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Leareth is, at this moment, incredibly concerned about the current state of affairs in Valdemar.
He was already very concerned about current Valdemaran politics, in terms of how it affected his own plans. He...hadn't predicted in advance that Vanyel would share everything Leareth had told him with the Senior Circle - or that Valdemar would suddenly acquire the ability to block Gifts - or that the King would explicitly sign off on Vanyel departing on a long journey to hunt down whatever details he could find about Leareth's past lives.
Vanyel asked him for a year. A negotiated grace period, a space for Vanyel to think about the vast revelations of their latest dream conversations, and to fact-check as much as he could of Leareth's own history.
The year-mark passed weeks ago. Leareth had already had spies in Haven, of course, but it was surprising, when Vanyel didn't reappear in their peaceful frozen mountainscape dream, and so he invested more resources into his own information-gathering mission.
The information that his spies have been gathering is deeply baffling.
It's...by now a widespread and well-known rumor in Haven, that an incredibly beautiful and attractive young man (or woman??? the reports are surprisingly unclear on this point???) recently arrived in the city - not explicitly linked to Vanyel's return to public life, but the timing seems to match closely.
Observed facts about the absurdly beautiful and gender-confusing stranger include:
- He has been often observed in Vanyel's presence. There have been no obvious romantic interactions in public, but there is nonetheless widespread gossip that the famous Herald Vanyel Demonsbane has found the love of his life. (These rumors include shockingly little of the usual expected disapproval of same-sex relationships.)
- She (or he, in a couple of the versions) has been observed flirting with half of the staff at the House of Healing, with varying degrees of success.
- She has apparently been seen spending long periods in the Companions' Field, apparently talking to the Companions, despite the fact that this is generally not done. She was often naked.
- A Palace servant who reports to one of Leareth's spies gave a transcript of a long conversation with the "inhumanly attractive" stranger, where among many other questions, he asked her if the Palace in Haven included "dungeons" for "scenes".
- She apparently at one point stood on top of the historic statue of King Valdemar in the Palace grounds, while completely naked, and gave a long rousing speech about how same-sex partnerships were completely fine and acceptable.
- She wears a very pretty but clearly unfinished hummingbird pendant on a necklace. When asked about it, she has apparently said "it's half complete so it's definitely plot relevant".
- This speech supposedly included, repeatedly, the quote "come the fuck on this is fucking stupid I have so many better things to do with my time do I need to have sex with all of you".
- Some observers claim they have seen the inhumanly beautiful stranger literally shapeshift from an incredibly attractive girl to an incredibly attractive boy in front of them.
- One of Leareth's low-level spies reports that the stranger seduced him - not even according to his own plan - and afterward said (quoted verbatim), "holy shit that advanced the plot - no offense, you didn't seem super plotty - did the Evil Emperor kill your whole family or something"
- There are secondhand rumored reports of philosophical conversations involving this visitor having devolved into orgies.
