No indeed. Rahim's used to speaking Osirian with his mother and Galtan with his father, though it's not surprising the child should get confused, with all the servants and apprentices and things speaking Kortosi Taldane. 

"No, sweetheart, but she'll be back in the morning and you can see her when you wake up. Back home – that's how we say it. Can you say that word again for me?"  

"Back home," repeats Rahim. "Why do we say it that way?"

"Well, in Azlant they used to say something very similar – like so – and a very long time ago when Azlantis first came to live along the inner sea, they met other people who spoke quite differently than they did – " 

Does Rahim seem to be following this at all?

...no, not really. Rahim has heard of the Azlantis, but does not know what they have to do with how you ask when mama is going to be home.

"...and in the end it came to be that that's how it was pronounced in Galt, and we're Galtans, so that's how we say it."

"Oh," says Rahim, who does not really know what it means that they are Galtans. "All right." 

After that he wants to tell his papa about how he was playing in the garden and there was a SNAKE there, a real one, although Marigold said that it was a garden snake and that they don't have any poison at all and are completely harmless. He bets it was a poison snake though. Atef says that there are lots of deadly poison snakes in Osirion, and also scorpions, which are giant bugs that have TWELVE legs AND a stinger that melts your skin off, in case his papa is not aware.

Why, doesn't Rahim remember? When he was quite a little baby – smaller than his sister is now – there was a rash of giant scorpions all along the Junira river, where he and his mama used to live and where his grandmother and grandfather live today. And papa and mama and Aunt Catherine and Uncle Shawil had to find the evil druid who was summoning them all there, and make him stop, and Rahim helped too! 

"I did?"

He did! Because, you see, his papa was very scared of all the giant scorpions, and if Rahim hadn't been there he surely would never have been brave enough to fight them.

Rahim looks proud, and then concerned.

"Papa," he says seriously, "You can't go being scared of scorpions when I'm not there."

"Oh," he says with equal gravity. "Really? Then I suppose I'll have to stop." 

"You should," says Rahim. "They are scary, though."

It's a few days later that he catches Frederick reading a book outside. He's supposed to be in the library studying. Rahim doesn't care about that, except that if he's not in the library then he really has no excuse, does he.

"Will you show me how to catch a frog today?" asks Rahim.

      Frederick doesn't even look up at him. "No. M'busy."

"No you're not. You're not working at all."

      "I said no. Go home and play with your turtle. I'll help you on Sunday."

Rahim inhales to object to that, and then remembers. "You are supposed to say home, not home."

      "Says who?"

"It's how you are supposed to say it. We are Galtans, so we say home."

      "I'm not a Galtan, you little shit." Then he closes his eyes and makes a face. "Don't tell your parents I said that. Listen, I'll show you on Sunday, all right? I promise. But go away now, I've got to finish reading this before your mother comes home."

Rahim, who now considers the frog probably dependent on keeping secret that Frederick doesn't believe that they are Galtans, or maybe that he is refusing to talk right for no good reason, groans loudly and tromps off towards the tower.

"You know, Papa," says Rahim, when he sees his father, "Some people do not say home."

Élie puts aside the book he's been trying to read to him.

"That's right, they don't. Your mama uses a different word when she speaks to you in Osirian, doesn't she? And people from Taldor and Andoran and right here on the islands of Kortos all speak languages more like our Galtan, but not exactly the same. They use different words too. What made you think of it?"

"Frederick said the wrong word," says Rahim, who is not actually very good at keeping secrets, especially when he doesn't know what secret he's supposed to keep. "Even though I told him how to say it right."

Ohhhhh.

"It's not the wrong word for him, sweetheart. Frederick is from Absalom, and people from Absalom don't speak the same way as people from Galt." 

"But then - but how do you know which way is right to say, then?"

"Well, one uses Galtan words when one is speaking Galtan, and Kortosi words when one is speaking Kortosi. Do you know what we're speaking right now?"

"Galtan, because we're Galtans. Frederick said we weren't, though."

Élie is starting to see the ghost of a conversation here and doesn't care for it. He pulls Rahim into his lap. 

"Oh. Sweetheart – did he say that you aren't Galtan?"

Nodnodnod.

"Well, it's true that you were born in Osirion, and that your mama and bāba" – he uses the Osirian word – "are Osirian too. But when I married your mama, we decided we would be all one family together – do you remember that? And I'm from Galt. So we're an Osirian family, but also a Galtan one." 

He wants to reassure Rahim that he'll always be his father, no matter what anyone says, but there's no use in calling to his attention an implication it sounds like he missed entirely. 

Then everybody who is part of their family should be Galtan, too. "Is Mama Galtan, Papa?"

He laughs. "Well, I suppose you could say she's Galtan by marriage – but, no, she's not. I'm sorry – we've made things awfully confusing for you, haven't we?" 

So everyone in his family is not Galtan, apparently. He wrinkles his nose. "How can you tell if you're Galtan or not, then?"

"That's a very good question! Everyone would agree that I am Galtan, because I was born in Galt, and grew up there, and so did my parents and their parents and their parents going back as long as anyone can remember. If some of those things aren't true, it's a little more complicated. What if a child is born in Galt, but his parents come from Cheliax? Or what if a couple from Galt move to Andoran and have children there? What then? Are all those children Galtan? 

...Well, grown-ups don't always agree." What happens when grown-ups don't agree, Rahim can learn when he's older. "I can only tell you what I think. To me, the thing that matters most is what language they speak at home. If a child grows up with Galtan, then he can read our books, tell our jokes, sing our songs – and he can argue with other Galtans about what makes a thing Galtan or not, which you" – nose boop – "have mastered at a very precocious age. That's why it's so important to me that you and your sister know how to speak it properly."