About Nesta/Harine we'll leave it at that. I understand now better why you interpret it the way you do, but I don't agree with your interpretation.



There's a reason why they never did that. That's claiming territory, with all the diplomatic risks it entails, and they would have had to fortify and defend those enclaves, and the roads leading to it, many of which they'd have to build and keep in shape. A trade enclave in the middle of nowhere would have been a magnet for bandits. All very costly. By buying land in the middle of nations, close to big cities with established trade networks, the SF benefit from all this for free, merely having to protect their own goods and the welfare of people coming to trade there.




There's no indication Elayne knew anything about the other enclaves. She would very likely have mentionned this if she knew, and measure all the implications better.

Elayne believed Andor would benefit because a lot more SF goods would enter the Westlands directly through Andor to be traded in the North and in Murandy, attracting foreign traders to Andor who would pay taxes to the Crown to get those goods out of the enclave. Merchants from Arafel or Shienar or Tar Valon would no longer need to go to Tear or Bandar Eban for SF goods, they'd go down the Erinin to Aringill and save a lot of money, and Andor would have its share.

But she got manipulated into accepting that goods not entering Andor, just the enclave, wouldn't be taxed.

Merchants will come trade goods in the enclave and the SF will open a gateway to the destination of their choice and merchants will pay the taxes to their own country only, and Andor will get nothing at all. The goods will never enter Andor, no more than the goods the SF buy in Shienar or Arafel will ever enter Andor, they'll pick them at the source, Travel to the enclave and put them on their ships.

All Elayne got out of the deal is cheaper SF goods for the Andoran internal market, losing in the bargain most of the foreign trade that used to transit through Andor, to the benefice of the Crown, Andoran traders, and all the businesses making most of their trade on the travels of foreign merchants (inns etc.). Or it did that, her deal with the Kin completely changed the game again, she just has to offer better deals than the SF (not very hard!) for trading in Andor and to begin sending her traders to the source of various goods. Andorans won't buy silk from SF anymore, Elayne will send her traders to Shara by gateway, just as in the days Cairhienin merchants could do this (and lost 20 years ago, destroying a lot of their wealth) and Andor will compete directly with the SF as a source of silk. Of silk and tons of things only the SF could offer. She screwed Zaida back, her enclave will be nowhere as lucrative as she believed, all the less since Elayne has very close alliances with the booming TR, Ghealdan, and she is Queen of Cairhien.