Not especially.

He's failed all reasonable tests and will be a disaster but Ser Cansellarion couldn't convince them of that, so no further ones.

He asked his questions days ago; he waits calmly for the vote.

There are a couple more questions, tying up loose ends from the previous day, and then Jonatan calls the vote.

"In favor."

"In favor."

"Abstain."

He recommended the man. “In favor.”

"Against, and don't say I didn't warn you."

Yes, Archduchess, we've all heard your fascinating theories about how the best way to prevent riots is to refuse to enforce the laws if it might possibly inconvenience someone.

"For."

"For."

"In favor."

And that you think that's what I was saying, and don't have anyone with the expertise to tell the difference, is why this is going to be a disaster. And a massacre, unless I decide that preventing one is worth the political capital I'd give up by doing so.

You defended Valia Wain at trial after the city burned down on her orders.

The law defended her, after she did no such thing. Because she did no such thing. And even if I had, every criticism I said in this committee would still be true, and you would still have no one qualified to judge better than me. You need expertise to run a city, let alone a country, even if all the available experts are people you hate.

"Against." He trusts Bainilus' and Shawil's judgment that the city needs an administrator more than a military man, and even if he disagreed on that point there are dozens of military men more qualified to run an occupation.

"I think we need a civilian, not a soldier, but if it's a soldier the rest of you are set on, I can recommend some Reclamation men who have experience policing Chelish cities."

"Against." If no one changes votes on Cansellarion's recommendation the vote still passes, but he for one doesn't know anything about cities and is only here to try to prevent something worse from happening, so he's just going to copy Cansellarion.

There are many circumstances under which he'd love to hear a recommendation from Cansellarion, but the aftermath of riots sparked by an Iomedaean cleric seem like one where his candidate's judgment is likely to be uniquely bad. With that being said, if the Lord-Marshal commits to opposing them, he can probably manage to shut down their candidate.

"Provisionally in favor, but I'd be happy for us to interview Lord-Marshal Cansellarion's recommendation tomorrow before we decide whether to send this to the floor. The vote provisionally passes."

He nods to the Hellknight. "During the Judiciary Committee's meeting, we heard a report from Sir Vallvé on punishments that were in common use in Infernal Cheliax, and how their severity was viewed by the populace. I requested that he share that report with this committee as well."

"Thank you, Conde. I hope it can be useful here..." and he'll give roughly the same speech as before.

"Much appreciated, Sir Vallvé. That leads us into the next topic I wanted to discuss as a committee, namely, legal restrictions on specific forms of punishment. I've heard a number of concerns raised that the status quo is creating undesirable incentives, particularly in the cities, and I'd like to open the floor to suggestions on ways to address that."

"I think it's pretty clear that making all executions private and painless has emboldened the worst elements of society. I am sure it was well intentioned, but part of good intentions is changing course when what you're doing doesn't work. And when I speak to the people of Westcrown, they are eager for the return of public and more exciting executions. I think it'll do the city a great deal of good to return to executions as they were practiced under Aspex's law."

"I think there is significant value in differentiating ourselves from the Thrunes, and Aspex did not have to design his punishments to accommodate the sensibilities of paladins. Let our justice be swift and inescapable, and the Judge will know better than us what they deserve."

"We also don't have to design our punishments to accommodate the sensibilities of paladins, and our attempts to do so is why traitors are released to the applause of cheering crowds and hundreds lie dead in the streets. There are twelve paladins in this body of six hundred people. May they vote as their goddess commands them, and the rest will vote for safety and order and peace."

He will nod, and see what others have to say about the proposal.

That is not what the Duke of Fraga said when they discussed this during the break. If this is some sort of negotiated concession to the radicals, Jonatan would really prefer to have known about it before he brought up the topic in committee.

"It seems to me that under the present system, a man who has already committed a capital crime has little left to lose by committing more, and much to gain if his capture was otherwise certain. I am not thinking of deserts, here, Your Grace, merely of the practical realities of administering justice.

...with that being said, I admit that I have some concern that even a very modest proposal to restore the laws of Arodenite Cheliax could be misconstrued by the floor as a proposal to torture children to death for failing out of school, and I think it is worth making it very explicit that any proposal we pass will not do that."

"I think if we stick to 'the penalties for murder and arson and treason should be a slow death' no one will get confused about whether we mean 'schoolchildren should be tortured for incompetence'."

In Almenar he doesn’t do that many torturous executions, they take too much time and effort and there’s usually not many around to see it anyways. They’re probably much more necessary and useful in the city. 

“Each day I’ve been surprised at how reasonable proposals get twisted - I think you are mostly right, Count Solpont, but we should be exceedingly clear on that in our bill.”

"If this is the principal concern in and of itself rather than metonymy there could be an age floor beneath which executions must be swift."

