"I could tap random civilians but it - doesn't hurt exactly but it's sort of tiring especially if you're not expecting it? I wouldn't want to do it to somebody who didn't know what was going on. And I can't hold more than one tap at once."

"We have a lot of secret immortality labs where people are apprised of enough information to work from effectively and who would probably volunteer. But if you can't hold more than one at a time it'd make more sense for us to work on it as quickly as possible..."

"I can work on being able to hold more taps if that seems more efficient. Or somebody else could work on that and I could focus on spell development."

"I can take a look at it. I assume there aren't any Maiar still around -"

"We don't think so and they wouldn't help us."

"I miss Olórin," murmurs Bella.

"He's probably still around. Just, you know, in Valinor."

"Yeah, I know."

"Any chance that yours would be amenable to being snatched out of your Valinor, if you've got an interdimensional teleport -"

"...it'd be worth asking? I'd want an interdimensional earwire, first, to ask. And I'm - not sure - I think there's imperfect consensus about everything but maybe not enough that he'll associate with me after I got kicked out..."

Huan went into exile with us, and he's a Maia. Just - don't bring it up around Tyelcormo.

Okay.

"Worth checking, at least. He might want to come to this world just so he can learn more about the destined future and how to avert it."

"It'd... be hard... for much destiny to play out as planned in my Arda... but yeah."

"Yeah, you stole your Fëanáro away. Destiny must be floundering!"

"His world is the poorer for not having any of you come to exist in it but other than that it seems an overwhelming benefit."

"Not sure we made the world any richer."

"That seems more a matter of fate twisting you along the worst possible paths than you not being inherently people who would improve most naive systems you were introduced to."

"If you like."

"Ehn, I'm probably biased. Doesn't really matter, anyway."

"It doesn't. We're here and we know what we want to do from here."

"And Beleriand would still have been worse off without us."

"Fucking Melkor," she mutters under her breath.

"Indeed."

"We should probably work out a way to kill him, I don't want to bet--any of lots of relevant things--that he won't find a way out someday."