"Really?"

"I did say I want my empire happier and more prosperous. I have other priorities but—that's an important one."

"Even at the cost of your slaves? You did say they were more important."

"...I think you might be underestimating how much power it would take to stop me from murdering and enslaving people at my whim," he says. "Make it inconvenient, sure, but stop me? Anything that could do that..."

He shakes his head.

"At that point my objection isn't 'but I want to keep my slaves', it's 'if you think giving more people that much power would be an improvement, you're in for a nasty surprise'. After a week there'd be no empire left. I'll be the first to admit that I have my flaws, but there's only one of me and I can effortlessly crush all opposition and that means that the empire stays at least as good as I know how to make it. If you had some way to give everyone the same power and immortality that I have, I would kill you before I let you use it, because if you did use it, all the most stupid impulsive short-sighted people would immediately try to overthrow me and light the world on fire in the process. And we'd all live through it, sure, but it is still possible to hurt me, and hundreds of thousands of me all trying to hurt each other at once would be a nasty mess."

"...hmm," she says. "I see what you mean. If I did have something like that, it would be more trouble than it's worth."

"I'm glad you agree," he says wryly.

"What if it was something else, then," she says. "What if I had an idea for a way to change the law of the empire that would make everyone much happier, but you'd have to give up your slaves to make it work?"

"Most clever ideas for how to change the law of the empire to make everyone much happier turn out to be disasters in practice," he says, "but you could take it to the useful side of the palace and see what they thought of it."

That startles a laugh out of her. "The useful side of—is that really what you call it?"

"I mean, is it not accurate?" He's grinning. "They do valuable things like run my government for me, and I laze around all day making cloud sculptures and torturing people!"

The reminder quiets her laughter.

"Would you give that up, though? Is there a clever enough idea, is there an amount of happiness and prosperity that would be worth it?"

"I can't imagine how anyone could come up with an idea that clever, but I'm hardly the cleverest person in the world," he says. "...I don't know. To tell you the truth, I don't know. Not for any amount of happiness and prosperity I can imagine, but then, there's plenty of things I couldn't have imagined until someone else dreamt them up. The world looked very different before, say, airships. The printing press. Indoor plumbing."

"But you wouldn't kill me just for suggesting it," she says.

"I wouldn't kill you just for suggesting it," he confirms. "See how dead you aren't?"

"Hmm." She smiles. "I do see that."

"...I'm very curious exactly how hypothetical all these questions are," he says, "but—I won't force you to tell me."

"Because that's not something that a person who was safe to talk to would do?"

"Yeah. Exactly."

She sits, thinking, watching him, for a minute or so.

Then she stands up.

"...huh."

He looks thoughtfully up at her newly revealed face.

"How old are you?"

"A few centuries." She smiles. "You're hardly in a position to tell me it's dishonest not to look my age."

"That's fair," he acknowledges. "So. Got any clever ideas for me?"

"Not... exactly." She brushes flakes of sea salt from her dress. "But I might want to introduce you to someone who does. Since you've so successfully demonstrated that you're safe to talk to about them."

"I imagine they don't want me showing up on their doorstep without a word of warning, even so," he says. "You can find me in the east gardens most mornings, and in the useless side of the palace most of the rest of the time."