"That's very reasonable and I wouldn't object at all." As long as it's below the age of Valia Wain and confederates, of course.

"Simple, standardized punishments may be differentiation enough from the hideous contest that the Thrunes made of punishment, even if those punishments are severe enough to give malcontents pause."

He hasn't turned radical; he is mostly concerned about their proposal having the desired effect--it is not just the convention that might misinterpret them, but lawmen all over Cheliax putting it into place.

"It is Evil to torture criminals. Not merely 'not Good', Evil. Without exception. Asmodeus delighted in it, and in forcing all to witness it and stand by, because that damns everyone involved by degrees every time. If we wish to rescue Cheliax from Hell, we must stop. For massacre and high treason, or military courts, perhaps it is a necessary evil, but it is not in any way necessary for ordinary capital crimes. If something must be done for serial criminals, find a way which is not Asmodeus's."

"Is there a specific example you wish us to emulate? It does not seem a wise venue for experimentation. Furthermore, I tire of everything that Asmodeus does being rhetorically identified as a uniquely Asmodean evil. He did many things simply because they were functional. That having been said, mandatory attendance at executions seems to me superfluous and troublesome to enforce, and always has."

Jonatan doesn't, actually, dispute that it is strictly speaking Evil to torture criminals to death. But Aroden Himself spoke of how a virtuous man must sometimes be willing to do Evil, lest greater Evil arise from his refusal, and sparing use of torturous executions are one of the clearest examples of that.

"It is an error, I expect, to think only of those men we condemn to death, and not of their victims. If a man who has taken a single life believes there is nothing worse that can be done to him than simple execution, and so kills a dozen more, those souls should weigh no less heavily on our consciences. Perhaps Pharasma will condemn me for this, though she did not a century ago, but it would be a mistake to shirk our duties to our subjects merely out of such fears."

"Our first duty to our subjects is to pull them out of Hell's grasp. Keeping them alive and intact is the most important secondary duty, but never forget that the first takes priority. If pointless torment saves ten lives relative to swift deaths in private, then it might begin to be worthwhile. But it would damn every executioner and magistrate involved, and nearly every noble, especially starting from where we are, and the right trade between souls and lives is not clear. And for every man who commits murder for the joy or profit of it and kills a dozen more, who might be discouraged by impalement or drawing and quartering, there are two dozen other murderers who killed one man in the heat and will not do it again regardless. Torment may save two innocent lives for every torture, but I think it very unlikely it does more than that, and at that exchange rate it is a very foolish trade."

"Fiducia Agramunt, it is a necessary time for experimentation, whether or not it is wise, because we face the novel problem of Hell's hold over us. We must seek Good unusually strictly, because if we merely are as Good as our Arodenite forefathers we will remain damned for a generation. I suppose we could adopt Andoren methods wholesale, and that would surely pull us out of Hell, but though I suspect I would be less uncomfortable with taking that approach than most of this committee, I would still be leery of it managing only to pull us to the Abyss, and not Elysium, and so I do not recommend it."

"I'm sorry, I must have misheard the honored Archduchess. If torment saved two innocent lives for every torture that's obviously worth tormenting every single criminal, and unambiguously so. And it's an obvious lie that it damns everybody; in other countries this is how it is done, and nearly all nobles and magistrates aren't damned."

"It is traditional in some places for the role of 'executioner' to itself be a stay of execution; someone already damned by their actions can serve the state without significantly worsening their final position, and delay their own torment thereby." It is not a Good thing, but as necessary evils go, seems like a bargain sometimes worth striking.

"For what it's worth, Conde, we ended execution by torture in Menador. I said the same things beforehand, and I fully expected to see crimes increase. As far as I can tell, they didn't. I do think that it was important that this was unrelated to any actions of the populace, and wasn't seen as a forced mercy enacted because we couldn't torture them all. And it might be different in the cities. But it wasn't disastrous, even with Chelish people."

"I varied from year to year in the degree of torturous execution employed versus allowing convicts to kill themselves cleanly in their cells beforehand. I have numbers, if you want them - about a quarter of those convicted and a fifth of those convicted for things that would be crimes under just judges and fair law. It had no noticeable effect on the rate of crime in Kintargo either, though I would trust the results in Menador more strongly than my own."

Menador's results are actually very surprising. (Kintargo's would be surprising if he trusted the Archduchess to be accurately representing the situation.) Maybe Menador is catching criminals so quickly that almost no one has the chance to commit multiple crimes? ...Or maybe they're running into the same problem he's had with trying to convince his servants he won't have them put to death for insufficient devotion to Iomedae, or maybe they've come up with some clever scheme he hasn't thought of.

"What is Menador doing to discourage people who have already committed capital crimes from committing additional such crimes?"

