"...I don't know that much about Eldar yet but I think would have noticed something if they were that different from people I know more about and that's not how most people work."

"How do most people work?"

"There's a few parts... first of all, people like or dislike people based on a whole lot of different factors. Usually the most obvious one is just a starting point or an excuse. Some human at home might think goblinoids are evil, but have to put up with one in their class, and eventually decide that goblinoids are evil except for Mo, who's cool, not like those other goblinoids, and it doesn't matter if Mo the goblin ever actually disclaims any of the things that the human didn't like, or if those things were ever true, or if Mo thinks that goblinoids in general are perfectly nice thank you very much - the human just started out with a prejudice but then Mo made a funny joke or something and that's literally all that would have to happen. And if somebody doesn't go around thinking all goblinoids are evil, but then Mo trips them in the hall, they might jump to him being a goblinoid as an explanation for why he'd trip them in the hall. In this analogy you're Mo."

"It is, but it's also kind of horrible that anybody including you considers something you had no volitional control over to be a reason to judge you."

"It's horrible that my mother is dying. The fact people don't like me for it isn't - that's okay, because I know how to fix it, I just have to be good enough. The thing you said is horrible because there's nothing at all you can do, even if you fix everything people might hate you because you tripped them in the hall. You can't possibly ever be good enough."

"Um, my point was that you might not be able to get people to like you that way. Even if you were so positively spectacular that everyone respected your accomplishments and knew there were sure a lot of them and they were very important they might not like you."

"Then," he says, "I don't care if people like me, just if they respect my accomplishments and know there are a lot of them and think they are important."

"Why do people even have to know about them if you're giving up on people liking you for them?"

"So they know that killing my mother isn't the only thing that happened because I"m in the world. Even if they still hate me."

"Why do you care what they think?"

"It hurts when they talk about me."

"But it wouldn't if they knew you'd accomplished important things? Are you sure?"

"Yes."

"How do you know?"

"You don't like me - what you said was 'no one will like you' but it makes the most sense to say that if you don't like me and don't want to say so directly - but you were impressed that I took apart the pen and learned the books, and I feel warm and safe and happy. if you liked me but weren't impressed, I'd feel hollow and fake and sad."

"If it's true you shouldn't not say it just to make me happy. I'll be less happy once I learn it anyway."

"But I do like you. I don't like everything about you but I like you. And I think Rúmil likes you."

"Okay," he says. "But also you think I'm smart, and that makes me happy."

"Yeah, I get that."

"And it's easier to control whether people think I'm smart. If they might like or dislike me for no reason, it's just not a good thing to try for."

"It's not 'no reason', but it is harder to control. It's often useful for people to like you even if you don't care directly about that, though, people who don't like you can make your life difficult."

"Not really. Whether they like me or not they'll still do whatever Father says, even if it makes me sad."

"He can't be planning to keep you in the palace all the time even when you're grown up?"