"Huh! What do they have instead?" 

"There's the President. People vote for him. I think they have a complicated system to tally the votes but basically how it works is people announce their candidacy and people vote for which candidate they want and then whoever gets the most votes, it might not be the absolute most I think it has something to do with regions, gets to be the sort of temporary king. And they hold elections every four years." 

"That sounds like a whole lot of work." 

"It is, but it also means that anyone born in the country, even a farmer's child, can lead the country. It was originally a colony of a different country but then it broke off and set up its own government based on the principle that everyone is equal and you're never better than anyone else just by virtue of birth. And, like, they're not great at upholding this principle, like, they only abolished slavery less than a century ago, and people descended from slaves are still discriminated against, but that's the idea."

"Huh! Valdemar's never had slaves. And anyone can be a Herald. Mardic was a farmer's child; I was, um, a street thief." She looks more proud than embarrassed about this fact. "But I guess not to actually be King or Queen. Not that I'd want to. It sounds exhausting and way less fun than getting to ride on circuit." 

"Good for Valdemar. I like it better here, at least so far. Back there people are afraid of magic if they even believe it exists and--well, you look enough like the ex-slave population that people would give you funny looks for being with Mardic who doesn't, and there are way worse hazards than disapproving horrible parents if people find out you like people the same gender as you. It sucks. They're making forward progress but, uh, I'd just as soon skip it."

"I'm glad you ended up in Valdemar! Some places are way worse, in Rethwellan they stone you for being–"

"Donni!" Mardic whacks her shoulder, and she cuts off. 

"Why'd you cut her off? It seems relevant. I'm not gonna hate every Rethwellan person I meet if it turns out the country sucks, like, the country I grew up in sucks and me'n Wilbur and Teacher and Eliza and Mom and Grandfather were all fine."

Mardic answers with private Mindspeech. :They...do bad things to people who are shay'a'chern – who like people of the same gender, that's the Tayledras word for it. It's illegal, punishable by death or exile in the official law, but usually the locals will lynch you first: He glances over at Vanyel. :I didn't want Donni to upset him: 

:Oh. Yeah, that's valid. It's not punishable by death in my country and it won't get you lynched all on its own but some other places are worse. I didn't realize there was a specific word for it, all the specific words for it I've ever heard were slurs and when I visited Innsmouth where there are Deep Ones, that's another species, anyway the Deep Ones are cool with it but they don't really have specific words for what genders you like.:

:Valdemaran doesn't have a word for it, you'd just be called 'pervert' or 'freak'. The Tayledras are...really good about it. I'm glad Van got to go there, after...: he trails off. 

:I met a couple, they were traveling with Savil and Van to the border when they found me. They were neat.:

:Starwind and Moondance, right? Savil's talked about them a little bit. They sounded like good people: 

:Yeah! Moondance was so fascinated when I talked about my world's medical science.:

:That makes sense - he's a Healer, right?: Mardic glances back at Vanyel and Tylendel. :We should probably rejoin the conversation: 

"So Mardic says the Tayledras word is shay'a'chern--does the word only apply to people who only like the other gender, like you, or does it also apply to people who like both, like me."

"Yes, I believe so. I have some friends who're like that." She's smirking a bit. 

"I guess 'both' is actually oversimplifying things a little, I've met Deep Ones and I liked some of them too. Uh, Deep Ones are a species from my world, they're a little human-shaped but, like, less so than Wilbur is, they have opposable thumbs and non-prehensile feet and can walk upright when on land but mostly they look like an unusually fishy frog. I don't think that's even necessarily a not-entirely-human thing, though, I mean most humans probably wouldn't want to kiss one but they were intermarrying with humans in Innsmouth."

"Wow, really? Can they, er, bear children with humans?" 

"Yeah! The kids start out looking human but after they grow up they start looking more like Deep Ones instead of aging until they're indistinguishable from full-blooded Deep Ones. Deep Ones don't really age past maturity, so they don't have set expiration dates like humans do; wanting immortality for your children is a frequently cited motivation for marrying a Deep One. I think the Deep Ones mostly want extra genetic diversity. And of course there's also the personal aspect which varies a lot and not everyone wants to get into it."

"Huh. That certainly sounds like an odd way for it to come out, but I suppose plenty of things in our world would seem odd to you." 

"It's weird for us too, honestly. Humans and Deep Ones sure seem like they ought to be less related than, say, horses and donkeys, but their hybrids aren't sterile like mules, and we don't know why."

“Hmm. Are they inherently magical? Magic in our world lets you get away with more, in terms of crossbreeding.”

"Hard to say. We don't have anything like Mage-Sight."