Ester was there on time and has been putting her feet up and knitting herself socks.

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.

And a smiling nobleman enters!

“Hello everyone!”

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?"

Blink blink blink. "- Why I'm what?"

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.

"...why are you casting a spell on yourself if you don't know what it does?"

" - Because it's an abjuration! Abjurations are safe!"

"That doesn't make sense!"

"I can try to identify the spell for sure, but I've only been getting tutoring in spellcraft and arcana for the past half a year.  I'm going to cast detect magic now."

She casts carefully and methodically, then waits the 3 rounds for it to come into focus.

"It's an abjuration... I really don't have the skill to tell anything else about it though."

And it would take too long to fetch Estella, and she really doesn't want her around such a volatile situation.

Quirze has a brilliant idea!

"I have a spell that gives a temporary Aura of Good.  If someone has Detect Good, we could tell if it's an Undetectable Alignment by if you can't see the Aura of Good from my spell!"

He's not Evil! Let's go with his idea! "Great idea, thank you, why don't you try that. ...does anyone have Detect Good?"

Two. Spells.

"You really need to give us homework that calls for spells before dawn, girlie."

"I'm sorry, ma'am," says Valia. "I wasn't expecting the Inquisitor to tell us there were two secret Evil people on our committee. It's not even a very big committee."

"I don't have detect good either. I'm pretty sure she's lying, though, since there aren't very many abjurations that last all day and don't have obvious tells - either from how you cast them or what they do - and thus she'd just be able to say what spell it was. It could be fastidiousness or waterproof, but we can check those by her pouring some water on herself and watching."

Time to show she can be an ally!

"Tomorrow I can spare a slot for detect good if you need it.  It might be wise to know potential allies just as well as..." she can't say enemies "people you have cause to be cautious of.  And then we could confirm or rule out if the spell is an undetectable alignment for sure with the nobleman's spell?"

"One of the other people on the rights committee said that it's almost impossible to fool Abadar's Truthtelling, that Delegate Ibarra might've even been lying it's so rare, and he knows more about magic than me and didn't show up as Evil so I think he'd know. You could pay for an Abadar's Truthtelling and say that you aren't Evil and really don't know what the spell did and haven't been hiding your alignment on purpose?"

"I am not going to buy a spell because you have all suddenly gone crazy! This is ridiculous!" Does nobody in this room think she's innocent?

"...If you're really innocent we could pay you back after?"

"I don't think you're going to say I'm innocent, I think you're going to find some ridiculous excuse! I know two spells! They're both first-circle! I am THIRTEEN!"  And having some trouble controlling her emotions!

That sure sounds like she can’t fool a truth spell and would be caught lying.

This feels kind of mean, and not very good, but also a truth telling should clear it up?

"We could all pitch in a few silvers up front.  The stipend has been pretty good in my opinion?"

And to try to be Good about it.

"And apologize for the caution afterwards... and agree on the questions beforehand and only ask those agreed on.  I'm sorry about the fact that many people like myself read evil... and make caution warranted."

Some genuine sympathy shows in her voice.

It would seem like a good suggestion except the woman who proposed it is...also Evil!!!

"- I know what I'll do. I'll fetch Blai. He's a cleric of Iomedae but he's third circle and ran a Worldwound fort and I bet he knows what to do in this situation."

Aspexia will huff, turn around and go look at the wall angrily while they go fetch Blai.

"Blai?"

"- yes?"

"The committee on combating diabolism is trying to figure out if one of the delegates is Evil or not and we don't know enough about magic and I was hoping you could help us."

"I... did prepare Detect Evil but would be surprised if you didn't."

"I did but I used it earlier. That's not the thing. She has another spell up. She claims it's just a protective spell but the Inquisitor said it conceals Evil. Do you know anything about that?"

"I don't know of a spell that specifically conceals Evil but there's one demons sometimes have, Undetectable Alignment, I know what it looks like."

"Can you check if that's what she has?"

"Yes."

