What's the key bit, the unpopulated or the powerful forces? Middle of the ocean? I bet a bunch of the domains of the Valar are amazing, shame about being exiled forever from Valinor and all. Edge of the world, if it doesn't get us killed. Utumno, which is even likelier to get us killed.

Unpopulated is just because natural forces are the ones we're best equipped to take advantage of. If people are there there'd be more than just that.

What's Utumno and why the edge of the world?

Utumno is the stronghold of the Enemy from the first war between him and the Valar. It's supposedly been abandoned for eleven thousand years, at this point, but before that there was very powerful magic at work there, so I'd expect there'd be something interesting. Same with the edge of the world, there's magic there keeping it in shape and it's very dangerous and nothing else is known about it.

That actually sounds tempting. It should be impossible, so whatever's doing it anyway is messing with physics. Does anyone know why it's dangerous?

It is not the obvious reason that you'd fall off! Apparently the force that pulls you down everywhere else pulls unpredictably and in varying directions, there, and there are tall mountains meant to keep people out. 

Of course it'd be too much to hope that gravity would be weird in any way that makes sense. 

If that's like, dangerous patches that need to be avoided, that'd sound pretty manageable. Every step of the way would be harder.

And the Valar might notice us doing it, though I'm not sure if they'd do anything.

Hm. They can find out about magic from Melian either way, but we don't want to be the ones being questioned. How closely do they watch it?

The one time I asked Oromë he said they'd know right away because they have warnings there so they can help people who get stuck, but he might have a different sense of 'right away' than us.

And we'll know if we've been spotted but might not know until we've been spotted.

If it's about helping people who get stuck, as opposed to stopping people from getting torn apart right this minute, we could just get in get out get on with it.
Maybe make multiple trips. Or even send a bunch of false alarms if they're any slower the twelfth time than the first.

I expect it'd take them a long time to get bored. Valar, after all.

Not even boredom, just 'oh, it's probably not an emergency,' but good point.

Could work, could make them paranoid Moringotto's up to something.

As tempted as I am to say that if it makes them move against him it's probably a good thing, you're probably right. Better to rely on his "right away" being our "reasonable time frame."

Are you expecting elementals at the edge of the world or are you just curious?

Both reasons. I've never heard of a gravity elemental before but I'm betting there are a lot of them there.

And what could we use those for?

Depends what we get, could be anything from flight to impassability to siege weaponry.

All right, then it's probably safer than Utumno and worth trying.

Utumno sounded interesting too, but that one would be just curiosity. And much too unnecessary for the risk.

Our magics don't seem to interact in a way that'd make you expect Others there?

I'd expect something. Formerly important ruins are a great way to find somethings. But I only really know how to go about getting mileage out of forces of nature, and Utumno isn't better than everywhere else for that.

Makes sense. And the ocean?

On the Ice they came to us, but places in the middle of nowhere where no one's ever been don't tend to have that much to catch. Weird gravity, intentionally placed, is better odds. And is probably less inaccessible than deep sea diving.

Okay. Better have a plan for if you do end up explaining yourselves to the Valar.

How likely are they to retaliate against an unfriendly-sounding lack of an answer?

If you swear you don't serve the Enemy? Probably just with a scolding. 

Possible they'd send you home.

They could do that? I'm needed here, but maybe they'd send a message...

I could pretend to be one of the naturally appearing Men. 'Had to start somewhere, why not the boundary.'

That'd work if they didn't check with Eru. And I'd very tentatively expect they could send you home. If you get them in a good mood they could probably let you send a message, or possibly let you go visit and grab things; if you're making them mad they might just make you leave.

With the lack of explanation, they probably won't be in a favor-granting mood.

How effective would it be if they did check with Eru, does he talk more often than they do to Melian? And the spontaneous generation option probably only works if I'm alone, so if it's that we'd have to decide in advance.

He doesn't talk to them very often but might if his own actions were being lied about - or, well, presented in a way that caused the Valar to believe something false. 

All right, no annoying the even more powerful superbeing if at all possible.

Even if it does mean the Valar know we're hiding something.

It's possible they'll try to wait you out. Keep you company until you explain yourself.

And I'm not about to try to out-wait a Vala. We could go with 'telling people is dangerous, ask Melian if you don't believe us,' but even then they could just confirm that it's dangerous and insist anyway.

Depends very much on which Vala.

I'd ask which, but we have no control. Doesn't make a lot of difference for now. We might end up leaning hard on getting out in time.

Yes. Or cutting off their attention.

How do you mean?

I think the forget-you're-there trick should work fine on the Valar, too. 

Right. It doesn't do much long-term, and that's on a human scale, but it's something.

When do we want to do this, and do you gain from having people with you?

Yes, it'd allow finding more before we have to get out of there.

And, whenever there isn't anything urgent going on. Could be any time, at least on my end.

Let's all go, then.

The next time they're all free is another week.

So in another (unnaturally long) week, they set off on a long flight. The cold at the northern and southern edges would be more dangerous than usual under the circumstances, and west is right out, so east it is.

It's a very long flight. But eight thousand miles later, there's a mountain range that seems to be angled funny, and as they fly towards it they'll be dragged backwards instead of down.

It's less uncomfortable than it possibly could be. Evenly distributed force is better than most seat belts. Very disorienting, though. They keep flying horizontally toward the direction that is now up.

Then they'll reach the mountain. The air's thinner. The bubble will at one point or another jerk awkwardly in the sky. 

When they're within a few feet of the mountain they'll fall toward it.

Does it get too thin to breathe? There's only the one water-breathing mask–

And then the unwanted landing. A few feet isn't much time to stop, but at least it isn't far to fall.

