Despite having grown up on a farm, and then being a king (which is an even earlier rise, believe it or not), Garion is not and never has been a 'morning person' because that implies there is a time when he isn't by default just a bit grumpy.

It doesn't help that he was told as a boy that the morning exists purely so that night and afternoon don't bump into one another and he's never quite stopped believing it.

He'll offer a crooked smile at Fitz.

"If only." He spreads a hand. "If I could avoid it, I would. I have to listen to it too, after all."

"Well aware. If I couldn't hear it, I'd definitely feel the shoe my wife threw a me the last time I tried to sing," he says cheerfully.

"Not with the singing. Just with knowing I shouldn't."

He tilts his head thoughtfully.

"Before this place? It only happened when the rest of the royal rabblerousers got me to drink."

Which was its own trouble.

"On my side, for the most part."

Look, he loves the Alorn kings (and Fulrach, of course) but very often, he's on one side and they're on the other when it comes to 'not being a bunch of troublesome jackasses'.

"'Co-workers' is the word I'd probably use."

He considers some of his friends who may or may not have been on his side when they became his friends.

He wobbles a hand.

But the question is a lot easier to answer.

"That was me. Took about half a year before I punched someone in the face for hurting one of the kids."

"Two years, I think?"

He shrugs.

"I'm not great with time."

It's a sorcerer thing. His grandfather once got preoccupied and spent a hundred years just fucking with something in his tower once. And his grandmother just watched him at it.

"Nope," he says honestly, "just... been here. But the days kind of blur after a while."

"Mostly, it's just the way people graduate. And then get demoted. And then graduate. And get demoted again."

He looks up and raises his voice a little.

"It's almost like the system's badly designed or something."

Drasnian. The word just... imprints itself immediately in relation to this one. He's absolutely an Alorn at heart... and definitely a Drasnian. It's almost like Silk is here with him.

Which he never actually wants.

Because Kheldar would lose his ever-loving mind.

"I suppose you have a point. Clearly I just haven't had enough time to contemplate the perfection of the design."

He puts his hand over his heart as well, but he won't repeat the nonsense. Instead-

"Have you even been here six hours?"

"So that's two considerations?" He tilts his head thoughtfully. "Come up with anything useful?"

"I don't think there's a musician in this or any world that could help me," he notes with some amusement. "And there's plenty of people for grudges. It sounds like there's even some you brought along with you."

"Practical," he says with the most complimentary sort of nod. If there is nothing else he can admire, it is the practical. He's never been one for wasting time.

"And lucky for me, given my voice and your ears."

"Then might I suggest ear plugs? I know a few of us use them."

Just saying.

"You can request them for sleep. And just... not pull them out again."