Tran can lay out his notes and explain how Valdemar has been considering what kinds of resource trades they can make with the aliens. They can't really lend mages, and it seems like the Amentans have better communication technology already than what Mindspeakers are capable of, but Valdemar does have some Gifted Healers who could be spared, if that's useful for either practical purposes or research? 

(They are trying to avoid letting slip anything that they only know thanks to Taver reading the visitors' minds.) 

Healers sound like they might synergize really well with medical technology and they'd love to borrow a couple to bring up to the mothership and introduce to the infirmary staff there! Why is it they can't lend mages?

- Well, because of the war with Karse, mostly. If the Amentans could help with that, then it might be possible to free up more personnel.

The Amentans could certainly consider that. It would be a substantial outlay of effort to bring military personnel to Valdemar all the way from Amenta, of course.

Valdemar recognizes that! They’re not sure the most beneficial help here would be from more (un-Gifted) warm bodies, as opposed to technology? He's going to hand over to Keiran, who's thought through specifics more. 

Keiran has so many questions about the capabilities of the Amentans' space vessels! And also their listening-devices they've been using! Can they take pictures from the sky and replace the need for Farsight scouting. Can the listening-devices be used to send messages both ways and how hard would it be to get hundreds of those distributed to all the military commanders, they could tighten up their communications on the field so much if they weren't bottlenecked on Gifted Mindspeakers. 

They can take pictures from the sky! Listening-devices are good for that too, hundreds isn't that many. They weren't planning to lend soldiers directly into the Valdemaran command structure, the personnel would be to train locals in using the equipment and to deploy some of the especially high yield weapons.

Can they say more about those 'especially high yield' weapons? 

They've noticed some big explosions on the border? That was how they could tell there was a war initially, in fact. They can do stuff like that.

"Ah, right. That's currently something our mages are doing. It would certainly take a load off them." 

(It does not seem like it will help Valdemar's negotiating position here to mention that any explosions in the last several months are done by exactly one mage, Herald Vanyel Ashkevron, currently holding a two hundred mile stretch of border almost alone.) 

"We'd be happy to talk about what would make this a good trade on both sides! Our interests here are mostly going to be in land and magical assistance but we could also use local help with science projects like cataloguing all your wildlife, refining our understanding of your language, getting all your music recorded - we can also get some value out of souvenirs people back home would be thrilled to have even if they're things that seem pretty ordinary to you, it'd be very special to hold a piece of another planet." But mostly land and magic. Maybe they're crossfertile and she can have MAGIC GREAT-GRANDCHILDREN.

"Huh - you want our music? We'd certainly be happy to show you some - there've been an awful lot of new songs, actually, these past few years. Interesting times are good times for Bards, you know." 

"Heh, we'd better let them record Demonsbane and Shadow Stalker before we pull Van off the border, or he'll make sure those recordings don't make it anywhere." Tran smirks, then turns back to the envoys. "What sort of souvenirs are you thinking?" 

"Jewelry, clothes - it's very convenient that we're about the same size and shape - we're still doing tests to see if we can eat your food but if we can anything from here that can make the trip will be an interesting treat for Amentans - curios in general, anything handmade really. It's all in a novel style as far as we're concerned."

Nod. "Well, for now, we've marked out an initial area of land that's within our borders but very sparsely inhabited. It's up north - our population north of Haven is much less dense, which means you wouldn't be displacing as many people, if you want all the smallholders to move out. We can show you on a map. It's along one of the tributaries of the Terilee River, and it should be good for logging and mining - I'm sure your technologies for both are much more advanced than ours." 

Taver has been having UNEASY FEELINGS about this the entire time, but he's mostly keeping that back from his Chosen. No point in distracting Tantras. And they do need the help with the war, which means they have to offer something in return. 

"Probably, yes! Is it far enough north that it doesn't have distinct seasons? That's important to us." The year's probably too short for most people to season anyway but people can flow in and out depending on whether they do, like a moon only some people probably will be fine here.

"...I wasn't aware that was a thing that happens far enough north. The growing season is definitely a lot shorter, the further north you go." 

...Randi looks thoughtful. Exchanges a glance with Savil, then with Tantras. 

"You know," he says after a few beats, "it's worth noting that there's quite a lot of land even further north of Valdemar. Which - obviously isn't within our purview to sell or trade to you, but it doesn't belong to any nation, and the population is also very low-density. The locals are mostly in small towns or under some landholders, and might well be willing to move if you give them trade goods in exchange." 

(And, more importantly, it would set up a buffer of powerful aliens in between Valdemar and Leareth's territory.) 

"Can you show us on a map where you mean? That will help our people figure out if it has seasons enough."

"Of course. Tran, could you go pick up a map from the archives that shows as far as the Ice Wall Mountains?" 

"S'fine, I'll do it." Katha is already on her feet. 

Tran already has the big map of just Valdemar, with enough detail to show small villages by name. He can go over that with the delegation while they're waiting for the more zoomed-out map. 

They can correlate it with their satellite photos! It should be seasonable at that latitude.

How about the area north of that, on this much bigger map? Valdemar hasn't explored it that thoroughly - this map is mostly pieced together from visiting 'merchants' (most of whom are plausibly more like bandits and not exactly trustworthy.) Some of it's north of the tree line. None of it's far enough north for the supposed phenomenon where the sun just stays up all summer and vanishes all winter - that would be on the other side of the mountains only. 

That's northerly enough that it would be dicey especially on top of the already too-short year, but they'd probably have some settlements there eventually even if they aren't a priority.