And then he coughs, attempts to defer to Mark's expertise, and mumbles, "I know what it - means."
Ivan opens his mouth.
"You," says Aurin, "you shut up."
"Thank you," sighs Mark, with visible relief. "That's given us years right there." He continues snuggling Mial.
...Miles, though, thinks he might understand it. He looks at Mial and Mark with unhappy recognition.
"Please tell me that was some sort of crazy Mark utterance and not what I think it was," says Miles.
"Sorry, no," says Mark. "He needs something he can't have, and it hurts intolerably."
(Ivan, forbidden to speak, does not reply.)
"That word is the exact antithesis of the things about Draconic that hurt him, and Draconic won't let him have it. It wasn't even possible to think before someone outside the trap came up with it," says Mark. "And now he's bloody Tantalus."
"And," Miles extrapolates, "the more people understand and acknowledge the forbidden vocabulary, the less it feels like eternally starving under a tree full of fruit?"
"Does saying it help?" she inquires.
"Well, I've been filled in on what it means now, to whatever extent that helps."
What does it in fact mean? I think I was upstairs for most of the context.
Aurin said Draconic for dragon is "siad" and "shren" is also Draconic and apparently the major dragon-ego-puffing-word for "awesome in a dragon way" is "siaddaki" so I just did the OBVIOUS THING HOW DID NO ONE THINK OF THIS BEFORE so obviously it means awesome in a shren way? And apparently now the world is ending.
I think your understanding qualifies as positive if you acknowledge that 'awesome in a shren way' is a coherent concept, Miles pens back. Draconic kind of scares me now.
It seems to be almost malicious. I acknowledge the coherence of the concept.
"I still hardly know what in fuck is going on," says Stalas.
Miles shows him the pen exchange. Stalas nods. "All right, me too, then."
"You're under bloody interdiction," says Miles, "but here—" He trots over and shows Milo the exchange between himself and Linya.
"Milo, unsurprisingly, is thoroughly in Mial's court here," says Miles.