"I don't see anything big from here. Anyone have better luck, or do we just keep going and hope it gets more intense?"

Nope, still breathable, definitely for Elves.  

The Elves have better vision and, scrambling to the edge of their current surface, Lalwen bounces something potentially promising over to Amber.

The same flat mountainside extends past the edge—the edge is just where down becomes parallel to the surface they're on.

The something doesn't seem to have a fixed shape that could be described more precisely than "convex." It's a distortion in the air, and somehow manages to both gyre and gimble. A small cloud of dust and stones hovers on average around it, being alternately drawn toward it or away or in some third direction.

That what we're looking for?

Probably.

It's less than a person's height above the nearest ground, so they don't have to worry about capturing it from midair. Less fortunately, the real-world dust and pebbles haven't always caught up to where the elemental moved their spirit world counterparts. They have to constantly check both the practitioner and normal sight on the way over to avoid getting pelted with inconveniences that may or may not physically exist.

Also gravity decides to change directions on them again. 

The elemental didn't react when Lalwen spotted it. It does when they hit the jolt. It starts whiffling toward them.

A thin string of the water used for flying starts looping around it and tracing out symbols. It stops in place, but then gravity starts shifting intensity as well as direction both inside and outside the circle.

That going to be a problem?

Depends if it goes further...trying to stop it...there. They land by staying stationary while down stabilizes around them.

Help me get it locked down tight enough to take orders?

They do that.

Proof of concept, I guess. We still don't know the Valar's response time, but we should be able to split up three ways now. Four once we bind something else.

The more we catch the better, but remember we're prioritizing strength over numbers here.

And they can now walk along the more-cooperative cliff face looking for more elementals.

Amber is the least useful on her own, so she sticks with Lalwen until the second gravity spirit gets caught. Once they're equipped well enough that all four can fly if gravity decides to burble again, they can cover one third more ground.

After some progress in the hunt, Now we know right away didn't mean right away. How far should we push this?

Retreat, hide for a while, see if a Vala shows up at any point to check things out?

If we can hide from them, then good idea.

Maybe hide separately? If they find one of us they can stall while the other three keep going.

Couldn't hide from Oromë, no reason why not from the rest.

Lying low it is then. We can give it long enough that they're more likely to arrive while we're hidden than not...

Yep.

So they all take cover and commence waiting.

And eventually - to ordinary sight it looks like a blazing meteor, to the practitioner sight like Melian a hundredfold - 

That's Varda, Findekáno says.

Varda is almost overwhelming just to look at.

She's one of the ones it's not impossible to hide from, right? Amber shrinks further into her crevice.

It is not.

The area becomes as she approaches, as bright as Valinor at the Mingling. She pauses and stands quite still. Is there anyone present? This area is dangerous.

She relaxes but, of course, doesn't answer Varda.

Who waits.

Is there anyone present? This area is dangerous.

No comment.

Is there anyone present? Reveal yourselves. This area is dangerous and forbidden.

This can't be anything like the longest a Vala has stood repeating the same sentence, but it still sounds like a broken record.

And she frowns, and closes her eyes, and then drifts - the gravity does not appear to affect her at all - in Amber's direction.

(And as in uffish thought they hid, Gilthoniel with eyes aflame....)

Amber comes out. "Hello?" she asks the blazing meteor.

It has to look better to not wait for her to actually see me, but I don't know how she guessed the direction. Or if it applies to the rest of us.

The blazing meteor resolves itself into vaguely Elven, strongly female, still decidedly blazing form.

Hello. 

And she looks at Amber's pendant. With the starlight.

It glints back at her. Much less brightly than most of the actual stars, let alone Varda herself.

Well, that's good news. If you aren't carrying the light of any stars she probably doesn't know where you are yet.

"Thank you for the warning. I knew it was dangerous and expected the risk, I did not know it was also forbidden."

We will eventually have to rescue anyone who attempts it. This is time-consuming and vulnerable to tampering by the Enemy. Therefore it is forbidden.

"Understandable. Does it continue to apply if I expect not to need rescuing, and agree to waive it?"

We would not permit you to die here because you had expressed the conviction that you would not need rescuing.

"Even if– oh well. I won't try to convince you not to prevent deaths.

...I might have a request, if you'll hear it."

I will.

And she's kneeling. Why is she kneeling. That's not gravity doing it, is "force people to kneel" a conscious choice that seems smart to Valar. Well, add a bow along with the kneeling; that can't be a bad idea.

"Humans are mortal, and I expect to be dead in several Years whether I take risks or not. I've heard speculation that a Vala might be able to cure that. If you're willing to try I can't offer much in exchange, but could at least promise not to return here now that I know it to be forbidden."

It is Eru's will that mortals be mortal.

But there aren't supposed to be any mortals in Arda yet.

"I have never met Eru, and can't say whether he would classify me with the mortals who feature later in his plan."

I can grant you longevity beyond that typical of a mortal so you can live until the other mortals arrive, or Eru offers clarifying insight on this.

"I will gladly accept the increase.

Do you know when they are meant to arrive?" A world stuck at midnight is kind of inhospitable for humans, but that might be a good thing to not say to the goddess of light.

When the Sun rises.

"The Sun?"

It is foretold that Arda will have a Sun, and then it will have Men. Just like the Elves arrived shortly after the stars. Yavanna is working on the Sun right now. It is a difficult procedure, and must be kept safe from the Enemy once it has been placed.

Yavanna's the tree one. Um.

"That is a sensible order for things to happen in. I was mostly confused at what you meant by a Sun."

A Sun is a very bright light suspended in the sky so Men can see by it. They cannot see very well and could not live by starlight.

