Point is, if he hasn't earned his father's trust by now he is not going to, ever.

And he of all people should know that. 

The oath not to tell doesn't extend to preventing people from finding out. And then– but– 

He does have an incentive for us to underestimate how much his father trusts him. Then we end up more willing to tread lightly and follow his suggestions on how not to get his father's attention. Maybe that's part of it?

That was the guess that came to mind. 

Bit transparent, though, if that was it.

...so did you mean to say being ruthless on your father's orders is the kind of thing that earns his trust, right after saying he trusts you less, relative to your brothers? Because there's a certain distinguishing feature. I tried to cover for it.

I think if he figures out he'll also figure out that he can't go tell his side of the sea, and I have leverage if he does that. 

I am actually a bit surprised he agreed to come.

It seems the issue wasn't geographical location.

I was expecting that one to take a long time to set right when I can't even tell him the truth, but I wasn't expecting him to have much chance to glare at me in the meantime. 

Yeah, fair point.

At least not with witnesses. Without witnesses 'not speaking' would be something he could work with. 

I think my father'll get out of his grief and paranoia eventually and when he does the current balance of power will be more stable.

In the meantime, how do we avoid prodding him to be a more active ruler? He can't very well miss the host walking across from the Ice.

Unfortunately.

Settle far away from us, don't send people over, convey messages yourself or with someone characterizable as neutral in this mess?

I'm not exactly neutral in the mess myself, that's important for karma reasons, but since everyone else has long histories with each other I can see how the perception would be different enough.

Are more neutral people likely to be common?

The locals, maybe. What do you mean that not being neutral is important for karma reasons? Or just that accurately representing your allegiances is?

I never told the Enemy I'm opposing him. And it wouldn't be worth letting him know I exist. He hasn't done anything against me in particular, which means if I'm otherwise neutral I'd be attacking unprovoked. Taking an existing side should be less bad.

Your magic system has really silly priorities. But all right. Are there penalties within it for not following up on a grievance?

It has very silly priorities.

No penalties for inaction in general. There can be exceptions, like maybe if the spirits think you owe it to someone else to retaliate against anyone that hurts both of you. Usually you'd just be passing up what it thinks is the right to hurt someone.

Fantastic. Well, no one here was under the impression you were neutral even before you showed up with one of Nolofinwe's sons but I think visits from you'll provoke my father less than visits from them. 

Right. Lack of history.

Has he been plotting uses for permanent songs recently? That would be a bit of a waste.

He was one of the people who got the 'stop, infohazard' explanation to which I ended up having to add the 'there are rules enforced on everyone who knows them' explanation and observe he could get the abilities without being constrained by the rules if he just permitted people who didn't need full freedom of action as badly as he does to be the ones exposed to the infohazard. People have brought me lots of uses for permanent songs, some of which might actually be things you can do - you mentioned crops might be workable?

It's doable. Plant growth is a feature of nature as much as rain or lightning. But I haven't done it before and definitely don't have any harvest elementals handy. Your greenhouses probably can't attract them as much as your forges did fire.

Doubt it. Are there things we can do to attract them more effectively?

Not if you're already trying for as much as you can grow. I might be able to, if I leave something else there to basically waste power and be magic. Spirits tend to go where other ones already are.

I would appreciate it tremendously.

Just show me where they are.

My pleasure. We should discuss anything else we want discussed, though, because after you walk around camp being very disruptive I'll want to go report to the King right away.