... Is Fraga qualified to be their spokesman? He may be a good speaker but he is terrible at picking his quarrels.

"His Grace, I believe, makes several excellent points. This convention should not be purposefully slow, no, but unseemly haste is not the virtue of Heaven. Just as it is better to spend a week building a good roof that will keep out the rain rather than let in the storms, so too is it better to take the time to make good laws rather than bad ones."

Is the risk famines from slaves not working, or at least being disrupted in their work?  Thea doesn’t really care that much.  She needs to make sure Estella is still tight with her, but a famine would actually drive up the price of their little purify food and drink+restore corpse combo, so a famine would help the abbey’s finances.  And she has her unique spell from Irori to stretch food even without that.  And a famine from ending slavery can’t last that long, the slaves either starve themselves or figure out working in the fields as free people.

Pfff, asking the druid if she understands what it's like to have to survive outside without magical means. Yes, dumbass, she does, she lives in the woods and goes and gets her own food daily. The reliance on Goodberries is because she's spending most of her time at this convention; if left to her own devices she practices proper hunting, with a bow. Anyone that thinks a druid is disconnected with the fundamental realities of how one fights to survive is deluded and furthermore, stupid. Saying this isn't productive, though. The long-winded foreign nobleman speaks of the benefits of bondage to a bunch of people who all just suffered under the weight of the Lawful Evil god of slavery. There really isn't a point to arguing with him; he doesn't seem to understand the land he's found himself in, he's just trying to mold it into something he feels would be proper.

She writes his name down, though, as a note to herself. Fraga, was it? Yeah, gonna avoid that duchy with her Plant Growths...

"Delegate Ibarra worships all the ascended gods," says Delegate Ibarra, "and Ragathiel, and Calistria, and Gorum, and Abadar, and he would be overjoyed to make sermons praising Calistria if he thought this assembly would hear it with any real joy." He folds his arms, leans back as he looks down on the Duke. "But truly I will admit to being a plain-speaking villain and not hide behind the mask of virtue, as His Grace the Duke of Fraga does. I am Evil because I fought Asmodeus with every weapon at my disposal when all the silk-clad nobles from Taldor were keeping their hands clean and Norgorber was a god who helped me do it, and I see no reason to deny it to this room. And yet I despise slavery! Slavery is wicked, yes, slavery will damn the slaveowners, yes, slavery is condemned by all the good gods, yes, yes, yes - none of those are my reason. I personally object to slavery because many of the cleverest and best people I know - best by the standards my lord de Fraga claims he holds, not merely my standards, low and debased by my long life in Cheliax as they no doubt are - were born into slavery or into serfdom, and could never have reached the heights they hold now without the freedom to pursue their own path. Everything I have said this session is to the best of my knowledge true, but I don't want slavery abolished for the sake of all the old halflings regularly sacrificed with whatever excuse is used now that Asmodeus no longer provides one.

"I want it because it is a tragedy -" and here his voice is serious "- whenever any child, human or halfling, grows up poor, dressed in rags, forced to labor for another's benefit, when that child could become - an inventor, an innovator, a daring trader, a sacred bartender of Cayden Cailean, a crusader at the Worldwound - an archmage. I want it for the utterly selfish reason that it is a tragedy a man grows up poor and frightened and weak when he could be someone I could talk to."

"And this is a tragedy the Taldane delegate wishes to make perpetual," he says, fire rising in his voice. "He intends to delay and equivocate and speak words of calm, measured reason, and every day the fine slaves of Fraga will make fortune after fortune for their masters, and he excuses it to us all by claiming he'll have a solution tomorrow. No solution tomorrow. Pass the bill. I call for a vote for cloture!"

Oh, this is going to be good.

She's not going to second and anger Fraga more. That would gain her nothing. Someone else will second.

"I second the vote for cloture." Sorry, Your Grace, but we need time to vote on slander after this, and you're not winning this fight.

Wait is Ibarra not an outright Norgorber cultist?  Is secondary worship of evil Gods tolerated in Good countries?  Fernando isn’t sure… it would at least it mean agreeing with him isn’t quite that bad and explain why the Queen hasn’t removed him?

Thank good, one of the nobles seconded it. Enric really didn’t want to have to officially agree with the evil wizard. He’d do it but then he wouldn’t be able to say anything on the floor again without it having ‘evil wizard’ attached. He’s starting to understand these things.

Apology accepted. He believes no fight is hopeless, but not everyone has his confidence.

Some day a cloture vote will fail but this is not to be the day.

The paladin and the important nobles gave them all the right answer last week. For.

For. 

The Queen is holding the ports hostage. Surely no one will be stupid enough to vote no.

She’s kinda confused about a lot of stuff that was said

But the normal people like Enric seem to be in favor. For.

Conradí doesn't see how banning slavery helps him at all. Plus, if this fails and there's another big fight, maybe the mask guy will come up with more funny insults, those were the best part of this whole thing. Against.

Easiest aspect of the loyalty test continues to be easy.  For.

For, and may the righteous gods guide the Slavery Committee to a reasonable plan for what to do next.

She doesn’t personally care either way, and the anonymity of the vote means appearing loyal doesn’t matter, but Irori probably hates slavery.  For.

If anyone was in doubt of her vote, they were not paying attention. For, obviously.

It's a bill he proposed to the floor, created by members of his committee. For.

At least they're just starting with the halflings. He doesn't care about the halflings, he cares about the mines. But the longer they are bogged down with halflings, the longer the mines have to replace their workforce with convicts and such. Against.

Antoni personally would just as well keep slavery legal, but he expects this will pass either way, and there's always a chance someone will read his mind. For.

Ysabet doesn't really see why she should care either way. Abstain.