Nod. She dismisses the illusion and does one with a piece of metal changing shape in her hands.

"Changing the shape of the metal."

"Making more thing bigger magic changing the shape of the thing."

"So making new material is a bigger deal than just molding something. All right. What can you do in general terms - I'm wondering if you can season the rainforest -"

"Season?"

"The places on Amenta where people like to live have four seasons every year. The equator and the poles don't. If people try to live there, their hormones do unpleasant things."

"Aliens live equator don't hormones do unpleasant things."

"Well, you're aliens," he says, "it stands to reason that not everyone would evolve the same way. But we're very crowded and have some uninhabited rainforest."

"Don't know magic season rainforest."

"So there isn't magic invented for it, all right. How is new magic invented?"

"...Magic do thing. Need understand thing."

"You would need to know more about how seasons worked?"

"Need understand seasons to know magic do, not-do. Need--" she does an illusion of snow-- "can do, need Amenta--" she makes an illusion of a random planet changing its axis of rotation-- "not do."

"- right, we don't want the entire planet changed. Weather doesn't have much to do with it, it's about latitude."

"Not changed latitude, not understand latitude seasons, need understand magic."

He nods. "Would it help to read an article about it or should we think of other ideas first?"

"Translation not read."

"- why not?"

"Translation magic need--alien or Amentan--for words. Amentan words read not here."

"You need a person? Why?"

"--Words not--aliens or Amentans make words. Words not words, aliens or Amentans make words, no aliens, no Amentans, magic not words."

...the blues are confused.

"We could call the polymath to help with the language barrier," says Cadra.

"No, no, I think his sister's being courted by that idiot Admai -"

"Dictionary," she tries. "Dictionary, words..."

"Definitions?"

So-so gesture.