"I like stories, and I like having reference books around even if I don't read them straight through, and there's nonfiction that's written to be more fun to read than textbooks - textbooks people will buy because their teachers tell them to but if you want people to read a book about history or something for another reason it has to be more fun than that, there's a lot of competition when writing's a major thing."

He nods seriously. "I don't think I know a book of things that aren't stories. I can learn it, though."

"There were some good books I read over the summer - I found an ethnographer who struck a non-horrifying balance in explaining various cultures, neither primly horrified at everything they did nor cloyingly culturally relativist, it was great. I read her book on two tribes of kobolds and her one on lizardfolk and I had two more on backorder but they were out of stock... She went and lived with different cultures and wrote down everything that happened and talked to people there and then organized it all so it'd make sense if read beginning to end by somebody who knew barely anything some of it wrong about the cultures."

He nods solemnly. "We only have two tribes of Elves in Valinor and they both live in Tirion. And the Teleri are far away on an island. I could write about the Valar."

"That would be really interesting, although they don't seem to work in a very ethnography-y way, it's not obvious how you'd go live 'among the Valar' instead of 'in Valinor' but maybe I'm wrong."

"Taniquetil, I guess. I'd get bored. The Valar take a long time to do anything. Though I could learn their language! Maybe I will do that."

"Ooh, they have their own language?"

"They do!" He looks at Rúmil for support. You've heard the Valar speak their language, right? "It's very very long and involves sounds we find it hard to make and is so different from Quenya that we find it hard to learn - like, their word for Telperion is Ibrīniðilpathānezel, and I got a couple sounds wrong in that. 'Manwë' and 'Aulë' and 'Ulmo' are all shortenings of their real Valarin names because we just couldn't make head or tail of them. But I bet I could do it."

"I bet you could too. Do you want me to ask your dad if it's okay to teach you a little safe magic?"

"Yes."

"...What's the etiquette on osawnwëing people when you don't know if they're busy or not?"

Fëanáro looks at her for a minute, suspiciously. "Is this a test? I did really badly with all of my etiquette tutors."

"...No, this is me not knowing." Rúmil, what's the etiquette on osanwëing people e.g. Finwë when not sure if they're busy or not?

If they're not expecting you it's better to go find them, otherwise he'd probably be bombarded with thousands of requests and disputes.

Okay. "So, I could go find him and ask now or I could stick around and tell you things you want to know for your story about Emily and whatnot, what would you rather?"

"Things about Emily! I don't really believe when you leave that you're coming back, you know, I expect you'll get tired of me. Does that make me like my father?"

"...Well, not exactly, but there's a resemblance. I'd honestly expect you to get tired of me, first, I only have nineteen years' worth of things you don't know yet and I don't even remember them all very well and even if reinventing wizardry's interesting it's going to be slow. Emily looks like this -" She sends a picture, "from the outside, she's pretty consistent about that unless she's feeling very windowy."

He giggles.

"And if you suddenly appeared in her she would say hi and be confused, especially since kids yea high don't usually know how to teleport."

He nods. "Will she think I do teleport and am not really nine, or will she think that someone sent me?"

"Well, since you don't know how you got there I bet you're confused and that suggests the second thing. If she did think the first thing she'd probably think you were shapeshifted or illusioned to look little. She couldn't tell how many years old you were because she wouldn't recognize your species but she could tell you were little."

"Does the inside of Emily change based on her mood?"

"Not unless she's really upset. If she's mad at somebody then hallways get long and all the doors are supply closets and bathrooms."

He giggles. "Could I find you? Where could I find you?"

"Depends on when you show up. Last semester I had a class in Emily but this semester I wouldn't have."