I wish I could be as sure of that as you are. And as casual to throw around twenty-year intervals.

I recommend facing down a millenium of waiting! It makes twenty years look positively reassuring. But really, it's going to go all right. Good skill.

Sigh. Thanks. - He could dream something that involves knowing about you and Maitimo any time. I will lead with, you know, 'can you be discreet about something', but it's probably better to tell him up front than make him try to figure out who he can mention it to...

I agree.

And during the relevant afternoon, Kib's waiting in a nice soundproof stone-construction meeting room, and in comes Aydanci, punctual and confused.

Kib's pacing. "Hi, Aydanci. Heard you started having your reincarnation dreams - did you start on a nice one?"

"Um, yes."

"Good - that's good." Sigh. "I'm reincarnated too. Still working through all the dreams - they get more frequent and longer, I get five or six hours of them a night every night now, no more normal dreams. They can be sort of hard to put into context by themselves, since they don't appear in order. We - we knew each other, so, I figured I'd tell you the story of your life, and you'd be able to place anything you dreamed about."

"That makes sense," says Aydanci. "- do dreams repeat? What happens when we run out of life to dream?"

"They don't repeat - or at least haven't for me, so far. And I haven't run out so I don't know what happens."

"Don't other humans know?"

"It's... actually not a common human thing. We're the only people who I know to be reincarnations. I don't know how it happened or why us, but I had to figure it all out myself."

"Oh." Pause. "Okay, tell me the story of my life."

And so Kib takes a deep breath and describes the context of how humans appear in the lost world, Aydanci may have heard of storks but this is before they were invented, he was found near a city-state called Lapis and brought up by a creche there, apprenticed in servantmaking but interested in medicine, working on medical golems -

"I wish I had my notes on those," says Aydanci.

"I have all your notes for you. You can take them all home with you."

"Oh good."

"Anyway, when you were eighteen you were in the library and you met this girl called Aly who was working on a secret golem project, and you started helping each other even though she wouldn't tell you what she was working on. At first, anyway, you got to hanging out pretty much all the time..."

"Um."

"Question?"

"Do I happen to be - you said pretty much all the time, did I marry her?"

"...yeah."

"Oh Eru, is - is she okay, I, what, I can't be married that's terrifying, and I'm a terrible husband I forgot all about her - is she okay -"

"It's - it's fine, it's fine, shh," says Kib, "- I'm fine."

There is a silence.

"Oh," says Aydanci. "Well. ...Good." With a soft solemn intensity and Kib ever so nonslightly melts.

"...so, yes, you married her, you were twenty, and you were really happy. And I'm a little out of order here, she told you what her secret project was before the wedding, it was storks."

Aydanci has had storks explained to him. Aydanci is looking at Kib like Kib is the first sunrise of the world. "She - you, you invented storks?"

Kib smiles a little. "Yeah. Aly invented storks." Remind me never to doubt you, he remarks as an aside to Findekáno.

Happiness. Strong affection. Not a hint of surprise.

It's interesting how readable Aydanci's face still is, even though it's not quite the same face - it's used the same way - he is, mercifully, being a fifteen year old Aydanci who remembers nothing to speak of, not contemplating tackling Kib against a wall right at this very moment, but Kib can pretty much watch Aydanci decide that he is okay with being married after all and that his already nonexistent plans for dating some random person shall become more nonexistent.

"And you were really happy for - four and a bit years," Kib says, and Aydanci tenses up. "- it's not that there was anything wrong with the marriage - the lost world didn't have any healing songs, let alone friendly Ainur, and humans aren't as good at controlling our bodies as Elves are. Humans get sick. A lot. Sometimes really badly. And Aly got - very, very sick."

Aydanci waits for the next installment of the story of his life, dismayed.

Kib swallows and picks back up. "You took really good care of her. But eventually she died."

"...I'm so sorry," whispers Aydanci, horrified.

"It's okay!" says Kib. "It's okay, I don't know how but I reincarnated. Uh, obviously not a girl named Aly anymore, and I didn't remember anything until I was fifteen either, and I didn't have anybody explaining to me that the dreams were of a real thing so I went years figuring she was just some kind of recurring dream-character - but I'm fine - and you, you were very angry at that disease and now it is gone, you killed it."

