"I don't know Cyprian. I wouldn't have guessed he'd refuse to give his assurance to Morgethai. It would be foolish of him to risk a war where I'm on the other side, and he's no fool, but he has the advantage here in one respect – some of his advisors know me. And they'll know that I don't want to fight."  

"I don't want to fight either. No one eager for this war has any comprehension of how horrendous it would be. But even if I counsel surrender - I will lose that vote."

"I could honestly promise to defend Andoran against an unprovoked invasion. But it won't be unprovoked."  

"It won't. I - if everyone knows the precise extent to which we have your protection, and Cheliax doesn't have slavery, maybe Andira would tone it down. She did somewhat when it was Hell at stake. But - Cheliax does still have slavery and it won't take very long for someone to turn up an escaped slave from Menador with a gut-churningly awful story about what was perfectly legally done to her, I have no doubt there are hundreds such."

"It is not in my power to abolish slavery in Cheliax. The decision is theirs. I can't – I can go back on that, but I won't. I can convey privately to Cyprian that I know he's preparing for an invasion, and and my wife and I won't look kindly on it – and I can protect any country I please from an unbidden attack by a foreign power – and I can ensure that a provocation against Cheliax doesn't spill over into a war with Galt, if it comes to that – 

– but that's not what you're asking for. You want me to commit, in public, to the murder of my countrymen and the ruin of my home if Andoran gives Cyprian a good enough excuse." 

"What? No! Morgethai's not even going to do that, and she could do it herself if she were willing to."

Oh, that's not fair. 

"I can't imagine what else you were implying. I'm afraid you'll have to explain it in words of few syllables." 

"No one is going to burn Galt, no matter what Cyprian does, because that would be an atrocity and none of the people with the power to do it are willing to do it, and they are right not to be. Morgethai intends, if Cyprian invades, to support Andoran in defending itself, without burning Isarn and in fact without doing anything in Galt, unless some of the other puppet states revolt in which case she might aid them. She will not do that by killing Galtans, because that is not even a good use of a powerful wizard if they're not willing to burn enemy cities and she isn't; powerful wizards are really useful for supply, logistics, communications, and trying to assassinate Cyprian himself.

I think that whatever it is that you decide to do, it is a good idea to convey it and a better idea to say it publicly than to convey it privately. Andoran's parliament makes Andoran's decisions, and they will make different ones depending what you are committed to. If you are committed to preventing a provocation against Cheliax from spilling over into a war with Galt, but not a provocation against Galt, then I think you should make that fact public, as people will make different decisions if they know it.

I am not asking you to commit to ruining Galt. Please do not do that. That would be terrible, we already have the means to do it, and we aren't going to." 

"If I commit to fighting against Galt in a war, how do you think Galtans will see it?"

"As an enormous betrayal, probably. They all know that it is a Galtan revolutionary who took down the Thrunes in the end. It is very important to them, that it was a Galtan revolutionary who took down the Thrunes in the end. And they do not see their country as - a threat to peace or freedom in Avistan. And I think the restoration of the Empire feels to many people like it has the air of inevitability, right now, like almost all the pieces have fallen out of the sky and into place."

"And if I make this commitment, before Cyprian has made any public provocation – "

"Archmage Cotonnet - I just want to be sure that we are - imagining the same sort of thing, here, because Morgethai and I have been speaking of this war for months now - what we'd be willing to do, what we absolutely wouldn't - and you were surprised by this war five minutes ago. You and I, as you observed at the start of this conversation, want the same thing. We do not want a war. We are not willing to destroy Galt to win one. I am trying to convey to you as much as I can about the diplomatic situation and about Andorani politics, because I think when you have that context you'll be able to do things that work better to achieve your desired results in Andoran. 

I don't actually know the bounds of the commitments it would be a good idea for you to make. I don't know what you can do! I don't know half the constraints you're under! If you tell me a specific commitment you're considering, I can describe what parts of it I'd publicize and what I'd backchannel and how I'd expect it to land in Andoran, but - I do not have some specific commitment in mind here, I don't know what you should do, and I am worried that to the extent you do have a commitment in mind it's one that I would absolutely not recommend to you -"

His head is starting to hurt. 

"Earlier today – I think – I made the mistake of assuming that the things a representative of the Church of Iomedae request of me represented anything close to what they actually wanted. It has made my life enormously more complicated and I'd prefer not to repeat it. I don't know what you've discussed with Morgethai. I do know, because you've said so, that you expect Cyprian to invade, and that if he does, you expect him to win. From this I have cleverly deduced that you would like it if I committed to Andoran's defense. I cannot see how I am to defend Andoran from a Galtan invasion without, at minimum, killing thousands of Galtan soldiers. If Cyprian cannot be dissuaded, he will die, and there will be another civil war. I don't know what you want me to say in public, or who you want me to say it to, but we presumably both realize that Cyprian refusing to back down is a real possibility, and can venture an educated guess or two as to what would happen in the aftermath. It might be worth it, at that. All I ask – please – is that we try to talk about it like rational adults instead of your trying to manage me into something you consider an acceptable outcome." 

