Yeah.

It's not really surprising. After thirty thousand years of building a habit it's not going to disappear overnight.

Please don't worry about us.

I'm not entirely sure I'm going to be able to refrain from worrying about Tyelcormo at least a little until he stops acting so...that...about Idaia.

Do you think it'll be hard on her?

...Depends on what you mean by that. I think there's an extent to which she considers it her responsibility to humor that mood for as long as it lasts.

And is that going to harm her?

I don't...think so? I don't think you could plausibly get her to stop in a way that wasn't worse than what you were stopping--I think she's going to be unhappy that he was in pain for a long time because of her, I think there are going to be times when she wants to do something not compatible with humoring him and repress the desire...

I'll trust your judgment.

If she does worse than I expect or I see something that could be done to help I'll let you know.

Thanks.

Of course.

And everybody meets or reunites with their lost in-laws.

And eventually the humans need to do human things like eat and sleep.

The next day she seeks him out of her own accord without having to have a servant sent to prod her.

"Hello!"

"Hi! ...I'm not sure if I should move into the new house with my parents or stay in the palace."

"We'd love to have you, but probably depends what you want to be doing."

"I've mostly been figuring that whatever I wanted to do could be done from either location. Points on the palace side include improved ability to remind you that I'm not dead and therefore break the missing-me habit faster, more convenient reporter-avoidance, better access to Idaia, and the fact that living in my parents' house could emphasize the 'biologically seventeen' aspect of our nature, which could be inconvenient for Idaia and Tyelcormo. Points on the house side include the fact that they've had a lot dumped on them pretty fast and having me around more often could help them deal with that better."

"House and secret passage to the palace?"

"You know, I wouldn't have predicted that the secret dungeons would be good practice for problem-solving, but..."

"I would have predicted that! Because I'm brilliant!"

"Yes you are. How long would it take to construct such a secret passage?"

"Are you assuming I don't already have arbitrary secret passages?"

"Did I give a domain of possible t-values excluding zero or negative numbers?"

"You can have a secret passage tomorrow, dear sister."

"You're fantastic. Thank you."