"I will be here." At a run that gives him a space to explore of several hundred miles, more if he fashions himself shoes; enough to waste some of their energy.

"Okay. Anything else before I go?"

"If this were real and my cousin were somehow alive I would desire that he know that I am so, so sorry, and that if he can think of any penance I can make that, assuming this is a hallucination, would not benefit the enemy then I will do it."

"...I'll let him know next time I see him."

He smiles. "No, you won't. But I don't think you gain anything from it."

"Well, then, next time I report having been to visit him I will have some story about our conversation."

"Thank you. I'll look forward to it."

"Really."

"If you are a Maia of some stripe you're going to slip up eventually; we incarnates are very different from you and you will not be able to convincingly imitate my acquaintances. When you make an obvious error I will not react, obviously, but then I'll know for sure. And I am looking forward to it."

"By that logic shouldn't you be trying to interact with more people?"

"The set of people who the Enemy wouldn't gain from seeing me interact with, and who don't want me dead, may have no living members."

"I suppose," she sighs. "Well, there's the orcs, but that's a little ways away. Orcs are at least incarnate. And mine are a lot different from the ones the Enemy would have on hand to consult."

"It may take more than a day for me to stop feeling abject terror in the presence of orcs, no matter their personalities or theological beliefs."

"Then you can put off moving in with them as much as you like, I suppose." Headshake. "Anything else?"

"Do you like your master? Do you find this work satisfying?"

"I'm working on my own recognizance. And you are very frustrating even in comparison with handling my constant impulses to flirt with Lúthien despite having less than no idea how Quendi navigate that sort of thing; your father interrupting every conversation we have to solicit Asgardian vocabulary and compose ridiculous sentences with what he has; and Findekáno being extremely emotional about everything. But I rescued you and you're making it difficult to turn you over immediately to anyone else and indefinite solitude is bad for the mind, so."

"I'm not going to seduce Lúthien, I don't like her parents and they seem to have a vested interest in her love life and I've never managed to sustain an interest in a woman past succeeding in seducing one and I vaguely suspect Quendi of extreme monogamous tendencies and it would in general be a fiasco. I just find it a constant temptation and you are the only person I can complain to without a hundred other people in earshot. Anyway, it's not indefinite, I have no intention of doing this for more than a year tops. After that I'm probably not going to be able to improve on wherever I've set you up."

"We can move on from romantic betrayal," he says curtly. "Though your reasoning seems sound given your premises."

"I do hold my reasoning to that standard. ...I haven't actually been able to tell if you and Findekáno are or were an item, but no need to tell me; I haven't asked him either and I'd just do that if I really needed to know for some reason besides hopeless cultural bewilderment. Anyway. Anything else?"

"How would you ask Findekáno outside the hearing of his people?"

"I could surround us with a layer of silence, if I really needed to."

He stares at her for a second, then turns away. "It sounds like you had a good many places to be."

He reviews the conversation mentally, trying to guess what could be learned. More than he'd like. He should be more careful. Part of him wants to keep giving them things, small things, to make this last a little longer, to hear someone speak with apparent sincerity of a Findekáno who is alive and well. That would be a betrayal. If he could outright buy his freedom with information for the enemy he wouldn't do it. He certainly won't buy a longer hallucination.