Carissa Sevar is a third circle wizard now, which permits her extra ribbons on her uniform, entitles her to hurt enlisted men if they strike her from across the room as standing there disrespectfully, and otherwise entitles her mostly to more work. She does Detect Thoughts surveillance with all of her second circle spells and Endure Elements with all of her first circle spells and is commanded in preparing Dispel Magics at third should they be needed, and she spends most of her time crafting.

Carissa Sevar is, unknown to her, really remarkably good at crafting. It's not just that she's faster than other people; she can also do things that weren't in the assignment, and she can duplicate anything she's seen, which means that she should be permitted to see any really good gear possessed by anyone coming through Fort #11, and then told to make it. Carissa Sevar's last commander sized her up as someone who might think too highly of herself, if she learned that this was not a particularly usual ability, and so left a note in her personnel folder to the effect that she should be set impossible deadlines and punished for not meeting them, with complaints to the effect that most crafting wizards can handle the pace fine, and that she ought to be systematically lied to about the expectations and expected performance in her role, and that if handled appropriately she'll generate a lot of excess revenue for her superiors. Also they should make some excuse to not let her out at the end of her third term of service.

Commander Artigas thinks it's kind of stupid to station crafters at the Wound at all, though being able to duplicate things she's seen is a good excuse; but that's not really the angle from which it is commanded that he criticize this situation. She can be assigned a number of training exercises that theoretically leave her eight hours to craft in and another eight to sleep. He can assume aloud when presented with a finished item to issue somebody that she would probably have wrecked half the spellsilver if she'd tried to be on time. This one is sluggish about resizing, is he supposed to find a unit where everyone has the exact same size hands in case they need to pass the sword around in a live combat situation? Marqués got the commander's personal chainmail done in three-quarters the time it took her to make this set.

He doesn't actually have her tortured though so he can't be that dissatisfied. She does fine with eight hours of duties on top of crafting. She reads everybody's minds and reports them for thinking disallowed things including that the fort commander is soft. She only has the enlisted soldiers punished for disrespect if they're particularly annoying. She churns out a great many magic items; her superiors will indeed grow rich by her efforts. She knows she isn't going to make fourth circle; third was a stroke of lucky, really, a week-long siege of her last fort during which all her spells went to actual fighting. Usually things don't go badly enough for her to need to use her Dispel Magics, and crafting's only dangerous if you're even more careless than she is.

"If by my purported softness I encourage actual misbehavior I will punish that. If instead I save time and Cure spells then I improve the margin on our collective survival, at least until a misplaced workshop wizard who can't read the list of meaningfully disloyal thoughts insists on wasting the time saved. Or this is an attempt to determine by personal investigation what I do when provoked, Sevar?"

"No, sir."

"I am sure you can eke out some fraction of the progress you should have made on that bow today if you run along."

(He is soft, though. And apparently you're allowed to think so.)

He doesn't have many more troublemakers than most forts, but maybe he's accomplishing this by swapping people around, which he does slightly more frequently than her last commander. He writes and sends a lot of letters, sometimes goes on patrols himself, shows up to training exercises on occasion to supervise or practice. At one point he has questions about what she could get Selective Alarm to do if he requisitioned her a scroll to copy.

Magic experiments!

...she is a responsible person and will find the time to look into it if the scroll becomes available.

(The point of torturing people isn't deterrence from wrongdoing, or at least that's only one point of torture. The other point is that it makes people stronger, like how fighting and getting hurt makes people stronger, like how Hell makes people stronger. But he's a priest of Asmodeus, so presumably knows that, and just doesn't want them to be stronger.)

No one has ever actually evinced to him the opinion that torturing people makes them stronger except in the sense that if you do it just right you can make them into priests of Asmodeus.

He will get her the scroll if she thinks she can make it twig to demons even if those demons are in disguise.

She has never in her life said 'no I can't do that with magic' and doesn't intend to start now.




She can, it happens, make it twig to demons. 

They get another reassignment; the new senior wizard for the fort is a terrifically cruel man who goes after her at once, as the only woman on the staff that he's entitled to and that no one else is, and her quality of work suffers, though not all that noticeably.

"Sevar, your already dismal timeliness has deteriorated. Have the kitchens confused you with someone who isn't allowed to eat this week?"

Damn it if she's also going to be punished for being late by the fort commander then she's going to be more behind tomorrow - no excuses. This wouldn't even be a problem if she'd been good at her job in the first place. "No, sir."