"I see. Please convey my thanks to Yavanna; it sounds like exactly what the world is missing."

Many attempts to light the world have become the particular focus of the Enemy's loathing.

"And he has had too much success already.

Do you know how long it will be before the Sun is complete, months or centuries?"

A Year or two.

"That's an impressive speed, for lighting a world."

It is a project of terrible urgency; the light will delay the Enemy in his evil plans.

"You know what his evil plans are?"

He desires the torment and misery of all things Eru puts on Arda, and defiance of the divine plan.

"And a Sun would mean less misery. I thought you meant it would be a setback in some specific project of his."

His servants are less effective in the light.

"Good to know. I'll keep it in mind in case there's a chance to use it against them. On a scale smaller than the Sun."

It is unwise for a mortal to combat the Enemy directly.

"I know. I'm not planning to knock on his front door and challenge him to see who can squish the other, but the more weaknesses his servants have the better."

Certainly. I am going to remove you now from this dangerous location to a safer one. Do not come here again.

"Understood. I don't want to contribute to things that can be easily exploited by the Enemy either."

Thank you. Eru's blessing keep you. And she is a mile away, the ground around her fading from a blazing white back to nothing.

It really does look like nothing, not just dark surroundings, until her eyes adjust to not being immediately in front of the goddess of light.

Did she leave, or just move me? As far as I can tell she never knew you were there.

Left, he reports after a minute. I did not consider the fact you wear starlight on a necklace. 

It's barely even visible except when the implement is thematically appropriate. It didn't occur to me there'd be a Vala who doesn't need to see it.

I'm not sure seeing is even the right word for what they do. Should we collect some more on the assumption we're safe now, or head out lest our next encounter be unfriendlier?

So many things I wanted to ask but couldn't.

Maybe keep collecting, but meander outward on average? You'd still get out faster than if you were here without magic.

Can do. What would you have wanted to ask, we lived with the Valar a long time and can possibly answer some of it.

Aside from the currently relevant ones about whether their warning system checks for people being present or just arriving, the big one was who's doomed. We still don't know their standards for who counts as following Fëanáro.

And of course anything about the relation between this world and mine would emphasize entirely the wrong things. Actually I'm surprised how curious she wasn't on that front.

Yeah. The Valar are - weird. Hard to predict their priorities. Sometimes they sort of make sense, like explaining you can't opt out from being rescued, and then sometimes - adding a Sun, that's bizarre. Why is Yavanna working on a Sun, she does plants. Maybe the Sun's derived from the Trees.

If any of them can do nuclear furnaces millions of times the size of Arda, we're even more outgunned than I thought. If it's a complicated lump of shiny vegetable matter, it at least makes a different kind of no sense.

Varda made the stars, what are stars made of where you're from?

Nuclear furnaces that dwarf the size of Arda. They're the same things as the Sun, some smaller, some much bigger.

They're also really far away, far enough that they look about as bright than yours.

Well, it did take her millions of years....

It took a bit over a million of your Years for the light in my necklace to get to Earth.

That's not even close to the farthest star, just the most distant I could get an image of with the best equipment I could borrow. There are maybe a few thousand million million million stars. I really, really don't think she could have built my world's set that fast.

Wow. 

Probably not, no.

If she could, I'd say she should evacuate this planet and wreck it with the Enemy still here, except that then he'd probably be on the same scale. Having the Sun be a shiny object suspended in the sky is very much worth it if it means Valar are merely gods.

As compared to what?

I don't know. I've never heard of anything except probably Eru that could build a universe of stars.

Are the gods in your world much like the Valar?

Almost but not quite entirely unlike.

They have the recognizable domains, there's a god of wine and I wouldn't be shocked if there's a goddess of trees or light still active. They don't take physical form, just tell their followers what to do in exchange for blessings. Their own power varies based on how much they've been worshipped lately, and what they do with it mostly depends on the particular god's inscrutable motives.

They're in a weight class of their own, past most other things practitioners deal with, but they're never omnipotent.

The Valar aren't omnipotent, thankfully. Eru might be. If so he has strange priorities.

If he isn't, he's near enough as makes no difference. At least for being able to say that about his priorities.

Yeah. Now that you've seen a Vala, whatever went invisibly to the parley with my cousins - Vala or Maia, can you tell -

Maia. The whatever had the same thing I haven't seen elsewhere, but it looked more like Melian's degree of it than Varda's.

Well, we did know the Enemy had some in his service.

Yeah. So the boring obvious scheme at least wasn't a waste of his personal attention. Unfortunately.

Valar have about several hundred times as much attention as people do. So it wouldn't have wasted much of it anyway.

I wonder who it was. A name wouldn't tell us much since we already know he has Maiar, but still.

I bet my cousins have some ideas, if they've been talking with the locals more than we have.

They floated the name Thauron, but I think that was just because he's the one they had heard of. Nothing really substantial, or even "he has a style and it's this."

He sends the mental impression of a shrug. Do you think you could tell him apart from other Maiar by the spirit-pattern?

Probably not. Well, I could tell it apart from a Maia that isn't influencing the world around them just by being there, but I doubt I could distinguish between two. 

And I don't want to risk practicing.

Agreed.

And they get clear of the edge of the world.

Once the rest of them have outgrabe, they can embark on the long flight back. It's simpler and faster than the other direction, now that they can freefall horizontally instead of galumphing around with flying water.

These are going to be so useful.

Firepower is exactly what we needed. Probably too much to hope that we can just walk up and pull down the Enemy's walls, but still.

We might be able to do that, I'm just worried about what happens next.

And I don't know how to find out what he's got. Magically or otherwise.