She beams at him. "Thank you. Also if you have any advice on what we should do if she is Evil - she's very young, or appears to be -"

"- sortition or noble or, uh, precocious? I haven't seen a lot of sortitioned children so I was assuming they were excluded..."

"She's a noblewoman." Valia starts guiding him back towards her committee-room. "Or she appears to be! Maybe she's a hag in disguise!"

"Well, if she's a noblewoman I'd talk to her liege about it, probably, before doing anything else. If she's a hag... I guess it depends whether the archmages intended on inviting a hag or if that's a surprise to them."

"I think Elie Cotonnet is insane," says Valia to Blai. She got her first close look at him during her speech and he reminded her more than anything of a man who hadn't been quite right in the head ever since he came home to all ten of his children put to death by the Asmodeans on the front lawn of his home.

And now they're back at the committee!

Blai nods politely to everyone, even the possibly evil thirteen year old, and Detects Magic.

After a few rounds of concentration, he confirms: "That's Undetectable Alignment."

Someone powerful enough to read (and thus need an Undetectable Alignment) at the age of 13 must be extremely capable.  Dia would like to be friends, except the person is probably dangerous. 

…Or they might be someone or something else entirely different in disguise.  She eyes the door in case they are about to go down fighting.

Or she could genuinely not know what it does? Has anyone considered that?

... She's going to run away crying now, that seems like an appropriate strategic decision.

Valia is vindicated in her never listening to people who are making convincing sounding arguments but are Evil policy. "Select, does this spell protect against anything other than people noticing you're Evil?"

"It prevents you from reading as any alignment at all, so it would also hide Chaos, Law, or Good." They were mostly looking for Chaos, at the fort.

"Okay. But it doesn't also protect against anything else? So if you're just a thirteen year old there's no reason at all to have it up?"

"I'd want to talk to her liege, it's not impossible she's hiding Chaos from someone known to be zealously Lawful. But it's strange for a thirteen-year-old to read at all. It usually took more than a year of combat service at the Wound for people to begin to be legible."

"Thank you. Do you want to go talk to her liege or should this committee follow up on that?"

"I don't mind accompanying you but I think you have more context than I."

"All right. We should do that...later, then, since this committee started late. All right. Next order of business is, I guess, Delegate Iroria?" Who is also Evil. Why do Evil people even want to be on Valia's committee. 

“I have information to share with this committee on 4 Lawful Evil Hellish Demigods collectively known as the Queens of Night.”

She begins to hand out sheets of paper with information written on them.

"Can someone who can read read this aloud, please?"

“I can read it.”

And Thea reads off information about Ardad Lili, Doloras, Eiseth, and Mahathallah, including titles, epithets, anathemas, edicts, common worshippers, domains, and areas of concern.

(Possibly notably to Victoria, Eiseth (and to a lesser extend Ardad Lili) is noted for helping woman claim their desires and brutally avenge all insults.  But Thea doesn't place any special emphasis on this.)

"I can elaborate more on Eiseth.  She formerly operated a cult in Cheliax, likely centered in Westcrown dating back to before Aroden's death.  I don't actually know her cult to have left Cheliax as opposed to abandoning Westcrown."

Hopefully it isn't a faux paus to accidentally draw attention to illiteracy?  Select of Iomedae should be too humble to be bothered by it.  Although it seems like with almost a year since things calmed down after the Four Day War she should have started to try to learn?

"If all of this is true, I definitely think it's worth avenging the wrongs done by these some cults. Apart from, like, 'aiding women who have been unfairly maligned,' that seems fine, but if this isn't a trick I assume they're not just doing that, that's not Evil." 'Avenging all insults' sounds like an Asmodean euphemism for hurting people lower-rank than you, not like getting revenge on people who deserve it. "...Is there someone who can confirm that that isn't Evil? Or would you be willing to tell us under an Abadar's Truthtelling that none of this is a trick?"