"Enchantment by lurking cultists? Sheer laziness? A morbid fascination with what I'm doing to people in my quarters? I do not give you assignments because I am indifferent to their completion."

We are all worthless before Asmodeus but he exerts himself to claim us anyway. We are all worthless before Asmodeus but he exerts himself to claim us anyway. 

He could let her drop the hour she's obliged to spend jogging up the stairs and back down, if he wants her work done faster, but she likes all of her limbs and will not mention it. "There is no excuse for the delay, sir."

"Then get back to work at best speed, or at least your top speed that doesn't spend lost materials in addition to patience."

The problem is that Carissa's new boyfriend thinks it's funny if she doesn't have enough time to complete her work and is accordingly in the poor graces of their commander, so getting faster doesn't even help. Also she's sneaking a second-circle spell which is supposed to be for duties for Alter Self once a week (just pretending she did the mindreading and not doing it), and is definitely going to get in trouble for that at some point.

She finishes an incredibly elaborate sword which bites demons with both holy fire and demon-specific hostility that she saw on a paladin once. 

"Congratulations, Sevar, it's only two weeks behind schedule. In the event that the man it's meant for hasn't been eaten in the intervening time for lack of his weapon I'm sure he'll be delighted that eventually you found it within yourself to do your job and contribute in some small way to the containment of the demon hordes.

"Now that you are between projects I require your presence in my office. You are excused from Common Taldane review on the grounds that the instructor has earned a favor from me and will probably accept it in the form of not having to listen to you attempt to say 'treaty obligation' today."

We are all worthless before Asmodeus but he exerts himself to claim us anyway.

He doesn't sound anywhere near angry enough to have noticed that nodon'tthinkaboutthathere.

 "Yes, sir." 

His office is on the second-highest landing on the lookout tower, under the spot where people go with spyglasses. The office itself doesn't have a view because windows would lose heat to the outside for no useful purpose. He's got a glass ornament that throws light within itself when he lights it up, casting a more useful illumination than most opaque objects manage; he's got a bookshelf with copies of non-sensitive letters and a small handful of actual books.

"When I was in seminary," he remarks, "- Prestidigitation. When I was in seminary I received a tidbit of wisdom about the nature of tyranny which I will relate to you now. It is not quite correct for Asmodeus's servants to exert authority over one another purely because it is pleasing to Him, though of course it is; were that all we were doing -" He's making something on the desk now between two of the four chairs present in the room. "- then the hierarchy would be flatter than He desires, with some power flowing downward but no benefit flowing upward except insofar as it accrued directly to Him by being a weak attempt at play-acting the requisite structure. In a truly pyramidal organization, those who command others under His gaze must achieve things for themselves thereby in the process. We pray to be raised high in His service not only because it is in the prayer book but because it is a way to get things we desire."

It's a chessboard.

"Do you know the rules?"

Her mind is racing trying to make sure she committed all that to memory exactly properly. She blinks at the chessboard. She has vaguely encountered the concept of chess. She has never played it.

"No, sir."

"Well, then. I hear wizards are all terribly clever, and it is a Cunning sort of game. You'll figure it out."

He advances a pawn.

"I do not tolerate gambling for stakes of the kind that might lead someone to Lawless behavior in my fort. It will have to be something more ephemeral. So when you make an illegal move or lose a piece, you will instead provide me with an attempted explanation of how you somehow got even worse at turning spellsilver into items in recent weeks. And - Sevar - 'no excuse' is not an explanation. It is in fact the most blatant and disgraceful lack of an explanation it is possible to give."

She has absolutely no idea what a legal move is. What if she just mirrors him, is that a legal move?

It appears to be, because he moves another pawn without commenting.

Then she'll do that for as long as she can get away with it, trying to think of explanations for him. He knows the true one, presumably. So what does he want.

He wants to take advantage of it being really obvious that she's just mirroring him to get her into a position where she's in check. A lot fewer moves are legal in check.

Wait, she just did the same thing as him but this time it was illegal? Why??

"Put your bishop back where it came from, Sevar, and tell me what's gone wrong with your performance."

"I have been spending less time on my duties. Sir."

"Try making another move, why don't you."

This one?

"No. Put it back. What have you been spending time on instead, Sevar?"

"The fort's new first arcane, sir."

Punctuated with more attempts at playing chess:

"And what is he diverting your attention to?"

He gave her the answer just a few minutes ago and she did her very best to memorize it. "Asmodeus commands that his servants exercise authority over one another not just because it is pleasing to Him but because it is pleasing to them, sir."