Yep. I'm worried nothing we've got will even inconvenience a Vala - though maybe that's too pessimistic, they don't have this kind of magic...

I'm very sure magic can in principle inconvenience a Vala. Whether we can do it with elementalism, when that boils down to different ways of moving physical objects around, that's more of a maybe.

Too high-risk to have asked Varda to grab some books from your home, I suppose.

I wasn't going to bring up the other world if she didn't ask.

But for that, it might actually have been worth trying to get her to steal someone's library.

You'd need to heavily imply it was yours, she wouldn't do it if she thought it was stealing. But a library'd be terribly useful.

We could try again. Maybe.

She disappeared before I could ask if she did make me temporarily immortal, and if she did I agreed not to come back here. Might not be able to imply things about someone's books without going to Valinor.

Think it's worth it?

I don't know. None of the people in Toronto specialize in hitting very tough things very hard, I don't know whose I'd even steal.

And there aren't people you'd trust to help?

I don't think anyone would. They all have their own agendas and this is far enough away to be not their problem. I did briefly try to drag a few people into my other mostly impossible task.

If they'd be valuable to have as help we can probably come up with something to bribe them with. But they'd also need to be very very trustworthy. Is there a non-Toronto library it'd be more promising to steal?

That depends on what Varda would have needed to know to grab it. Presumably it can't be "the nearest one with a lot of books on this subject," and I wouldn't be able to give very precise directions.

Trustworthy and bribable both exist, but I don't think anyone is both.

Yeah, probably not. 

Valar are pretty naive but if you said "I would like the books from the nearest library with a lot of them" she'd probably realize you were stealing.

And it'd be tricky to differentiate the relevant books from the non-magic ones without giving away that magic exists.

So it probably isn't worth a trip to Valinor.

You can't replicate whatever trick landed you here, right?

I have no idea how I landed here.

Oh well. How long until you'll be able to tell if you're temporarily immortal?

It's gradual enough that noticing it not happen would take years. My years, not yours.

That's inconvenient, Lalwen comments. How long do you have in our years if she didn't do anything?

It varies. Around seven at the outside.

And Eru meant it to be that way? How -

- consistent with his other design choices, I suppose, in its senseless destructive stupidity.

He might not have had anything to do with my world's humans. For all I know the mortals he designed have thousands of Years before the senseless destructive stupidity kicks in.

If that's so then the Valar will probably be persuadable to lengthen your lifespan to theirs.

Of course then I'd have to tell them about Earth. But that's a problem for another– for when there are days.

I'm looking forward to that! 

Me too.

I wonder if it'll also have nights, Varda didn't say.

I hope so, I'd miss the stars. Varda'd be annoyed about no one getting to see the stars. Bet there'll be nights.

I hope so just because it's what I'm used to. Were there nights back when the Trees were working?

Nah, it cycled gold and silver but was always bright. She sends the setup.

Varda didn't object?

From the top of Taniquetil you could still see the stars fine, and from - from Alqualondë - or anywhere else far enough from the Trees...

Makes sense. I'd miss stars, and I'm not even Varda.

The earliest-arrived Noldor missed the stars. The Vanyar didn't, which, good for them. So we made Tirion far enough out that you could see them in Telperion's hours.

And now, a lack of stars is not one of our problems.

Nope. Wonder what kind of elementals you'd have found around the Trees.

Light, probably. Lots of light. That would come in handy now even without it apparently being a universal enemy weakness.

Well, stay friendly with the cousins and maybe they'll let you collect Silmaril elementals. 

If we get the Silmarils back before the war ends. I almost hope we don't, what if someone not Melkor steals them...

We can probably get light easier than that. Unless that light is special in some way, like some way that can impenetrably secure a kingdom, there's no need to bring them into this.

They're practically alive, they respond to people and to their environment changing, and they're exceptionally pretty. I bet they'd attract unusually strong light elementals.

Practically alive? Huh.

I hope I get a chance to see those.

Just don't touch, she says wryly.

Fëanáro was possessive of them even before the war, I'm not optimistic he'll let anyone see them afterwards.

Can't say I'm surprised. And even if they are magically special, they wouldn't need that by then.

If they're magically special that would actually explain a lot, he says thoughtfully.

I meant our kind of magic.

Aren't all things that are symbolically important and very intensely whatever they are going to be attractors for our kind of magic?

Yeah. But that just means it'd be a stronger attractor than other light sources, not that it'd do something unprecedented.

I don't know enough to predict whether it'd do something unprecedented.

Once we've won we can worry about whether it's worth asking really nicely to see the Silmarils.

They seem to be at least invested in pretending they like you. They sent all those nice engineering diagrams. 

I think that was them at least pretending to me that they like you. Helping their allies build up to better oppose a common Enemy, or something like that. I'm not the one running a kingdom that benefits from it.

It's a bit past the point for pretending they like us, but helping against a common Enemy, maybe. Is Maitimo not also at least pretending to like you personally, that surprises me.

That too, I just read the engineering part as not mostly being about me.

Fair enough. I don't suppose he's pretending hard enough he'd give back the things they stole with the ships?

No idea.

He's still making a point of sticking to the karma rules voluntarily, so I might be able to nudge him by emphasizing that it'd be fair.

Is he? That's weird. 

There's no way he can become a practitioner, right? Couldn't have been spying in Doriath, couldn't possibly have enough information -

It started before Doriath. I think it was originally because he was hoping I'd show him the ritual, and now, maybe just not wanting to admit that was why?

Possible.

I'm probably overestimating him if I say that if he wanted to be a practitioner he would be but it is not plausible to me that if he wanted you to show him, that's all he'd try.