"I can promise this isn't a trick under Abadar's Truthtelling yes.  Will the committee members split the cost with me?  I can answer other questions if we can agree to them in advance!"

Friends and allies.  Lawful Good is supposed to be capable of that.

"And yes, I would like if you had some time later after the committee to help me understand Calitria's teachings, understanding the distinctions seems important to me."

Even Evil people ought to be able to tell the government about Evil cults! "I can pay some money towards an Abadar's Truthtelling. I don't know how much it'll be. Abadarans change their prices, and I only have the money they give delegates."

"Those entities all exist and are Powers of Hell and I do not recognize any inaccuracies in their descriptions but I have no specific knowledge about followers of theirs or their operations."

"That's promising at least though that that much is true, since they probably didn't know you'd be here to verify it."

"My understanding is Truthtelling requires extensive measures to overcome, and outright absurd measures to overcome in a way not beatable by moderate skill at spellcraft, knowledge at arcana, and a detect magic.  I think two or three silvers from each of us ought to pay for it and I'm easily willing to pay that much to see my information used to hunt these cults hunted down."

Why does the Evil person want her to teach her about Calistria?

"I... guess I can try to explain them to you later... but I'm not an expert or anything. ...And I'm not going anywhere alone with you."

She'd offer to help but it's not like she could do anything if it was a trap, she doesn't know that Iroria would beat her but she could definitely do it with help.

"Perhaps do it in the convention hall? The archmage's protection ought to be good for that, at least."

She's paranoid, but Thea can't blame her after dealing with Dia's paranoia.

"I think your understanding of your own nature and what made Calistria pick you would give me insight into Calistria.  Irori encourages learning from many sources of wisdom.  And yes, I'm happy to meet in a visibly public place, the convention hall is fine."

She smiles warmly at the paranoia.  This Calistrian seems sensible, even if for the moment it isn't to Thea's advantage.

In that case the committee will go and find an Abadaran to confirm all the things she said about evil cults.

"If there is anything else any of you want to ask, it is likely fine with me, but I want to agree on the questions in advance, no extra questions sprung at the last moment while the spell's duration is going."

Jaume is charging eighteen silver for a Truthtelling today.

"—before we have him cast the spell, are you willing to say that you haven't, like, burned down a house full of kids who did nothing wrong, or anything like that?"

"I want to ask if you have killed any innocent people."

Some insane part of her is tempted to volunteer that she has killed innocent people. She is not going to do that. She's not doing anything. She's extremely unclear on why she even bothered to be here.

She was reassured by the Archmage's words on day 1 and she reread the relevant decrees last night, so she will tell them the truth without asking for a lawful agreement restricting how they will use that information.

"Yes.  When I was an acolyte of the Sisterhood of Eiseth I killed two people that would be considered innocent by most definitions.  I killed a sparring partner on accident.  Our instructors regularly commanded us to push our sparring to the point that immediate healing was needed for the worse fighter to survive afterwards, and I got a lucky blow to the head in at the same time an instructor was a bit slow with healing.  The other kill was at the orders of the Sisterhood of Eiseth.  My orders were described to me at the time as executing a minor criminal, but in hindsight I think it likely the only clear crime of the person I killed was vagrancy, and the intent was to ensure my discipline, ruthlessness, and resolve as opposed to a lawful purpose of society.  I regret causing both deaths now, and understand doing so was evil, and also even of questionable lawfulness."

There is some genuine sorrow clear in her voice as she mentions the sparring partner, but her voice becomes monotone as she finishes reciting her crimes.

"If you need more details I can give them before the truth telling so we aren't at risk of running out of time on it."

Valia actually has...no idea what to do with that. One impulse is that the woman was the victim of the cult and is trying to bring it down. The other is that you could say things like that and also have another dozen murders behind the curtain you aren't sorry for - well, she can ask that - "Are those the only instances?"

“Yes.”  She says without hesitation.

Well. It's not that it's okay, but the woman knows it's not okay, and - the Asmodeans induced people to do Evil things to try to damn them. She knew that already. "You're - trying to set it right, by warning us about the cult and destroying them so they can't hurt any more innocent people?"

