The earcuff can't tell direction but it does in principle let my full complement of telepathic powers work through it and even if we didn't tell him that if I were him I'd be nervous.

"Oh. Right. And you could presumably use them for offensive purposes too. Except for the oath. Huh, I wonder what Leareth would think of that? It seems...really not his style of anything."

He glances over at Bella, thoughtful. "I wonder if he even knows about your subtle arts. I think a lot of it would be harder to find out about through spies who don't have access to the Heralds or Healers. But, I agree, he's going to assume you have powers he doesn't know about and he's probably going to be even more paranoid than he would be if he knew your exact list of abilities." 

Uh, my oath doesn't prevent me from using subtle arts for offensive purposes. It only prevents me from doing that in my capacity as a therapist. If I get mugged the mugger is going to wake up a while later with a headache.

"Good point." Vanyel stretches, shuffles back so he's sitting against the headboard. "I guess we could come up with a questions list and then think more about communication methods? Oh – one thing is that it doesn't have to be him on the other end of the earcuff, right? It just has to be a Mindspeaker. If there's someone he's willing to risk, which, um, seems like a thing he'd be willing to do – he doesn't even have to be there in case he's worried you'd have the power to control them through it, he just has to be nearby enough to pass things along." 

It doesn't have to be a mindspeaker if they're talking to me.

"Oh. Right. That's useful. Um, questions, then? We wanted to know what he knows about the gods, right?" 

Yes. And his theories about other worlds.

"Right." Vanyel makes some notes. "I mean, he really can't have much to go on, right? On the other worlds part." 

Right. I still want to know what his guesses are, I think it'll be informative.

"That makes sense." Vanyel writes it down. "Um, are there other categories of question we have right now? I, um, really do wish I knew more about what he's planning and why. Not that I actually expect him to tell me? But, I don't know, if the thing he's been trying to do is–" 

Vanyel stops, frowns. "I'm not sure he's trying to ally with me. I think he's been, something like testing whether I'm someone he would want to ally with, or thinks he can ally with? But I don't know what would make him decide that I am. Or that you are." 

I'm not even sure that's desirable. He's framing it like it is, by making the salient alternative having a whole fight about it.

"And the other alternatives are...avoid it, get him to leave Valdemar alone somehow? What if he won't?" Vanyel scrunches up his face. "I can't leave. Maybe you can. I - can't. I really can't." 

He takes a shuddering deep breath, presses both hands over his face. "...There's probably a lot more alternatives I'm missing because I'm upset. Aren't there. Can you. Um. Do the calm thing. Please?"

Calm thing.

That's better. "Thank you." Vanyel looks at his notes. "All right. Alternatives I'm not thinking of because I'm framing it– because Leareth is framing it to me as this either-or. We could...I don't know, have diplomatic talks with him without it actually being working toward an alliance? Er, were there any other specific alternatives you were thinking of?" 

Personally I'm planning on leaving for another universe at some point. I do not have to leave behind enough information for him to chase me.

The thing Vanyel doesn't say, he crams it down tightly behind his shields and does not say it and does not even think about saying it, is that this doesn't help him at all, and– and he isn't sure why he expected Bella to want to help him with the terrifying future he can't walk away from, of course she can leave, this isn't her world, and, and yet...

"That's true," he says dully. "This isn't actually your problem." 

I expect to be able to affect things here from there, wherever there is. The first step is an interplanar earcuff.

"Oh. Right." Aaaaand now he's embarrassed that his first assumption was that Bella was planning to just escape the situation entirely and leave it to him. Although she still could do that. It might even be the right choice for her. Not get sucked into yet another of his stupid unsolvable problems. "That's...a ways off, though, right?" 

Vanyel takes a deep breath, and spends a few seconds trying to actually think. 

"...I don't have to talk to him," he says finally. "I haven't ever thought about it but there probably is a way to block the dreams. I don't – I can't just let him invade Valdemar, but I don't think that was going to happen for a decade anyway. Maybe more. I'm way older in the dream, my hair is all the way white from using node-energy." Right now there are just a few barely-noticeable wisps of silver scattered through the black. "So that's an option. I mean, I don't know if it's the one I should take, but...I've been playing the game on his terms because it didn't feel like I had a choice and...maybe I do have a choice." 

Couple months, maybe more. I can try to block the dreams the same way as nightmares, yes. It wouldn't be free of downsides if it worked and it might not work but it's possible.

"How hard would it be to unblock again? If it's not hard then I think I might want to just test if it works. So I know whether I have the option." He scowls. "I...really don't like how the dream right now can just happen anytime at random and I don't have control of it. To be fair I don't think Leareth does either, it's - kind of just happening to both of us." 

The nightmare one wears off on its own, that's why it's supposed to be supplanted with lucid dreaming eventually. Nightmares are very persistent and Foresight dreams might differ in either direction. It might take me a few tries to find the correct place to block the dreams, since I don't have experience with it, or it could turn out they go through a channel I can't affect at all.

Nod. "You don't have to try it now. I'm almost certainly not going to have the dream for at least a week, it's never happened more often than that." 

Nod.

"Were there any other thoughts you had for right now?" 

I don't think so.