Have you considered, if you're going to keep doubting Jilia's word, asking the Fiducia who is literally in this room to verify it? They have a spell for that.

It's not that she's a liar, it's that she's delusional. Wain wasn't lying either, and still managed to do incalculable damage to the country.

"Nothing we haven't always done. Menadorian nobles have always been responsible for directly enforcing justice, so there's been relatively little interruption in the system there, and I think that helps. But I don't have a good explanation. I thought that we had to be doing it, too."

Elias is mostly just unsure if this will win votes or cost them, and so stays silent for the moment.

"I admit that I am uncomfortable with the prospect of risking the ability of the whole country to keep order merely because it has yet to cause problems in Menador. With that being said, my understanding is that currently our magistrates are prohibited from sentencing men to a slow or painful death, regardless of the crime. Perhaps, as a compromise, we could simply lift that restriction, without mandating that they exercise it in any given case. If it turns out that our country is best served if it is exercised only rarely, then it can be exercised rarely; if it turns out to be needed more frequently, we will not have prohibited ourselves from employing one of the key tools of a functional government."

Are you calling Lastwall nonfunctional? Eh, someone else can say it.

Hmm.

"Allowing for flexibility in judgment and regional variation seems wise, yet I am enamored by the idea of standardization and predictable law. We do not want people lapsing into Asmodean traditions for lack of a superior example, and I am reluctant to have hundreds of imported lawmen applying the traditions of their homelands unthinkingly throughout Cheliax. Perhaps we should grade the punishments, create wide sentencing guidelines, and the headline of the bill will be banning the variation and ironic punishments that were the dark artistry of the Thrunes."

"Banning Asmodean punishments and bringing back traditional Arodenite punishments seems like a good way to make it clear to people that there is a difference and a middle ground between the present madness and Asmodeanism."

“I would support that. Some in the convention are trying to paint our every proposal as disguised Asmodeanism - we need to show the people a better, coherent vision. Aroden’s Cheliax was ready to be the seat of the Age of Glory - I doubt there is any better example to follow in this day. We can make allowances for the peoples’ current confusions and evils, but we should not compromise on the end goal.

Perhaps the proposal on punishments should be brought to the floor along with other returns to Arodenite traditions.”

"Do you imagine, either of you, that any human currently living and not recently resurrected remembers what Arodenite punishments were? No, that will not make anything clear to anyone outside the nobility, except perhaps a handful of underground historians. Further, they would not trust it if they understood the difference, because they are Chelish and know, with near absolute certainty, that anything the government says is a lie, telling them what they are supposed to believe. Only actions, and ones which are wildly different, are going to convince them we are any better. An extreme shift is necessary as a practical matter even if you do not accept the moral urgency."

"Thank you for your wise perspective as always, Archduchess," does the woman ever shut up.

“Archduchess, the point is not to convince the populace we aren’t lying about Arodenite Cheliax - the point is to restore the rule of law on a tried and tested pattern. As you say, the people will believe little we say - that is why we need a system they can see the justice in, and let them learn its truth over time. 

The commons in the convention itself we can hold to a higher standard. We will tell them the truth about the past - even you can confirm that. There must be a dozen ways to show them, starting with us resurrected avowing it. 

We do not need to depart from Aroden’s wisdom just to distinguish ourselves from Asmodeus - now is when we need that wisdom more than ever.”

"If we're worried that people will misunderstand the phrase 'Arodenite punishments,' perhaps we could simply list which punishments our proposal restores, while noting the fact that those punishments were traditionally used in Arodenite Cheliax." That was obviously how they were going to write the law anyway but it's not like he was expecting the Archduchess to be reasonable. "If we are additionally banning forms of execution common under Asmodeanism, it might also be prudent to list any specific punishments that we want to be certain to disallow."

"Aroden's wisdom suited a populace raised under Aroden's wisdom, whose grandfathers were also raised under Aroden's wisdom. I do not dispute that it was an excellent way to run a country, nor even do my resurrected radical revolutionaries who fought the Civil War for Ravounel, even though they are pushing Kintargo and Ravounel more radical in nearly every other way despite my best efforts. But Aroden never pulled a populace out of Hell's grasp. His policies in the very earliest days of Taldor before Taldaris I, when it was uncivilized and becoming civilized, would seem a better place to look for rules to suit our current situation, though I don't remember that appearing in His books and do not know what they were."

"In the absence of clear advice for the situation we actually have, you should not assume reasserting old policies will have good results now merely because they had good results then. Tradition is valuable when circumstances change slowly, but after a century of abrupt and total changes, it is very obviously not going to work as it did before; it will do something wild, which could in theory be wildly good, but could equally be wildly bad. If you want a model which has predictable results, look to Andoran or Galt, not to Aroden, and decide whether you consider those acceptable."

