"This is the me?"

"Yes."

"What happened?"

"There was a civil war. Melkor set it up - planted evidence, did illusions, figured out all our internal politics and said the wrong things to the wrong people and had my father persuaded that his half-brother was going to try to oust him and Nolofinwë persuaded that my father was going to murder him and then killed the King."

"Ouch." He puts an arm around Aitim. "Which we were on opposite sides of."

"Yeah. I won. But I couldn't kill him so I just - kept him."

"Why is this intractable?"

" - hmmm?"

"- I mean, I realize we are currently here, and that when last you were in your world there was a war on, but, like, if you get home and the wizards rip up your Melkor also, is this still a hard problem to solve in any way."

" - not really, no, not if the war were over."

"Why is his hair short."

"Got the point across."

"It's a strange point to want to get across, if I'm understanding it properly, but I assume we're missing some context."

"Several hundred years of it."

Shrug. "As long as you can fix it I think anyone being shocked that a society that hadn't invented plumbing also hadn't invented modern sexual ethics has, uh, skipped even more history classes for being depressing than I did."

"Elves usually get ethics first."

"To some extent it's actually weird Elves get ethics at all, given the degree to which - at least among our people - they're the thing extracted from watching history happen and going 'okay, that thing, it's bad, can we enforce a taboo against it?'"

"It really seems like something you'd get right on the first try."

"But that's what I'm saying, it doesn't actually seem to be something societies get right on the first try. Except bizarre Elf societies, and this Elf society is just - not-bizarre."

"It's definitely bizarre," say several Elves emphatically.

Beka is looking confusedly between various Macalaurës.

Rabka has tuned out to have a side conversation with Rebecca about how Pink II can totally have a lactation potion if the wizards have enough ingredients.

"I don't see what the problem is," volunteers Beka's original Macalaurë.

"The problem is that your world is apparently evil!!"

"Yes! We are! That's how people are when the Valar aren't twisting them!"