"Thanks, Edie. We were discussing how to fix my universe's assumptions about who can be in love and be a parent. Our gods have some silly ideas."

"Your gods are dumb and bad," she nods sagely. "People shouldn't listen to them."

"People should listen to them, not doing that goes badly. People should listen more skeptically."

"Why would not listening to them go badly?"

"They are powerful and can enforce their laws."

"That's bad."

"It's on the list."

"Okay so people should pretend to listen to them up until Odette fixes it."

"Great idea."

"You're lucky to have her."

"And vice-versa," Odette says, kissing his cheek.

"You probably wouldn't have given up the whole war as a waste of time if you'd run into Findarato first but it'd have been a close thing."

"What are you imagining would have happened?"

"Uh, he'd have been extremely condescending and rude and you could use your Sympathy scrying to find out what happened to the previous inhabitants of his palace and you'd conclude Elves were dicks and maybe anyone we called the Enemy had at least good taste in enemies. And then hopefully you'd have encountered some orcs and realized not."

"...Previous inhabitants of his palace?"

"It's a cave system. Thingol gifted it to him. The petty Dwarves used to live there. Now they are extinct."

"He killed them and then gave their home to someone else. I am going to have words with that man if he brings up the word 'Kinslaying' in my presence."

"I don't know that he did it, or did it deliberately. I just figured you'd Sympathy-scry and find out. And the Thindar don't think petty-Dwarves are people anyway."

"I see. Well. Fortunate for our counterfactual selves I don't usually bother past-scrying things without a particular reason."

"So unless you ran into a petty-Dwarf, no writing off Elves as irretrievably awful."

"I would probably not have written off your entire species. But we'd have gotten along better if I didn't find out you were his cousin until after I'd already started liking you."

"Unlikely. If you hadn't been up north when the fighting started the likeliest way you'd meet me is if we lost but survived, and limped over to Nargothrond ourselves, where status as King's cousins would be very relevant."

"I'm glad that what happened was, instead, not that."

"You're a king's cousin? And he's a jerk?"

"Your other self is about to be a Queen's sister."