From everything he’s heard since returning, calling Andoran and Galt predictable is insane. Fortunately they don’t need to convince the radicals like Jilia, just a reasonable majority of the convention. 

If you want Andoran or Galt, you can get it! Just do what they did! That's entirely predictable.

"In Lastwall torturous executions are banned. I know that there are many features of Lastwall's governance that are believed to only work because of the Goddess' intervention, but I don't think this is one of them. The practice was, as Archduke Narikopulus mentioned, copied in Menador, with no ill result, and Menador is not governed by paladins. It was tested, by Iomedae when she was mortal, in an army assembled from the people of Taldor, who are not renowned for particular virtue among all the peoples of the world. It may seem, in theory, that the having no way to escalate beyond a death sentence means that the state cannot dissuade those who have already committed capital crimes from doing more, but in actual practice that does not seem to be the case. Even the theory is less persuasive than it sounds - Why should we imagine that there are many men who would be deterred from evil by the threat of mortal torments, when they are undeterred by the prospect of Hell or the Abyss? In forbidding torture of criminals, the queen acts with both mercy and wisdom, and I see no reason for us to overturn that."

"I agree. I am confused by it, but I am forced to agree.

If you mean to ban specific punishments, the fashion in Asmodean Cheliax was to be as creative and varied as possible, so any list any individual can give you will be incomplete. Some forms with variations were particularly common, I suppose. Impalement, flaying, slow cooking, use in the opera or the arena. Kantaria was primarily using crucifixion, boiling, impalement, burning, hanging, tearing limb from limb, and the breaking wheel, but we were more restrained than most places."

And the ordeals, but those aren't executions. ....oh, no, if they standardize punishments over the whole country then they might have to stop doing those. That doesn't make much sense, though, the ordeals are definitely older than Asmodean rule.

"I agree, we cannot ban specific punishments in a country that once prized creativity in punishment. We must create a list of allowed punishments, bound their severities, and let the writers of laws pick what punishments are appropriate for them. Banning a punishment necessarily means banning it for the worst crimes, and I fear if we do not openly allow some flexibility and severity it will instead occur in secret.

Did you say hanging was a torturous execution? Perhaps the chair or Marquis de Almenar, who both lived in Cheliax before the Thrunes, can describe executions and their severities as happened then."

"Well, I'd call the way we did it more torturous than beheading. We're working on switching most executions to hanging the way they do it in Lastwall, where the neck is normally broken instantly, but it's a bit of an investment."

Obviously beheading is better--that's why it is a noble privilege that it's the standard method of execution for them. But if the Lord Marshal really thinks they shouldn't be hanging common criminals, it might be harder to find agreement than he thought.

They boiled people alive?

"In Aroden's day, the most common forms of execution were beheading, garroting, and hanging — in the ordinary fashion, not the fashion of Lastwall. When torture was used, it took the form of burning at the stake, breaking on the wheel, typically used for lesser treason, or turning to parts, reserved for high treason."

"Lord Marshal, we must make allowance for the people of Cheliax, who have been lied to for generations about the true natures of the afterlife. The Asmodeans have told them that hell is a reward, that pain is purification, that their final destination is certain and not worthy of their consideration. There are many in Cheliax today who do not fear Pharasma's judgment and do fear the torturer's tools. Until we can convince them to come around on the first point, to abandon the second is to abandon the defense of innocents.

We must counter the lies of the Asmodeans with the truth. Torture is the province of those irreparably set against civilization, not everyday civilians. If we remove it from the public sphere, the people will assume it continues in private, and may very well be correct in those suspicions! We should abandon mandatory attendance of executions, but by keeping them public the people can verify the sad ends of those who act against the public, and that those sad ends are both stern and merciful except in extreme cases, and we few overseers can ensure that our many underlings are operating according to the law. By telling them we will burn cultists, we make it easier to believe that we will not burn murderers.

Our purpose here is to write a wise and just law which will both pass the floor and be followed by the people of Cheliax. My hope, at this point, is not to find a bill you will vote for, as I understand that sort of positive action would open you to responsibility I am loathe to put on you. Rather, my hope is find a bill that you are merely willing to not speak out against on the floor. It will fall short of the standards of Lastwall, but mere days ago people were clamoring for Valia Wain to be torn apart by lions, and I would establish a clear break from the Thrunes and bury that sort of barbarity without sacrificing the right of the people and state to appropriate self-defense."

They'll believe all those things are happening in private anyway, you idiot.

"I will not condone torture, even through silence, no matter how evil the victim, especially not when it has been shown by the examples of Lastwall and Menador to be unnecessary."

Well, perhaps it was his mistake for trying to compromise with a paladin. He will lean back and let the chair steer.