"Archmage, I know that a year ago you and your friends did something that risked Rovagug's release, killed several archdevils for good, didn't kill Asmodeus but we had to ask the Goddess whether it did, and left you unable to intervene in Mephistopheles' takeover of Razmiran. It would be grossly irresponsible for me, or for Lastwall, to tell you what we want you to do! It is our obligation, as your allies, to tell you what is going on, what we expect to happen, what we expect would happen if you responded in various ways, so that you can make those decisions informed as far as it's in our power to inform you. But when I'm doing that, it's not in an effort to secretly steer you into doing something in particular, because I have absolutely no idea what constraints you're under, what the stakes are of your various commitments, or which ones you are even allowed to make. I am telling you what I expect to happen. I do not have suggestions for you. I cannot have useful suggestions for you. This isn't indirection, it's ignorance."

"If you consider yourself my ally, you could have told me about any of this months ago. I don't know why you chose to wait until I brought the issue to you, but I doubt it's because you respect my time too much to bother me about it." 

"I thought that you knew because I thought that the Queen of Cheliax told you."

"The Queen of Cheliax does not know! Well, she knows now, because I just told her – did it not occur to you to check? You thought we were allies, and we knew about a plan to conquer your country, and this wasn't worth asking for a clarification?" 

"It did not occur to me to check immediately. I don't have a - diplomatic representative to you. Felandriel and I were planning to speak to you and the Archmage Naima at some point this winter."

Yep. Pounding headache. 

"You know where I live. I don't make myself difficult to contact. This week I have recieved thirty seven different requests for political intervention of some sort and I'm not even sure all the involved parties are literate. Coincidentally, I also learned this week that when the Church of Iomedae requested my help retaking Drezen over a year ago it was because they wanted to reassign personnel to prepare for a potential war with Cheliax and not a blatant bribe. And also that, contrary to popular belief, Lastwall and the Reclamation armies aren't actually independent institutions when it comes to staffing decisions. Incidentally, when I asked de Luna about that, he also said it was because his Church respected my judgement too much to dream of trying to explain any of their decisions. 

I told him then what I'm telling you now – I don't make better choices when I have no idea what my ostensible allies are trying to achieve, or what resources they can bring to bear,  or what they need my help with and what they can do on their own. I've spent the past eighteen months acting under the assumption that the govenrment of Lastwall was indifferent to the project of rebuilding Cheliax! This is obviously my fault as much as anyone's for not asking, but the fact that nobody told me didn't help. I would have made very different decisions had I known. I will make a much less embarrassing show of accomplishing what should be our shared goals if I know what they are and what you want from me. I'm not a God. Talking to me is cheap. If I can't fulfill your request because of secret divine nonsense, then simply I won't. You shouldn't worry about that. But, short of that – if we are actually on the same side, then naturally I want to take your wishes into account before making major political commitments. What else are friends for?"  

Codwin actually has no idea how anyone could have not known the crusade was to free up forces for the invasion? Wasn't it very openly advertised as such? But - communication is always much much harder than you expect it to be and in directions you didn't expect it to be. "I apologize. We should have contacted you as soon as Cyprian refused Morgethai, even though we thought you already knew. I have been attempting to redress that in this conversation by telling you all of the options as I see them, and what I think will happen if you take them. I found it alarming when you proposed burning Galtan cities.  I will share more options now that I am feeling more reassured none of them will inspire you to burn any cities. I do not know which of them you should take, though if you would like me to wildly guess, I can.

I believe that Cyprian intends to find a provocation between now and springtime and invade then, or next year if he doesn't have a good enough one this year. I think when he does that Morgethai will probably try to assassinate him. I understand it's a painful situation to contemplate intervening in and I understand that a likely consequence if she succeeds is a civil war in Galt."

Everyone knows that when you ask for an obvious bribe you have to come up with some polite verbiage about how it's really good and noble and necessary, and everyone knows to ignore it, and even if you're charmingly optimistic and check back six months later you'd notice that Lastwall isn't preparing for anything to do with Cheliax, Lastwall swears up and down that the Reclamation is an entirely independent entity and nothing to do with us, why would we bother to explain that that's all a polite fiction to the single living person who probably cares the most about it. Wasn't this man raised Chelish? 

"I wasn't aware that I did propose burning Galtan cities. I meant that if I kill Cyprian my country will collapse into civil war, and if you're right I may have to. Do you have any intelligence on what he's really after? It matters if it's just an inner sea port or the right to say he's conquered everywhere that Aspex ruled. Do you have contacts in the Galtan foreign ministry?" 

"Yes. If it's important to your decisionmaking you can speak with them." He does not need to tell Cotonnet this puts them at risk. "We think he cares both about an Inner Sea port and about the reunification of the Empire, and wouldn't be wholly satisfied with just a port but it might distract him a while. He will probably go for Absalom, eventually, just because no one's ever done it, and you'd want Andoran if you were doing that. We believe Megane would like him to stick to River Kingdoms, he knows of course that the Church would like that - the other wild card is whether Taldor's succession war kicks off in the next year..."

"I can tell Megane privately that I'll interven if he attacks Andoran on a sufficiently thin pretext. I don't trust her to keep it private, but nobody else trusts her either, so she can do with that what she likes. He won't be satisfied the the River Kingdoms, I think. The poor man had himself all set up for a glorious victory in Cheliax. Taldor's better than Andoran on that front – easier to sell in Galt, and Aspex himself never managed it. Besides, they might invite him in." 

"I am sure that somebody in Taldor will invite him in. 

The other thing you could conceivably do it talk to the Eagle Knights yourself. They hero-worship you, obviously. They might listen to you where they won't listen to me."

"Really? I'd rather assumed they think I'm a vile monarchist traitor to the cause of liberty. ...Thought it would also surprise me if the Eagle Knights as a body have a uniform opinion on anything except the practice of chattel slavery."