OOC: CW for brief SA mention toward the end
Róisín had not taken offense at Shenzi's assumptions. As a fresh recruit, she might have been less jaded about the Peak and its reputation, but now two whole years in and she had learned a great deal about who the sisters were and the complicated tangle of what they had stood for in the past. She could only imagine what Shenzi's opinion of them was, given her long enslavement in the Lagoon. To imagine having neighbors that claimed to be fighting for the good of the isles constantly overlooking your plight had to burned marks of its own into her heart.

Shenzi's bitter laugh at the discussion of promises prompts a weary smile to the painted girl's lips and she nods, recalling the hopeful way she and Oswin had approached Rade. Neither of them had known what to expect going into that conversation, and while Róisín hadn't been naive enough to think that one talk was going to fix everything, she had never expected that the promises made on both sides would be broken.

No matter what they had told Rade, their commitment to fighting for the good of all was flawed.

Still, Róisín keeps her tongue still, not trusting herself to not vent about every problem that weighed upon her heart. The last thing that she felt she should do was unload her own troubles on the mare that had just been given a chance to choose her own life. It would be disrespectful and exploitative to try and weaponize Shenzi's dislike for the Lagoon men to serve Rói's own goals.

Yours is a rare spirit, Róisín. Shenzi's statement makes her throat close, and she swallows thickly against the rising sense that she was nothing but a fraud. A girl trying to walk around in shoes three times too big for her. None of her mother's teachings had covered what you were supposed to do when you suspected that your superior was colluding with the enemy, or how to navigate a truce between two great houses that had spent many long years directly opposed to one another.

Thankfully, Shenzi absolves her of having to say anything in return to such praise, although Róisín would have gladly listened to a thousand undeserved compliments if it would save her the awkwardness of having to navigate through the Barb's question.

A part of her - the part that had spent years of her life traumatized by the actions of the silver witch - screamed that she should name Nyimara now. That she was entirely within her rights to claim Shenzi's boon by demanding that she not return to the black-hearted mare. That Róisín speak of every despicable thing that Nyimara had ever done to her family in the name of jealousy so that Shenzi might also see the terrible parts of Nyimara that Róisín had always known.

But who was she to do that?

As much as Róisín felt strongly about Shenzi being released from her captivity, her freedom was not a result of Róisín alone. The Peak had freed Shenzi, not Róisín. She had merely been the spokesperson for a herd's belief, and it was not her right to claim Shenzi's service, even if the brown mare had offered it directly.

"Nyimara has troubled my family since I was a small child," she finally said, the image of her mother's sorrowful face and bruised body in her mind. Róisín had always known her mother to be strong and resilient, and yet there was no mistaking how close to the end she had been when she returned home with the child Aranck had forced upon her mother as a result of Nyimara's schemes.

Trouble hardly seemed a fitting descriptor for the constant rounds of kidnap and torture that Nyimara had brought to them, but what else was she to say? If she offered any more information she had no doubt that she would slip into attempting to skew Shenzi's opinion of Nyimara and she had promised herself that she wouldn't do that.

Shenzi didn't owe her anything.

Not even her help.

Unbidden, tears prickled in her eyes and gathered on long dark lashes. She drew in a conflicted breath to steady her voice, and then finished stiffly, forcing each individual word out. "But I would not ask you to forsake your friends just because I did what someone else should have done long ago."