"Not well, but some. This is Fëanáro, he's been helping me since I landed on the Quendi. These are - Fazil, Mahdi, Hagan, Korva," she says, pointing at each of them.

"Hello."

"It's an honor to meet you."

"Good to meet you, too. Where are you from?"

"Osirion. It's a human country on another plane from Imrainai's."

"A human country without Alteri?"

“Yes.”

"Didn't hear anything about that from the Quendi. How many people do you have?"

“I don’t think the Quendi knew about us. There are millions of people in Osirion, most of them human. Hundreds of millions in the whole world, I think.”

"Huh. Earth's around eight billion, but I guess it's good to have more models, if we mean to attempt to break away and settle somewhere else."

“I hope that our people can be helpful to yours and I’m very sure our gods will be, if they can reach your plane.”

"I hope so. We'll need all the help we can get."

“Have we checked if the gods reach?”

Head shake. “I mean to. And check if they have an afterlife.”

"Not that I've seen." She looks at Imrainai.

"There are lots of stories. Can't say which ones are true."

“We can attempt it if you give it a list of your dead but it’ll work better if people are willing to attempt it themselves, to get people they know.”

"Attempt what, exactly?"

“Scrying for the dead to see if they have an afterlife. - I’m sorry, I imagine this isn’t your most significant priority right now. I want to know about it because if our gods reach your world and your dead reach our gods I wanted to seek your advice on whether to court Imrainai.”

She raises her eyebrows and smiles a tiny bit.

"I think we can find the time to look into it, depending on how it works. Earth space is a decade away from the nearest star in the network. Even if the Alteri noticed the Valar I don't think we ought to be in a rush to take our next step without thinking about it."

"Also time's paused here," volunteers Elizabeth. "Just, like, in case that's helpful."

(She blushes a little and looks over at the singed apple tree to avoid making eye contact with anyone.)

“Thank you.”

"Mind you, I have absolutely no idea how scrying for the dead works. Imrainai has a definitely-dead sister, if that helps you any."

“It’s easiest with someone who knows the dead person, though you can also use likenesses and possessions of theirs.”