"Good. I'm sorry I didn't get it sooner."

"It's okay -" honey. "You made a lot of progress with the medical golems before that," Kib assures him, "they were a big deal. And you eradicated some more diseases and made some more storks. But - you were - not really okay. There's... pretty much an eighteen year stretch of you not being okay, it's not going to be the most fun thing to dream, sorry."

"...what about after that?"

"Well. I reincarnated. A stork got me, since there were storks by then. I grew up. And then I got eaten by a weird portal monster that plopped me right in downtown Tirion when it tried to eat me."

There is a startled pause. "I have to say," Aydanci finally remarks, "that is not where I was expecting this narrative to go."

"Well, I had to get here from the lost world somehow," Kib says. "Somehow was a snakey portal-faced thing. It ate more people before someone managed to kill it, but as far as I ever heard I'm the only one who ever found a way back. Anyway, there I was in Valinor, very surprised by a place having its lighting handled by shiny trees instead of a sun and the inhabitants being telepathic Elves instead of humans like I was used to. But the Valar could put the worlds in more sustainable contact, so for a while they did that." Deep breath. "The dreams are in a random order. I didn't - I didn't have any with you in them for a while, except a couple tiny snippets I didn't figure out. I only realized Aly was real at all when I had enough memories to be able to sort of read Harthanic, which she'd learned and I hadn't the second time around."

"... I can't imagine I would hold anything that happened in the interim against you."

"You didn't," Kib says at once. "You didn't. And you'll know what it was whenever you dream it, which could be next week or something, so I'm going to tell you up front, but it is from pretty much everybody else a complete secret and you've got to be discreet. Okay?"

Solemn nod.

"The King picked out your parents for you and he made sure they would nonjudgmentally tell you things like 'sometimes, humans marry people of the same sex' because otherwise it would have been really awkward when you got your dreams. Thing is, this was not instantly accepted fact in Valinor; Elves have different rules. I landed expecting that 'oh, I only like men' would be minor trivia only of interest to similarly inclined men, and I mentioned this minor trivia, and boy did I get told off. But since I had been so indiscreet I met, well. Similarly inclined Elves."

"...Oh."

It is not an upset "oh", it is a "....processing", so Kib lets him process. When he seems to be done - although he still has a "huh, let me reevaluate everything" look on his face - Kib moves on. "Complete secret," he says. "...but once I remembered I was married, I showed up on your doorstep accompanied by the King, well, before he was the King; and Findekáno. And you said you had some experience with unexpectedly losing loved ones and didn't want them to have to do that for," cough, "uh, the crime of having good taste."

...Aydanci giggles at the last phrase, then - mentally backtracks and says, "Wow. That would be a secret."

"It is. Hush-hush," says Kib. "I was actually not that good at not being obvious about it. So when I brought you back to Valinor and the Valar decided we were okay to be married on a technicality because I'd been a girl at the time, I went around gushing about you constantly partly because I felt like gushing about you constantly and partly as cover." That gets an affectionate smile and a nod of approval at the cleverness of this plan. "So we got a house and were ostentatiously married - you didn't go out that much, you were in your forties and humans who'd visibly aged were a curiosity and people stared at you, plus you'd kind of spent eighteen years staying home all the time being lonely and introverted and didn't have much reason to break the habit. Some - some time passed, and then the Enemy killed the Trees, you'll have heard about that - and -"

"...And I died during the Darkening?"

"Yeah," murmurs Kib. "I was out, it was early and you were still asleep and we were running low on tea, and it went dark and -" Kib takes a moment to breathe. "And I heard you screaming. Enemy'd been through our house and - and hurt you. Almost everybody was gone to some idiotic festival the Valar had thrown to improve morale, all the way by Taniquetil, there weren't any Maiar around to help, no Elves in singing distance - somebody osanwëd me a healing song but it didn't work at all, or didn't help enough, I could only see by shines I ripped off a clock and don't even know which it was for sure -"

"Oh - oh I'm so sorry -"

"It's not your fault! I'm sorry, I, er, you could talk a little bit, you wanted me to promise to be happy and I may have. Threatened that if you didn't come check up on me I would promise no such thing. I'm... not sure if that was functional in reincarnating you or anything."

