serial procrastinator

and a rare variant

Peeling Maia's "everyone hates me" goggles off the situation I think Beshalar is probably terrified.

Beshalar got assigned this job on literally no notice, so he was starting late, he's had this job of protecting the emperor for literally hours, with a partner he's only just met.

Its only been a couple of days since the rest of the line of succession were suddenly died. No one knows exactly what happened yet, or if people are still actively seeking to kill the rest of the royal family. If Maia dies there will be at best a regency and at worst a huge succession crisis and Beshelar will be expected to commit ritual suicide.

but he also views beshelar as a fundamentally safe person. sure, beshelar hates him, but he is also kind and dutiful - maia assesses his personality incredibly accurately within seconds of meeting him.

he believes beshelar hates him, but also trusts him to protect him, to go with him during his ritual.

and its this odd mix of trusting beshelar implictly and feeling at least physically safe with him, and also believing besh hates him (for everything that maia hates about himself) that leads maia to taking his anger and bitterness out on beshelar - mostly internally, occasionally out loud (the argument after the corazhas meeting specifically, in which beshelar is genuinely concerned for him and offering sensible advice, while maia, desperately lonely and out of his depth, interprets it as beshelar treating him like he's stupid and shouts at him.)

maia is deliberately kind, or at least understanding, to almost everyone, even internally, with the notable exception of beshelar. beshelar is like a safe and acceptable conduit for his own self hatred and internalised racism.

all the way up until everybody's favourite beshelar scene, where he reacts with sheer unadulterated rage upon discovering that maia was abused, and straight up yells that the previous emperor was a monster for allowing it to happen. an opinion that could probably get him immediately executed for treason if maia felt so inclined.

and maia, who 'has not expected this reaction from beshelar' is so stunned and shocked and amazed by this - by someone he believed thought very little of him being uncontrollably furious at the thought of him being hurt - that he starts laughing hysterically.

A wish upon a star🎋