"Ah-ha. Well, unfortunately for your and Fortuny's budding romance Asmodeus has also commanded that we hold the fucking Worldwound. Are you spending spell slots on this nonsense?"

"All of my spells are for the Worldwound, sir."

"Sevar, I may have opined that you belong in a workshop but it is not actually within my remit to send you to one where you can safely expel a brat, or do I misread Fortuny's tastes entirely? Check."

Yes, it is a completely impossible situation, it is forbidden either to become pregnant or to use a spell protecting herself, she has no idea what she was supposed to do but she's very sure it's not fabricate mindreading records and she cannot admit that's what she did. "I figured I'd figure it out if it came up, sir."

"I am not impressed with the quality of your answers, Sevar."

She feels angry, which is very stupid, because no one in this situation has behaved anything but reasonably, except for her. 

"If I may use a spell once a month for my health there will be no risk of trouble, sir."

"Yes, well, you actually may not do that on a routine ongoing basis. How many second-circle spells am I taking out of your disreputable hides?"

"What was I supposed to do, sir?"

It is a very very stupid question and she cannot actually believe that she said it aloud. There is a kind of clarity in having said it; things can hardly get any worse. They probably won't kill her. Third circle wizards, even mediocre ones, are a substantial investment. But they will hurt her more than anyone has ever bothered to before, because it is a heretical question on three different levels and an insubordinate one on six.

He captures her knight and crushes it to dust in his fist. "You were supposed to go over his head, and if you couldn't locate the sense to do that, you were supposed to not lie to his commanding officer when asked directly about it. Just the same way as if I start acting like I've been suborned by a succubus you are supposed to go to the next fort and get someone to contain me, not wait around until my commanding officer swings by for a surprise inspection and cover for a mistake that could get us all dragged into the Abyss. I have, Sevar, so little tolerance on mistakes that could get my whole fort dragged to the Abyss. How often will a whole fort turn on one foolishly prepared second-circle spell? Seldom. Not never. We operate on thin margins. They're not so thin we can't supply the forts with whores. Little though it occasionally seems like it you represent someone's earnest attempt at an education and I expect you to put it to operational use."

Go over his head and say what? That it made her sad? That's a toddler's complaint. That it was making her work slower? Any reasonable person would observe that she could just continue to do her job even if she did not like it. You are not, actually, supposed to go running to the fort's commander any time a man demands to fuck you and any reasonable fort commander would be furious with you if you did. Everyone does it and the commander would have absolutely no time in which to do his job if he had to field whining over it and if she had whined to him he would have completely reasonably and correctly told her to get over herself.

She does not say any of this. 

"I prepared Alter Self without permission on three occasions."

He writes this down. "Make a move, Sevar."

She takes a piece from the back row and places it on top of one of his even though that's definitely not going to be allowed. 

The last time she told him about a discipline concern that wasn't technically against any rules she was reprimanded and told to stick to the ones on the list. She is nowhere near suicidal enough to say this.

He picks up the pawn she captured and sets it aside and obliges it to cease to exist, but they didn't agree on a stake for that so he makes no attempt to explain himself. Then he moves again. "Check.

"Estimate the loss of productivity if you are reassigned and must pack up your tools and be re-stationed at #15."

"Packing takes about five minutes. Sir."

"If you don't know a key fact like how far away #15 is, ask the question or incorporate the uncertainty into your estimate, don't imagine yourself capable of and authorized to teleport."

"If I walk to #15 it'll take me a week, if I get there; if I ride it will take fourteen hours, if I get there." What is the point of this.

"Would you be an asset to a patrol group you traveled alongside, or would you be a disciplinary hazard?"

Carissa has never broken regulations of any kind except to avoid getting pregnant which was also against the relevant regulations. He knows that, so it can't be the answer. He also knows she's a third circle wizard so that can't be the answer. "I don't know, sir."

"Is there information, that I might have, that would cause you to know."

"Who else are you assigning? Have I succeeded in believing I'm supposed to report them if they inconvenience me even if they break no rules in so doing? Do they believe I'm supposed to report them if they inconvenience me? Have you healed me or am I barely competent to stand? Am I allowed to use my spells for patrol work or am I to expend them all as usual before we leave? What's the weather? Are there demons?"

Am I eager to reach fort fifteen because it's run like a normal fucking Worldwound fort or dreading it because it's a normal fucking Worldwound fort with instructions to spend the next three weeks taking me apart? Do you really think it is a good use of my time to do patrol time estimates?

She's really not suicidal so she manages not to ask those last.

