"But there are sacrifices involved in the life you've chosen, Sebastian. Don't tell me you didn't hurt inside when you saw how much Fiona and John had grown up—how much of their lives you'd missed—when you came back home from a deployment. Or how much it hurt when you lost one of your friends to the Rish or some Crown World lunatic or Rogue World merc. I respect you for being willing to make those sacrifices, but that doesn't mean I want my daughter to make the same ones without thinking about it long and hard."

And you hate the very thought of getting the personal letter from the Minister of War, Sebastian thought. You're terrified your daughter won't come home one day. Well, you've a right to be ... but she's the right to make the decision herself anyway, when the time comes.

"Are you asking—or telling—me not to answer her questions?" he asked. "Not to discuss my life with my granddaughter?"

"Of course not!" Collum's vehement denial was genuine, Sebastian realized. "You're her grandfather, and she loves you. She wants to know about your life, and you have every right in the universe to share it with her. For that matter, you damned well ought to be proud of it; God knows I'd be, in your place! I'm just ... worried."

"Have you discussed it with Fiona?"

" 'Discuss' isn't exactly the verb I'd choose." Collum shook his head with an expression Sebastian recognized only too well. Fiona, after all, was very like her mother had been.

"I've voiced my concerns," Collum continued, "and she shares them, I think. But she's got that damned O'Shaughnessy serenity. She just shakes her head and talks about leading horses to water, or tying strings to a pig's back leg."

" 'Serenity' isn't exactly an O'Shaughnessy characteristic," Sebastian said dryly. "Trust me, she got it from her mother's side of the family. But she's a point. You'll not convince Alley to do anything she thinks is wrong. And you'll not convince her not to do anything she thinks is right."