"Duke, you are mistaken if you think having such punishments in public will deter the Chelish people from believing they, or worse, are present in private. They will believe that anyway. And if they are present in public, it will take much longer for them to learn otherwise; I daresay longer than any of our remaining lifetimes, do we not avail ourselves of the archhealer's reincarnation, though I would hope to be pleasantly surprised. You would have a reasonable argument, if your assumptions were correct; I would even agree. But I have governed the Chelish for over twelve times as long as any of you, and I say to you with no doubt in my mind that those assumptions are incorrect."

Jonatan is not thrilled with the prospect of arguing against a paladin about this on the floor, but he's seen some of the crimes people in his county have gotten up to under the belief that the consequences would be gentle. Paladins weren't this unreasonable a hundred years ago.

"Thank you for your counsel, Your Highness, Lord Marshal. With that being said, unless anyone has further thoughts, I'd like to call a vote on this proposal." He's not confident it's a good idea to bring it to the floor immediately with several archdukes and the Lord Marshal opposed, but he wants to have the option of bringing it to the floor, particularly if the Archduchess decides to bring more hastily-written, destructive radicalism for a vote.

In light of the diversity and severity of punishments under Infernal Rule, Cheliax shall in matters of criminal law only perform the following fourteen punishments on civilians:

1. Whipping, with a horsewhip, no more than 80 times, ceasing before the point of risk to life
2. Fine, with any amount unpaid collected via indenture
3. Imprisonment.
4. Pillory, not to exceed one month.
5. Branding.
6. Civil Death.*
7. Banishment.
8. Maiming, only in situations where it will inhibit commission of the same crime and will not pose a risk to life.
9. Hard labor, not to exceed ten years.
10. Death, by hanging, garroting, or beheading, with an eye to swiftness.
11. Confiscation, or death and seizure of inheritance.
12. Burning at the Stake.
13. Breaking upon the Wheel.
14. Turning to Parts, reserved solely for the punishment of High Treason.

Writers of criminal laws shall identify which punishments from this set are appropriate for violations of that law, and may not invent new punishments. It shall be standard, in the case of repeat offenses, to increase the quantitative penalty or to increase the grade of the punishment. Punishments 1-3 may be referred to as "corrective" punishments. Punishments 4-7 may be referred to as "humiliating" punishments. Punishments 8-11 may be referred to as "afflictive" punishments. Punishments 12-14 may be referred to as "torturous" punishments. The military shall determine its own punishments under a separate law.

* Civil death is the loss of all civil rights, and all property is considered to pass on as though the individual had died.

Please, she wrote it last week.

"What are permissible forms of hard labor? Is indenture permitted to exceed ten years, and thus become more severe than hard labor?"

"Indenture in the case of unpaid fines typically did not include hard labor of the sort used as criminal punishment; agricultural indentures were most common, followed by domestic labor, though with some variation depending on local conditions. The length varied with the size of the unpaid fine, with no explicit cap. Those sentenced to hard labor typically served in the mines, in the navy, or on logging expeditions."

"It will be universally understood that criminal indenture means death in the mines if anyone holds any grudge at all against the convict and that no criminal indenture will ever be escaped without the extraordinary intervention of someone rich and favorably inclined toward the convict. People did not successfully pay down indentures, in Cheliax; they were structured to be permanent profit sources for those who hold them, they still will be if that is legal, and they will be assumed to be structured so even if it is not."

"Additionally I consider it dishonest to class hard labor in the mines as anything less than a torturous execution. And I question the wisdom of permitting something that the Hellknight we just spoke to earlier said his order rejects. I am aware you aren't trying for this code to be Good, but I thought you were at least trying not to be Evil."

"I appreciate the advice about how this statute is likely to be perceived." This is, for once, mostly sincere. "I fear that only time will be enough to show that indentures are no longer being structured in such a fashion, but I certainly think it would be prudent to take reasonable precautions against misuse of indentures."

He edits the second punishment. He's not actually sure what the correspondence between unpaid fines and indenture term should be, so he's copying Acevedo's censorship law.

2. Fine, with any amount unpaid collected via indenture as an agricultural worker or domestic laborer, for a maximum term of 1 year per ten crowns left unpaid.

"My understanding is that the staffing of the mines is the remit of the Committee on Natural Resources, and if you believe they ought not be staffed by convicts, I recommend that you take it up with them." He doesn't feel particularly inclined to dignify the remainder of her continued attacks on his character with a response. If she wants to think the entirety of Arodenite Cheliax was Evil, that's her prerogative.

"I have one other concern, though I must be honest and admit that it does not decide my vote. Menador has continued the limited use of trial by ordeal in exceptional cases. I believe the practice predates Asmodean rule, though I do not know how it fit into the standardized system under Aroden. It is well-understood there, and many are protective of it. I would like to avoid disrupting a system which is functioning well. Will this statute prevent it?"