"I am planning to reassign one of you or Fortuny alongside platoon #54. Whether you believe that depends on whether I succeed in convincing you that I do not want the border to fall to demonic incursion, which is proving remarkably difficult that I'd start to wonder why you hadn't alerted the last inspector had you not already indicated to me why you might not do that. I do not send my men to patrol if they are impaired, as a strict reading of the Worldwound treaty does not actually indicate that one can send one's own forces out into the snow to leave a blood trail for demons to follow that they might be torn to pieces, while you cannot do that to an allied guest, even if a loose interpretation permits it. You would be expected to prepare and cast with the patrol in mind. The weather report from the last time one of the clerical staff forecasted it is as ever posted in the mess hall. If we knew whether there would be demons, the patrols would be redundant, but if I did have confidential intelligence to the effect that there were unusual numbers in either direction I would consider using that information to time and strengthen patrol groups if it would not leak information about that intel to the enemy.

"Was that so hard?"

Fortuny's not actually that atypical and there's no particular reason to expect his replacement to be any different except that she will be able to say truthfully that the fort commander makes exceptions to his general disinterest in any behavior not prohibited by regulations for hearing about her sex life. 

"I don't believe I have any information not known to you and relevant to answering your question, sir."

"I'm taking one and a half second circle spells at scroll prices out of your pay." A piece moves. "Checkmate. Go tell Fortuny I want to see him. You may tell him that I want him immediately. - And, Sevar?

"I never told you that you could not ask me what the rules of chess are. You did that to yourself."

That's probably a deep theological point but she can't actually map it to any!!

Awwwwww did Sevar start whining? She's such a contemptible little bitch sometimes. He hasn't broken any rules and isn't particularly worried.

Chessboard. Chess pieces. Fortuny's playing white. "Do you know how to play, First Arcane?"

He does! He's not fantastic at it but he memorized six ways to beat most people and so beats most people. "Yes, sir."

Blai's first move in response to his opener doesn't immediately contradict this idea. "So," he says, "I'm taking the cost of one and a half second circle spells out of your pay at scroll prices, and I presume you can figure out why."

"- I didn't tell the little bitch to use any spells, sir. I'd have beaten it out of her for free."

"So you intended to waste my spells instead."

"Who said anything about healing her?"

"My desire not to have fort resources squandered because you can't tell the difference between a wizard and a whore. If you want to be eaten by demons, Fortuny, I'm afraid your request is denied and you are required to get to Hell the long way like everyone else whose skills belong to the Worldwound." He flips a tiny hourglass. "Pick up the pace."

Sure, he has the play for this strategy memorized anyway and is just pretending to contemplate it. "I'll place an order for a Cure wand if it's that important to you no one sitting at a desk have any bruises."

Blai plays fast; he's looking at the board but if he's processing it it's happening very swiftly or mostly in advance or something. "Your commitment to finding and purchasing - once forced to purchase, rather than appropriating - the most ruinously expensive lay in the fort is tremendous. Tragically, it would not address the charge of equipment sabotage."

"Sir?"

"Equipment. Sabotage. Have you ever been at fort that got a late arrow shipment, Fortuny?" He takes a pawn. Fortuny needed that pawn.

Yeah he has to figure out if the memorized thing still works without that pawn. Or if one of the other ones do. "What's the equipment here, Sevar? Was she that whiny about it? She's fine."

"It's your move. No, the definition of equipment excludes personnel. But Sevar is employed to produce equipment and her collapse in crafting time dates to your arrival. You are that rare and undesirable specimen of a commanding officer who has managed to be worse than nothing in terms of his subordinates' performance. Usually we appoint a command structure because we expect to accomplish something thereby. If I want to tend to your personal enrichment I'll requisition more camp followers."

" - she's making time and a half on all her magic items, and then some. I wouldn't sabotage that, I get a cut."

"Do understand, Fortuny, that I am not convinced that you wouldn't do something just because it would be incredibly stupid, especially if it would require you to exhibit any self restraint. You're making her worse. It's your move."

He can't think how to salvage his strategy and will just do something else. "In the long run pressure's good for wizards. Makes us stronger. Push her hard enough and you get more out of her over a year, even if she needs to get the fuck over herself and figure out how to handle it."

"Check. Is that so, Fortuny?"

"Do you think I made fourth circle by having everyone spare my precious feelings and make sure nothing got in my way? She's having a better time than any wizard ever has at wizard school."

"I do not run a wizard school, Fortuny. I run a Worldwound fort. If you want to invest in Sevar's long term arcane potential and spend resources already elsewhere promised to do it you need to clear it with me, not with your dick."

