I was older. All these things I admired. I, uhm, I've learned, recently, this won't be the first time. That they were tortured." Roa lifts her head and draws in a slow breath. "We can't allow this to slide. He can't get away with it."
"Wait." Issa unknots one hand to lift and stay Roa's progress, a frown beginning to brood above her gaze. She has to pause herself, though, eyes wandering as she sorts out what she's been told Roa has learned. "Before?" she questions, then, the frown fully formed. "For the trials?"
There is a tiny nod, blue gaze again dropping to Roa's hands. That pinkie goes twist-twist-twist in her fingertips. "Yeh," she says softly, nodding faintly. "Before, actually. Caught in the second month. Tried in the fourth. Did you ever wonder why the biggest names were tried last?" She laughs softly, "Turns out it wasn't for theatrics after all."
Issa listens in peace to Roa, one corner of her mouth pulled in as she chews on it, the only break from her normal, neutral expression. When the weyrwoman is done, she nods slowly pulling in a deep breath and turning her head to cast flicking glances across her weyr. A single whispered word is uttered on the exhalation. "Sanctioned." A bit of silence is allowed for her to mull it over, only a few beats before she circles back from the tangent they've taken. "Our hands are tied, Roa. He's Telgar. And you're not now. Remember?" There's a subtle hint of prodding sarcasm hidden in that last questioning word. But it quickly slips away, replaced by a weary helplessness that shoots minute tremors through a few of her words. "And while there might be ways around the autonomy, that doesn't change the fact that we're not supposed to know. Don't you think it would be suspicious for you to bring up grievances of secret torture only after she's been returned to the island?"
"Well, certainly, it will have to be done carefully," Roa agrees slowly. "But in this instance, not being tied to S'lien might give me more power. I still have contacts at Telgar. Those who might help, and I don't know what would happen when the weyr learned what their Weyrleader was, but it would certainly be something. I...the dragons had to know. They had to sense something, even if a queen kept Chiavelth silenced. So perhaps one of them leaked something? All we need is a rumor. Something to give us a reason to press for more."
"Rumors." Issa's mouth twists around the word and its distinctive 'of course' tone, as if chiding herself, practiced as she is at creating them, for not having thought of it sooner. Her left hand is brought up to brace her forehead, fingers smoothing her mild frown lines. "It would need to be air tight," she muses. "From what I've heard of S'lien, he's anything but stupid. If there's a hole in what we say, he'll find it. Pick at it." She's thinking aloud now, barely paying attention to Roa as her eyes skip about. But then she returns, addressing Roa directly, though her gaze remains elusive. "If you ask Telgari riders for help, make sure they're completely trustworthy," she stresses.
"I'll ask one," Roa says quietly. "And he is. Completely. Especially...he'd want to know about this. His dragon can listen for any undue distress in the others. Hopefully some of the riders will be fretting that the dragons were upset and there will be a sort of feedback. Otherwise, I suppose they'll all have forgotten by now. But where could he have hidden a green dragon? I don't think he could have entirely. And that..." she sits up straighter again, "that might be all we need. If S'lien had an exile and didn't notify the Council? That's enough. That's enough right there to have the other Weyrs wanting to know about Telgar."
If Issa listens now, she gives no sign of it, vacant and staring. Until that idea that strikes Roa is voiced; then her attention is given wholly to the goldrider, even after words have ceased to come. A beat or two, and she mends the brief silence that had fallen between them. "That's enough," she mutters, then repeats, stronger, "That's enough. Roa, that's... brilliant. I... It's so simple." Her hand falls away from her forehead, tracing a light path down past her temple as she stares past Roa's shoulder to a dimming glow to one side of the entrance, eyes flicking as she considers problems, pitfalls. "Find out if anyone saw anything first. See if any notice some distress. Dig for information. If we don't have to fabricate a story, it'll help. And it will help to know how she was kept, if she was quieted, if we do."
Roa is nodding now, bottom lip nibbled as she thinks. "I'll send word to my contact in the morning. He'll get back with what he's found. And if you have any friends who transferred from Telgar and have friends or family there, well, now might not be a bad time to encourage them to go visit. If you trust them enough. Truth is best. S'lien can twist it if he likes, but we can untwist it right back again. If we make something up, we play his game. He..." she shakes her head. "Not this time. This time it's too much."
"I wouldn't mind playing his game, if it's the only way," Issa comments darkly, reweaving her fingers together between her knees. "Sometimes it takes a lie to get to the truth," she mutters down at her hands before turning to face Roa once again. "But you have the lead," she concedes. "I can't be of much help. The only Telgari connections I know are E'sere and Lexine, and... well... family ties, and such." And if criminality is in any way genetic, they can hardly be trusted.
"And sometimes one lie is all it takes to kill the truth. I wouldn't bring Lexine in on it, no," Roa chuckles and shakes her head. "Criminal or not, I think she'd rather cover it up than spread it around. And E'sere...well..." she only snorts softly. "The Weyr Council is in couple days. If we're lucky, the rumors can start spreading when they're all here to overhear them and we can see what each one will do. J'cor, at least, will want to know more. If he doesn't right off, I'll help with that."
"Mmm," Issa offers, the tuneless humming coming after Roa's had her say, the vagueness of it unclarified. "Work quickly and the rumors will spread themselves," is her advice, then she adds, with an extra sour note, "especially one of such a gruesome nature." No more than a beat is spent in thoughtful silence before she says, voice still carrying some of that jaded sourness, "They thought it was approved by the Weyr Council, you know."
Her smile is small, fleeting, bitter. "Well," Roa says softly, "why wouldn't they?" One hand lifts to rub at her eyes, shoulders slouching. "I should get up early to send word. You should get rest as well. Thank you for telling me." The other hand lifts, both rubbing at her face. "Nothing for eleven turns," she groans, "and now barely a seven goes by, before there's something new."
"Exponential," is Issa's comment for that observation, a word that, perhaps, she learned from Reyce. To illustrate her point, her right hand separates from her left and flattens, forming an upward swooping curve in the air. "No end." But this she doesn't elaborate; instead, she lets her hand fall back down and lowers herself down to the empty stone behind her as if she intended to obey immediately Roa's order to get rest and fall asleep right there. "I'm sorry to throw this on you," she says, sounding quite awake, despite her actions. Sighing up at the ceiling, she then offers, "Well, sleep well. In spite of it all." A twist of humor for her farewell, even if it is of a bitter variety.
"No end," Roa agrees softly as she straightens into a stand. "I'm sorry you had to hear it from them. I don't get the impression they were overkind in the telling of it." She rubs at her face a final time. "We're not innocent here on the mainland. We just hide our guilt better. Sleep well, Issa, when you get around to it." In the distance, Tialith is winging her way from the spire to Oshisyth's ledge.
Issa has no keen observations or well-worded wisdoms to impart on Roa in return, a mere, muffled, "Thanks," sounding from her before she falls silent once again. Oshisyth, deathly still throughout the whole of their conversation, though her eyes gradually returned to a more normal, sparking green, moves to slide her head up against Issa, then falls motionless again, watching the weyrwoman retreat while her rider has eyes only for the stone above her.