He doesn't want to be one, now. By the end of that first conversation he had sworn to it.

But you think he might have resolved not to want to so he could swear to it?

Yep. Or genuinely changed his mind when he heard more, that's technically possible.

Or consulted with his father and got new orders.

If it's that one he did it without telling his father what the question was. He didn't tell Fëanáro about magic.

Did he tell his father enough his father guessed, though.

...I think I only asked him to swear he hadn't told anyone. He couldn't have known at the time I'd make that oversight?

Give someone not his father enough information that his father will guess, but that person won't - or give it to that person in a language they don't even speak - with orders to not tell anyone and a reminder that orders to keep things from the King should be disobeyed, and then he can swear to 'haven't told anyone, haven't given anyone enough information they can figure it out' - hasn't ordered anyone to tell his father anything, and if you happened to ask him to swear that he doesn't anticipate that any of his actions will cause the King to learn the truth, he can actually still ensure his father doesn't find out. 

Sorry, I should have given you a guide to Maitimo or something.

You did, I just...

Okay. He's either done that or not, can we assume if he's going to it already happened? I can just ask, and be conspicuously suspicious if he can't swear.

I think it's a safe assumption by now, yes. What do we gain from knowing whether he has?

Um, we'd have a more complete list of people it'd be catastrophic to have captured, we'd know Maitimo is taking chances to be slimy when he sees them...

Mostly it just seems like the kind of thing that of course we'd want to know.

But right now they at least have to pretend Fëanáro doesn't know anything.

If he does know, the pretense might not make things better.

Maybe he even came up with some brilliant plan given the capabilities he knows about, like Maitimo thought he would, and in that case I'd want to know about it.

Then it's probably worth asking. 

Also if Maitimo's sliding things past you it's good to at least know he's doing it.

Or maybe he isn't, that'd be good to know about too.

Even if I'd bet against it.

You're never wrong betting against the decency of my cousins.

We'll find out.

They arrive back at camp with their lovely new gravity elementals. The Elves vanish at once; they'll have been missed in a dozen places at once. I'll give the King a briefing, Findekáno says distractedly. 

And eventually, after everyone on this end is informed of recent events and likely future ones, Amber finds herself talking to Maitimo.

So, what's in your father's pile of uses for longer-lasting songs? she asks, while it could still plausibly be an irrelevancy before getting to the important things.

Running a generator - I demurred on that one, seemed like the kind of thing you possibly could do? - heightened perception, heightened reaction times, enhanced strength - he really wants the one for better reaction times, it lets you think faster and would accordingly let him invent faster - those don't seem like things your magic could do, so I said that maybe we didn't want to teach the Nolofinweans those songs...food remains pressing, food preservation, the song that lets you go without sleep. Those are the main ones.

We could do generators, could maybe fake strength but it'd be ineffective.

So he did have a list, then.

He has lists of research applications of everything he even hears about, of course he'd do it for novel magic.

Not if he knew that particular novel magic didn't exist. I got a bit paranoid recently that even without telling anyone anything there might be enough clues for him to figure out it's a cover story.

I told him 'infohazard, cut it out' before I spread the fake explanation. I very much doubt he believes the fake explanation. But he trusts me enough to drop something if I say that, and skepticism wouldn't stop him from coming up with research applications - if anything, it'd be very suspicious if I explained some novel magic and my father didn't have a paper out within a week with a hundred research applications -

Good point. We can rely on the nebulously defined limitations I don't want to state details about for why some of them aren't happening.

The other thing is, um, you probably wouldn't have to tell anyone if you wanted those hundred applications for the real thing. Has anyone pieced together anything closer than "infohazard, stop"?

 I did and I am not actually the sharpest mind that got intrigued by the problem. From what you described about where the breakthrough point is, getting a sense of your capabilities while still believing that it's something intrinsic to humans and explainable as a variant on magic in this world wouldn't be enough, right? 

I don't think it would, no. I mean, "this is what spirits and Others are, humans can talk to them" would, but "humans can fly" shouldn't.

Who are you thinking might have figured out enough?

If anyone figured out anything resembling 'there are spirits and Others' they haven't told me about it, but I haven't had much time for casual conversation. If there's something making the stakes higher than previously communicated I can try to interact with everyone who plausibly might have, come back to you with better guesses...

They're the same, it's just that I realized I was incorrectly paranoid back when I was being paranoid...

Have you arranged for anyone to find out my real capabilities, and if not can you swear that as far as you know no one knows? I know it's an extreme thing to ask, it's just, I should have said it broader than just telling people the first time around–

Yeah, sure, somewhere soundproofed which this isn't, because that'd be a terribly ironic way for someone to learn. How's your Quenya - do I need to figure out how to phrase it in familiar vocabulary words -

I'll understand if you say it the way you did last time, that everything you said since I last spoke over osanwë is true.

They find another building which is comfortably soundproofed. 

(The envoys to Doriath have been told to ask Melian about the ritual of awakening, ask if she'll supervise their own because she's a powerful Maia and they wouldn't want to do it in Elwë's kingdom without his leave and her guidance. Well. He gave ten people letters to that effect and told them to read them only if the first large number they thought of turned out divisible by four, to act on them if it seemed wise in their judgment, and then not to tell Maitimo whether they had done so.)

To my knowledge no one in this camp knows your real capabilities. I have not encouraged any efforts to discover them, I haven't told them to anyone, and I haven't had any interactions with anyone or passed any information to anyone that made it likely they'd figure it out. 

"I swear that everything I said since you last spoke over osanwë is true."

That's in this camp as in in this faction, not just people who happen to not be on some errand right now, right?