"I haven't spent resources already elsewhere promised. She is ahead of schedule."

"Don't make me repeat myself. Check."

Only one move in response. "If you've been accounting around her making double pace, I'll back off her, so she can keep double pace. But that's a favor so you can pad your paycheck more; what is promised to the Wound, the Wound is getting, and has been at every point, except because Sevar decided to waste her own spells on herself, which is her decision you should absolutely make her bleed for."

"The location of Sevar's blood is no longer your concern. I am exchanging you to #15 with platoon #54 tomorrow, your personnel file will contain the phrase 'equipment sabotage' and a recommendation that you not be given any direct reports. I'm promoting Grec because clearly circles do not an officer make. Checkmate."

That is a bizarre and frankly stupid position to take! He's sincerely completely baffled!

......oh, Artigas is himself fucking Sevar. Go figure. "I understand, sir," he says, amused.

"Report to Sergeant Llopart immediately. Dismissed."

Carissa informs future superiors that the fort commander makes a point of learning about her sex life. They draw the obvious inferences and mostly leave her alone. She crafts things. 

It is not against regulations to be under the impression that the commander is fucking one of the wizards, and it has no evident operational effects, so it doesn't matter. Presumably she's capable of noticing that he's not fucking her if ever she thinks to herself that she needs to know if the rumor is true.

Grec is a no-nonsense sort in Artigas's mold, only second circle but good at keeping track of personnel and interfacing with supply logistics.

She much preferred having a fourth-circle wizard around who she could learn from but she acknowledges that losing this was her own fault for failing to stay on top of her work.

Artigas does make a point of hosting adventurers who are in the area, and sometimes they are wizards, or have cool stuff for Carissa to look at. There's also Fiducia Boian's party, who do not advertise their exact expected date of arrival but usually swing by #11 sometime in Gozran; Fiducia Boian is a fifth-circle Abadaran cleric and has the party to match. Artigas shows him around personally except when for procedural reasons he needs to look at things without supervision, which everyone is instructed to give him their absolute cooperation in doing, and if anybody is caught in a lie to the Fiducia under Abadar's Truth, which Boian is permitted and encouraged to use as often as he finds necessary to assess the worthiness of the fort, they will be deprived of their alcohol ration and moved to night shift at a minimum.

Unpleasant shifts are an appropriate punishment for being very mildly irritating and wildly lenient for anything real. It is really an incredibly irresponsibly lax fort but it's none of her business and like everyone else present she is its beneficiary and so shuts up about it. There are worse things than a commander who can't be bestirred to actually punish people, at least as long as you're allowed to make up for it by torturing them yourself, and she is!

Fiducia Boian stays for six days, watching operations and reading records.

He wants to know if the rumors are true that Sevar's sleeping with Artigas.

Is she required to answer the question.

"I'll find out from him if you don't. Seemed out of character and I need to know if he's cracking up."

"I have absolutely no understanding of what moves him to interest in my sex life but it doesn't seem to be a personal interest."

Fiducia Boian doesn't trouble her again. When he's done he moves on.

Carissa takes out her frustration about the whole thing coming up again on a bunch of the actual fortress whores.

The well-being of the actual fortress whores is not a command priority except in the sense that he's known to be stingy about ordering new ones if they go through them faster than expected and people might object to her making that a likely problem.

Uh huh, and what're they going to do about it? She's the most powerful wizard around now.

Well, eventually Grec tells her he's hearing complaints and if he keeps hearing them the commander's going to hear them.

And do what? He didn't even torture her over stealing spells from the fortress and that was operationally relevant!

"Right, but he'll reassign you to someone who will, if you can't keep your nose clean under his rules. I've got letters from two third-circle wizards and more seconds asking if there's a slot here, why should we keep you if you can't do what you're supposed to do in the first place?"

Carissa considers outsourcing your torture to be cowardly and contemptible. "I have followed every rule meticulously. The complaint is that sometimes the whores are out of service because they have been employed, as they are supposed to be, for stress relief. Yes?"

"If somebody puts two bolts at once in his crossbow and then looks at me like he has no idea what I'm complaining about and says that he aimed them, as they were meant to be, at a demon, it's not cute. It's not cute when you do it either."

"I have no specific desire to be at this particular fort. I will follow its rules while I'm here and if I'm reassigned will follow the rules where I'm reassigned. If we're handing out forts based on the dearest fondest desires of everyone's hearts now then I guess you'd better waste Asmodeus's resources rushing whoever dreams in their heart of this fort here. If you want to give me new orders about the whores, fine. 'pathetic people are whining, change your behavior until they stop' is not how to run an organization."

