"I would be intrigued to discuss this further at some later point, when I have more thoughts on it ready." 

"Sure, any time."

He stands. "Thank you." 

"You're welcome."

And she goes home.

And calls older Vanyel.

:Yes?: He seems slightly distracted. 

Is this a bad time? It's not urgent.

:Um. Try me in two candlemarks?: 

Sure.

She tries him in two candlemarks.

He is much less distracted now! :What's going on?: 

Your Leareth wanted me to update you. And Maitimo but Maitimo is conspicuously suspicious of me and that's not super fun - I assume you are also some amount suspicious of me but you don't, like, radiate it at me - so maybe you can just tell him how Leareth's doing for me.

Brief hesitation. :Right, that makes sense, I can pass things along: 

He's pretty convinced he's out of Angband now. He's still, like, tired and traumatized and everything, but he believes he's not there any more. He has some damage to his core memories, self-inflicted when he realized he'd been tricked and needed a really lasting way to communicate that to himself, but I'm going to try to fix it with reference to the intact core memories of the local Leareth.

:Wow!: Vanyel absorbs that for a moment. :Is that why he stopped doing Gates, then? That's - honestly really impressive, catching it, I would've thought it'd be nearly impossible when Melkor could just erase his memory and try it over every time he got at all suspicious: 

Yeah, that's why, and it's really cool he was able to do that!

:I've spent a lot of time imagining what'd have happened if it'd been me instead, and - I think I might not have been able to catch it: 

Yeah, no, it's really exceptional. And lucky that he even structured himself in that way in the first place, and was able to alter it on the fly.

:I'm not sure I understand what you mean by 'core memories', actually - it must be something that Melkor couldn't just put back again...: 

It's possible that Melkor couldn't figure out exactly what he's done? Valar aren't actually very good at mind magic, they just have brute force to apply.

:Hmm, right: Pause. :I guess I should think about a message to send back to him, but I don't have anything off the top of my head. Anyway. I - was wondering if it'd be possible for me to speak to the local Leareth directly, at some point? I have some magic questions that are fiddly to convey otherwise:

(And it's hard to fake. Not hard enough to fake that they'll be willing to give the maybe helpful stranger any information about his location, but still.) 

- yeah, you know what, I've been hesitant to lend out the earcuff but I think I'm there now.

:Huh: He seems a bit surprised. :What changed?: 

Since I'm going to try to use the intact core memories as a template, he let me look at them.

:Wait, so he let you read his mind?: 

That bit of it, yeah. He was nervous but then decided that since I am against mind control, if I were going to do anything while I was in there it would be making him against mind control, and that I would not do that, on account of being against mind control.

:Pfft: Mindspeech laughter is very recognizable as that. :Wow. I guess that'd make sense. Also it's kind of hilarious: