I don't know what they are! she points out. Someone might want to get around to telling me.

"...Er, if you can wait eight minutes or so, Vanyel should have the book." 

Can't read the language. I guess I can ask him to read it to me.

"Hmm, I'll have Taver pass a message to Tran to check back with you about it later tonight..." pause "...done. It's very convenient that your subtle arts let you talk to us, but it's too bad they don't help you read. Did you eventually learn to read the local language in Arda?" 

I was there for nearly twenty years! I'm fluent. Also writing was invented while I was there so I read and write Quenya better than most native speakers.

Lancir gives her several shades of baffled look. "...All right, I'm going to ask you later when I have lots of time how exactly a world as advanced as that one didn't have writing until the last twenty years." 

Sure.

Lancir goes. Exactly ten minutes later, Vanyel's door opens. "Bella, are you still – oh, you are here." He hesitates for a while, gnawing his lip and looking like he badly wants to ask a question, and then looks past her and blurts out, "...wait if you were in Arda for twenty years why do you look like you're still my age?" Eyes go to floor. "I don't know if that's offensive, sorry." 

It's not offensive. Elves don't age and thought it was a pretty horrific concept and the Valar agreed to slow down my aging as much as they could. I don't know if it will keep working here. I'm in my thirties somewhere, it's hard to know precisely because the days and years were different lengths. I guess I also don't know how long yours are here. I was nineteen, are you nineteen?

"I'm eighteen. Elves don't age? Do they still– I guess they must die, there's a god of the dead." He kicks at the doorframe. "I, um, that wasn't the thing I wanted to ask about and I should just ask before I decide to pretend I wasn't going to..." And then he doesn't say anything. 

They can die of accident or violence. There used to be more violence, on the other continents, when there was an evil god active there. There are still leftovers from that time around but the Elves who still live there are mostly all right day to day. And no one's ever died in Valinor, though one could if one bothered a dinosaur or something. ...What were you going to ask?

Vanyel stares down at his slippers. "...Would it be all right if I wanted to have you as my Mindhealer instead of Lancir? Or therapist, I mean, whatever the right word is. I, um, I wasn't going to ask because you didn't know and it was – I don't..." He trails off, shrugs. "But you do know anyway. I can't undo that even if Lancir apologized. And, um, I...do have pretty bad problems and I would like to not. If it's possible. Lancir's Gift only helps a bit but yours is different and maybe it would help more, and you had training, and I...just..." Vanyel looks like he wants to sink into the floor. 

I don't know much, I didn't let him get very far. Uh, and my training cut off abruptly though I think I manage all right. If you want me I certainly have room in my schedule - though, I don't know if you paid Lancir or if he has some other setup, in Valinor they didn't use money but I think here you do.

"...I think the way it worked with Lancir is that we're both Heralds and the Kingdom pays for our living expenses and it didn't really matter. I can definitely pay you if you're worried about having enough money here, though." He glances up and down the hallway. "Do you want to come in? I, um, don't really want to talk about it out here, and I could make you tea or something." 

No more tea for me today, thanks. In she steps.

Vanyel closes the door. "Thank you for not letting Lancir get very far, I think? I mean, maybe that's silly if I'm going to tell you anyway, but...I don't know, I still would sort of prefer if I told you myself." 

As soon as he said your name I was just sort of waiting to see if the next thing he said was catching himself slipping up and apologizing profusely and when it wasn't I told him off. I don't know what it is that's weighing on you but you don't have to tell me today, it would be very reasonable what with me being a new person to wait longer, get used to me, think it over. Also there's an intake process I usually start with.

"All right." Vanyel goes and fills a cup of water from a jug and then holds out his hand and closes his eyes; five seconds later the water is steaming. He goes and digs in a jar of dried leaves to throw some in. 

"I probably want to think about it?" he says finally. "That sounds like a good idea. If you're going to stay than probably you'll have room in your schedule still in a few days? I'm still really curious how your subtle arts work, though. Just because it's interesting." 

Sure, ask away.

He looks around, pulls out his desk chair and makes a questioning gesture that probably means 'do you want to sit here', and then sits on the desk. "First, how does it work that you have telekinesis and the not-Mindspeech thing? Are those coming from the same ability or different ones?" 

Same thing. Some people get pyrokinesis, too. All three are ways someone born with subtle arts may be able to focus their mind to achieve an effect but the telepathy's the most common.

"Pyrokinesis would be like this?" He produces a little tongue of flame, a few inches above his palm. 

Yes, or what you did with the tea, if they were particularly good at it.

"Oh, interesting. Those are actually different Gifts that I'm using. Or, I mean, I could..." The flame winks out. A few seconds later, a ball of fire of a bluer shade appears above them. "That's with mage-gift, which is how I heated the water. The other one is Firestarting, which is kind of my stupidest Gift honestly, I have it really weakly and I have a very strong mage-gift, the only advantage of Firestarting is that it's a bit more energy-efficient."

He disposes of the second flame-ball as well. "How much weight can you lift with your telekinesis? Do you have to be able to see what you're moving?" 

I can't lift much, and that's after years of practicing it in my spare time to improve it. I don't drop something if I lose sight of it, but I don't get tactile feedback and if I'm visualizing it incorrectly I can't pick it up or make it do anything. I use it to braid my hair and turn pages and stuff.