"Yeah, I can imagine."

"I'm... curious what you think I'm thinking."

" - I imagine you are trying to decide how you feel about the person I actually am and how much information you have about the person I actually am."

"That all the detail you have?"

" no. Uh. You would have appreciated more directly having the 'I tortured him' information - I knew that at the time, too, just couldn't make myself say it - maybe I should've written a letter - you're deeply freaked out about everyone letting me get away with it -"

Nod.

"That's another thing I didn't really mind until I met you. It is horrible. I'll figure something out. Your society might rub off on people - just having it around as an example -"

"It's not really why we're decentralized but it doesn't hurt."

"And it could probably be fixed without going fully decentralized but on the other hand that might be the fastest way to kick it, and Elves are very slow about social change."

"I've noticed that. For example, you collectively rejected the Valar's entire project and I haven't heard any alternative rationale presented for the thing about gay people."

"I think at this point it's literally just 'ewww, weird'."

"Ewwww, weird, they deserve whatever happens to them as a consequence of being weird? I dunno about that."

"There's cultural residue of the - understanding we were raised with - but it mostly is just 'I don't want to think about that'."

"People."

"They didn't torture anyone. Just let themselves forget about it."

"Yeah." Sigh. "Uh, I have a list. One item on my list is actually that I'm weirded out by how you - used - the background assumptions about what being King entitles you to, about whether gay people have it coming, etcetera - you obviously have a lot of influence and you can afford to spend it towards personal projects or you wouldn't have hit on me and arranged for everyone to support the version of reality that allowed that."

"Yeah. I thought I was entitled to that, I could have changed how people felt about it and I didn't because I found it comfortable and reassuring. They thought being gay was horrible but they'd forgive it from me. Felt like - a kind of loyalty that wasn't all about the war."

"Can you elaborate on that?"

"I enjoyed the fact that people would overlook my conduct. It was more reassuring the more objectionable they found it, because it was a - stronger signal that they really were unconditionally loyal to me, and I liked that they were unconditionally loyal to me. I didn't consciously encourage the prejudice - and it's gotten substantially better than it used to be - but that's part of the reason I didn't push much harder, you know, find the most competent closeted people I knew and offer to protect them in coming out and living openly - I could have done it if I'd put everything into it. I don't think it was badly spent on the things I spent it on instead, but I could have done it."

"Is the unconditional loyalty thing just... useful or..."

"No. But, uh, I think I could get the thing I get from unconditional loyalty out of - conditional loyalty that's conditional on the kind of person I am, coupled with being a good person."

"What's the thing you get out of it?"

" - safety, comfort, a sense I can stop walking such a narrow line - that I can let whatever I am show and I won't lose everything for it - that's why conditional loyalty coupled with actually being a good person works, while conditional loyalty along with my willingness to play nice doesn't meet this desire at all - flexibility, the confidence that no matter what gets thrown at me I won't be scrambling to put together another coalition -"

"Do you think you can do actually-a-good-person to the point where you'd have all that?"

"Well, see, before I met you I didn't think so. But now - yeah. I can. On my own, even, if I have to."