Can you stop thinking of him as a King? He doesn't have the power to throw you in dungeons somewhere, he just has the same name as someone with that power.

If I stopped thinking of him as a King I'd probably get really annoyed the next time he phrased something as an order.

...what makes that acceptable to you? Is it that coming from a King it doesn't imply disrespect the way it would coming from someone else? If it's only not annoying because he has the power to enforce it, I don't understand how that works with your growing confidence that we don't conduct ourselves that way here.

I mean... there are non-King people who can order me around, I'd generally do what a teacher said, say, and those don't scare me. But that's within a limited context, compared to what kings can tell me to do. You'd actually have to go really far up the ranks of people who can tell me to do things back in the Imperium to find anyone who can state as a fact that I am going to tutor his toddler once a week and expect not to be sniped at for being presumptuous however enthusiastic I am about tutoring his toddler. My parents could do that if I had a sibling, or a little cousin maybe, but I don't, and otherwise it wouldn't come up like that.

Fair enough. The man you and Fëanáro spoke of who frightened you so much?

Uh, not a teacher, but a faculty member. Being vice-chancellor doesn't technically authorize him to announce that I'm going to tutor his child, if he had a child, which as far as I know he doesn't, but it can stop mattering whether someone's technically authorized if they're... She trails off.

'bad like Melkor', Fëanáro said, 'or bad like your gods who just don't think people matter', but I'm not sure there's really very much difference.

She shivers.

Hug?

Nod nod. Hug.

Very big hug. He is careful of her hair and then realizes he has no idea if that matters to humans. 'Complicated', she'd said her societies' touch rules were. We are careful not to touch someone's hair if they're a friend, because it's intimate. Do you have any rules like that?

...Uh, not about hair. Was it weird that I patted Fëanáro on the head? Is this also why I'm supposed to go around in a braid all the time?

It doesn't have to be a braid, but yes, wearing your hair down is a bit like ...the way you described the attitude towards nudity in your society, maybe. Fëanáro's still a tiny child, parents braid their children's hair for them at that age, so that's no concern, though if you did it in public people'd probably raise an eyebrow and even though Fëanáro's a small child when he was sitting on my head to read with me it was appropriate for me to wear a head covering.

Huh. I mean, there's ways to interact with people's hair that get read that way but it's pretty context-dependent and some of the context it depends on is 'nobody involved is a small child'.

Do you have areas where touch would be - inherently a little intimate, and if a small child were going to be grabbing at it you'd probably put some clothes on?

I'd be wearing clothes over all such locations anyway. If I went out in minimal decent clothes and a child started poking me wherever I had bare skin worst case I'd be ticklish. And the clothes don't make it not weird to touch parts that it's weird to touch, anyway.

Fair enough. Well, don't pet adults' hair unless you have permission and you'd like to communicate romantic intentions, and if children old enough to know better start clinging to your hair disentangle them, I can't think of any disasters that have resulted from hair misunderstandings.

Okay. Iiiii'm probably not going to be communicating any romantic intentions any time soon because I feel like nobody is going to be quite clear on the concept of human adulthood.

And you have all these interesting priorities like reinventing wizardry that make pursuing a lover sound tedious, he says agreeably. I am willing to trust you on human adulthood but it does seem that anyone with a thousand years on you might think and move at a different pace than you do.

Yeah, that too, and also I want to lurk without participating in that sphere long enough that a while goes by without surprises like 'hair: it's a thing' cropping up.

I assure you I didn't mention it in a bid to make you add 'learn romance' to your list of priorities.

I didn't think you did.

Fancy ink shop next?

Yes please.

So they head back out into Tirion and to a dazzling house that's doubling as a store - the inside is half outfitted like a parlor and half like a antique shop - where inks of all kinds are sold.