Yes.

Hm.  Potted plants, statues, any sort of space-taking-up hall decoration nearby?  Even in an alcove or something?

There's a set of statues across the way a while.

Hm. Looks close enough. Malak sticks a little bit of magical shadow to the base of the back of the statue. How far was it between the two rooms?

Malak moves out of sight of anyone nearby, turns visible, and walks up to Lúthien's room.

"Can I speak with her?"

"Probably, let me ask Lord Curufin."

(Room distance?)

"Well, I'm leaving tomorrow morning, I wanted to say goodbye for now..."

(Lúthien's rooms are about ten minutes from Malak's.)

"Yeah, I'm asking him right now, it'll take about ten seconds -"

Malak waits patiently.

"Says of course but briefly, please."

Malak steps in, closes the door partway behind them--enough to block line of sight to the guards but not sound.

"Hi. I'm sorry, I couldn't think of any plan within the next few months that could save anyone instead of just getting more people killed. And I think I have to leave here for a while because all the elves around are driving me up the wall and I need some time to learn to shield my thoughts and get a bit more comfortable being around a bunch of telepaths. I'd still like to talk to you, though--I don't know how often messengers will go between where I am and here, but we can write letters and keep planning and maybe figure out something that works.  Here, I wrote down instructions for how to encrypt or decrypt messages so that nobody else can read them, and here's a key at the top--It's not the same one I gave to Curufin so he won't be able to read them, you should probably memorize it then destroy it--" Malak shows Lúthien a piece of paper, which reads:

You will have twenty-five minutes.  Go to my room and wait for me there.

And features a map of the parts of Nargothrond that Malak had visited last night, with a path marked between Lúthien's room and Malak's.

"I'm really sorry I couldn't help. Hug?"

(And the guards still aren't looking?)

Guards aren't looking.

Lúthien hugs her. "We can't write letters, I can't read."

Can't...read? What kind of princess is illiterate and it's not like writing is new what hopefully she can read a map, no, fuck, no counting on that uuuugh can't read??

Malak taps Lúthien's head and their own and gently projects a mental map of the path between the rooms, tries to make it just seem like they're thinking about their own route back in case anyone is listening and they feel like they're going to throw up no time for that now though they hug a bit tighter and cast the spells one-two and

And now Malak looks like Lúthien and Lúthien looks like Malak and Malak is whispering with Lúthien's voice, "go."

...

She goes.

When Lúthien has gone, Malak closes the door again--making sure the guards get a glimpse of "Lúthien" inside the room. They let a minute pass, then drop some shadow in the room, turns invisible, and steps neatly from one shadow to another.  They dismiss both patches of darkness and slink silently back to their room.

She's there. What -

Wince.

They had to think nothing changed. We're both going to walk out invisible in just a minute, together. I have to be touching you. Telepathy only in case of emergencies.

They write a quick ciphered letter to Curufin--Apologizing, explaining--and leave it in the middle of the notes on magical theory.  Ink and pen go in pack, pack goes on back, sword in sheath goes to Lúthien--hold it close to your body don't let it rattle or hit anybody.

Then, they guess two Malaks aren't any more suspicious than a Malak and a Lúthien...

They clasp Lúthien's free hand, turn them both invisible, and slip out, headed for the gates.

They can sense the presence of a mind even if they're not reading it, you know.

AUGH FUCKING TELEPATHS.  I suppose invisibility doesn't hide that.

Well, you're halfway broken out and I can't see any way to undo that half, and an alarm has already probably been raised if they could sense the absence of anyone in your room. Do we try to get all the way out, or give up? My estimate of their ability to hold me against my will has just gone up so I am in favor of trying to leave.

Yes, definitely, let's leave.

OK let's go, still invisible, it can't hurt, if it comes to violence I don't want to hurt anyone do you think you can be more specific with your song targeting, get them and not us?...Does it rely on people hearing it?

It relies on people hearing it, if we muffle our ears well enough we'd be fine, but everyone knows to react if someone starts singing a magic song in their vicinity -