If so... thanks. Sorry about asking that.

A slightly exasperated sigh. I also haven't given information about your capabilities to people unaffiliated with our faction, or people who've renounced an affiliation with our faction, or people affiliated with our faction but outside our camp, and I haven't had people mess with their declared affiliations so I could swear things about my faction more easily, and I don't intend to do any of those things.

"I swear that everything I said since you last spoke over osanwë is true."

I'm being even more obnoxious about this than is called for, aren't I.

If it helps, I haven't been doing that kind of thing with what I swore to keep secret either, and have occasionally deflected people when they seemed to get close.

I appreciate that. And you may be way out of line in terms of social protocols but it really makes a lot of sense, given who you're working with and what's at stake. The Enemy sunk a millenium into sowing distrust between our hosts, it must really matter, and anything at all we can do to counteract that...

Yeah. I'd prefer my world's set of expectations for this, where people make definitive statements whenever necessary, but that's not the set we've got.

Some better news, I think we might be able to get some leeway on what the Enemy could reverse engineer by making things that look like he could manage it but need magic to run...

Like most possible subject changes, it's a welcome one.

Yes. He bounces ideas to the engineers and gets suggestions back and sketches some out and takes very pretty notes to take home to Amber's host.

Can't guarantee it'll be the best use of magic resources, but some of these would definitely work. We could use trains and cars or even airplanes, and if they capture any let them scratch their heads at how it stays up.

No chance that'll cause them to guess about magic?

It'd be a pretty huge jump.

Would it help to add complicated-looking decoy enchantments on the parts that are going to run by magic, so it looks like a normal innovation?

Enchantments don't look like anything - well, not to my sight - but we could add them, yes.

If they don't, that's even better. It could be anything making that propeller turn.

Yep. A real project to pull something like that off would involve a lot of people, though, I might have to think about how to make it plausible that we came up with it with so few.

A lot of people even if one of them's your father? He knows to stop at "infohazard," and doesn't need to actually be able to build it if his reputation would make it believable.

That'd probably be the way to go, yes. I will tell him the reputation for working alone is paying its belated dividends.

He won't mind getting credit for an invention he can't replicate?

He'll probably add figuring out how to replicate it to his list of projects but it's a long list. If we suddenly need some of them and don't have your cooperation on building them anymore then it'd be a problem, but I'm sure we could cover for it.

The limit would be on how many we can make, which would require pretty much the same kinds of covering for it.

Everyone'd expect enchanting something like that to take minimum of a year. 

Okay, never mind. A Year is plenty of time to find the magical resources. Even the scaled-down version to what they'd find plausible rather than what they'd expect is probably plenty of time.

If enchanting were fast this war'd be much easier. I bet you could pull off heavier-than-air flight - 

- we had gliders, Findekáno was ridiculously good at it, he probably can't risk himself in one of those machines now but he'd have so much fun with it -

We can pull off heavier-than-air flight. At least basic heavier-than-air flight, I don't think I could describe a jet engine well enough to fake it with magic let alone build one.

You'd just have to describe it well enough my father could build one.

Has your home society had more time than us, or are they just more creative?

Probably the difference is mostly that it's more populous.

That'd do it. The larger industrial base - he sighs longingly. Was the question you've been working up to all afternoon the one about a more thorough oath, or is there anything else?

It was mostly that one. The other awkward question, Findekáno suggested it, was the contents of the ships. I couldn't tell him it wasn't your decision that ended up with all of it on this side. Do you think you could get away with sending it—or whatever of it should be theirs—back?

Some stuff, probably yes. Other stuff, I can get them something of comparable value but not the literal contents. It'll take a little finagling, but next time you come by I can have as much as you can carry.

On a scale involving multiple ships. Well, it's something.

I'll pass that on. Hopefully there don't turn out to be disagreements about what's important to whom.

Is Findekáno willing to talk to me?

He'd rather not. It– might very well change if he knew you didn't start the fires.

I have thought about it a lot and I think he'd tell his father and then have fun interfacing with someone else in this camp - our spying is inconveniently good, I actually can't have them keeping secrets on my behalf - 

- what is owed to who is something best hashed out over a lot of inventory lists and by people who can credibly say that their side regards the solution as fair -

- does he read the letters I write him -

I don't think so. But I did emphasize not needing to know whether he does or not, so it's possible he does and doesn't want you to know he does–

Well. Tell them I'm working on getting them ship cargo, and if they have a preference ordering over how they get things returned to them then they should communicate such.

Will do.

Was there anything else we needed to cover?

Not on our end. Thank you for stopping by, as always.

I think that was everything on ours, too. Let me know if you wind up needing magic done on any almost workable inventions.

And back to the Nolofinweans.

What's he have to say?

He didn't do it. Hasn't told any of his people or indirectly encouraged them to find clues, hasn't been playing games with who counts as his people to get around it... I really should have just asked that stuff the first time around.

And he can't guarantee all the contents of the ships themselves but says he's working on that or equally valuable things. We should send a list of what's how important.

We can do that.

I'm relieved. Also a bit surprised.

At the return of property, or that he hasn't been spreading the secret?

That he'd swear there's a wide variety of games he's not playing.

Well, he can't be playing one of every possible class of games. He could have done nothing at all about who counts as his people and instead tried to alter what counts as telling them, or even be completely on the level.

We can hope. I'll make him a list of stolen things, though it's not as if his best guess wouldn't be accurate...

If he knows in detail what was valued how highly by whom that'd be completely... he does, doesn't he.

Yep. Don't know if he's being obstructionist to buy some time or so we'll talk with him or what, but he does know all of those things.

