"Yeah. He'd love this place with people dying for no reason and making noble sacrifices to kill Archdemons and things."

"...There are kind of a lot of things about my life that could plausibly be the result of a god who likes sad stories," says Stalas, "and if any significant fraction of them are, then I think I've found my next project for after we end the Blight."

"He did make a very convincing show of agreeing to read miserable poetry instead. Valinor and Endorë are just nice, now."

"And if all the while he had Thedas in his back pocket, that is a problem in need of solving."

"Yep. The Valar are actually nice and once did not know enough to be good at it but now do, though."

"That sounds promising."

"It could also be that Eru didn't make Thedas and we're farther away than I thought, which might be inconvenient for me but means if the Valar make it here they won't have any obstacles to helping."

"Inconvenient for you...?"

"Quendi have chips in our heads that - send information to the Valar, and the Valar can use that information to copy us or bring us back if we die. If I'm too far for my chip to send that information then if something happens to me I don't wake up safe at home. It's not a complete disaster because my husband is authorized to let the Valar copy me if I'm not around to make decisions - and he wouldn't do it for Years and Years, and maybe not even then - but that would only work to the time of the last message the Valar got from my chip."

"...huh," says Stalas contemplatively.

"Even if we're somewhere Eru made it could take a very, very long time for anyone to travel here even if they knew exactly where it was. It takes twenty-five Thedan years to get between Valinor and Endorë."

"...and yet, you got here instantly when that creature attacked you..."

"Yeah, that part I don't know. Information can go that fast, between Valar and the smaller gods the Maiar, but not stuff, not any way we know of yet. One of my friends was working on it. It was not going to be in the form of sudden monsters."

"I would be a little worried about your friend if it was!"

"Eru could do a faster than light stuff-moving monster but it's not really his style, it doesn't have a - story shape to it."

"Hmm. So there's at least one thing in this picture that isn't explained by Eru, and it's the thing that brought you here... that suggests this place isn't Eru's fault."

"The place is his style, though, and the monster appeared in Valinor to begin with."

"Hmm. I can't comment on what is or isn't Eru's style without knowing more about him, I don't think."

"I don't have a way to act on it being him or not him anyway except that the usefulness of killing myself to get a message to Valinor depends on whether I'm being backed up."

"...I'm going to recommend against killing yourself to get a message to Valinor, at least for now and maybe ever depending how things turn out."

"I was thinking of maybe asking them to evacuate the continent," says Tev.

"That's a good idea but it's the kind of thing we should think through and be sure about before trying it."

"It'd almost certainly take longer to get here than anyone alive in this world has before you die for no reason even if the Valar could tell exactly where Thedas is by what the stars look like from here."

"Unless they learn the secrets of the creature first."

"That's possible. It still might take them a long time; they're slow by nature and this is new."