"I'm sad a lot, it's not your fault."

"I'm the prince, all of the bad things are my - not fault. My - ree-spon-sib-ill- I lost track - reespibility - no, no, I lost track again. Anyway I shouldn't make you sad."

"It's about a thing that happened very far away."

"Like Rúmil? He's sad about a thing that happened in Endorë a long time ago. And that is still my respibility because he's one of my people."

"That..." is a fucked up thing for a small child to believe "is an interesting way of looking at it but I decided to be sad about this thing" before the blue-green sphere even crumpled "and it will not help anything if you are also bothered about it."

Forehead crease. "...okay. ...maybe the Valar could fix the thing?"

Nope they're dead. "I don't think so."

Lip definitely trembling. "No they're not dead they're not they can't die you might be mistaken."

"- what?"

He tugs desperately at the doorknob. "I'm going to go check -" Door opens -

"- if you let that door close while you're on the far side you can't come back here and it might be important please wait -"

"I'll come right back I need to check if they're dead I don't think they're dead someone would have said something -" he is tugging the door more open, he doesn't quite have the height for it -

"Not yours, yours are fine, other Valar far away."

He might be too upset to be parsing Cam properly! "Can't be dead, they can't die -"

"Your Valar are fine, I - were you reading my mind people where I'm from don't do that so I wasn't thinking - understandably -" Timothy wake the fuck up and read your messages which now include I SCARED THE TINY MINDREADING YOU AND HE IS TRYING TO LEAVE HELP

He is standing in the door looking very confused - "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I don't - I was just listening -"

"People where I am from can't listen like that please don't listen to me thinking. Your Valar are okay."

He leans against the doorframe and rubs his eyes. 

"I'm sorry. I won't. I'm sorry. If the Valar are okay then they can fix it, probably."

That would be. Interesting and possibly hazardous to Cam's health. "Maybe."

"- I'm trying not to listen but you could just keep your thoughts private if you don't want to share them? That would be easier than trying to not listen, it's not even like trying to not listen out loud where I can plug my ears."

"...I don't know how to do that because people where I'm from can't read minds at all."

"- but you have Valar -"

"I'm... not from the place with Valar" were they reading his mind what the fuck they probably were "originally and I didn't talk to them much."

"Okay. I'm not great at teaching how to do thoughts private but you pick a - way of separating thoughts you want to share and thoughts you want to keep secret, like, imagining that your secret thoughts are in your bed snuggled up cozy, and your not secret ones are standing on the windowsill playing? Or your secret ones are all wrapped up and your shared ones are open. Or your secret ones are under the water and your shared ones are above like an island...I really am sorry. Everyone learns how to do it so if someone is sharing thinking things it is always because they meant to be."

"That makes sense." Okay he will just metaphorically chiplock his entire brain how about that.