I am no matter what could have transpired today far more indebted to you for aiding my allies in safe passage across the ice than I could possibly be for my own life. But thank you for my life as well. We would not have gone had we anticipated the Enemy'd send that.

Both of those are things that had more than enough reasons for being done.

Oh, on the subject of the Ice, how long is it likely to be before Macalaure has the song for better control of elements? I didn't realize earlier it was such a long process, or for that matter that sharing songs isn't usually done.

Recent events rather make a mockery of trying to stick with what's ordinarily done. Macalaure will have the song before you leave.

The King did say he'd rather I not tell you when his people are leaving. Do you mean Macalaure'll be done before the earliest time the departure reasonably could be, or did you get more detailed information from somewhere?

You're leaving in a few days. It'll be ready by then.

What.

I usually don't do this quite as much because I know very well it's obnoxious and disconcerting, but I also usually have more time to work with. The song'll be ready.

Not that, I mean, I knew he was supposed to be the best but I thought composing takes years normally. 

Well, not just that.

He's taking absurd safety shortcuts in the drafting process by having Huan help him, so if the song is unexpectedly lethal it'll minorly inconvenience Huan instead of costing us something. It's been unexpectedly lethal two or three times now; there's a reason people take years to compose.

Oh. Minorly but enough that composers don't normally ask Maiar for help?

In Valinor it was also socially unacceptable to take shortcuts at things. Artistically contemptlble, you know. We had all the time in the world. 

The rare and precious commodity of inconvenience.

It is lower priority, because of a bit of information I was up until now planning on withholding so you didn't figure out we were leaving in days, so if he were endangering himself or Huan it might be unnecessary.

I'll let them know that. 

You said you were willing to share more about your capabilities if I swore not to share it. I think that would be useful. I am not going to be able to effectively trade off our risks against yours if I'm guessing blindly on yours. Even if I'm very good blind.

You'd be willing to swear not to spread knowledge of my capabilities except when you think I'd approve?

Um, I mostly don't object to telling allies in general, as long as they aren't a security risk for some other reason, as long as they already know about magic and you don't arrange for them to figure that out so you can tell them this.

Good to know, thank you.

If I swear not to share knowledge of your capabilities unless I think you'd approve and someone manages to figure out a way to bring that in conflict with the Silmaril oath then I just collapse in unbearable psychological torment. I can avoid this by thinking you don't approve of that happening to me but it's a bit of a risk to take. 

How would those even conflict? The Enemy gives some idiots a Silmaril and they keep it, and there is no way to get it back without informing people because...because I'm defending them from you? There are multiple reasons that wouldn't actually be a conflict, but maybe there's something along those lines.

I cannot think of a way they'd conflict and am pretty sure it'd be fine, and can always frame it carefully enough it's fine, but I want to give it some thought and make sure there's not anything non-obvious coming to mind. 

If anything like that did come up, whether I would want you to be able to tell people would depend on whether I'd want you painfully incapacitated. Which I'd like to say is never even if we're enemies, but if the Silmaril oath is forcing you to do things then it might depend on what happens if you tell or if you don't.

Yes, exactly. So it's not done lightly.Swearing never to tell would be safe: pure negative oaths don't cause psychological torment, they just stop you. Swearing to tell only if I think I'd have your approval - not as much. 

Would it have the same problem to say only then or if there's no other way to obey the Silmaril oath? I don't really mind giving up the use of torture as a weapon in a situation that probably won't even come up.

And is less likely to if it couldn't be leveraged to torture me. That obviates the problem entirely. "I swear to share information about your capabilities only if I think you'd approve or there's no other way to obey the other oath I've made. I promise not to bring about conditions where keeping that oath obliges me to share your capabilities as a way of circumventing this; I swear it's my sincere expectation that this situation will never arise."

Sorry about asking for that. Even if it was called for under the circumstances. And sounding so casual about torturing you, for that matter.

Okay, so the main thing about magic is that the world is– not made of spirits, but at least full of them. In general those are like air molecules, only important in the aggregate, but some are big enough to matter as individuals. I work with relatively simple nature spirits. There are others that are more like animals or people or abstract concepts than natural forces. If I look closely at a wall I can see spirits representing what it's made of, what it's for, what if anything it means to people...of course, I barely recognize any of these. Your forges had a lot of fire elementals as a side effect of burning so long and so hot, so I got everything that looked important captured at least enough to make them output extra heat.The most important elementals I have are a pair of water ones. I use them for applying force without needing anything to push against. Either one could hold up a sphere of water as wide as you are tall. Primarily I use this for flight, and the casts you made are for applying it to valaraukar.

One of the other things spirits do is flow back and forth between people or people and things. You have a connection to basically everyone, plus one running off in a direction that I assume means Silmarils. Watching for a connection that suddenly gets more solid, and breaking it if it does, is how I was confident I could spy on the Enemy safely.

He outright smiles at 'you have a connection to basically everyone'. There's a lot at stake, you're not going to hurt my feelings. Thank you. Breaking it? What does breaking the connection between two people do?

It basically means 'you are not thinking about me right this minute.' I'm sure it can be done permanently and comprehensively but I wouldn't know how to do that if I wanted to.

That I would take as hostile.