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Edarial is nine, and he's avoiding his mother again.
Exploring the palace gets old after a while, but the library's even worse, and he suspects that if he spent any more time in his room, he'd scream. So, exploring the palace it is. Berathyme's with him, anyway, so the palace won't be so boring. She tends to make observations he didn't notice himself, and that's always interesting, if not always useful. Corridor, corridor, guest rooms, oh yes that is the closet with all of the uncomfortably looking coats, he'd forgotten about that one. Berathyme observes that they've been used relatively recently, some poor souls must have suffered - and then he opens a door and there's something he doesn't recognize.
He stares at the bar in confusion, consults briefly with Berathyme, and then wanders in.
What exactly is going on here?
royal_obligation
royal_obligation
"I mentioned my mother made an awful queen? She had this habit of just - doing things on a whim. Which occasionally included giving estates from one family to another for no reason. Or something."
she_sells_seashells
"So now you have to figure out how to get back all the things people need that have been put in the wrong places."
royal_obligation
"And do it politely without - insulting the people that enjoy their shiny new gifts. Yes."
she_sells_seashells
"Can you get the people who got the things and the people who originally had them to make friends and then nudge the first to give the things back to the second as presents? Or give the original holders credit for doing something nice that's actually mostly you, for the current holders."
she_sells_seashells
"...Well, when we leave Milliways we won't actually be able to understand each other any more."
royal_obligation
"That - is true. Hm. I - don't know what the solution there should be. I'm willing to help teach you Marlatian, though?"
she_sells_seashells
"I'll learn it," agrees Shell Bell. "But we can't really start here since everything's translated, and I bet nobody ever wrote a Marlatian-English dictionary. It'll be full immersion. So I won't be able to consult right away."
royal_obligation
Edarial nods. "That's all right. It's - the consulting is a bonus, not why you're allowed to follow me to my world."
royal_obligation
"Oh. Hm. Uh - I don't know how to speed that up. I mean, obviously we talk here and plan things, but once we're out of Milliways..." He shrugs, weakly.
she_sells_seashells
"Yeah. Oh - I know. We can write up a list of phrases. If you take something you wrote or recorded yourself out of Milliways, it's in your language - so we make two copies, and you hold one and I hold one, and then they'll be in the two languages and we'll know they match up."
she_sells_seashells
"I'm not sure. 'Where's the bathroom'? 'What is the word for...?' 'Yes' and 'no' and 'maybe'?"
royal_obligation
"Probably explanatory things like 'hungry' or 'thirsty' too, those sound like they'd be smart. Uh, room names, kitchen, bedroom, so on?"
she_sells_seashells
"I'm not asking if you think it's pretty, although thank you. I wanted to make sure I didn't have to transliterate it. It's a word - both bits of my nickname, are, actually. Shell, bell."
royal_pain
Zevros asks the Bar very nicely for an alcoholic drink. He needs it. Ugh, no wonder his brother is failing so badly at getting married.