The locals have confirmed that Elwe's the King, there, and that his kingdom is hidden by magic of a Maia who is also the reason he disappeared for twenty-something Years back when everyone was emigrating.

...and we think this Maia is potentially friendly in spite of her disappearing-people-for-centuries habit.

Well, that's what I meant about not wanting to go poke her without more information.

Yeah.

We need to send an emissary to Doriath in the next few years anyway or it'll be odd that we arrived and did not announce ourselves. 

Well, if we don't gain a meaningful advantage by waiting...

Have thoughts on who it should be? In terms of capabilities and temperaments, I'll be better at the people...

Gonna guess 'not inclined to immediately ask what the heck she was doing with that guy for twenty Years' is important. Good at spin, in case she's a Valar partisan and will not be best pleased that we had differences with them. Patient. Definitely don't send me.

Wasn't planning to. And we know what she did with him, they are now happily married. 

I'll try to have another group of people who the first can report to; Doriath's not three hundred miles in radius so we shouldn't need to lose touch with them, and if she's got some sort of mind control that she employs more generally than on lovers we'll at least know what happened to them...

Kib shudders. Good plan.

I mean, it's technically possible she's just very good in bed and there wasn't any mind control involved. 

Two. Hundred. Years.

I have given you all of the information that I have.

There is definitely something sketchy going on with any situation involving someone vanishing long enough for civilizations to rise and fall and then popping out happily married to a medium-sized divinity.

So we'll send the people with an outside-the-walls escort to keep in touch with them, and we won't send anyone we can't afford to lose, and if she's willing to help us win the war we will accept her help. 

Elwe was also by all accounts gay before he met her, come to think of it, so I can't even send people who'd be safe...

Grand. Not only gay but gay enough for there to be accounts of it!

Oh, back by Cuivienen it wasn't a big deal, we hadn't had the Valar to explain things to us yet. 

They're so helpful.

If you want to get the memos about the adventures of our emissaries, can do.

I'd be curious, and I can't program and poke chassis and pet owls constantly. Although I'm working on an identity verification golem program. Since I think they might not be fooled by shapeshifters - the same way they can recognize people across reincarnations -

Oooh, fantastic. I am entirely in favor of keeping an entertaining spread of activities for my valuable strategic asset, and you might notice things in the transcripts. 

Might. And I appreciate that; I could push myself harder but not indefinitely.

I think we should plan for the need to last indefinitely, and also have something in reserve so we can push ourselves harder in a time of actual crisis. I'm probably going to dial back the shifts pretty soon, now that we're sustainable on food and all behind good walls.

Sounds like a good plan. I don't have a great sense of what the working conditions were doing to people - they'd drive humans spare in under a week -

We had perfect compliance but I think that just means I should stop while I'm ahead. People were swearing mind-controlling oaths to get themselves through their shifts, that's not ideal when we can function without...