:All right. Well, I’ll be around at the base, if you end deciding you need to talk then: She hesitates, briefly. :And - I’m proud of you, all right? I know none of this is easy:

<Doing the right thing rarely is.>

Nod. :I know: Right now Alloran is reminding her a lot of Vanyel, she thinks. :All right. I’ll let Matirin know, and we can get you a ride back to Earth on the next Gate: Her lips twitch. :You’d better say proper goodbyes to the foals. They’re going to miss you:

<I will miss them too.>

:Mmm: But at least he’ll see his own children again. Melody feels almost burstingly proud. :Well, I’ll see you around:

And she heads out.

Alloran tracks down all of the foals to say goodbye. 

They’re sad that he’s leaving!!! They want to know if he’s going to write to them with more stories.

Taver watches from a ways off, distantly fond. :We appreciate the help you have given us over the last six months: he says to Alloran. :Your presence here was of great value to us:

<I am grateful for the assistance of your people> Alloran answers them. <I will write you stories, if I can.>

Melody finishes seeing her backlog of patients at the House of Healing and then gets her Gate back to the Andalite base on Earth. She looks for Matirin. 

He is doing an interview with some Earth reporters but concludes this promptly enough.

:I spoke with Alloran today: she tells him. :He's very eager to go home and I think he's ready. He's on board with staying on the base for a bit so he can ease back into being around Andalites. I assume you have precautions to make sure he won't cross paths with Mhalir: 

<Yes, I told Leareth that he should not visit while Alloran is here. It should not be very inconvenient, it will only be a week or so until the next trip back to our homeworld.>

Nod.

Melody almost says something about her vague unformed concerns, but it's not like she has anything more specific than 'Alloran is very tense and stressed', which is unsurprising for multiple reasons. And any more detail does, in fact, feel private and not Matirin's business. 

:I'll be around during that time: she says instead. 

<Thank you. I know I upset him. I think it would have been worse to have him learn it from the news in a few months.>

:No, I agree. It would've been deeply unfair to him not to tell him. I know it must've not been easy for you either: Sigh. She can cheer herself a little by remembering that it's not official yet; maybe it'll prove to be more of a political impossibility than Matirin realizes, getting Mhalir's sentence reduced. 

- Melody catches that thought, reminds herself that death is, in general, bad. Still, Alloran is her patient, he's one of her people, and Mhalir isn't, and she wants to throw Mhalir into the suuuuuuuuuun and isn't going to pretend to herself that she feels otherwise. 

<I just hope it wasn't totally pointless because I cannot swing it anyway politically. Thank you for - looking out for him.>

He is slightly on edge the whole week Alloran is with them, which he feels badly about; Alloran might notice it and conclude that it's about his body language, which it really isn't. His body language looks almost normal; he moves less than most people, but that's not the sort of thing that draws the eye or produces the instinct that something is wrong. Alloran gets the longer version of morph that lasts up to 24 hours and goes out flying with some of Matirin's Andalites who have taken to long flights and Matirin half-expects him to run off or something but he doesn't.  Mhalir is in orbit the whole time, just in case. 

He meets with Nerefir before he returns to the homeworld. There's much less to hand off this time because he handed most of it off before he went off to war, but they spend a full day talking anyway. Nerefir is curious about Leareth. Matirin is as non-evasive as he can be while still maintaining the vague illusion that Velgarth is an advanced civilization. ...Alloran can shatter that illusion, if he wants to. He might do it, if it thinks it'll discredit Matirin. 

It is for this reason that he is pacing unhappily the evening before their departure.

Leareth has been working on morph research with Cayaldwin, who is annoyed about Mhalir's weeklong absence, and the fact that Leareth is planning to leave at the same time as Alloran so it might be months before Mhalir has a safe source of transport to the Andalite base. Leareth hopes to make visits back but until he figures out the permanent Gate, it'll be massively inconvenient. 

When he's out of math stamina for the day and they've hit a good point to wrap up, he excuses himself and heads out to the field. Spots Matirin, and joins him in pacing, without saying anything at first. 

<What's the status of the satellites over Velgarth?>

<I have everything arranged for it, but they are not yet in place. I wanted to wait until I have the interworld permanent Gate technique and can more easily visit Velgarth, mostly because I am concerned our gods might take offence - I do not know if They have the power to interfere with satellites at all, but They could certainly inconvenience my other operations.> 

<That makes sense. It occurs to me that Alloran could, if he wants, tell everybody that Velgarth has not yet invented electricity.>

<...That has also occurred to me. It is possible we could respond that Valdemar is a less advanced kingdom but we did not wish to embarrass them or something, which is not entirely false - I wish I could have shown your people the Eastern Empire, they do not have electricity either but they have mage-lights everywhere, permanent Gates for trade and goods transport between all the major cities, it is an impressive place. ...Also at this point very authoritarian and corrupt, it drifted that way after I stopped attempting to influence it, I do not actually recommend visiting.> 

<Yes, I think we can say that - and also say truthfully, I think, that the local gods are very controlling of their territory and some of them keep it visually premodern, for many of the same reason most Andalites don't live in cities ->

<Yes, that is - misleading, perhaps, but not false. And we could reinforce that Valdemar does, for example, have near-instantaneous communication to their borders with Mindspeech, and an advanced, self-powered surveillance system over the entire kingdom. Perhaps Vanyel should give a talk on the Web, actually. It is quite an impressive feat of magic and could easily be framed as an advanced technological invention.> 

<That is a good idea. Would he be willing to come back to the homeworld to give that talk in the next couple of days? I think it is better to get out ahead of it.>

<I will ask him, but I imagine so. He has expressed curiosity about seeing it before and I do not think he has any looming commitments that cannot be rescheduled.>