"I'll know." Lifebonds are handy that way; he'll know instantly, from the way it hurts to be a world apart, and from the release when that pain stops. "I have no idea how Fëanáro is going to react and neither did Vanyel. I really doubt he'll camp out for a week - I suppose there's a scenario where he drags Maitimo home by the ears right away. But if not I think he'd go and come back today, maybe tomorrow. Jisa and I can wait." 

"Mmm. And Jisa can undo all of the mind-affecting magic on Maitimo that is Telumë's rather than Sauron's tampering -"

"I assume so, she came up with most of it. Working with Fëanáro." Stef ducks his head. "I'm sorry - we knew it was going to be awful for him, but we really did have to find out what he knew about Sauron's war plans. But that's not relevant anymore." 

"I am not upset that the magic was used to question him. I am worried that it was used to get him to write this letter instead of the many other letters one could write with the same facts that would be less convenient for his captors."

"Yes. You should talk to him and you should do it without Telumë there and - I think Jisa can bounce her Sight to you, it's not trivial to interpret but she can get rid of all the mind-affecting things other than the stupid oath which she is very upset she can't fix, and you can verify that." Over the course of their journey back, Jisa has spent several candlemarks crying on Stef about the soul-sucking nightmare her last three weeks turned into and she's furious with herself and with Telumë and Stef is kind of sore about that part. 

He mostly believes the interpretation offered in the letter, though - that this was a lot of stupidity on several people's parts, but not malice. Jisa believes it and, while she and Stef agree that Leareth before any of this might have been able to fool her, Telumë is half a terrifying immortal mage and half a scared and overwhelmed teenager, and Stef doesn't think he could fool Jisa about his feelings or motives here. 

"Can she also get me a list of all of the changes to his head that were present at the time."

"Yes." 

"Great." He paces.

Stef brings Jisa back a while later. She looks...tired, mostly. Frustrated and pained and very very tired. 

:The ongoing mind effects that would've been in place when he wrote this letter - and when he had sex with Telumë, I guess - are the blocks against suicide and projecting to people with osanwë, and the spatial reasoning distortion so we could keep him captive at all, and a block against consolidating memories properly so we could talk to him without him using that against us. The last thing was really bad for him, it took a while to notice how bad but that's the main reason I put my foot down on this not continuing: She can bounce slightly hazy impressions of her Sight to him, from memory. 

:A few times he was - basically trying to sabotage his own mind so he couldn't answer questions, and we'd do our best to put everything back how it was when he was asleep. That'll be a bit messy to undo fully but we can try. There were also some one-off things that weren't ongoing effects and shouldn't have influenced his thinking later but I suppose we can't be sure of that. He would try to deliberately not hear questions Telumë was asking and - we'd nudge him to pay attention. We had to basically compulsion him to eat and drink - it's called a set-command but it's similar - and often he'd ask to be put to sleep, a few times we did it without his asking because he was trying really hard to get around the suicide block: Jisa doesn't feel bad about that part, actually, he clearly didn't endorsedly want to die overall but would have several times over in various moments if they'd let him. :He panicked when the marriage thing happened and I calmed him down with Projective Empathy because I had no idea what'd happened and needed to talk to him. I think that's everything: 

Would you have been able to see if Leareth was using compulsions.

:I definitely would - I have mage-gift too. So does Nayoki, she was one of the others there. Melody doesn't. Compulsions show up at all to Mindhealing-Sight but not totally clearly. Melody would have asked if she saw anything though. In general he wasn't doing any of it because - well, partly because he's not in practice yet, having a new body, and I think partly because it would have made the situation even more upsetting for him: 

And someone was always watching when he was interacting with Maitimo?

:Yes. Not always in the room, but watching with Gifts: She looks down. :It was for Telumë safety, originally, since he isn't a Thoughtsenser this time around. But I'm glad of it now for Maitimo's sake as well: 

Telumë's safety? Was he worried that Maitimo would bite?

:...He was worried that Sauron might have given Maitimo some instructions for ways to nudge Telumë's plans, or misinform him, cause him to make worse decisions. Or that Maitimo would do it of his own initiative since he is currently under an oath to love Sauron and work toward Sauron's aims. And he's very smart and knows Telumë extremely well, managed to nearly kill him several times before he made it up north at all: Shrug. :I don't think that happened, actually - after the fact I think Telumë absolutely shouldn't have interacted with him after the bare minimum of questioning, and maybe should have delegated that too, but...not really for that reason: 

Was someone observing while they had sex.

:Closely enough to have noticed a compulsion, anyway: She is really hoping Findekáno doesn't ask who was observing– all right she should obviously fess up to it now rather than try to hide it, that's dumb, even though it makes her want to melt into the floor. :Melody was the first time. The second time was me. It was, um, things were messed up in the way this entire situation was, and I wasn't reading him that closely because, well, incredibly awkward, and I wasn't mindreading Telumë so I don't know what he was thinking - but I'm pretty sure Maitimo wanted it and there were no compulsions involved. But you should ask Maitimo yourself when we're there and he's verifiably not under any mind-effects, obviously he's the one who actually knows the answer there: 

Aren't they hard to notice? Sigh. Does Telumë have other prisoners.

:Not that I'm aware of but it's possible I wouldn't know. Not at the same place where he is all the time, anyway: 

Was there any discussion of coming forward about this before the marriage made it impossible to keep secret.

:...Not that I remember? But I might not, I was sleep deprived: She's had so many nightmares related to Maitimo's misery and obviously being traumatized and not being allowed or able to fix it, which she isn't going to mention because it's clearly not the important part. :I think there weren't that I was there for: 

- I'm not mad at you, he says, looking at her instead of angrily past her for the first time. You're, what, twenty -

:Eighteen: Gods, she didn't even manage to mark her name day when it passed at some point in the horrorscape of the last seven months. 

Was Maitimo aware that there were children watching while they - he shakes his head. I think I should go for a walk. Please let me know when Vanyel leaves this world and when he gets back.

:All right: 

...Jisa is kind of offended to be called a child, and also that this is why Findekáno isn't mad at her, and not totally pleased with how she handled herself just then, but - well, probably that could have gone worse. It seems like it would have been quite bad if she were obviously trying to cover anything up.