"...I think I don't want to explain Calistria to you anymore. Delegate Ibarra said he was a Calistrian but he was using it to take vengeance on innocent people, not just people who deserved it. ...Also I want to make sure the wording about you not trying to trick us is really tight but I don't know how to do that."

And — there's probably no one out there seeking justice for the vagrant she murdered — why are all the obviously Evil people so much stronger than her — that's not an excuse —

Her chest feels like it's on fire. People shouldn't be able to just murder innocent people and then stand there telling you about it and get away with it.

”I admit I personally want revenge on the cult, and want to ensure they aren’t in a position to come back to kill me or the other former acolytes, but protecting others is my next most important motive.”

Hopefully revenge doesn’t sound too questionable as a motive with a Calistrian right there… except she’s turning against Thea.  Thea is hurt by this a lot more than she expected.

“I’m not sure how or if you expect to promote your Gods teachings without explaining them to people that want to learn.”

Thea tries to keep the irritation out of her voice.  She’ll leave the question about truthtelling wordings open.

"......if you can say under the Abadar's Truthtelling that you're only going to use it to take revenge on evil cultists who deserve it, and aren't going to decide that actually revenge means burning down houses full of children, or other Evil things like that, don't only say the houses full of children thing, I'll explain them to you." While also trying to figure out whether she can deal with Thea, but she's not going to say that part out loud.

Only going to use the information she gives them?  She just listed two other motives!  Oh wait, she means the Calistrian teachings.

”My primary intent in learning Calistria's teaching is to understand the dividing line between Evil and Neutral in seeking revenge, but I don't mean to tread that line in practice, in the long run I want to aim for Lawful Good, I figure overshooting is better than undershooting on that alignment axis.  So yes, I can swear to only practically apply the teachings of Calistria I learn from you in taking revenge on evil people who deserve it, and I'll add I will only do so if I believe is it likely to make the world better in some way, and I will only do so if I can prevent harm from my actions to bystanders, including children as bystanders automatically.  Does that wording suffice? I'm fine working on the wording more, I'm not actually used to Asmodean contractual wordings, the SIsterhood of Eiseth preferred other evils, but I'd won't swear a carelessly worded oath."

"...does that sound like a reasonable wording to everyone else or does that sound like something a diabolist would say to trick people."

"I...think it sounds pretty reasonable. ...do you still worship or venerate or act on behalf of any power of Hell?"

“No.”  Again she says this firmly without hesitation.

"Then yeah I think I'm happy with that wording."

She looks around the room at the other committee members.

He’s not even officially voted on to the committee yet!  It sounds fine to him! (Although it is well short of the nuance and conditionals Axiomites will often include in their oaths, it’s fine by living mortal standards).  So he gives a brief nod.

"...Can you add a part about Evil powers to the part about powers of Hell? It turns out there are Evil gods who don't live in any of the lower planes."

“I do not worship or venerate or act on behalf of any power that is Evil, or any power that resides in Hell, Abaddon, the Abyss, or Xovaikain.”

She takes a moment to consider her words.

“I don’t know of any other evil outer planes, but if you do, you can add them.”

That's more of them than Valia knew of! She thought there were three.

And all of that checks out under a Truth Spell?

If they're ready for him to cast it now.

Thea’s ready, but she doesn’t want to interrupt any last minute ideas, so long as they get them said before the actual casting.

She hasn't thought of any more ideas.

"Abadar's Truth."

"Everything I told you is true to the best of my knowledge.  My primary motivations in presenting this information was to get revenge against the Sisterhood of Eiseth, protect other former acolytes of them, and to protect people in general from them.   My intent with learning from delegate Ferrer was to understand Calistria and the boundaries between Evil and Neutral in revenge and it was an intellectual understanding I was after.  I swear to only practically apply the teachings of Calistria I learn from delegate Ferrer in taking revenge on evil people who deserve it, and I swear I will only take revenge using these teaching I learn if I believe is it likely to make the world better in some way, and I swear if I do so if I will prevent harm from my actions to bystanders, counting children as bystanders.  I do not worship or venerate or act on behalf of any power that is Evil, or any power that resides in Hell, Abaddon, the Abyss, or Xovaikain."