"I don't blame you for, for wanting me back. Whatever the means, I'm alive. I don't know how much right I have to speak for my past self when I have a fraction of his memories, but I don't think he'd hold anything you said against you."

"Okay," says Kib, letting out a breath. "- thanks. And - Servants recognize people across incarnations. Aly had a magpie, when I showed up at your house he went right up to me and did what I told him - and the storks knew who you were - so - I told a stork to tell all the storks to bring you to me. And one did. And the King found you a set of parents."

"Because the Valar were closing the portals, and to do otherwise would have stranded me on the lost world."

"Yeah. ...I thought about doing that. It's not... especially safe, here. I thought about leaving you in Valinor, too. But I don't know if the dreams come when you're developmentally a teenager or if when you're chronologically fifteen. And Lári was aging slower than humans normally do by a factor of ten. You'd have been a baby. And if I'd left you on the lost world you'd have had no way to get to me and - well. Last time you weren't okay without me." Sigh. "So here you are."

Aydanci nods. "Well, thank you. Here's where I want to be. Even with the dangers."

"Good. So - that should let you place whatever you dream about. I should be able to answer any more questions as they come up."

"I - suppose my main question is, well. What now?"

"Up to you," Kib says instantly. "I mean, I realize that you have been raised by Elves and therefore probably assign very heavy weight to the concept of marriage even though humans don't do the soul thing, but I don't have expectations about it. It's not impossible you could go decades without having a dream I feature in at all, and I don't expect the fact that I told you the story of your life will have magical effects of any kind, and it is fine if the answer to 'what now' or 'what ever' is 'nothing in particular'. ...But I will stop making a point of not being places I expect you, since the point of that is likely obviated now."

Aydanci considers this, and nods, and says, "All right. I uh - do assign very heavy weight to the concept of marriage, but I very much appreciate - this. Not expecting anything of me in particular." ...He smiles, shyly. "That doesn't mean I'll, er, exercise that option forever, but having it is appreciated."

"Heh." Nod. "Well. Pleasant dreams."

"You too," says Aydanci wryly. And he ducks his head - considers - and goes and gives Kib a hug.

And then slips out.

Kib collapses into his chair. Well, that went. Really well.

I am very glad.

Fuck, I missed him.

I know. I'm so glad it will work out.

Took the part about you and Maitimo really well too. ...Didn't mention how Maitimo's been doing, but that can wait, he won't dream it.

I think Maitimo wouldn't be pretending if he didn't want people to believe the pretense.

I might in fact have had to compose a sad song if the fifteen-year-old version of your husband decided that he wasn't sharing.

If he'd done that I might literally have pulled a 'you'll understand when you're older'.

He laughs. I hope the romantic dreams don't take too long, then.

Maybe a little longer. He's fifteen, a couple years older would be better. ...But I told him I invented storks and he looked at me like I was, well, the objectively best person in the world, and if he does decide to pounce on me earlier I might not be able to bring myself to peel him off.

I feel like Maitimo and I were on the receiving end of the 'I'm not jailbait and I know what I want' talk at some point.

And objectively best person in the lost world. We're going to have to give that title for Arda to my uncle, much as I dislike him, if he figures out how to kill a Vala.

I was eighteen! This is meaningfully different in human development! He hasn't grown into his elbows yet!

We didn't know anything about human development and just had to take your word for it! You were grown into your elbows, though.

I know things about human development. Totally not being a hypocrite.

Well. Congratulations. I hope he has age-appropriate dreams right up until the elbow-related milestone where you feel comfortable wanting him.

Thanks.

You should tell Maitimo.

Now, do you think?

Is there a reason not to? Other than that, going by precedent, you'll be very sad afterwards?

He'll find out when he gets the half-batch of notes tonight anyway?