More reading and more Gate practice and taking breaks to consume media on his new computer and transcribe songs and being teased by Lissa about whatever she can think of.

The next session, three days later rather than two, Vanyel spends ten minutes poking just his head through the Gate and pulling it back, until the momentary inner-ear confusion seems mundane and boring. 

The session after that, he learns one of Leareth's weird adapted Gate spells and uses it to locate some concealed magic artifacts. 

Cam thinks the sticking his head through thing is clever.

Vanyel thought it was pretty clever of him too! 

He can, with Leareth's insistence, be persuaded to wait and do one more Gate-work session a couple of days later. Which goes well.

"All right, at this point I don't think I'm really holding us back from leaving anymore?" he tells Cam. 

"Then I guess we can drop in on Endorë. Do you need - pictures of some sort, or -"

"It would be easiest with a memory - I think you said that the Elf you invited here might be able to offer me one and would be comfortable with telepathy...?" 

"Right, yeah, I'll send him a message." Cam does this. Alassëo comes down the stairs.

Leareth politely requests a sense-memory of a place on Endorë, ideally one where it won't be too disruptive for a lot of people to suddenly appear through a magic Gate. 

Alassëo can suggest a section of the underwater Noldor bunker.

...Leareth is very curious why there's an underwater Noldor bunker, but if it's safe, then sure. 

"I put it there when we landed. It made sense at the time."

"That ought to work fine, then. Vanyel, do you think you are up for crossing the Gate the normal way?" 

"Probably? Almost definitely? I just don't know if Gating that distance is weird for some reason." 

"I think we should probably do it from in here, since that is less straightforwardly several light-years away - I assume distances between Milliways and arbitrary places in a linked world are not really a coherent concept." 

"I don't see how they could be."

"Whereas Gating several light-years of linear distance is likely to be noticeably difficult." 

Nod. "I don't know if inter-world Gates are weird for some reason? But I can probably figure that out by standing back when you do it, and if it hurts on the approach, then I back off and Cam sedates me for it? And probably it'll be fine." 

"Yeah, if you're on Yfandes you can give it the same berth you needed originally and still close the distance quickly if that's more caution than necessary."

"Makes sense." 

:I, er, hope it's not going to be too problematic dragging a large horse into an underwater bunker: 

"It's very spacious, I had no materials costs and Elves're claustrophobic."

:Phew, I'm glad - I'm not exactly claustrophobic but, well, I don't fit through regular doors back home: 

"I don't know that you can canter down the average hallway but you'll have room to walk."

"I'm excited," Lissa says brightly. "I mean, I know it's a very serious trip, but I've never seen an underwater bunker before." And probably there will be more Elves around, who are goooooorgeous. 

"We should figure out what to pack." Leareth smiles slightly. "I suppose it is less critical than usual given Cam's abilities; if I forget an important reference book, he can make another copy. Quite handy." 

"Yeah, I don't know that you need to pack anything actually unless you don't want me to know it exists and expect to conceal the presence of something you don't want me to know exists so well that I never conjure all your possessions just in case."