"It must be difficult to find that some things you want are intractably incompatible."

"Yes. Though I'm not sure it's even that, it's—I've spent five thousand years finding out what I wanted and then arranging to get it, and I thought I had it all more or less worked out, if not perfectly, and then... I'm suddenly so much more aware of what I'm missing, and I can't do anything about it because the last five thousand years of my life are getting in the way."

"And on top of that you object to all the straightforward options to make it less intrusive."

"...?"

"Moving. Lying. I'm assuming there's also some problem with becoming less inherently frightening and then waiting a while."

"I'm not sure becoming less inherently frightening is even an achievable aim, and I absolutely don't have the patience to try it and wait several centuries to see if it works."

"It didn't surprise me very much to find that an inherently mortal species was impatient but you're not an inherently mortal example."

"I'm much more patient than I used to be, but I'm still human. A hundred years is much too long to intentionally deprive myself of one of my favourite things without even knowing if it's going to be any use or not."

"Mm."

"It's kind of hard to tell what you're thinking sometimes."

"Amongst ourselves Elves have to specifically designate which thoughts are private or they're readable to people who are nearby enough. I'm considered very cagey."

He laughs. "Does that mean you can read everyone's thoughts, or does it only work between Elves?"

"Only between Elves and orcs. It's a chip thing. I would have warned you otherwise!"

"I don't think I'd really mind that much."

"Well, I would. I'd warn everyone I met, just in case."

"Fair enough."

"Some of our blessings work for souping up the telepathy, especially the ones that are reserved for marriages."

"There's specific ones for marriages?"

"Oh yes, that's how we formalize it, picking out blessings we want and getting them together. There's also a party but it's not the important part."

"That's sort of cute."

"Is it? I hadn't heard that before."

"Well, I don't know a lot about blessings, but it sounds like you're sort of... changing how you see the world together? A little like if two people in Skygarden were getting married and they both went and got wings for the occasion. And I think that's sweet."

"Some of them are like that! The most popular ones make being married a visible trait - it's in the eyes, I don't know if you have the vision for it - and expanded telepathic range, but many of the less common ones do what you describe."

"Well, I don't know if I can see marriage since I don't have the first clue what it's supposed to look like."

"It's like a little spark in the pupil."