"I admit that I'm less familiar with the customs of Menador. I believe that as written this statute would not prevent it, as a trial by ordeal is not a punishment per se, but rather a method of determining a verdict. With that being said, I don't mean to disrupt a tradition that is serving Menador well; is there language you'd like me to add to this statute to ensure that trial by ordeal is explicitly permitted, without accidentally permitting anything that ought to remain illegal?"

"I am unsure of the wording. Perhaps it could be allowed only for those who stand accused of crimes for which the ordinary sentence is afflictive or torturous, and only as traditionally practiced in areas which currently make use of it."

"Would it also be acceptable to say that the accused may request a regular trial if they'd prefer not to undergo trial by ordeal, or would that be too disruptive to its traditional use?"

"I think that's acceptable."

In Menador, this statute shall additionally permit those who have been accused of crimes for which the ordinary sentence is afflictive or torturous to undergo trial by ordeal, in accordance with the Arodenite traditions of Menador. However, if the accused requests an ordinary trial instead of trial by ordeal, this request must be granted.

"Do you see any issues with this wording?"

"That looks good to me. I must vote as I believe Iomedae would order, but I thank you."

"If no one wishes to propose further changes, I call for a vote on this proposal."

"My mountain duchy and marches practice Menador's customs as well in this respect, and I do not know for sure but suspect the mountains of the Hellcoast as well."

"Thank you, Your Highness, I wasn't aware of that. Will this suffice?"

In those regions of Cheliax which practiced trial by ordeal before the Asmodean regime came to power, this statute shall additionally permit those who have been accused of crimes for which the ordinary sentence is afflictive or torturous to undergo trial by ordeal, in accordance with their Arodenite traditions. However, if the accused requests an ordinary trial instead of trial by ordeal, this request must be granted.

This gets a polite nod.

Trial by ordeal is properly the remit of the judiciary committee, and will seem out of place in a restriction on punishments, but this will perhaps increase the law's chance of passing. He stays silent.

Like anything else in this proposal isn't the remit of the judiciary committee.

"Very well. In that case, I call for a vote."

“In favor.”

“In favor.”

"Against."

"In favor."

"Against."

"Against."

"In favor."

"In favor."

"In favor."

Felip, normally eager to vote, is silent and sitting back. The count is now 6 to 3, passing either way. His vote feels like it does not matter, and yet to him that makes it matter all the more. 

When they drafted this law, he focused mostly on how it would permanently enshrine an end to overwrought torture. The current temporary bans seemed clearly inadequate, to the three problems of popularity, order, and goodness, and this was their best guess as to what would balance the three.

He has ordered men hung, before, and not in the fashion of Lastwall. He has attended the burning of cultists in Mendev, and felt the grim satisfaction that they would hurt no one else. He has seen bodies broken upon the wheel; thankfully he has not had any cause to do it yet. The turning to parts he has only read about, and it sounds extremely unpleasant. Fit for the worst crime, perhaps, but he has trouble holding on to certainty in this moment.

No government is staffed solely by paladins. Mendev's judicial system is independent from Galfrey's control, and he suspects he sees why, now. He knows less about Lastwall's, but the paladin assizes are warriors turned lawmen, not what you would expect if that country's magistrates were paladins. He does not know how it is done in Qadira, where Sarenrae's church is deeply entwined with the state.

(If he had to pick a new state religion for Cheliax, he would have picked Sarenrae; a redeemer for a fallen country, as their attempts to follow Iomedae would merely recreate the Godclaw. But that would be politically fraught in its own way, and the church of Sarenrae is already divided against itself. And the good gods are not jealous, the way Asmodeus was; a state church means something very different, here, and so better to have all the helping hands they can receive.)

The pause since the last vote has grown a little too long; he has to choose.

"I abstain."

Jilia raises one eyebrow and the edge of her lips a small amount, which probably only Chelish-born would be able to recognize as an acknowledgement that he's done something she approves of more than expected.

(She can't tell what, exactly, he's conflicted about. But his exchange with Cansellarion is enough to guess.)

"In favor. The vote passes."

He passes out another sheet of paper.

It being in the public interest that the people are reminded of the fruits of crime, and to ensure that criminals have not been unduly punished leading up to their execution, executions shall be done in public, except when safety or security concerns render this impossible.

"I had one more matter I wanted to attend to before we conclude this session. It seems to me that the use of private executions is worse both for public order and for our subjects' ability to trust that we are not re-enacting the horrors of the Thrunes. I propose that — regardless of which penalties this body enshrines — we return to the practice of conducting executions in public when possible."

This really seems like the sort of thing the Archduchess (and for that matter the Lord Marshal) should be in favor of, even considering how soft they are, but he's not really optimistic.

