"You told Karen that I'd whisked you off on suspicious premises, right? How much does she know after that..."

"Yes I did but not much else except to panic if I stop writing her. I may have to visit at some point, she'll probably worry."

"Might be worth it. At some point we have to close the door so I can study for my dreadfully neglected exams but I'm in no hurry."

"I'm at a reasonable stopping place, I'll go do that now. Don't strand me. Oh, also, Maitimo is going around telling people you have a crush on Cam."

"Which people, and did he say why -"

"Me. I don't know about anyone else. Why you have a crush on him or why he told?"

"Why he told -"

"He said you had a plan involving love potions and he wasn't going to enable it because it would be unhealthy."

"Well, sure, now that we've got better options - thank you for telling me -"

"You're welcome." And off she goes.

And he sits down and starts reading. "Maitimo says you haven't taken a break in a while, are you likely to take them as often as they'd be beneficial?"

"I'm not actually well calibrated on that because occasionally I wind up deciding a given break was not beneficial."

"- is everyone being okay?"

"...I was actually thinking, like, nightmares."

"Ah. Those I can't fix, whereas siblings and alts and Amriac I could scold. There're potions but I'm assuming -"

"Even before I ever got summoned to Arda I often just didn't sleep, it's not a big deal. Also I think Amriac would ignore you and I'm not sure about Maitimo."

"I don't think Amriac'd ignore Macalaurë and Maitimo'd listen to me on anyone I knew better than he did."

"Do I count? He's known me longer."

"We could compare notes, I suppose. I think he's been - running with a lot of pieces turned off for the last while."

"...oh?"

"I want to like people I get to know, I care about them a lot pretty fast, I'm invested - he's - assembling and maintaining functioning working relationships and leaving them there? Which would make me miserable and can be assumed to be making him miserable but I guess if you were ordering enough people out to risk a fate worse than death maybe that'd be the more efficient way to - organize my head - anyway I don't know if he'd say he knows you better."

"He did notice the thing with Miranda. Miranda is neat, by the way. Very fond of you."

"She's a good kid. I promised her a continent. When I take over the world, you know."

"I think she may have been assuming that given recent events this should be adjusted for inflation."

"Is she."