So, Grec actually does have the authority to torture her for insubordination. Artigas is a stickler about infection risk and also about her productivity so he goes with "you can prepare spells in a stress position if you're not a complete loser" just like they did with him at school.

Is he also going to convey new orders about the whores or are we sticking with 'pathetic people are whining, change your behavior until they stop'. Because she will change her behavior but by tracking down whoever complained and making it clear that won't be tolerated.

She's also banned from the whores till further notice. What does she even need them for, she's a woman.

She just likes seeing people suffer and there is not a separate staff available for torturing when in a bad mood. Perhaps he can correct this oversight.

"Get a less stupid hobby."

She has never had hobbies in her life and does not intend to start. 

Grec does write in for one more third-circle who wanted a slot at the fort, since they have the budget for it without Fortuny. The new guy doesn't talk to Carissa at all; he's a very head-down sort and mostly associates with archer units, supplying them with Good-aligned Abundant Ammunition on top of the standard Endure Elements and Infernal Healing, and spending his third circle slots on Phantom Steeds or Invisibility Purges during patrol.

Some time later a notice is posted - in the mess hall, the entryway, the barracks wings - that Cheliax is under attack by the soi-disant "Glorious Reclamation" allied with a party of archmages and they should expect some supply disruptions as forces are reassigned. Artigas is cutting rations - not to half, but to seven-eighths, for now - and the new archer-unit wizard is required elsewhere and doesn't come back from his next patrol, having been obliged to continue on to meet a teleporter wizard and be redeployed. The orders of those who remain at the fort remain the same. Hold the Wound.

Asmodeus is stronger than any of those things and Carissa holds them in contempt for attempting it. They will learn from their mistakes in Hell eternally. Whatever. 

Yeah, no, a week later the notices are replaced with new ones saying that Cheliax has been conquered by those guys in what they're now calling the Four Day War, orders remain the same, hold the Wound. One of the junior clerics tries to desert his unit and get on a chain of patrols that would in theory eventually let out in Kenabres, and Artigas has him hauled back, summarily convicted of desertion, and executed.

Carissa is not particularly inspired to desertion. The Worldwound is probably the safest place to be. The new government also won't want the world overrun by demons. She is deeply confused but Asmodeus permitted this so it's presumably part of His plan. The thing to do is just to keep one's head down and work every waking minute and not come to anyone's attention no matter what.

Things proceed almost normally, for some time, and if one's head is very down one might not even notice the change in tone of the various mutterings. Rations remain at 7/8.

"Sevar, a minute," says Grec, one morning, when she's in the middle of preparing her spells.

"Sir."

"This isn't going up on the wall because it's delicate, but everyone's going to find out.

"Every cleric in the fort woke up without spells this morning and I've heard from the patrol that just came back from #15 that theirs did too."

We are all worthless before Asmodeus but he exerts himself to claim us anyway.

Except apparently He - doesn't? It turns out there was actually such a thing as 'too worthless', and -

"We're going to lose the Wound. Sir." Clerics are extremely important.

"Probably. Meantime - Artigas remains in command, and I told everybody in my chain who's less of an ungrateful bitch before I told you. If you fuck with him you'll die. I don't care about the other priests but he probably does and I will if he tells me to."

Is he somehow under the impression that Carissa would ordinarily murder the fort commander, but not if she's told that she'll get in trouble for it?

"Has the commander claimed that I am insufficiently grateful? If told what to be grateful for I will be very diligently grateful. I am not a traitor to Cheliax."

"Most people don't have to be told to be grateful that he likes chess instead of torture and prefers not being eaten by demons over not being petty and wasteful, you imbecile. You'll want more Infernal Healing and a Phantom Steed. If you want to pull a miracle out of your ass and learn to make wands this afternoon that'd help. You are under orders to lend your coat to anyone on patrol who's smaller than you and wants it over their normal one, if we have to send out un-abjured patrols, and you may sit in the kitchen to warm up while coatless if the kitchen staff aren't moved to complain."

Has it occurred to you that possibly if he were a proper Asmodean we wouldn't now be without all our clerics, and that the lack of discipline around here is a bad thing, and that ignoring things until they get inconvenient enough to merit shipping people to other forts is a stupid and extraordinarily costly way of solving discipline problems that could be solved with a single normal punishment? No, of course not, because you're barely even a spellcaster and were appointed to your position purely for your slavish devotion to the commander's problem-solving method of not doing anything.

