"I'm pretty happy with this outcome myself," snorts Seofar. "Nothing against the kid, though, he was all right."

"What was he like?"

He considers this question.

"...Looking back, I get the sense there was a lot more to him than I saw. But he cared about Kelora, right from the day he met her, that much was obvious."

"Well, that's good. Hey, did we have an Aeleva, that you know of?" she asks Serik.

He thinks back.

"Yeah, actually, Hali had an ex-girlfriend who was very... that. She and her father fucked us up pretty bad in the war."

"Good for them, all things considered. Did she have a kid?"

"No, I don't think she was married. But if we had a Corino he would've been two thousand years older than her, he'd probably have been dead before she was born."

"I guess that's true. Hey, do you think that means there'll be a me in this world three thousand four hundred years from now?"

"I look forward to it."

Snort. "Well, she'll have to pick a different soulname, 'Delightful' is taken."

"You can't possibly be the first person in the world who's ever thought of that one," says Seofar, amused.

"Well, yeah, but presumably whoever else had it is different enough from me that it wouldn't be weird. I don't want to have the same soulname as another one of myself, not if I can avoid it. If there was already a me here and she was Nentiane I'd've picked something else."

Shrug. "Fair enough."

"I have no idea what I'll pick for mine. Tempted to translate 'Tekhesin' into Ansati just to annoy Esarkan, but that would be petty."

Seofar bursts out laughing.

"I love you. But while retrieving emotional reactions from the void is remarkably satisfying, I think perhaps it would be better not to use your soulname for that."

"I won't."

"I got a snicker out of him at one point and felt bizarrely accomplished."

"Getting a snicker out of my father is pretty impressive, honestly."

"Still. It was when we were discussing you, actually," she tells Tanaikon. "He said 'Lord of the Howling Mountain' totally sounded like a thing Seofar would call himself if he lived on a mountain and tortured people there and I explained that you hadn't picked the name and that seemed to amuse him and I pointed out that when you show up every few years to kidnap someone and have basically no other contact with the outside world you have very little control over what people call you and he snickered."

"It is the sort of thing I would've called myself, honestly. But as it happens I didn't. And these days the sort of thing I'd call myself is... well, a little less - that."

"Fair enough."

And here they are back at Seofar's rooms.

"I assume you two can find a way to entertain yourselves while I figure out this soul thing?"

"...I think that after yesterday I might be all sexed out for a little while. But we do have that book."

Seofar laughs. "Yeah, we'll be fine."