"The Komarrans generally are not as bad about Cetagandans. This Komarran just happens to be under a great deal of stress about my presence, and I suppose anything that gives off even the faintest and most obscure whiff of danger is going to make him sweat."

"Well, hopefully he principally takes it out on the security people who couldn't be bothered to have him in to look at me and not on you." Squeeze.

"Hopefully," Miles agrees, snuggling her. And crossing mental fingers on the wish that her curiosity has been flawlessly deflected from the subject of Galeni's Cetaganda-related worries.

Well, she doesn't ask anything more about it, at any rate. She just snuggles him. "Anyway. I don't think I like 'Tybalt' as much as you do. Makes me think of the Romeo and Juliet character. Hating the word peace. Getting stabbed."

"Sounds perfectly Barrayaran to me."

"But little Whatshisface Antoly will be only slightly less than one-quarter Barrayaran."

"He'll be a Vorkosigan. Barrayaran enough. Well, what's something you like better?"

"I like Loren, I said. Casmir's nice too."

"Anyway," he says, his mind still running along the previous track, "I don't think of myself as slightly less than half Barrayaran. I'm not sure how I do think of myself, but that's not it."

"I suppose that makes sense, I was neglecting upbringing and yours was thoroughly Barrayar. Still. Casmir? Loren?"

"Can't decide between them, neither one is grabbing me the way Tybalt did. I guess there's plenty of time to think about it. What about girl names? Any ideas there?"

"I actually like my designer's name, but it'd probably be inappropriate on a number of levels."

Miles snorts. "Yeah? What is it?"

"Sathanne. I suppose you could tweak it a bit to pass unnoticed, but maybe better not."

"Or pick something that only sounds a little like it... plenty of French-derived names end in -anne. Sylvianne? Adrianne, if we want out firstborn daughter to have a built-in excuse to despise us and our choices?"

"I like 'Adri', but not enough to do it twice. Is 'Ninon' in use on Barrayar? I know it's French but not what dialect, and it's an extremely well-disguised derivative of Anne."

"I don't know off the top of my head, so it's relatively obscure if so, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. And it's cute. I've always liked Natalia for a girl, but of N names I think I like Ninon better... should the girls alliterate too? The singular girl or plural girls or lack of a girl, depending on our reproductive choices after Aral Adri is born."

"Yes, Aral Adri first, and then we can contemplate girls and Whatshisface Antoly and so on, but it's nice to have an idea of where our aesthetics overlap. I think if Whatshisface Antoly winds up alliterating it might be a little - twee, so perhaps only one alliterative name and we can pretend we didn't notice."

"Ah. Perfect," he says, stretching up to kiss her on the cheek.

Snuggle. She makes a quick note of the other discussed names appropriately peppered with question marks and then collars her pen again.

Snuggle-snug.

Snuggling continues, nothing that would be too embarrassing for Ivan to walk in on (though when he's back hours later freshly showered, he does knock first). And eventually Linya departs to make sure she has a hotel room - "Your bed here is tiny, and I don't think I want to room with Ivan."

"It's true, it is. And he snores. You have made a wise decision."

Ivan grumbles something incomprehensible, and in short order Linya is gone.

"So, Ivan. What is there to do around here without poking my nose out of the embassy?"