She got the random crying under control. She has not gotten the random desire for someone to hurt her very badly under control. Maybe she will sneak off and burn herself or something.

She and Queen Carissa have swapped spellbooks to compare notes. She has more spells but Queen Carissa learned directly from Aroden for several months and has more context on some of his specialty spells. They both have the improved version of Sending he came up with. 

She mostly doesn't look at Mhalir. "I can take him back if you want," she does say, when they stop moving.

She would kind of like to have a private conversation with her husband but it's not a big deal if that needs to wait.

<...I do not think she actually wants me back but it is harder to tell from the outside> Mhalir confesses. <I - you can put me in a glass of water for a few minutes to talk to him, if you do not need too long.> 

It seems like that would sort make the privacy thing silly - if he's going to know the contents of the conversation anyway he could just listen to it in the first place - but she's not totally sure what it is that Leareth's been wanting to say to her and not saying. I could also try to find you someone else? Pexa's probably too little though she'd be delighted....I bet Vanyel would go for it in the long run but I don't know if you being a Leareth would be an upside or a downside...

<...I should probably find an alternative.> He searches mentally through the names he remembers. <You could ask - Nayoki? Leareth's second-in-command?> 

I have no read on whether she'd go for it but sure, we can ask her. Tadesse and Ekunde probably already have as many people in one head as is really wise - not that I know specifically that anything'd go wrong, but - oh, I bet Ekunde's siblings would go for it, if you ask them, they're....generally the kind of people who think new things are cool and want to try them.

<....Sure. I - we - can ask them, I will not be able to do the asking once I am not in your head anymore.> 

I mean, you can stay until we find you someone else, I'm not in a hurry to be rid of you or anything.

She actually feels suddenly sorry for him; it'd be terrible, to be small and vulnerable and have all your life plans contingent on someone else seeing fit to enable them. 

...It's not like he exactly asked Alloran for permission. Yeerks can be - a lot less polite, than this. 

She seems like the younger Carissa totally unbothered by this, missing whatever instinct makes most people object to other people doing bad things.

She does think to herself that Leareth, come to think of it, does something almost exactly like this, or did until recently, seizing bodies from their original owners - and his version is worse, because it kills them, but it doesn't make her think of him as small and vulnerable because it's done once it's done...

Mhalir doesn't usually think of himself as small and vulnerable either. He commands a starship, after all. 

But - 

- well, if you offered him a human body instead, he'd take it. 

She wants to give him a hug but she can't because he's in her head. I think you should see Leareth at some point. I'll try to talk him into it.

- Mhalir does a sort of mental flinch, and then has to remind himself that Leareth is not Aroden and has never been a god and being in his head probably won't leave him disoriented for hours and afraid for his sanity. 

I would expect not!

:Ideas for who can hold on to Mhalir for a while?: she adds to her husband. :Assuming you don't want me to have him for the next week or so, I don't mind but you looked like you might.:

Leareth isn't sure that he should mind but, in fact, he does. Mhalir isn't as young as their Ma'ar but he feels a lot closer to it than he does to Leareth's own age, and the thought of Ma'ar eavesdropping on every single interaction with his wife for the next week is exhausting. 

:- Hmm. I could interview some of my mages, there are several I would trust with it. Or - Tadesse's sister, maybe? I feel that she might be good for him, and I expect she would be willing: 

:I thought of her too.:

And to Mhalir - :if we're going to the palace....you're very sure your Carissa won't betray us?  We can put on more compulsions if we need to...:

<...I think it is - not something I could rule out entirely, but it would take another surprise update on the order of what she experienced before? And I have not seen any hint of something like that in your head, so it would need to be something you were not aware of...> 

...that seems awfully unlikely, and in the space of things that unlikely I think there are a lot more where we don't want her crippled. "Come on," she says to other Carissa. "I may not have married into more money than you but I bet I married into a nicer house."

"Mine can go to the moon." It's not quite true but it doesn't feel as false as it would have a day ago. 

"I saw it! It's very, ah, functional. Mine has forty bedrooms and six ballrooms and probably we could Wish it to the moon if we really needed to somehow."

"I have to admit I've never really seen the benefits to having more than one bedroom. Are you very hard on the beds?"

" - yes, actually. How'd you guess."

"Everyone knows all Good clerics have rough sex."

"What, all of them? Maybe the Good gods would do better if they filtered less rigorously on that specific criterion. Or is it a natural consequence of cheap healing."

"You tell me, you're the Good cleric."