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The tavern was too warm. Not intolerably so, but enough that the air clung slightly—just enough to register, not enough to bother with. Kaveh had claimed the seat by the wall, which was fine. Better, maybe. Kaveh filled space, his voice cutting through the tavern’s murmur like a knife through parchment. No need for Alhaitham to do the same.
Tighnari was mid-story, Cyno watching him with that blank focus that meant he was actually enjoying himself. Alhaitham let their voices blur into the background, a steady hum beneath the clink of glasses and the occasional burst of laughter from nearby tables. Predictable. Comfortable.
Kaveh was mid-rant. "Do you have any idea how many forms it takes to change one structural support beam? One!"
"Is it more than ten?" Cyno asked.
"Try forty-two!"
Alhaitham took a sip of his drink, the bitterness sharp on his tongue. The conversation would loop like this for a while—Kaveh’s outrage, Cyno’s deadpan, Tighnari’s corrections. A self-sustaining cycle. He could drift at the edges, interject when he wanted, or simply let the current carry him.
A tilt of Cyno’s head. A flick of Tighnari’s ear. Kaveh’s fingers tapping against his glass. Small things, noted without effort, filed away without urgency. This was how it worked: Kaveh talked, the others reacted, and Alhaitham—
Well. He observed.
A single line, dropped like a pebble, could shift the current—but only if needed.
Most found Kaveh exhausting.
Alhaitham found him… efficient.
He didn’t have to work hard to exist here. The conversation unfolded around him, his mind a quiet hum beneath the noise—no need to calculate his place, no need to adjust. He was exactly where he needed to be: present, but not performing.
Yet even in the ease of it, his attention moved in slow, steady arcs. The tilt of Cyno’s head—amused, not bored. The flick of Tighnari’s ear—listening, but resisting the urge to interject. The shift in Kaveh’s tone, the way his fingers tapped against his glass—frustration edging into theatrics. None of it required conscious thought. It was just there, like the weight of a book in his hand, familiar and unremarkable.
A nudge was all it took.
"You forgot the form for internal variance declaration," Alhaitham said, not looking up.
Kaveh nearly choked. "That form is obsolete!"
Tighnari perked up. "Wait, I thought they reinstated that one."
"They did not!"
And just like that, the night recalibrated. Kaveh was on his feet, halfway through a lecture on legislative inconsistencies before Cyno could land a dry remark. Tighnari sighed and corrected them both. The rhythm adjusted itself without his interference.
Good.
This was how it worked: Kaveh’s complaints were structure. The others orbited around him, their reactions predictable but not uninteresting—like watching a well-worn script play out with minor improvisations. Alhaitham leaned back, his drink cradled loosely in his hand. No steering required. No engagement necessary.
Kaveh filled the space so he didn’t have to.
The tavern was tolerable—not for the drinks, not for the noise, but for this: the steady undercurrent of voices, the way the group moved in practiced syncopation. And Kaveh, always Kaveh, at the center of it all, unknowingly conducting the room so Alhaitham could simply be.