Valia is late to her committee on excising diabolism because the paladin wanted to talk with her but that was probably more important. She does not, after all, want to offend the Queen and all the non-evil powerful nobles in Cheliax and she doesn't want people assuming that the Church agrees with everything she says, much less that the Church agrees with a bunch of things she didn't say but kind of implied.
None of that means they don't need to do plenty of excising diabolists.
Someone new is here, a woman in monkish attire, standing not sitting, nervously holding some sheets as though waiting to give them out.
Standing next to her is a teen girl, around 14 or 15, similarly dressed.
After Valia's speech earlier he concluded that this committee was definitely not going to do anything positive and his attempts to do harm reduction were probably futile. He is not here.
Why are there more Evildoers trying to get on the committee. She wasn't even trying to hide it. You'd really think they'd have gotten the message by now.
Korva really, really, really doesn't want to be here. But she told the count she would, so she is here. Internally screaming, but here.
She's also a few minutes late, but her reason for that is probably pretty obvious from the new member she's walking in next to. She blinks slightly in surprise at seeing Iroria, but on second thought it makes sense - if she had an evil cult to report, she wouldn't settle for telling one committee member and hoping it got solved, and especially not after they told everyone there were evil people trying to infiltrate the committee.
Aspexia del Mar sees no reason not to just normally show up on time? She's in the committee.
Aaaand then Valia will get here!
"Okay. Sorry I'm late. First off, we are actually not allowed to say that people should get rid of their Evil nobles like Pezzack did. I think that we should be allowed to say that, and I think we're allowed to say that we think we should be allowed to say that, but we're not allowed to say it, because it counts as rebelling against the Queen, and the Queen is Good and freed us from Hell and some people who I don't think are stupid think that complaining to her about specific Evil nobles might work and so we're supposed to try it before we try rising up against them.
If it does work it'll save a lot of lives and if it doesn't work then a lot of people will be on our side who right now think that we should just trust the Queen.
I do think that if anyone is thinking about actually trying this they should, uh, make sure a lot of people know that they're going to see the Queen before they actually do it so she can't just make them disappear.
I just wanted to make sure everyone knew that because they might have followed my example and I did not know this and I don't want any of you to be in trouble on my account.
Second off, Delegate del Mar, would you be interested in explaining to this committee why you are using powerful magic to conceal that the Judge rules you Evil?"
Yep, this meeting is off to a great start! Hopefully Thea gives them the information on the faiths of the Queens of Hell and then they can be out of here!
"I don't think that using powerful magic to conceal that one is Evil is the kind of thing one does by accident, and I don't really think the Inquisitor Shawil got it wrong. The Inquisitor Shawil knew the hearts of every person in the convention hall though he didn't tell me all of them because he says this committee should be focused on the worst problems, not every bad person we find. But you're a noble. You hold power, or are supposed to inherit it. And you're Evil and you're hiding it. Why?"
"... I, uh, think that you might be misunderstanding something, Select?" she says, looking rather more like a scared child than a powerful evil sorceress. "I'm first circle. I know two first-circle spells and four cantrips. One of the spells is a ward and one of them puts people to sleep. I don't have any powerful magic."
"Well, then, you should go tell Inquisitor Shawil that he's misunderstood. I'll go with you so I can apologize to you once he's cleared it up."
" - I think I want to know why you asked the Count of Egorian to go around spying on people for you, and how!"
She had kind of forgotten to think of Aspexia del Mar as a noble rather than as a thirteen-year-old in really nice clothes. She thinks, or hopes, that she'd have given her less benefit of the doubt i she'd known.
Either way, she obviously trusts Valia way more. It's not like kids can't do things that are very Evil, and Valia is Valia.
Valia's now not entirely sure she's in the right but is only more stubborn as a result. "At the end of yesterday, we agreed to look for more means of checking who's Evil. Since the Pharasmins can't get everybody. And I thought, I bet an inquisitor would know, so I asked him."
She sings something quietly to herself, and then focuses.
"The how is obvious, given that it's not hard to see that abjuration spell you have up right now. And it's not endure elements."
"It's an abjuration spell," she says in the voice of someone who has never remotely considered anything to the contrary to be true. "It's safe. Abjurations are just wards, they don't hurt people."
"They can hide that you're Evil, though." Valia is assuming. She doesn't know all that much about magic. It would be kind of nice to have Ibarra, who does, except he's an insane murderer who just wants everyone to suffer, so better not to have him, really.
The noble is a pretty good actress. Dia can’t risk trying to bluff these people. If a 13 year old better at bluffing can’t get past them, Dia has no chance.
If you just refuse to trust Evil people at all you are safe against them convincing you that Evil things are fine actually!!!!
Time to earn some crediblity.
“Undetectable alignment is 2nd circle for clerics and would do the trick. Nondetection is 3rd for wizards and would also work, but then you couldn’t even see an abjuration is there.”
The tutoring from Estella has paid off.
"I don't know what it does," she says. "It's a ward. I put it up every morning and it lasts all day."
The other woman is also Evil! She's one of those they spotted this morning! Frustrating how they don't have anyone who both knows things about magic and isn't Evil. "Can you tell what spell she has up?" she asks the other Evil woman even though she can't trust the answer.
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