I guess Orome's probably too far away from the city for Tyelcormo to count for that.

Yeah, and hard to find, it could take a month. Though it'd be an excuse to get the two of them out of here. Not that I'm not also worried about you, but if anyone so much as threatens Idaia my brother will overreact and then we'll have real problems.

Yeah, I got that impression.

I will absolutely start a war for the two of you but only if it actually helps.

I'd say 'don't, it's not worth it' except that anyone who's liable to die in such a war would have a much easier time coming back than either of us would.

Yes. I think it could be worth it. But I'm really working very hard to prevent a war, not to win one.

An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.

They head back to the palace after the talk. They are not assailed in the streets.

 Well, that was more informative than I'd feared and less than I'd hoped.

It's something. There's going to be debates in the forums all week, I feel like I should have someone there to warn us if the mood in the city's a problem.

Probably.

Do you have enough reading material to keep you occupied?

At least for another little while.

All right. I can recommend some more when you get through it. Take care. Lots of it.

I will. And I'll tell you when I'm done what I've got.

The debate at the forums the next day gets heated. There is some shoving. The day after that both sides come armed. 

Of fucking course.

What are the two sides, exactly?

People who want to leave Valinor, consisting of people who want to stop their homeland from being overrun by Men, people who want to rule over the Men and make them behave better, and people who wanted to leave before Men were even on the table. And people who want to stay, consisting of people who consider themselves loyalists of the King, people who hate one of the 'leave' groups, and people loyal to the Valar.

Oh, god, Elves getting Valinorean conservatism on her infant species. Augh.

Okay that emotional reaction had time to get back to the actual immediate problems.

The actual immediate problem, Maitimo says, after shutting down the city and closing the forums and declaring a curfew, is that actual use of power is super rare in Tirion and might escalate the situation, though it seems better than not doing it. The King's holding a public audience tomorrow to try to talk things through with both sides.

I hope that turns out to be a good idea.

You attending?

Unless you think my presence would be particularly inflammatory or something.

I don't. I think we should all go, it'll give it more credibility if the King does manage to settle things.

"All" meaning...