"How do you think he will feel about this when we get him back - if we get him back -"

"...I worry that in particular is an area where my predictions and judgement are not reliable. But - my inside view, here, says that I am not hurting him in the moment when we see each other, that he is happy about it and his current self endorses it, and...I think I would predict that a future Maitimo who is not evil anymore would - respect his past self's autonomy and decisions, there. And that if he did have complicated feelings, we could work through it then. But. Possibly I am very insane here." 

"I don't expect him to be upset with you." A long pause. "I - so far everything that has happened has been, as far as you know, something he's happy about, something he endorses right now. But you have also said that you are not sensible about him, that you don't expect yourself to have good judgment - how sure are you that that will continue being true, that you won't go to him when you're angry or frustrated, or change his mind if he's not in the mood -"

"Very sure!" Telumë pauses, holds up a hand, takes a moment to actually consider it. "...Which does not necessarily mean I am right about my future self, but - it - that is the only thing I feel I can really anchor on, right now. That I love him. I do not want to change his mind by force, here, I want to - give him the only freedom of choice I still can... I can commit to speaking to Melody every time I am considering seeing him; I think she would know if I were doing it from a place of anger or frustration." 

"Okay." Sigh. "And if anything else dangerous and outside our model happens - even if it wasn't his fault, like the marriage, or a rescue attempt from Sauron -"

"Then Vanyel speaks to the Shadow-Lover again, we make sure there is no security risk with his disembodied soul being able to speak to Sauron or something, and we kill him and deal with it after the war." 

Hug?

Oh, gods, please, a hug would be so appreciated. 

Hug. "Is he still periodically torturing you?"

"No. I assume he wants my goodwill so that I will decide to keep him here instead of sending him to a desert island or killing him. If he tries it later we can compulsion him not to." 

He nods. He holds him. Sings something vaguely familiar and very very sad.

Telumë stays there for a while. Cries a little. 

I am very sorry that - you cannot be with him right now and I can, he thinks at Findekáno finally, at least osanwë works despite his utter lack of Thoughtsensing. You would be justified in feeling hurt and upset by that. Frown. I mean, you could visit, if you wished, we could memory-block him for it. But I am not sure that makes the situation better on the margin. 

I am not going to visit him. After the war, if he recovers, I would - it would be important to me that we could maintain a close friendship. But we can discuss that later. 

Telumë blinks. It takes a while to even crystallize his confusion. Are you - not going to have a relationship with him anymore? That seems very unfair. You were in a relationship with him before for far longer than I was! 

- I mean, yes, it's very unfair! But you're married! He's not going to go on sleeping with other people! - right now he probably would because he is evil but I am confident once he's not evil he won't!

Telumë covers his face with his hands. I - am not sure what I thought, actually. Humans sometimes have relationships with more than one person! With the Tayledras it is common, even. I thought... Really it should have been obvious to him that the Quendi would have stronger feelings about this. I would not mind if you were also married to him, even! I know that Eru supposedly thinks that is bad but I feel we have already seen that Eru is not the final authority on Quendi marriage. 

I don't think very much of Eru. But - I think that probably you and Maitimo once he is recovered, if he recovers, should talk about different cultural expectations around marriage, and make sure you have something that both of you are happy with, and I don't want to - have expectations at that when Maitimo's not even around. 

...I understand that. It is somewhat premature to address this. Just - I want you to know that I recognize I - took something, here, that you had a much stronger claim to. I am not sure what Maitimo will end up thinking but I know what I feel, here. 

You did. I appreciate that you know that. But - it would be tragic if the awful circumstances of your marriage got in the way of it ever being shaped in a way that actually works for you. 

I bet Maitimo will be able to figure something out. If we can get him back.

Nod. We will have to win this war first. Telumë moves to stand. I will go see if Vanyel is done speaking with Treven and Dara. 

He is. They talk. Vanyel doesn't say much to Telumë, then, but– :Findekáno? Can we talk very briefly in a few minutes?: 

Certainly.

Then Vanyel will head to his office as soon as Telumë has finished filling him in. "I'm kind of worried about Telumë right now. Are you?" 

"I'm not sure. He thinks he can't kill Maitimo right now, not while believing he's capable of keeping him comfortable and not a threat to us under conditions he agreed to. That...makes sense. Keeping Maitimo in the north instead of forcibly evacuating an island somewhere and hoping Sauron doesn't notice also makes sense. Probably this will be horrible and ugly and bad for him, but everything else probably would be too. And I can't really claim to be standing up for Maitimo's interests here when my conclusion was that we should kill him. 

I also feel differently about it because they're married. I probably shouldn't. My intuition about a situation where two people are married and one of them is evil and everyone has concluded we can't safely keep him alive, except his husband, who is stubbornly trying, is... that that's not the kind of mistake I want to prevent people from making. But probably I'm importing lots of other things from 'married', like 'voluntarily and deliberately agreed to be each others' highest priority and spend their lives together' and 'have a long, healthy history of emotionally competent problem-solving', when Telumë and Maitimo's marriage is....sort of the raw metaphysical fact without any of its traditional correlates. Except love, I guess. And the fact that they apparently cannot keep their hands off each other no matter how much it'd be a good idea.

I don't see how to give Telumë better options."

"Neither do I. Except for - I don't know, at least going over there regularly, making sure he has someone to confide in. Reminding him what Leareth was shaped like - you know, that's actually something Maitimo wrote himself, in his letter to me about their marriage." He scrunches up his face. "Which makes one wonder if it's somehow secretly furthering Sauron's aims, doing that, but - gods, what am I going to do, refuse to interact with the situation in any way out of fear that anything Maitimo touches might be a plot of Sauron's at one remove? I can't do that and it'd make things worse, not better."