Or maybe it's because Maitimo, having not burned the ships, has less clout and ability to return things than Findekáno assumes. One can hope.

He asked about you. Whether you're willing to talk to him.

If it were necessary. I don't think it is.

Yeah, outside of emergencies I don't know why it would be.

He'll live.

He does seem to be doing well with his own faction. More than that I'm glad not to have to pay attention to; they're there and we get to mostly avoid them.

Yep. Thank you. When you get home, there's something I want to show you, it's been worrying me-

Already on my way– what is it?

He sends it. One of the people in their camp, connections streaming north.

Toward the Feanorians? No, everyone's got those ones...

Looks like towards Angband. Maybe you can see better from the air.

I'll look on the way in.

Who is it, does he know you know?

Can't imagine anyone'd know, it's not as if I've confronted him. Name won't be meaningful to you, but I've known him several hundred years - 

If someone's selling us out to the Enemy—

They can't have just walked up to Angband. And there's no way the Enemy could approach just exactly the right person to ask. Unless he could. Something doesn't add up, and I hope it isn't the version where the Enemy can spot traitors at a distance.

Yeah. I notified my father. We're keeping an eye on him. Any way to fake the connections, anything else they could mean...

Connections can be faked, but if the Enemy knew they were even a thing that'd be much worse than him having a radar for evil.

It could be a connection to something else? We'd know if it were a person, and then there'd be more than the one link anyway, but sometimes objects can count. If the Enemy got something important to him that could be all it is.

...that is entirely possible. We'll hope it's that.

There being exactly one is still strange. But at least there's room for hoping.

If that's not it, you need to look for the same in the other camp-

Good point. So much for mostly not having to worry about them.

I'll turn around and look from the air. Won't be able to see everyone, but it has to be worth checking.

Mind that the Silmarils are in Angband.

Oh. So at least eight false alarms and probably more, and I won't be able to tell one connection from another. I guess it'd be worth asking Maitimo whether the Silmarils are unusually important to this or that person if there are any I don't recognize.

I think it's worth it, yes.

So she turns around and overflies the Feanorians. Well, whichever subset of the Feanorians happen to be visible from the air right now. Anyone fraternizing with a person or obsessed with an object in Angband?

Seven of them.

Seven: Notably isn't eight. It's not just that the eighth isn't visible from the air; some of the seven are indoors and the connections are visible anyway. There are just that many spirits flitting back and forth. So that's what happens when you swear an oath to have no higher priorities ever.

But there isn't anyone marked as suspicious, so she flies back.

They look safe?

The ties to the Silmarils were even more obvious than I expected. Other than that nothing.

There were only seven. Hopefully it just means someone's out of the camp at the moment.

They were sending an envoy to Doriath. I think Maitimo'd have mentioned if something happened...

I am not at all sure of that. It'd go against the image as competently handling a bad situation.

But an envoy to Doriath does seem like the kind of thing where they'd want one of their royals. Maybe it's—the one who'd want to meet the Dwarves. I think Irissë called him Moryo and I have officially lost track of which name belongs to whom.

He'd be an interesting choice of envoy, but yeah, might like the Dwarves. Okay. So we've got someone with a connection in Angband - is it the same type my cousins have, can you see that?

I can't really distinguish varieties; I think theirs was just an exception because of the Oath. But no, it's not the same as your cousins'.

She sends him a comparison. As usual with the Sight, what it looks like to her isn't the same as what it looks like to him, but he can at least see the difference in her view. Each looks like a narrow channel with indistinguishable spirits flowing in both directions, but the Feanorians' ones are more direct and glowing brighter than normal connections do. The suspect's tie to Angband looks like any ordinary link.

So they didn't somehow sneak one of them into our camp with a disguise song.

....Enemy might have done that.

A disguise good enough to impersonate someone you've known for hundreds of years? Even if they accidentally spoofed the Sight by getting enough of a relationship with everyone the target knows, they should still have more than the one tie to Angband.

Right, good point. And the Enemy can't be playing that, he doesn't know it exists.

There's got to be a simpler explanation. Maybe it's not the Enemy at all, just some one or thing or place that happens to be north of here.

It's a long shot.

I'll keep you apprised of what the King decides to do.

I wish I had an easy solution.

I don't suppose you can spot from the connection when someone's communicating? Seems like the kind of thing enchanters could do, but I don't even know if it can be picked up just from practicing or not.

I still can't tell different kinds of connection apart, and I've been looking at them a lot. But that's all I've been doing.

Me neither. Then the Sight might not do much more from here. Hopefully telling us who to watch is enough.

Hopefully.

And the report, a few hours later: found the team he most recently went out scouting with, said there'd been a discrepancy we were trying to sort out and asked them to swear to the truth of the report they'd signed off on, and swear that they had never since arriving on the continent interacted with the Enemy or anyone who served him. Which they did.

That's good. Might just be an object.

But, oaths can be fooled. What if he just didn't know?

Not impossible, but hard to think how it would have happened...

You were considering disguise songs, and we only know this isn't that because disguise songs shouldn't show up this way to the Sight. Non-practitioners should be strictly easier to fool.

Still means the Enemy would have to know who to approach. I'd like to think that's implausible.

Who to approach for something that didn't involve treason might be a fair cry easier. He was in Valinor for a hundred Years...

And we don't know that there's been any treason. Does that sound like something the Enemy might do, if he knew he couldn't expect anything obviously disloyal?

Maybe? He spent a while in Tirion doing things that weren't obviously disloyal, just trying to provoke Fëanáro to more and more paranoia...but paranoia can't be the game here, we weren't supposed to know about it...

