Razmir has been killed and replaced by the bard Ilythyrra, who is supposedly secretly Mephistopheles, Lord of the Eighth. Normally, this would make him (her? Him?) Alexeara's highest priority, but - he was told of this by Cyprian, who heard it from Catherine de Litran, who is secretly Myrabelle, who may herself be Mephistopheles and is one of the most gifted liars on the plane regardless. Which is to say, Alexeara does not actually have very much reason to think that Razmir is secretly Mephistopheles, rather than non-secretly an evil archmage pursuing godhood.

The Archmagi Cotonnet, when asked, aren't much more willing to comment on Mephistopheles' identity than the Goddess, but they are willing to comment on Catherine de Litran. Élie seemed to be trying, in some sense, to reassure him and utterly failing. Myrabelle, according to Élie, is an immortal body-stealing witch who lived many lives before the death of Aroden; (At least three over two-hundred fifty years, he concludes after reviewing de Luna's notes) She's not a servant of Hell and genuinely opposed Cheliax, (The same could be said of Baphomet, but this at least disconfirms her being Mephistopheles, insofar as he trusts Élie's knowledge) she's evil (he  knew that) and hates and wants to destroy all the gods. (Deeply concerning!)

...Also Élie turned her into a book and read her entire life history. This is rather hard to argue with, as an evidence base, but also seems suspiciously convenient. Élie is confident that he couldn't be fooled this way; Alexeara has no way to check that. Well, he has one way to check that.

(Is Élie Cotonnet correct in his assessment of Myrabelle's character? UNCLEAR; Is Élie Cotonnet correct that Myrabelle could not have faked being turned into a book or caused that book to have misleading contents? UNCLEAR)

He asks Élie, somewhat rhetorically, whether he thinks Myrabelle is going to do anything that would be unusually evil in someone who's not an evil archmage, like killing millions of people in evil rituals or creating an army of the undead to conquer the planet. Élie answers that he thinks she probably won't do that while he's around. Alex asks what will happen when Élie is not around. Élie says they'll cross that bridge when they come to it, which Alex feels is rather missing the point.

Alexeara has three evil archmages to contain but not try to topple or directly oppose. (Presumably because such attempts would leave him fruitlessly dead, fruitlessly un-dead, or "fruitfully" dead, with the "fruit" in the last case being destabilizing the continent's newfound peace.). Razmir is simple enough - He'll promise Cyprian support if he's attacked, warn Lastwall that Razmir might now be a real god after all, and have a long talk with the Lord-Protector of Molthune about who not to ally with out of convenience. With Geb there's little to do but watch and wait to see if he retaliates and how. Almost anything else would make that situation worse. With Catherine de Litran...

Well. They say to keep your enemies at sword-length. Alexeara petitions the new Chelish government for the return of Castle Cansellarion and the surrounding lands to which he is the rightful heir. He's only slightly surprised that his petition is granted; he's moderately surprised to be granted the whole county of Lladó along with it and very surprised that the grant is made without requiring any sort of oath of loyalty or fealty to the queen, merely an agreement to govern "consistent with the laws of Cheliax, when they shall be established."

(The response also informs him that his family's castle is now haunted. So it goes. He can probably clear that up when he has an afternoon free sometime in the next year.)

Alexeara spends a while wondering why he's been granted a county before accepting. One possible explanation is that Myrabelle expects it will make him easier to monitor, or easier to constrain to actions that don't constitute treason - But there was no oath of loyalty. No strings attached. If she institutes some law that he finds unconscionable - or inconvenient - to follow, he can simply abdicate.

A second explanation - more likely, he thinks - is that it was the result of a negotiation with the new Queen's allies. They don't share her history with him, they are good, or at least non-evil, and while he suspects many of them would side with her if it came to an open conflict they still seem to consider him an ally as long as it doesn't come to that. So they might have insisted, either as a reward for his help in their campaigns or simply due to a lack of other qualified administrators.

(He asks Shawil, not really expecting a full answer but optimistic about a partial one. Shawil seems more clear-eyed than Naima or Élie about what exactly they handed Cheliax over to. Shawil tells him that Naima and Catherine have been picking the new nobility, which is at least a promising hint that it might be the second.)

A third explanation, which he considers before his acceptance but seems more and more compelling each month after, is that it's just intended to keep him busy. Being responsible for a Chelish county immediately following the war is an enormous amount of work. His people are evil, terrified, confused, hungry, terrified, and evil. The local druids are also evil, or unusually opposed to civilization, (he can't really blame them) or both; they are invariably unwilling to help with the harvest, which puts the populace at the whims of the weather. There are refugees and bandits and rebels and not much to distinguish between the three. He's directly responsible for the old count's direct holdings, and his own old family holdings, and the holdings of a couple of lesser nobles in his county who were purged or incidentally killed or fled the country and haven't been replaced. He's indirectly responsible for the remainder of the nobles in the realm, most of whom ought to be replaced themselves but it would look bad if he just purged everyone and replaced them with his own people.

This would have been more than enough reason to decline the county, if he had any other leads on how best to counter Myrabelle's influence. But he doesn't, so it's not clear what this is distracting him from which would be better than spending his time on running a county, even though he is in fact quite thoroughly distracted.

Word from an ally in Westcrown about the constitutional convention reaches him slightly ahead of the official news, but only slightly; they must have kept the planning fairly closely held until they were ready to send out invitations.

Élie probably believes this is a legitimate constitutional convention. Élie is - not even very mad, for an archmage. That doesn't mean this convention has a lantern archon's chance in hell at being even remotely productive. Cansellarion has read reports of the original Galtan conventions, and this one seems to be starting from a much worse position.

But he'd take republicanism, as terrible an idea as it probably is, over Myrabelle's rule of Cheliax.