“You are very good at it, Ennaris,” Stephen says. Against all his instincts — a comforting gesture rare and alien from him — he reaches out and lays his own scarred hand over hers. A reassuring squeeze of the hand she can still feel. He’ll undo the cuff eventually, but not just yet; he can’t have Ness distracted from this conversation by that pain in the arm once it resurfaces.

“I’m the biggest fucking hypocrite,” the swearing is a sign that he’s letting some more of the formality fall away, he is speaking to her as a teacher and a mentor and the Head Healer and perhaps, finally, as a friend, “but if there is one thing I know professionally, it’s that the body is a machine like any other. Your brain quite literally deteriorates with sleep deprivation. The body requires maintenance, and it can wholly break down if you push it, yourself, too hard without rest and healing.”

It’s very do as I say and not as I do, but still. It’s worth an attempt.

And then, awkwardly feeling his way through the conversation, away from the familiar territory of medical advice and over to something even more delicate: “And Sarrux was… it was a lot, for one of your first combat missions. Needing to take some time to recover doesn’t make you bad at your job.”