<Cayaldwin, this is Mhalir. I - do not particularly intend to use access to your thoughtspeak, but may I retain the option? I would not mind being locked out of controlling your body.> 

<What? Of course!> He's still glaring at Matirin. <Or we could do it with no compulsions, that sounds like a valuable test to run about whether you're on our side, so I'm sure they're planning to run it.> Glare.

<Please don't break any laws.>

<Threatening to murder people is against the law!>

:If you want me to take off all of the compulsions, I realize that is also a valuable test and I can do it now. I am not at all worried he will abuse it: Leareth lifts a hand and then waits expectantly for either Matirin or Cayaldwin to confirm.

(He'll keep an eye on both of them, of course, out of general paranoia, but Cayaldwin can't Gate yet even when he morphs Gifts, so it would be hard for Mhalir to take over and run off with him, even in morph, without Leareth just being able to follow.)

<I am not either! I didn't even have to threaten to murder him to be sure of that!> 

<All right> Matirin says, a bit tensely.

Leareth removes the compulsions. 

And Mhalir slips out of his head, and can be held up to Cayaldwin's ear. He slips back in. Relaxing a little, but still feeling pretty shaky, even if it's mostly for stupid reasons and not accomplishing anything. 

Cayaldwin trots off without saying another word to either Leareth or Matirin. 

Mhalir doesn't even try to control his body; at this point he's used to not doing so, sitting back and watching is the more instinctive motion, and he doesn't need it right now to feel comforted. It's kind of touching, how furious Cayaldwin is on his behalf. 

<I am not angry with them> he explains once they're a reasonable distance away. <I understand why they thought it worth doing even though it did not feel necessary to either of them.> 

It's probably some politics. Cayaldwin hates politics. Everyone should stop doing politics and just invent things. He is not surprised that Mhalir isn't angry, Matirin mostly doesn't do things that make people angry, Matirin wants everyone to like him (but this means it is sometimes strategic to be easily angered, around Matirin. It is one of the frustrating things about him.)

Fair enough. 

Mhalir would be delighted to go back to morph-tether math now and not give the matter any further consideration.

Great! They can do that. 

Matirin morphs bird and flies around because it helps with the feeling vaguely badwrong. Looks for Leareth when he lands.

Leareth is in Andalite morph (his usual one), pacing.

He joins him but does not say anything.

Leareth falls into step with Matirin. He doesn’t speak either for a while, just silently appreciates the company.

<Well, that was moderately stressful> he says finally. <I think no permanent damage was done to our relationship with him, though.> He’s less sure of his relationship with Cayaldwin, but if anything it seems to have improved Cayaldwin’s relationship with Mhalir, which is the more important one. 

<I think not. I think I understand him a bit better. Maybe. There are still some things that make sense to me about you and not about him.>

<I am curious about that. I do not feel confused by him - frustrated, yes, dismayed sometimes, but not confused.>

<I think in his place I would not have held Alloran. I would have - I don't know.> Swish. 

<I am not sure what I would have done in his place. The cost to Alloran... Ultimately, he is one person, and I am reluctant to say there is no cost I would not impose on one person if the galaxy were at stake. I think I would have tried harder not to, though. And...I suspect there is a cost to Mhalir himself that he was not weighting at all, but I am not sure how to point at it more precisely.>

<I don't mean the cost to Alloran. I mean, if he'd sent Alloran home, it might've seemed possible to - imagine living in a world where the Yeerks won.>

<...Yes, I think that is another factor Mhalir was not taking into account, not fully. I think he imagined even that would be vastly insufficient to change any Andalite’s mind - that they would have believed it a trick, I am not sure, but - that is the strongest reason I would have sought every possible alternative. He had political constraints, the Yeerk Council were accusing him of siding too much with the Andalites, but surely he had other routes to appeasing them, and - at the very least he could have arranged to let Alloran escape by ‘accident’, if he lacked the political capital to do it openly. I think I would probably have done that, and then ruthlessly killed many Andalites elsewhere to make the political point, since the Yeerks tend to consider death worse than slavery but Andalites feel the opposite.>

<Huh.> He sounds vaguely amused. <I think - on its own it would have been insufficient. But it would have - made it make sense to look whether it was on its own, whether there were any other signs...>