"How is the audience meant to ascertain if someone has been unduly punished leading up to their execution?"

"I don't expect it to prevent all such abuses, but Her Majesty has forbidden the use of torture in interrogations, and this would at least provide a chance of someone in the general public noticing injuries indicating that something like that had occurred. Even the possibility of someone noticing may serve as a deterrent against violations of Her Majesty's will."

"But they could be healed."

"I agree that that is a significant problem. With that being said, if would-be torturers need to secure the services of a cleric, whose presence must then be explained, or else purchase expensive magical items, I expect it will at least render their task more difficult, if not entirely impossible."

Nod.

"With the Asmodeans gone, and Kuthites rightly outlawed, I think it will be difficult to find clerics willing to cover up illegal torture."

He is speaking to an Abadaran, who are said to put a price on anything. But hopefully their price for this will be high.

"Devil's blood will presumably only get harder to come by."

Oh, right, the Chelish wizards have a spell for healing, don't they? He had forgotten that. Is it important enough to change his position?

...no, probably not.

Devil's blood? How is that relevant — right, Infernal Healing. Some people say it was invented by Aroden, in the days after Earthfall. (Jonatan's always found that explanation a bit suspect; Aroden would do it if He had no other choice, of course, but the healing of the righteous gods is far better for most practical purposes.)

In any case, Fiducia Agramunt is almost certainly right about the logistical difficulties. He nods.

"The benefits you name are real, though I think smaller than you believe. More importantly, you have neglected the costs, which are considerable. I will never again witness a public execution without seeing a blood opera again in my mind's eye, with the convict the star. Are you familiar with blood opera, gentlemen? Most of you never lived somewhere - and somewhen - it was practiced, and Fiducia Agramunt does not seem the type. It is much like an ordinary opera, except that at at least one time per night at the climax, and for more 'sophisticated' productions several before that, one of the characters dies, and just before the death, at the height of the aria, the singer is exchanged with a convict who looks similar enough and has a matching costume -- if no such convict is available, one is created earlier in the week. And they die in truth, the same way as 'their' character, on stage in full view. Blood stains are often left on the scenery for the full run of the show, so that everyone can see even earlier in the show that they will not be disappointed."

"That is what a public execution means to the people of Cheliax - a man subjected to torment and death for the purposes of entertaining them, if they are high in social stature, or entertaining and intimidating them, if they are low. It is corrosive to public morals and to the morals of those who order it, and a reminder that we are not so very different from the Thrunes, and will reinforce that reminder every time it takes place. If we were writing a constitution for a state which had recently thrown off the yoke of Taldor, I would not oppose it, and in forty years, it may become the right choice. But in the state we have, I must oppose it. Right now, it serves only Evil."

"The queen refused to make a spectacle even of criminals who had richly earned their death like Bernat Vidal-Espinoza, because she understands this. Lastwall does not practice it either. Do not override her, for the sake of everyone who watches and everyone who has to order such a sentence."

"I think Lastwall would reconsider their policies if they had the catastrophic effects that they've had here in Cheliax. As you say, different policies are for different times and places, and trying to run a nation formerly ruled by Asmodeans according to radical nonsense has sufficed only to result in the present catastrophe. I am not a foreigner; I know Chelish people, and I say this will be good for public order, good for their respect for the government, and absolutely necessary to be taken seriously."

"In what way has executing criminals in private contributed to any catastrophe at all, Conde? Which public executions would have sufficed to prevent the riots of the third? What other catastrophe could you mean, that in some way occurred because we killed criminals in private rather than make performances of them? They did not riot that night because they were unaware they could die for it; indeed, the riots were so dangerous because Espinoza convinced them that they would, and they would go to Heaven if they did. Yes, the censorship regime was radical, a problem, and a cause; that is why I and others wrote new laws for it over the week and brought a combined rule to the floor as soon as we could. But do not lay the blame at the door of 'radical nonsense' and then claim that as evidence that something utterly unrelated must be changed."

"I do think that routine public executions would have prevented the riots of the third, yes, and the other riots since the Queen took power. I think that it is good for people to know the rules. And they don't know and don't trust anything that happens in private, nor should they. They do not perceive the government as taking crimes seriously, because the government does not do any of the things that they understand the government to do when it takes crimes seriously. 

I would find your analysis of the riots more persuasive, Archduchess, if you had not spoken in Valia Wain's defense. I think your closeness to her and commitment to protecting her may be making it difficult for you to analyse the situation neutrally."

"Your Highness, you told us not ten minutes ago that many Chelish subjects assumed, in the absence of public executions, that the barbaric punishments of the Thrunes were continuing in private. It seems far more difficult to disabuse them of this notion if they cannot even observe which punishments are actually in use."

