"It was good. I did a great deal of thinking. Also it is helping, to have mage-sight back. I feel so much more oriented to the city when I can sense magical artifacts as landmarks."

He relaxes in Maitimo's arms. Pays a lot of attention to how he feels about it, which is: content, and safe, and grateful to have Maitimo there. 

"I'm really glad. I'm sorry we didn't do it sooner; I should have imagined what it'd be like to be without osanwë."

"It had not occurred to me that it might be possible to do it partially like this. Melody is very talented." How does he feel right now? Very deeply cared for, he owes Maitimo so much...

"She is! You are of course recovering at the most record-setting pace but the other prisoners are doing considerably better than we expected too."

"I am incredibly grateful for her help." He shifts in Maitimo's arms, so he can look at him. "And for yours. I cannot imagine what I would do without it." 

Hug. "I think it might be slower but I bet you could eventually put yourself together from very little. I'm glad we can make it easier."

Leareth is a lot less sure of that, actually, but he appreciates that Maitimo is trying to reassure him. "I am ready to go to sleep now," he says, instead of saying any of the confused fragmentary thoughts bouncing around in his head. 

Then Maitimo will sing him to sleep, holding very still so he isn't scary, watching Leareth relax and thinking about how stupid it was to bring him to Cuivienen, it really seems to have set him back a lot -

Leareth spends the next week on and off thinking about his accidental discovery, and not telling anybody about said thoughts. From the outside, he's perhaps a bit clingier than before, but he doesn't seem unhappy.

Nights are a lot easier for him with mage-sight; when he wakes up panicked and disoriented from nightmares, he can check the wards on the room himself. 

Maitimo sings to him and gives him hugs when they seem needed and gives him sanitized, boring updates on the international diplomacy situation and eventually brings up again whether Melody could help him with his stress around Vanyel. "I don't think it'd bother her that she knows him - it's not like it's about something he really did -"

"I suppose it is worth at least asking her." Which he can do the next time he's seeing Melody anyway. 

If Melody is uncomfortable about this at all, it doesn't show. "That makes sense. It's not really about him at all, just - minds make associations. I don't at all mind trying to help; I'm not sure I can address all of it, I think most of all you need time and lots of low-stress interactions with him, but I can probably do some redirects that'll help somewhat." 

"I would appreciate that." In addition to the whole immortality...thing, Vanyel is the only person he can think of who might have useful advice on the subject he's most preoccupied by right now, which feels very weird to bring up with Melody. 

Then Melody can spend a candlemark throwing in some redirects so that Leareth finds the most frequent types of interactions with Vanyel more neutral. Vanyel coming into a room and greeting him, for example. 

"You're likely to still bump into upsetting associations once in a while," she tells him. "If you write down whenever that happens, I can try to patch it at our next session. My main goal here is to get you to the point that you can have some normal, un-fraught, pleasant conversations with him, which over time is going to help the most." 

He's relieved about this; it seems like it'll be really good for both of them. Leareth is always very tired after a session with Melody, so he lingers in case he wants to be put to sleep.

Leareth would like that. 

Maitimo sings to him, holds still for him, leaves once he's fast asleep. 

Leareth schedules a couple of very innocuous conversations with Vanyel over the next few days, which Vanyel is happy to cooperate with. They have a certain amount of practice with sticking to neutral topics when anything substantive is too fraught.

Melody's redirects don't completely get rid of the problem, but they do mean that every time Leareth reflexively expects Vanyel to be angry in response to something he said, or hurt him, it's always followed by the reminder that this is pretty unlikely given Vanyel's entire...Vanyel...and his thoughts steering back to the previous topic.

He brings up the immortality method first; weirdly, that feels less stressful to talk about than his feelings toward Maitimo. 

Vanyel listens very calmly, his expression controlled and level. 

"I see," he says when Leareth finishes. "Does Maitimo know? It...seems like something that might, er, bother Quendi more." 

"Maitimo has asked not to know any more for the next several years, until it - matters less - if he becomes too upset to speak to me." 

"Oh." Vanyel winces slightly. "I mean. Probably wise of him. Still a bit ouch." He lets out his breath. "...I'm not mad, Leareth. I swear. I'm not surprised, that this is something you did, and - if you did it, I fully believe it's because it was the only way. And it meant you were around when Arda needed you. That was pretty important." 

Nod. 

"Anyway. I'll have a look, might take me a bit to get the hang of the trick with visiting the Void, but it does help that I've been to the Moonpaths. Someone else took me there, but still." 

"Really? That sounds like a story." 

And then Leareth can spend the next while hearing about Vanyel's adventures in Kata'shin'a'in, which is fascinating and mostly not that stressful.

It is tiring, and he's ready for bed earlier than usual, and Mindspeaks Maitimo to see if he's available. 

He is. "How was your day?"