I could imagine limited influence being absolutely worth a convoluted plot. Even if it's just one person and all orders have to be plausible, there's no way that wouldn't come in useful eventually.

I just have a hard time reconciling that with the Enemy being the recreationally evil, giant fortress type. Would make more sense with a larger-scale endgame.

I assume his endgame is to have the strength to assail the Valar. But - hmm. 

Eventually. But I don't see a way for this plot to escalate—if there's anything evil he can just say no.

There's got to be something we're missing.

Yep. We can keep a close eye on him, that's about it.

And confirm that he didn't lose some possession recently.

If there's some way to find that out without potentially tipping off the Enemy that it's a question we're interested in.

Have suggestions?

Is he married or something? It'd make things a lot easier if someone else might have noticed things going missing.

Or we could just ask for an oath not to share the fact that we asked with anyone whose identity hasn't been– with anyone. Since we don't know how good Enemy disguises might be.

Even a totally innocent person would as likely as not refuse to swear that.

Oh. Just because of the general disapproval of oaths, or because this oath is dangerous?

I can't think of a way it's dangerous but it wouldn't surprise me if Maitimo could, or could think of a way to build a lot of leverage off an oath not to tell anyone something...

Right. And we shouldn't just swear not to use that oath against him because Elf oaths handle blurry edges differently from practitioner ones.

I almost wish we had Maitimo on hand, we could put them in a room together for five minutes and end up knowing everything while somehow not tipping off the Enemy.

We would. If my cousins were good people this war'd be infinitely easier. 

Or even if asking for help wouldn't be multiple simultaneous disasters. If.

Maybe we're coming at this from the wrong angle. If the Enemy is using disguise, who does he impersonate? We know he didn't outright replace them or the connection wouldn't be pointing to Angband, and two of your father would be noticed...

Impersonate one of us, though - maybe not me, that'd probably also be too conspicuous, though I'm out of the camp a lot more and you might be able to time it right - someone who could claim to be acting on my father's behalf -

- and even explain that my father couldn't publicly confirm, and shouldn't be confronted about, giving these instructions -

Then that gets the set of plausible orders up to "suspicious" but still not to disloyal. Covers potentially Enemy-serving orders that your father might plausibly wish he could give–

–if there are a lot of actual ones of those instead of just plausible, it might be a good idea not to tell me. Maitimo again.

Yes, that crossed my mind. There aren't. Sigh. I was going to say 'not that you can just trust me on that' but I suppose you actually can.

I'll try not to infer anything if you don't say no to this question next time it comes up.

Things that we might plausibly want to happen but that actually help the Enemy. Telling Doriath about Alqualonde? It'd rebound on both us and the Feanorians, but there'd be no reason to disbelieve someone who looked like you saying otherwise.

Yes. Or if it's a long game, things that they can then leverage to convince the Fëanorians we're planning to attack them -

It has to be a long game, I still don't see any possible short-term payoff past bragging rights.

I wish we knew how compromised the victim was. There's a good chance we could clear everything up just by telling him what we suspect, and he stops taking questionable orders. And another chance that he conveys that straight to the Enemy.

And if he is the kind of person who'd at my request swear not to tell anyone about a conversation he had with me, then he already swore that, probably, to the impersonator...

Figures.

If we knew it was you being impersonated, you could just pose as whoever's posing as you. But it's just as likely to be Turukáno or someone, and we don't have the information to narrow it down.

Yes. There are probably half a dozen people who would be trusted if they claimed to be speaking on my father's behalf, or it could be anyone if he has a way to fake swearing to it.

Worse and worse.

The one good thing is they can't have expected us to find out like this. We have enough practitioners to watch in shifts for when the Enemy agent leaves Angband, we can confront them with their doppelgänger.

Yep. Could be a lot worse. I'll tell everyone to start keeping an eye out.

And just because they haven't yet accomplished the same in the other camp doesn't mean they can't. Though it'd be harder.

Yeah, they do have Maitimo to see through it.

See through it and also have his people internally coordinated in a way that'd be hard to guess by observation - assuming the Enemy can't eavesdrop on osanwë - and also the Enemy'd almost have to impersonate him and he's hard to impersonate.

Plus if there were only one candidate here, we'd know who by now.

If it turns out all this is just because the Enemy stole something, feeling like an idiot will be such a relief.

I'll let you know if we think of a safe way to ask that.

I doubt there is one, but yeah. It'd clear things up.

I'll make sure to watch for the connection to move, when watching won't be conspicuous.

Yeah, we should set up shifts on that. 

They do. 

It's a few weeks before it moves.

As soon as Amber hears about it she's with the other practitioners watching the link get shorter and shorter. That rules out the captured object theory.

The clandestine meeting place isn't in easy view of the camp, so they end up taking to the air. And then the Elves can see that the suspect is meeting with–

She waves, hugs him, looks around, doesn't spot them. The conversation lasts about ten minutes.

Apparently it would have been too much to hope for for it to be one of the people they have with them.

Can anyone overhear it?

No, osanwë.

At least that means no new oaths.

We can ask the real Artanis to pretend to be the pretender, but that works as well any other time. I think we should ambush the fake one.

Agreed. Do we have anything to kill it with, if it's a Maia -

Fire and gravity elementals plus swords? If swords work then the bullets with the same enchantment should too; we could try and shred it from up here if we don't want to take it alive.

I very much doubt there's a way to take a shapeshifter alive without being sure it doesn't have illusions it could use to fake oaths.

Firing from above it is, then. She passes around the weapons, basically bladed and pointed hollow bullets filled with water. There are only the two water elementals but they're no longer short on ways to make objects move threateningly.

Or from behind, if it survives there's no need to give away our position.