She doesn't say that, obviously. 

"I acknowledge my error in not having realized how grateful I should be." She actually hadn't particularly resented the commander for being lazy until being told she was supposed to be grateful but now she does. "I can probably pick up wands but I don't think I can pick up wands of cleric spells, certainly not before our inevitable deaths."

"Endure Elements isn't cleric-only. Dismissed."

It will only delay their inevitable deaths by a few weeks but sure, she can start burning the fort's spellsilver to make wands of endure elements. Probably. How complicated could it be?

Artigas is little-seen for the next while. He takes meals in his quarters and mostly operates through Grec. When a demon stuns itself within sight of the fort he does emerge to help beat it to death, then retreats.

Perhaps he too is wondering if he should have been a better Asmodean, even if it's too late now. 

(She totally could assassinate him. She's got all this spellsilver and you can really assassinate anybody with enough spellsilver. But she doesn't actually want to, and she actually isn't a traitor, and also it's deeply nonobvious what the next step would be. They're all going to die; they may as well die with more dignity than the demons do it.)

Supply continues erratic. He dismisses almost all of the camp followers, sending them on the long slog one patrol at a time to the overland supply hub where they can be sent home. Or fuck off into Mendev if they'd rather; there's no real reason to stop them from doing that. The ones who stay are assigned to hauling in snow to melt and drink and are not to be detained from doing so. Rumors continue to filter in, from patrollers, that the Wound's been closed by the archmagi who conquered Cheliax, but there hasn't been any noticeable downturn in the demons so people are skeptical. Grec tells her they're to stop preparing Detect Thoughts; they need the Endures and the Infernal Healings.

One morning he strides into the mess hall at breakfast with his table knife on his necklace in place of the pentagram, carrying his Light-doodad. He casts Light on it in front of everybody, with the knife, and announces, "I am again a cleric of the third circle answering now to Iomedae. Expect changes accordingly."

Oh thank - Iomedae, she guesses, that's who to thank - they're not all going to die. They're not quite out of spellsilver yet and they have a third circle cleric again and they might not die.

Carissa does not know anything at all about Iomedae but it does not matter. The god that exerts themself to gain your worthless soul is the one to obey.

She will close her eyes and pray very diligently for Iomedae's correction. And for - Heaven, she supposes, rather than Hell, though that's a very terrifying leap to make while still unsure if Asmodeus is going to eventually destroy it -

The mood about it is mixed but even stretched across hundreds of people a Create Food and Water is a welcome respite at the Wound. Rumor has it Artigas burns the fort's scroll of Malediction. He writes a letter to Lastwall for instructions, but it takes a long time to turn around. The camp-followers-turned-snow-gatherers are now all on kitchen duty except one who's managed to get herself ingratiated to the quartermaster's assistant, and they have instructions to report directly to Artigas if anyone touches them and they would rather that not be happening. Every fort is understrength and even if he can't get replacements he will still reassign units that can't behave to the neighbors, and those don't have any clerics at all. He gathers everybody who needs a channel twice daily in the mess hall; wizards are not to spend slots on Infernal Healing anymore. Sometimes he visits the neighboring forts to channel there, then turns around and comes right back with the next patrol. When he gets the return letter with the Lastwall disciplinary handbook, he Scrivens a copy, has each wizard Scriven one too, and puts them about as the new law of the fort. It means no more chess, and some people are very alarmed about that.

It doesn't actually seem to forbid chess, it just says that the punishments for misconduct should be...punishments...which seems appropriate and correct to Carissa. Lenient punishments, but - Lastwall does hold their share of the Wound, and if this is how they do it then it must not be intolerably lenient even if it looks it.

She reads the rest of it.

They put people to death for rape! She...has no idea how to feel about that, actually. It seems really quite excessive but in the satisfying way that sometimes witnessing a really gory execution is satisfying. 

Yeah he has to put seven people to death for that when one kitchen girl talks.

That in fact seems kind of excessive once she witnesses it. In a satisfying way, but still. They do...in fact...need to save the world.

What is Iomedae's objective to just torturing people for rape and then not having them be in Hell and having them continue to be available to save the world?

The handbook doesn't specify! Does she want to try asking the priest?

- yes, actually. It seems important, if they are Iomedae's property now. 

"Lord Commander. I am trying to understand the teachings of Iomedae regarding punishment."

"- well, I've read the same handbook you have but my guess is probably better than yours. What about them?"

