"I should probably solicit more details about the diplomacy thing. Not necessarily right now, but definitely before I go do it."

"I am extremely not the person to ask."

"Didn't think you were."

"Whenever you're ready I'll have Maedhros set aside an afternoon."

"Probably a good idea, although I meant more along the lines of asking Fingon what it was he wanted me to say to these people."

"I think the two of them are coordinating pretty closely on this, but yes."

"Oh, that makes sense."

"Without us at least acting as a political unit pulling off this sort of thing would be impossible. When Maedhros and Fingon disagree nothing happens."

"Think it's going to cause any problems when I'm officially with my sister's city instead of you guys?"

"You're not officially with us now. And yeah, probably will upset the table a bit. They'll work it out."

"I'm not officially with you now but I'm not officially not with you either. Anyway it'll probably do some of these people some good for a human kingdom to have one of the highest trumps on the table."

"I expect a lot of people will agree to your sister's kingdom who wouldn't otherwise - not that it's up for vote, exactly, but diplomatic recognition will be good - specifically because it means you're not with my family."

"Which is kind of ridiculous, since I intend to do as I please regardless, but. Politics."

"Are all ridiculous. Though also, when we're spending most of our time with you we can probably influence what it pleases you to do, people don't intend an insult to you when they assume that where you are has something to do with your objectives."

"It is true that if I spent less time around you I probably wouldn't care about you as much and if I didn't care about you as much I would be prioritizing bringing your dad back much lower."

"Yep."

"Bah. I don't care. I need people to care about and you're pretty great. I just wish all this 'the personal is political' stuff weren't flying around so people wouldn't make a fuss over me resurrecting whoever I pleased."

"People mostly make a fuss because they notice you're responsive to fussing."

"My responsiveness to fussing is to ask your brother to help me smooth feathers, not to actually not do the thing I want to do. I--am very conscious of how much power I have and that I don't have an exceptional resistance to Conquest, so I try to avoid throwing down ultimatums, but," she shrugs. "I don't really know what I'm doing here and I'm trying not to err on the side of unduly throwing my weight around so if you tell me I'm erring in the other direction I can't say I'm surprised."

"I think it's a good side to err on. I'd probably have been bothered, if you'd shown up here throwing your weight around, so it makes sense other people'd feel the same way. I just don't want you to feel like the political consensus is right and you have to get it in your favor to be right."

"I don't. If I did I would probably be putting off bringing your dad back instead of having tried and succeeded at making it work instead. I just--I don't like having to justify myself to other people, and I hate the idea that I would have to leave someone dead if I had been less clever, and I'm going to have to diplomacise with someone while pretending to be a completely different person, and--augh. I wish everything were as simple as 'get stronger, smite Morgoth.' Fucking politics."

"Yup."

"Maybe I can just pretend politics don't exist once Morgoth's dead and making sure people aren't as pissed off at each other as they could be isn't necessary to keep all the weapons pointed at him."

"That sounds lovely. I am super in favor."

"Add it to the 'when the war's over' list."