She speaks swiftly but smoothly to get it all spoken within the spell's duration.  She remembers a few more minor thing while the spell's duration is still going.

"This isn't a trick.  And the written information I gave you is accurate to the best of my knowledge.  Sorry, almost forgot to mention written as well as spoken."

The truth spell does not waver.

"All right. I'll call a committee vote, I guess, to add addressing the cults of the Queens of Hell to our mandate?"

The truth spell wears off

"Thank you, I'd appreciate that.  I wasn't actually planning on asking to join, since that was my main concern."  And since Dia thinks this committee will be politically toxic one way or another.

"All in favor of figuring out how to address this cult, and I guess any cults we learn of like it, as part of this committee's work?"

“In favor. I think dealing with the worship of infernal demigods is obviously going to be included in our job anyway and I see no reason to stop at the archdevils and leave things half finished.”

"In favor." Murdering innocent people doesn't stop being bad just because you're doing it for some other Evil god.

"All righty."

Sure.

Can she LEAVE this ROOM yet

"In favor."

"Looks like we all agree, then?" Can the murderer please leave now.

“There was one other small thing it occurred to me tell you all (well Valia in particular), but I don’t know you would trust it coming from me, and we already used one truth spell.”

Now, how to politely say some people are misunderstanding Valia and think she is planning on starting and leading a mob…

"Why didn't you tell us before the truth spell, so that we could've verified it?" (Because she's Evil and lying, obviously.)

“I already used nearly the full minute of the spell and covered all the important things.”

Now Thea is actually getting irritated.  She thought she had earned some trust but apparently not.  Or maybe chaos sucks at cooperating and Nuria and Tetula were exceptions?  She glances at Valia.

"If you'd said it before the spell then when you said that everything you told us was true as far as you know it would've been covered under 'everything'!"

“I didn’t think of it then because I didn’t think of it as that important.”

But now she’s wondering if Dia was right and this committee is a lay-inquisition* about to happen.

She turns to leave.  Hopefully Delegate Ferrer will still explain Calistria to her later.

(* Golarion equivalent of the phrase witch-hunt)

“If nobody else has an urgent matter to cover, I should like to hold a vote on inviting Lord Aspramunt to join the committee. I believe we there is always something to benefit from hearing from more voices, and having spoken with him I expect that to be all the more true here.”

And more importantly it gets them a noble that isn’t the archduke - who didn’t even show up today yet, praise be to Lady Shelyn - or the evil heiress.

“Hi everyone!”

He’ll hold off on defending his honor until the Calistrian actually attacks him.  He doesn’t have any abjurations up so he should be fine?

She's visibly unhappy with the idea of adding another nobleman to the committee but not enough to actively protest.

"I think it depends on the voices, probably? It wouldn't be good if we were still listening to Delegate Ibarra. But as long as he's trying to actually help the committee and isn't secretly Evil it's probably fine."

“The only agenda I have is supporting those that fought against the Asmodeans!”

"—Just to check, you mean supporting people who fought against them in good ways, like the Pezzack rebels or people who took out their village's priest, and not people who did things like burning down houses full of children because their parents were vaguely connected to Asmodeus, right?"

"The people of the West Hills of Aspramunt were unusually disciplined in overthrowing their baron, I've even heard his children still live!  But that would already be covered by the Queen's amnesty.  The issue I speak of... they were slow to receive the news of the Queen's victory, and have been turning back travelers and government officials who have tried to pass through the land even after the amnesty.  I don't yet know them to have killed any innocent travelers," -not that he has good information in the first place- "but it would be an unusual display of discipline for them to have avoided any deaths in the process of defending themselves from bandits and remaining Asmodeans in the manner they did.  I was hoping the amnesty could be extended for isolated villages slow to take the news.  It would make negotiating with them to bring them back into the proper order much easier if I could guarantee they wouldn't be punished for... accidents... that may have happened in the course of securing their land."

