This damn story was supposed to be a brief fluffy thing about an elven poet smooching a lady, and now I find myself saying things to myself like, "not a family ghost as in dead person, but a family spectre as in 'a spectre is haunting Europe'," and "eidolons of possible futures playing with the big picture of elven culture like it's an RTS," and "there's not enough smooching in this,"
"elves don't have the word 'propaganda' for the same reason mermaids don't have a phrase for 'oh no, I'm all wet'. (still not enough smooching)"