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[He touches his temple with his index finger.]

There are ways to hide or to shield, but not to lie. It .. is a personal concept.

I've been keeping them closed since I got them. [ Except a small bit to Miles when the boy had been distressed by it, but she has a feeling Aral would have picked up on that already from his son. ]

I didn't think you'd want an uninvited guest.

[Miles is not a telegraph, he's skywriting.]

I would abhor it. However, I believe this is an invitation.

[ She frowns as she considers that a moment and reluctantly opens her side of the link. ]

Then I accept it.

[He forces down his own guards, rather than reach out for her own space. It was his invitation, after all. The connection opens between them, the mind on the other side of it something organized, unyielding and hard as stone at first brush.

When you are ready. The concept 'Agent Tex' and 'Allison' spoken in Cordelia's voice blurs at the end of the thought.]

[ Her own mind, what he can see of it, is kept clouded and partitioned off. Something he should be able to tell is more out of habit than distrust, she's had mental companions before without a body of separation and learned very quickly how crucial it was to keep them apart.

She's tentative at first as she reaches over the link into his mental space. How much has Cordelia told him about her?

You can stick with Allison when we're like this. Though there's some doubt mingling with the sentiment, would this even be more of a one time thing? ]

Edited 2016-04-01 18:18 (UTC)

[As you wish it. There's a brush of respect, like a breeze, here but in passing. This close, his own is similarly partitioned, flat stone between him and everything else.

He finds in him that knotted, complicated concept and unpacks it. It's not organized, the way words are. There's no sentences and verbs carefully picking out meaning and context. The grammar of this is different, far more raw.

--It the concept of being Vorkosigan. There's the heavy maple leaves, lush districts, winefields and a barren, radioactive scar, twisted, unhealthy plants taking root there and reclaiming. There's the hillfolk, his people, rural, plain and ferociously loyal, upright as the trees. The horrible sickly sweet taste of maple mead and the blurring rush of it's wicked alcoholic burn. There's the fire of adrenaline, whipping a flying machine through a gorge in the dark, memory more than vision... there's the complicated, threads towards a man, white, deathly white in a bed, the bond is laced red with raw pain of a trust abused.. there's a tall, wirey man, distant, scornful, the link is a deep, impression jagged and broken, but a deep, unshakeable loyalty between the two of them was tested and unbroken, a young man, Gregor, the resemblance to the creature kept alive in the bed uncanny, a new trust there, a loyalty offered and laid open to see what will return--

It unfolds further.

--Men in brown and silver, uniforms pressed, pride evident. There were the deep backcountry dialect as well as the urban tones of the educated cities. Flashes of a man fetching him as a child from a tree. The view of older brothers, with wives, families of their own, the gossip of affairs, the games in the hall. A new young man from the city who was truly HIS more than his fathers, decorated and earnest, determined to make a DIFFERENCE in his district, to his lords. Another, a hatchet-faced man with a complicated, deadly air, holding Miles with the gentleness of a father. He was a protector, but also the tiny child's freedom. No danger got closer than the dark man's long, long arms--

And once more.

--There are no images at this depth. It's a simple feeling, loyalty beyond all other bonds. Trust that goes to the bone. Identity that comes of family. Removed of all of the images, lord and sworn alike, these lines, silver webbing, remain true and untarnished--]

Edited (html and clarity) 2016-04-01 19:44 (UTC)

[ No, it's organized by any stretch of the imagination, but every bit of it is being parceled and processed as she takes in each image.

It's the first she's ever seen of Barrayar, of its people beyond those that have been brought here. So they're happy living like that. Or so it seems from what he's showing. And with the bonds she's seeing, feeling more than anything, she's starting to believe it.

Mentally she's peering closer, as if to get a better look at this man deemed protector before the image is gone and replaced. A simple questioning Bothari? follows after it, in an attempt to put a name to a face. Suddenly Gregor's earlier comparison makes a lot more sense with this context given.

Does he really consider all those sworn to him part of a family, a home that is as far as it is near? ]

[Sergeant Bothari. He affirms. There is an impression here, a sketch of a complicated, troubled man, without any details. Aral's own emotions towards him are a simple, uncomplicated like of the man.

He's a good soldier. Better Armsman.]

[ Sounded like it. I can see why he was called a family friend. Though there's curiosity in that statement, just how troubled was Bothari? Not enough to keep anyone away from him.

Soldier she can be, but Armsman... She's still not sure how any of them can be this trusting. Her hesitation bleeds over into the link as she wonders how long this invitation was meant for. ]

[There's no answer to that curiosity, the subject folded up and set aside. Bothari's matters are the business of only Bothari and the lives the man has touched, for good or ill.

The link shutters, gently pulling some distance... but does not close. Some halfway point where what crosses is what is intended to pass. Aral clears his throat and answers aloud.]

Such vows are not made simply nor regarded lightly. I imagine he remembers more than you give credit for.

[ That she can understand and respect. He won't find her probing anymore about the man, she knows enough to be content.

She takes that for a hint and draws back herself, though leaves the link open herself. For now, at least. ]

Yeah, I'm sure he does, but... I'm not used to this kind of trust being given so easily. I haven't known you or your son for long.

I don't know if 'easy' is the term. My best friends and my worst enemies wear the same uniform, hold allegiance to the same Emperor.

You learn quickly to understand who you can trust.

And I fall into that category? You trust me enough to involve me in...

[ What exactly? She motions vaguely as she finishes, somewhat lamely, ] Your family.

Just so.

Even at his age, he has the legal ability to form such vows. But you may consider this a formalized offer.

Though be aware that what it is, is not easy, simple nor in any manner perfect. [His own memories, those brief flashes, were warnings as much as they were too deeply entangled within the concept of a liege-lord to remove.]

Edited 2016-04-01 23:03 (UTC)

[ Wait. Did he just say yes? She stares for a moment, caught in shock.

Once she finds enough of her voice, she murmurs, ] I didn't think it was any of those things. [ Then more loudly, ] Nothing in my life has fallen that way.

There's a reason why I came to talk to you and Gregor once I realized what had happened.

You are uncommonly considerate, yes.

[ She snorts. ] Telepathic links aren't exactly common.

Completely impossible in my own world.

[He lifts an open palm.] I had meant in general.

[ She shrugs. ] I've dealt with something similar before. I know I appreciate the privacy and the lack of barging in unnanounced.

A less agreeable experience?

You could say that. It was part of what made the military project I was in so experimental.

Your complicated gentleman, again?

No, someone worse. [ The name Omega bleeds through the link for only a brief second, eclipsed with a flash of red, hot aggression that she suppresses and pulls back even further from him. ]

It's a long story.

[That sensation was familiar, and it stills Aral, both on the link and the man across from her seems to scarcely breathe for half a second.]

I trust if it becomes an issue, you would let us know.

Edited 2016-04-02 02:24 (UTC)

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