He needs to appeal to the Calistrian.  Perhaps reminding her of the other nobles involved?

"And of course, the duke neighboring me and the archduke above me might want to insist on me punishing the west hill villages for their slowness to recognize the return of the proper order, and I would like a firm legal standing to go against that if needed."

Blink blink. She feels some sort of way about them sparing the baron's children. Maybe they hadn't had time to do anything bad yet. You shouldn't hurt innocent people, even if they're nobleborn, and probably a young enough noble could still be innocent.

"I definitely don't think people should be punished for defending themselves against bandits and Asmodeans! I just wanted to be sure you weren't going to, like, start defending Delegate Ibarra."

"He's the person denounced in the Select's speech, right?  I can imagine how hatred and-" don't say a desire for revenge, it will offend her "-a need to strike back against Asmodeus might lead someone into Evil, but no I don't defend it.  You could talk to the elected delegate Sefora if you have more detailed concerns about the West Hills rebellion in particular?  She's the leader of the rebels of the West Hills, and I think she has a clearer picture of exactly how the peasant rebels there have comported themselves."

Pointing the Avenger at Sefora is either a really good idea or a really bad one... maybe he should have thought over in more detail how he is going to handle Sefora.

He's very prettily spoken. Her husband was like that when they were young.

"I guess we should probably vote?" she says, when no one else says anything to the new nobleman. "I abstain."

"We need some noble, right? This one seems fine."

"All in favor?" She looks around the room. "All right, Quirze, you're in. Was there anything else anyone wanted to get to today?"

"I was hoping we could discuss the idea I brought up this morning — uh, for context, Delegate Quirze, this morning Valia got us all together and told us that Delegate Ibarra and Delegate del Mar were secretly Evil and using magic to hide it, and then he walked in on us and gave a speech about how he burns down houses full of children, and he said there were lots of people in the city who could have told us how Evil he was. Anyways, basically, I was thinking that probably there's lots of people who are really obviously Evil, where everyone who knows them knows they've murdered innocent people or forced themselves on women or had innocent people tortured for fun, and we should set up some way that anyone in the city can come to us and tell us — the delegates know where to find us, but not everyone does. We'd obviously need to check to make sure that diabolists weren't just making up lies about innocent people, but I think it could help a lot. ...I think I explained it better the first time but that's the basic idea."

"I don't want to promise things for the Church of Iomedae but I'd like it if we could take reports about really Evil people and I think the other priests would be all right with it as long as we reported them instead of killing them ourselves. So it doesn't fix everything, it doesn't fix anything the Queen doesn't want to fix, but - the rest of the Church thinks she wants to fix everything and just doesn't know about all the most awful stuff people are still doing."

“That sounds like a wise combination of handling things Lawfully and dealing with remaining Asmodeanism, Select.”

There, that should signal his position on this committee appropriately.

"If it turns out that there's, like, a super Evil noble running around hurting people that the Queen doesn't care about because she likes them or something, I wouldn't want to say we can't do anything about it." (She missed the implications of the reference to an 'amnesty' earlier and has not yet heard an explanation of what it means from any of her other committees.) "I think it's more important to be Good than Lawful, I honestly didn't realize it was possible for someone in Cheliax to be both at once until I met Valia. But I definitely think it's fine to try bringing things to the Queen first, and it'll only be an issue if the Queen secretly wants Evil people to be in charge."

"If the Queen isn't a just ruler and is letting Evil people get away with awful things because she doesn't care then it would be right to rebel against her but we ought to give her a chance first, the people who have been following things think she's been doing the best she can so far. And if that's wrong, we'll want them on our side and they won't side with us without proof anyways."

Nod nod. "That makes sense to me."