"Lúthien. It's not an especially pleasant story."

(notetaking, notetaking) "Maitimo isn't convinced I can do a convincing impression of people he knows. If he wants it can I share my transcription of this conversation with him?"

"Yeah, for sure. Thank you. For trying to help."

"I can see arguments for either response, although I can tell him that you'd like to meet and discuss it in case he'll make an exception for you as he did for Olwë's grandchildren. I have little impression of how he handles people outside the borders of his wife's protections. Within them it seems safe and pleasant compared to anywhere else you could be; but that wasn't what Lúthien guessed he'd offer, and the tradeoffs are different and less appealing."

"We're here to take down the Enemy. I wholly expect that the local population would rightly resent us if we just asked to join their settlements; we could have remained in Valinor, were it our desire to live in peace while others suffered, and not been a strain on the resources of their people. My concern isn't that I get nothing in return, my concern is whether he'd give sensible orders."

"I'm not sure how many he gives or what they typically are. I'm going to ask Círdan probably sometime this week about settling orcs near his city; maybe he'll have a useful perspective on the matter." She writes that down.

"I'm concerned also that, while he regards himself as King of the whole continent, the local communities don't seem to regard him as their King and might not be pleased if we aligned ourselves with him. That we can look into while you're absent. We are only just beginning to interact with them, and have yet to talk politics."

"Yeah, I'm a little unclear on the extent to which his sovereignty outside the borders may be a figment of his imagination."

"I'm not sure that isn't what rule always is."

Shrug. "So far his only attempts to have sovereignty over me were conditions over my visits I was willing enough to agree to and permission to do things. Hopefully this will continue."

"My father spoke at length of Elwë."

"Oh?"

"We never knew how and why he'd vanished."

"He was staring at his wife-to-be for three hundred years while a forest grew around them. But it was mutual so at least they have common interests."

"That does answer many questions, but perhaps not in a way that inspires confidence."

"No, not really," she acknowledges.

"I wouldn't generally even consider it, but Artanis isn't wrong that we can't win this war as four or five squabbling factions."

Nod.

"Has my brother discussed this? Does he think he can do it all himself?"

"I think his plan is to approximately besiege Angband for three hundred years - which is at least more productive than staring at anyone - and meanwhile furiously invent things so that at the end of this time he can kill the Enemy. My assessment of this plan depends largely on whether I assume the Enemy makes orcs because he likes being gratuitously horrible or because it is practical for him to maintain an army of orcs. If it's the former a genius advance of some kind is honestly more likely to help than a lot of people with ordinary weapons."

"I don't follow."

"If the orcs are around because he needs orcs - because a large group of individual humanoid creatures running around stabbing things is the best way for him to accomplish his goals - then it is reasonable to assume that opposing him with your own large group of individual humanoid creatures capable of stabbing things is a viable strategy. If he's just making orcs to be cruel because he's a sadistic bastard? If he doesn't need them, if they're his hobby? Then you need to hold out for the other Valar to suddenly become responsible and competent, or for Fëanor or somebody to invent something, or for me to get help from another realm."