Liad
Solcintra

In which Val Con’s eldest brother sends news.

I wonder if Shan’s joke about someone wanting to sell him a cloak is an indication that he’s still getting fallout from the skimmer cloak incident after seven years. Or maybe it’s a joke between friends that has survived even after the incident that started it is long over. Or maybe I’m reading too much into it and it’s nothing to do with the skimmer cloak at all.

The uncertainty with which Priscilla introduces the idea of crying lifemates implies that it’s the first time she’s put forward the idea as a serious suggestion. Shan doesn’t seem surprised, though; it’s a possibility that must have been on both their minds since Priscilla came to live on Liad, and I think by now they know each other well enough to know what they both think of the prospect, even without discussing it explicitly. If they haven’t seriously discussed it before now it’s perhaps because they’ve been comfortable continuing as they are, and perhaps because, as Shan says, the timing is not good.