"It seems to me that putting people to death makes this fort weaker, and sending them to Hell doesn't serve Iomedae. I see why she'd do it for things like desertion that you can't otherwise discourage, but - rape you can discourage easily enough by just torturing people."

"I'm not actually sure you can. It is not systematically tried in the forts that would have enabled the experiment. It does seem like it ought to work in principle. Sending anyone to Hell doesn't serve Iomedae but I think this doesn't slow down Glorious Reclamation soldiers taking our cities back home and apparently it is not to slow me down rooting out men who can't keep their bits to themselves. It's possible that it would be directly Evil in such a way that I'd lose my spells again, to order or allow it, whereas by-the-book swift execution is construed by the Judge to be a matter of Law and not Evil."

Well those are as good guesses as any. Carissa will think less of Iomedae but only moderately so. "No further questions, sir."

"Dismissed. - actually, no, I have something unrelated to tell you."

"Yes, sir?"

"Your personnel file instructs that you are not to be allowed to know that you are a dramatically swifter and more valuable crafter than most. There's nothing specifically about this in the Lastwall handbook but I'm operating under the assumption that I'm no longer allowed to lie. You may see the file if you wish."

What?

"- oh, because people improve more if they think they're behind? Do people improve more if they think they're behind? Why would Iomedae want to forbid that?"

"- based on the file alone I cannot rule out that this was among the motivations for the instruction but it read to me more like you'd be a defection risk if you knew what your abilities would command elsewhere. I don't actually know if I am forbidden from lying; I've met Iomedaean paladins, but not clerics. It seems safer than assuming the rule does not apply to me."

Carissa wouldn't defect and is quite upset someone thought so!! 

"Are we all supposed to be doing that, since we're Iomedae's now?"

"You're not going to lose spells if you break one of Her rules and if it were required for me to order all soldiers under my command to give up lying I do think the handbook would mention that, so no."

That's not what Carissa meant, exactly. 'Should the fort commander order everyone to stop lying' is a different question than - maybe she can just say this. There really ought to be at least some benefits to his being an unreasonably lenient person. 

"If Asmodeus does not value us any more then it seems a very terrible thing for all of us to go to Hell, which has perhaps as little remaining use for us. Iomedae wants us, or at least exerts herself to prevent this fort's annihilation; therefore it is useful, to us, to know what Iomedae wants her things to be, so that we can be that, and not be of no value to anyone. There are lots of things Asmodeus valued that you were not commanded to tell us all to do but that constituted being a better Asmodean than other people."

"I suspect it would be bad for your Law to announce a policy of never lying again and then break it, so I don't advise you to do that. But it might be plausibly good for your climb out of Evil to decide to tell the truth, when reasons not to come up, particularly if motivated by a desire to emulate Iomedae and Her servants. It's almost certainly less important than not torturing people."

"Yes, I had gathered from the fact She prefers sending people to Hell to flogging them that She felt very strongly about that. Presumably it is why She likes you." Which means Carissa can't even call it incompetence any more since getting picked up by a new god was in fact the most valuable thing the commander could be doing.

"- I don't claim to understand any high level strategic aims of any gods, but - you could model it as something analogous to a hostage situation, where Asmodeus and His Hellish systems have so damaged so many of us that a typical Chelish person is now a hostage of Hell, and the right move is not to - indicate at least on a policy level that this fact is a moving one, lest that tenderness inspire even more machinations dedicated to inflating the hostage population."

"That still has the implication that Iomedae would rather kill people than flog them but I guess lacks the implications about whether she minds people going to Hell. Which was the confusing part alongside the intense dislike of torture! I think - the problem is that other people won't be following that rule, right, unless they're commanded to and maybe even then! No one's going to report a rape if you've got to wildly overreact about it."

"Someone did. I assume many other people are not, which - since as you point out it leaves us more of our force alive to hold the fort - is not at this time an unmixed curse. Awkward though it is from a Law perspective. - if you want to have an extended conversation about theology I am not averse but will think better if we are playing chess at the same time."

Does Iomedae like chess? Probably, or she wouldn't have picked the fort commander who is obsessed with it. She can sit down with a chessboard. And ask about the rules. And -

" - I spoke imprecisely. Some people will happily destroy all their petty rivals by reporting them. If they haven't calculated what will happen if we all do that."

He explains the rules of chess. Opens his chess book to the first page, where they're all written out, and leaves it on the desk for her. "It's very hard to get people to calculate that. I'm not sure yet if a large shakeup in the established rules and habits improves or worsens the matter."