"- I think Leareth will be willing to consider that, once he recovers fully from the injuries that your wizard inflicted on him. He would definitely be interested in understanding how your world thinks that treaties should work." 

Ebet is not going to mention the rumour he heard that Leareth, one, promised to return the wizard who had been holding him prisoner to Golarion with him, and two, might consider including the other two as a freebie. 

" - is recovery from injuries a substantial constraint there? - my colleague Laborda is a priest of Asmodeus, and can heal any injury immediately. Perhaps he should return with you."

Laborda, if he's alarmed by this, does not indicate it. 

"Perhaps." He looks to the Healer. 

     She answers. "It depends on whether magical injuries - to specific magic-use organs that only our mages have - would be included? Can it heal conditions that are closer to illness or starvation than injury per se?" 

"That requires more advanced spells but is certainly still possible," Laborda says. 

Ebet nods. "Maybe. You must understand why, right now, we don't exactly have a lot of faith in your people's goodwill toward Leareth. We would want to...take precautions." 

"Your world seems to be missing - the entire concept that people who are adversaries, or even simply 'not decided friends', might deal lawfully with each other, not out of goodwill, but out of a self-interest with a horizon greater than the self and the present moment," Hulien says. "I don't think I like any of the things you have in the place of that concept."

Ebet, half to his own surprise, smiles. "Leareth would like that. I think he's just about given up on anyone doing that outside of the Eastern Empire. He is also very paranoid, though. I don't know about your world, but in this world it's stupid not to be." 

"That is a sense I am getting," Hulien says. "It follows, then, that it would be a foolish failure to adapt to this world, were we to agree to whatever bonds you recommended so as to heal your Leareth."

"From your perspective, quite possibly. Though in fact, Leareth does not currently have an incentive to harm you. He would probably agree, I think, to a compulsion against harming him, but with no restrictions against simply leaving. Which I am sure you are well equipped to do even if we were to attempt to interfere." 

"And here we find ourselves in the frustrating situation where discussing our capabilities in any depth is itself something we might hesitate to do, until we understand each other better. Suffice it to say that I do not generally assume it to be the case I could depart a place against the interference of the people who designed and built its magical protections, and that I am very much not accustomed to relying on it. Is Leareth in any danger? How important is it to arrange magical healing for him?"

...Ebet is, suddenly, less sure of that claim himself. 

"As far as I'm aware, Leareth is not in danger and will make a full recovery - it's just a question of whether it takes a week. The main cost of that would be delaying any negotiations with your people over a treaty." 

“Then we wish him a swift recovery, and will plan to speak with you once he has recovered about what guarantees of safety we would require for negotiations.”

"Understood. ...We do also, currently, have Carissa Sevar on site. It's worth noting that I don't feel we owe it to Cheliax to return her before we've negotiated a lot further, given that your people acted against ours first and would certainly have brought Leareth back to Cheliax under a highly restrictive geas if not for - interference. But she did go on to help him in returning to his territory, so between the two of them, there's some established cooperation. We would prefer she stay on site until the geas expires, given that she's the only one qualified to troubleshoot it. But if you wanted to send messages back and forth, Leareth may be willing to facilitate that." 

What????

Obviously there's not yet a prisoner exchange agreement, and obviously no one would exchange prisoners without one. So what is communicated by saying that it isn't owed to Cheliax to return prisoners? What does it have anything to do with anything that Cheliax took Leareth prisoner, are they claiming that Cheliax in doing so was breaking some kind of norm except no one locally even believes those exist? Some sort of - very simple norm, 'if you do it we're allowed to do it too' -

"We would appreciate confirmation from her of Valdemar's account of her arrest and treatment," he says after a barely perceptible pause.

Malduoni began his preparations only days after the rift opened. It wasn't exactly subtle or hard to notice, that Cheliax was suddenly at war. 

It's earlier than he would have chosen to make his move. But not by all that much. His army and his wizards are mostly ready. He can get to work on final arrangements, there. 

Of course, it's important to understand first what's really happening over there.

There's another world. One with different magic. Different gods. This is, in some sense, far far bigger than the matter of recapturing Cheliax. And of course it has huge ramifications, for whether an attack on Cheliax is in any way a good idea. 

A week after the war begins in earnest, Malduoni successfully gets his first agent past the rift. Cheliax is frustratingly impossible to get people into in important positions, but Cheliax is also mobilizing troops hard and fast. They have very few wizards even at first and second circle who aren't enlisted. However, they do have some retired, honourably discharged wizards, who are now invited to reenlist. And one of them, who was only at second circle when he received his honourable discharge, later contacted the underground church of Iomedae.

