"Well, mistaken judgment, but a noble intent and a good instinct. ...I suppose the advice might have been right. Steering the constitution will affect a lot more than a hundred lives and souls, but it's hard to say how far one Splendid delegate can shift the ship. It's possible you'll be allowed the chance to keep trying, but it doesn't look good. Only the gods can say whether this was all so inevitable that it was wrong to accept the chance to try.

...You would have been fine in Kintargo. The Silver Ravens would take you under their wings the minute you let them, or Shensen and Lord Rexus Victocora, who organized the rebellion-in-waiting for me before the Ravens were raised. I am dearly fond of all of them, but they're all much more like you than me, except maybe Rexus."

Oh. It hurts, somehow, to learn that the next-best plan thrown out by worried people in Pezzack was not an equally doomed one but would have gone well. She nods, bites her lip just slightly. "Well. Maybe I'll visit sometime, if you wouldn't mind, if - other things work out."

"I would be delighted. And I hope I can visit Pezzack and see Abrogail II in the original house, with or without Shensen - she's an opera singer as well."

"We rebuilt it. Without Pezzack being the capital of the archduchy there aren't really enough rich people for it to not be silly having a whole fancy operahouse but we rebuilt it anyway. It's - I hope you like it." Now she misses home. She'd manage to have all these civil conversations about how maybe if the Queen is merciful she'll be exiled without missing home but now she misses home.

Jilia smiles. "I'd do the same. Even if it hadn't been their target. You can't not rebuild the heart of your city, if you love it. I hope we can get you home to it in due time."

"Would you pardon your - Silver Ravens, Archduchess, if they got hundreds of people killed?"

"It depends much on how, to my understanding of codes of just law. Ignorance is never a perfect excuse, but they wouldn't have it at all, they've made their mistakes and learned their lessons before my time." Unless it was starting a rebellion, which would be more uncertain even for them, but goes beyond what she'd be able to have any discretion for. "So for most causes I wouldn't. More accidental causes, I might look for a lesser sentence, even if not a pardon. But, I admit, most of the resurrected nobles are probably less inclined to be lenient than me. I got very, very sick of punishments running a city under Asmodean law."

"I have never met a noble of any stripe who didn't put people to death for wildly smaller inconveniences and have found it puzzling how many people insist that it'll be fine. But I hope you're right."

"Many nobles are petty tyrants everywhere, I think, and under Infernal rule even more. But that's not how law is supposed to work, and the Queen is trying to do it right. There's hope. I might be wrong or she might give up on it, but there is hope."

"Thank you, Archduchess."

"I suppose there were a few more things from the riots. ...Hellknights. There were two locations attacked, the Order of the Chain's local house and Taranik House, where the Pyre and the other Hellknight delegates were fortified. Both went much like Ibarra, but the mobs were not as eager, so they attacked closer to the conjured rains and retreated faster. About two dozen dead between them, I believe, all from the mob. The Chain will have taken some as prisoners."

"I think one thing I didn't expect was that - it was very obvious to me who you'd stand a chance of killing if you tried and who you'd need a plan for, and it was not very obvious to the people of Westcrown."

"Someone who thought he was witty once said that a mob is as Wise as its most foolish member, divided by the number of people in it. When there isn't anyone leading it... That's not entirely wrong. I think joining a mob is like drinking heavily; makes you brave and foolish, because you feel like you can't be beaten."

"I think it is a virtue, to be willing to risk everything because the world is so unjust it should not stand a day longer. ...not the only virtue, though."

"Yes, and one of those virtues tyranny tries to stamp out the hardest. It needs to be tempered with good judgment, but it's important. ...One of the noble delegates, the Countess-Heiress whose grandfather is rumored to be undead, was attacked with her retainers. Few casualties on either side, and the retainers are being raised. A number of tieflings were caught out on the streets and hung, including at least one child. There were other mobs, but the rest were just opportunists, looting or pursuing grudges which had nothing to do with you or the pamphlets."

Valia considers everyone who was trying to do the right thing her responsibility, but has no particular sympathy for the common murderers. They were not mistakenly under the impression being a common murderer was a good idea. "Thank you."

"You're welcome. Are there any favors you'd like to ask of me, before I go?"

Please don't let them also hang everyone who trusted me - best obtained by shutting up.

"No, ma'am."

"Then I'll take my leave. You'll be a formidable force for Good with a few years of experience, Select Wain. I look forward to seeing it."

Valia with great effort takes it as the compliment she suspects it is intended as, instead of as more cruelty, and bows as the Archduchess leaves.

She bows back and departs.