"I think among our demands should be the return of public executions, and for serious crimes like inciting riots I don't think anyone should be offered the Final Blade. These people are savages and when they see these modern executions they don't see mercy, they see weakness and nothing to fear."

"I am skeptical our gloriously merciful queen will permit this, Your Excellency." Elias says.

"Mercy is a virtue, in its proper place, but too much can quickly turn into vice, and leave even its beneficiaries worse off. The Queen is wise, and surely doesn't wish for further unrest in her city. ...I do expect her to object to the proposal to deny criminals the Final Blade. But public executions seem like a very reasonable step, and even if some receive the Final Blade in the end we could still administer lesser, non-fatal punishments beforehand, with severity increasing as the crime does."

"Oh, certainly, Your Excellency."

"I find that I doubt anyone was ever encouraged to crime out of the belief that hard labor, necessarily faraway and nonpublic, would be a lenient sentence, and wonder if it might be underused. It at least does concrete good to someone somewhere."

"The problem with non-fatal punishments is the other archmage, Naima, who doesn't seem to care in the slightest who she heals. Removing a hand for theft is hardly a punishment if they'll have it back by the weekend for a dollar. Sending them off to the mines or to dig a canal might help repay the debt to society of lesser cases, though. I agree on the public executions, there's nothing Asmodean about a headsman's axe and seeing it in action will certainly give some second thoughts."

It costs more than a dollar but with considerable gnashing of teeth Jaume has learned that people use numbers like that figuratively.

It is time for the first course! This one is an old Chelish recipe, Fideuà. Prawn and fish in noodles, cooked in a large flat pan. Each seating place has its own, so the guests don't have to share; the remains will be given to the servants, and any further remains to beggars. This is a house of abundance.

Felip gives a quick prayer to the major goodly Gods; Iomedae for courage, Sarenrae for compassion, Erastil for plenty, Desna for luck, Milani for hope, Shelyn for love. He looks at Isidonia during the last bit.

Waiting, over here, for this to conclude in a way that isn't an obvious snub?

"Fiducia, will you bless us as well? I merely look up to the heavens, but you must shine brightly in the eyes of Abadar for him to empower you so."

That's satisfactory. "Abadar, please guide our hands and the coins they hold to prosperous uses."

"Amen." (To all of it, in context.)

With the blessing concluded, they can dig in and conversation can resume.

"This Zone of Truth idea sounds promising. I don't recall a similar trick in Mendev, but if something like it can be done we can easily separate the sheep from the wolves and keep the people of Westcrown safe. But this city sees many visitors; surely we will not consider all of them criminals, or force all entry to the city to one lane."

"Anyone who arrives from now on obviously wasn't a participant in the rioting, and given that the port is closed any current visitors who were can hardly leave until we've had time to check them. As long as we keep the soldiers in the streets to prevent a second such night, I hardly see why foreigners would be much of an issue."

"How do we tell which residents have marched through the lane, which have newly arrived, and which have not yet proved their innocence? If we could somehow mark the whole city, and then wash clean the innocent, that would manage it."

"If we're worried about innocent foreigners being mistaken for criminals, we could give them Arcane Marks as well, distinguishable from those used to mark innocent citizens of Westcrown."

"Adding any steps to entering the city and conducting business here is costly. I do not say not worth it, but in need of more careful assessment before being declared so."

"Arcane Marks only last a few weeks on people. This is a temporary measure to restore order, not something we need to impose long-term." Gods willing, anyway.

"It also may dent smuggling, if only customs offices issue the mark, and wizards at the lane check for residency papers."

He gestures, and now his napkin bears a crimson imprint of the ducal signet of Fraga inside a triangle, for he is Felip the third.

"It leaves the problem that an arcane mark is the personal logo of a wizard or sorcerer, available to any novice. Will we have a registry of which marks are valid, and spend trusted wizards at the gates and ports who will not fall to simple bribes, when currently lettered soldiers are enough?"

He nods in agreement again. Cerdanya has proven quite the sensible fellow.

"Certainly I would be wary of making it a long term plan. But if we must do it for a month, to deal with the rioters... I think it is a price Westcrown can pay, and rather a pittance compared to half the city burning down because we sent the message that arson was acceptable. And if we have the zone of truth up anyway, we can march the wizards through it a few times to ensure they've been following the rules."

"Dear Conde, if someone participated in the riots, and then walked out of the city and re-entered, would they get the visitor's mark, and thus be presumed innocent, even though they had murdered someone?"

"Ideally we would not let them leave, but as excellent as Ser Cansellarion's troops are at their job I'm not certain even they can fully police every entrance and egress. Instead, perhaps we ought to not assume that all visitors are innocent unless they arrive by ship, and accept that some few will still escape the net."

Elias observes that Count Acevedo is fantastically ignorant of all aspects of how a city functions. Interesting.

"It seems logistically difficult to effectively bar all land travel into the city, and we'd lose any trader who didn't come by ship or teleport. If it's only for a few weeks, better to watch as many of the exits as we can. Some criminals will escape, and I'd prevent that if I could, but I'm not sure that measures that extreme would be worth the cost."