"Oh. Hmm. You could– Nevermind, you hate Mindhealers. You could ask Shavri for drugs? There's a herb I use a lot that's fairly mild and shouldn't leave you still groggy in the morning, but it still helps. And, I don't know, try not to dwell on it too much? Find some neutral distracting thing to think about instead." 

"I'll keep that in mind, thank you."

"Good luck. You're meeting with them again today?" 

"Not all of them. Savil and Shavri."

"Ooh. That seems like it has a chance of going better?" 

"I hope so."

"Mmm. Anyway, I'd better let you go." 

General Ashkevron can escort Belrun back to her room to wait for the next meeting. 

Belrun amuses herself by looking at various microbes in the room. She sketches a funny-shaped one.

Shavri arrives with Savil. She looks tired but less so. "Ready? We can do it here if you prefer, won't be too crowded this time." 

"Saves the walk." She fills in another edge of the microbe and then lets her Healing-Sight drop; she'll never be able to find the same one again. "Good morning."

"Good morning." Savil adjusts her position in the chair, wincing and rubbing her lower back. "Hmm. I've been trying to figure out what a useful avenue is for making progress, and, well, the thing with Leareth is that we have to assume he's going to do exactly what best helps him achieve his goals. He doesn't have any scruples, even Vanyel admits that. And I know you can't tell us all of his goals, but if we can end up on the same page that invading Valdemar isn't the best path for him to achieve his goals, whatever they are, then - I think we'd feel a lot more open to at least attempting cooperation instead." 

"Let's assume for the sake of argument that for some reason he needs to control a nation-sized chunk of territory by some means somewhere, no comment on whether that's the case as stated. Where do you want him to go instead?"

"...Umm, I don't exactly feel good about sending him at our neighbours instead." 

"Which you can imagine makes it even more difficult from a position of not in fact being partial to Valdemar. You may assume for the sake of argument that even if his requirements aren't that specific, they are of approximately that magnitude, like, say, has to either take over Valdemar or... I don't know, blow up the moon, that one I'm fine telling you I definitely made up."

"This is getting hypothetical enough to be hard to think about, but - I guess we'd want to point out how metaphorically blowing up the moon would be easier and more convenient than taking over Valdemar? We've got to be a lot harder to take over than he expected originally, given that we're forewarned, and Van's made the new Web and the vrondi and all that." 

"I do not have detailed invasion plans but I don't think one generally plans a war by assuming one's opponents will have no talented personnel, clever tricks, or unexpected resources. Anyway, if you blow up the moon this also has consequences even if they're not concentrated on Valdemar in particular and I regret that I cannot be more specific about what those would be since it's not 'the tides go horribly wrong'."

"Fair enough. We're aware he knows what he's doing, and we probably can't beat him in outright war even if we could make it costlier for him to win. Still, I'd want to know more what he intends to get out of blowing up a metaphorical moon before I'd be willing to consider doing things to make that easier instead." 

"Yeah, that's the secret part."

"Great. So we can't actually talk about it." Savil gives her a piercing look. "Belrun, you don't have to answer this, but - what's your sense, as to whether invading Valdemar is currently Leareth's best approach to accomplishing his mysterious aims?" 

"I don't think the case for it being Valdemar in particular is all that strong," she says after a moment. "There's probably nuances to it we skipped so there might be more to it than I'm aware of but insofar as I'm up to date, another option might be fine, if not the first choice. We are of course talking about a scale of decisionmaking on which the difference between 'fine' versus 'first choice' is likely to be measured in lives, lots of them, but if Leareth weren't willing to see some people wind up dead to do what he needs to do, he wouldn't have planned a war to begin with, you don't get clean wars.

I suppose in principle it wouldn't have to be an invasion if you'd prefer to be peaceably annexed but I think having your country run by Companions behind the scenes would come to be a dealbreaker."

"This is because of, er, the part where Companions get very uncomfortable when you bring the conversation around to gods? Or something different?" 

"It's not specifically that it makes them uncomfortable, it's more the underlying mechanism. The thing that makes Companions something more than people shaped like horses. We're not sure what god made them, not everybody's as flashy putting their name on everything as Vkandis is, but they are clearly exerting ongoing influence and it doesn't seem overwhelmingly friendly to Leareth and his plans. If any Companions want to negotiate with me on behalf of him and their backing divinities respectively I'm up for it but I think that's not standard operating procedure."

"Huh. I suppose Rolan would be the obvious candidate to negotiate on behalf of the Companions and, er, god or gods. I could speak to him about it. Unfortunately his Chosen isn't briefed on this situation, due to being fourteen." 

"I'll talk to his Chosen too if they want, fourteen or not, I was pretty bright when I was fourteen and I doubt I'm unique in this."