"I sincerely cannot think of any more."

"I can." Findekáno will still be under all the non-time-limited oaths and his "just orders" definition left lots of room - Maitimo could get creative with arranging to endanger his own life if he wanted - the cunning use of subordinates -

"I swear that after Angband's levelled I won't give him any orders. I have been aware for centuries that I could coerce a vow of eternal obedience out of him by having someone else threaten my life for it, and I haven't done that, and I swear I will continue not doing that."

"Would you take this oath from a hostile party on behalf of someone whose well-being you highly prioritized?"

"I swear that, if you hold up your end of the agreement, I will not attempt to arrange circumstances so that Findekáno spends more time in my company than he desires, swears oaths that he would not freely choose to make, swears oaths while under the influence of other ones, or in any other manner has his desires modified against his will. I will not permit others to arrange circumstances to bring that about, I will not make it known that I would desire that, and if I learn it has occurred or is occurring I will do everything in my power to prevent it or reverse it, and I will not personally benefit from it. I swear that I would accept this oath from a hostile party on behalf of someone whose wellbeing I valued highly."

Fine.

Nukes, then. They'll want what she had already built in Tumunzahar.

"I can send someone for it." He looks exhausted. "Thank you."

Elspeth is very nearly constitutionally incapable of telling him he's welcome under the circumstances and doesn't bother. She will go think about nukes in front of whoever.

Engineers are assembled.

And she mentally walks through how far she's gotten and what they will need to do to get the rest of the way. She hadn't gotten as far as thinking about deploying the thing yet.

They have some ideas. There's a stir in the room and then people scurry off to requisition needed materials and building crews.

And now she needs sleep.

A guest room has been set aside for her. It is very prettily decorated.

How nice.

She sleeps. She wakes.

Someone brings her live birds. She passes the King in the hallways and he smiles at her like he's delighted to see her.

fuck youuuuuuuuu~

The engineers are delighted to discuss nukes again.

Fine. They can have everything she knows about them all unpacked and distilled and lined up neatly and true true true.

Her general mood is leaking into her thoughts on nukes and frightening the engineers a bit but okay. 

It will be slower if she tucks her thoughts away and has to deliver everything verbally so they can just deal with that.

They do not want slower. 

They work.

Maitimo probably has a few years to get Findekáno to forgive him. He spends a while thinking about how to do it. 

Elspeth thinks very loudly. About engineering when the engineers are present, but that obligation doesn't take long to discharge. And then she thinks loudly about other things. Possible she shouldn't stay here now that they know what she knows. Maybe she could go crash with Aredhel or something.

Always an option. People are in fact a little faintly awkward around her. 

Maitimo decides how to approach it.

Elspeth dithers. The mere fact that someone did something on one's behalf doesn't necessarily equal personal endearment, it's not like she needs to be around to look out for Findekáno, they're not even friends or anything. Seems a little weird not to be sure if he even knows what's going on though.

Maitimo considers the strategies and settles on the one with the best odds of success. He clears a few days on his schedule, since he doesn't expect this to leave him very functional whether or not it works.

He goes to his rooms.

And then he murmurs under his breath, "I swear to deeply, searingly regret everything I've done to Findekáno. I swear to hate myself as much as Elspeth hates me."

It is, of course, staggering. He stumbles inside because that's what he'd been planning on doing and he is hardly in a position to think of other things to do.