Malduoni has been involved in funding that project for a long time. Indirectly, of course, through several layers of cutouts, like he does with anything where gods are involved. But these are strange times, and call for more extreme measures. He's willing to reach out. Not revealing his true identity, of course, but admitting to some of his connection to the underground church of Iomedae, and calling in a favour owed. He's willing to provide more resources to them, now, despite the higher risk; the times warrant it. In exchange, he wants someone to get him across the barrier. 

The wizard re-enlists at second circle, despite the fact that, during the interim decade, he's levelled several times to fifth circle. It takes him another week, in total, to fake his capture and presumed-death at Ifteli hands, slip away, and learn that a Dimension Door can get him across the barrier intact. From there he still has to travel overland, speaking to (and mindreading) the locals. Finding the fastest route to the sea. He has Teleport, but not to places he's never seen; the journey has to be accomplished by a mix of Phantom Steed and Fly, depending on terrain. 

He knows how to make attuned magic items, for a Plane Shift, and does this - there's plenty of time - but that isn't the primary plan. 

...

Malduoni scries his agent every day, briefly. When, another week after the barrier crossing, he finds the man camped beside the ocean - on a remote northern coast, many miles from the nearest village let alone the nearest city - he's ready. 

The next day at local-dawn - which Malduoni has mapped out meticulously relative to local time - he's watching. He waits until the man has cast Fly and taken it as far as he can. You can't Plane Shift from a scry.

You can, however, cast Gate from a scry, and Malduoni has it prepared. It's a very conspicuous spell, thus the extra time taken to make sure that nobody will be anywhere nearby to pay attention. If any of the local 'mages', as they call themselves, do notice, there's no particular reason for them to connect it to the war raging in a distant country, hundreds of miles away. 

Malduoni parts ways with the agent, after paying the man handsomely in gold and magic items, as agreed. He doesn't know, or need to know, what else the church of Iomedae needs of him.

The war is three weeks old; the rift itself, closer to a month. 

Malduoni, alone in a new world, begins his explorations. 

Ebet in fact said this because he hasn't failed to notice that the Valdemarans are being very conciliatory toward the Chelish envoys. Presumably, Valdemar is both terrified of a war, and also - letting Cheliax set the frame for this, one where they can accuse Valdemar of egregious wrongdoing. Leareth's people have no intention of going for that. 

"We will relay the request to Leareth," he says levelly. "I expect he will be able to consider it in the next day." 

:Talli?: he checks. 

     :- On it: Between the two of them, she's by far the stronger Thoughtsenser. She has a go at the Chelish diplomats' odd shields. 

Savil is watching the exchange in...confusion, mostly. Leareth's mage, despite the fact that he's clearly not a diplomat, is - well, he's handling this better than any of the Heralds managed. Save maybe Vanyel; she wasn't actually there for his conversation. But there's still - some sort of disconnect, there, a gulf that isn't quite being crossed and is leaving both parties slightly off balance. Or at least that's what Kellan is claiming to her. Savil has no idea, she'll have to take his word for it. 

"I'm glad to hear it. I hear the claim being made of the eight-year-old girl is that she went with Leareth voluntarily; that's the claim being made of Sevar as well?"

He's not readable, at least not without pressing hard enough he'd probably notice.

"We didn't stay enough for a full debrief from either of them, given the urgency in returning the girl to her parents. But, yes, my impression is that it was actually Sevar's idea - that she thought freeing Leareth and going with him would be a better position than remaining a prisoner of the Star-Eyed Goddess." 

Pause. 

"- We don't believe she was aware of your presence in this city. That's probably relevant to why she thought this was her best option. She was also relying on Leareth's Gating ability to get out at all, and didn't have the ability to coerce him to choosing a destination other than his preferred one." 

Nod. "Can you tell us more about this Star-Eyed Goddess?"

Ebet scowls. "She's terrible. Well, obviously her people wouldn't say so, but both peoples under pacts with Her are incredibly xenophobic and violent toward outsiders, and that's clearly Her doing. And She seems to hate technology and progress even more than Vkandis does, which is saying something." 

"Do you have any idea what it means that there is an agreement between Her and Vkandis under which Leareth and Sevar belong to Her?"

Shrug. "Not especially, no. I'm not religious." 

(Some of Leareth's researchers are, while very much not religious, nonetheless experts on how gods and their agreements work. Ebet isn't one of them, though, and has no intention of mentioning that.) 

The Chelish diplomats are incredibly confused by this claim and let this show on their face, mildly. "Are there other gods Leareth's organization would warn us against allying or collaborating with?"

"- That seems like a complicated question that I don't feel qualified to answer. Certainly our experience has been that none of them are especially possible to ally or cooperate with, let alone appealing. Your case might be different, though. Leareth would know who could advise you much better than I do."