"I agree with much of what the Archduchess said. Was it the private executions that led to the events of the Third, or was it the lack of torture, or the lack of censorship, or the fact that the Lord-Mayor was an Abadaran rather than a soldier? Perhaps it was all of these, perhaps none; perhaps any one would have sufficed, or perhaps all were necessary. Perhaps it, or something similar, was inevitable with a population recently liberated from Hell.

In Lastwall, they would change their policies if the policies led to horrendous violence, but in Lastwall they would change only one law at a time, and so it would be clear what the cause of the disorder was. In Cheliax we do not have that luxury. Many laws were changed at once, because nearly every law previously in effect was the work of Asmodeus. Now, you propose to repeat that folly with far less justification. The night of the Third was terrible, yes, and I would like to prevent its recurrence, but we do not know which laws will best do that. We can only guess, by looking to the examples of other countries. Shall we do as Lastwall does, Lastwall which is the most stable land in Avistan? Or should we turn instead to the example of Taldor, and of Galt at the height of its revolution, and of Cheliax-under-Hell which, if you have not forgotten, was so incapable of preventing riots that half the continent revolted out from under them? Perhaps predictably, I stand by the laws of Lastwall. Any speculation that they are unsuited in this way for the people of Cheliax is merely speculation."

Cansellarion being a paladin about everything was expected, but this seems rather extreme. 

“Lord Marshall, Lastwall is an admirable redoubt of stability, but no other realm has Iomedae to steer its path and bless its people. Nor can we hope for even a fraction of that leadership now that the Goddess has withdrawn her hand from the mortal realm. 

Every country not directly guided by Iomedae has found these laws necessary! You ask us to look to the example of other lands and then ignore the evidence of our eyes! Even Mendev, under Iomedae’s protection, has public executions, no?”

Jonatan is rapidly becoming sympathetic to the position that paladins should be holy warriors and should absolutely not be anywhere near the government.

He nods. "I do not know if public executions would have prevented the riots. But I can tell you that in Arodenite Cheliax they did not cause riots; if they had, that would of course have been more than sufficient reason to oppose them.

With that being said, Lord Marshal, I confess I struggle to understand your opposition. A man is just as dead whether he hangs publicly or privately. There is no special property of the public square that makes executions conducted there more painful. The Archduchess tells us it is corrosive to a man's morals for him to witness the death of a convict; do you believe it is less corrosive to encourage him to put the deaths of convicts out of his mind entirely, as though turning a blind eye to them will make them any less real?"

The discussion of public executions continues a little longer, with no clear consensus. Eventually, Jonatan calls a vote on the proposal.

This is for them being available to view in case anyone wants to verify it's happening and how, right, not for obligatory attendance? If so, in favor.

(Yes, he's not proposing to make them mandatory.)

Against.

In favor.

In favor.

In favor.

In favor.

This one he has no strong opinions on. Menador is doing public hangings. He does think it's salutary that the people know what's happening, and doing it privately sounds like it probably requires new facilities. He should probably still be assuming that Iomedae and Lastwall know better than him, but he doesn't see it.

Abstain.

Against. The outcomes of votes here are getting predictable.

In favor.

Sure, they might be predictable, but they're paying him to vote how they do, not how he thinks they will! He's not gonna guess and maybe get it wrong.

In favor, have them in public and maybe self-preservation will get through the skulls of the next group of rioters before they light the torches.

"In favor. The proposal passes. Is there any other business before we adjourn for the day?"

"Yes. Urban order must handle both situations of internal disorder and simple crime, and external infiltration and complicated crime. Let us turn our attention to the latter, and to fiendish agents, be they hidden diabolists, demon worshippers, spreaders of disease, or any of the dozens of other threats, less common but no less serious. In a nation the size of Cheliax, we cannot leave threats like this to the watch or the local nobility, and must instead rely on specialists, who understand the ways of cultists and how best to confront them.

I propose we write a law that establishes three elements:

First, that there exist a list of powers forbidden to worship or aid, beginning with all evil deities, and minor fiendish powers, such as archdevils or demon lords.

Second, that there exist organizations chartered to investigate and punish such worship wherever they find it, with rights and responsibilities appropriate to the trust placed in them.

Third, that there be a royal office to coordinate between those organizations, and update the list of forbidden powers as the situation changes.

There are, of course, many details to establish for each of those three points, but it seems wise to ensure we are all in agreement on the aims of the law before closely contemplating its methods." 

"What is the advantage of having several organizations and a coordinating body instead of a single organization with any necessary subdivisions?"

On the face of it he's in favor, but given the rest of the committee's proposals he's worried about the office expanding the forbidden powers list.

"What is the reasoning behind having a changing list of forbidden powers, instead of just directly banning the worship of evil ones?"

"Besmara, my lord," Elias murmurs.

"And isn't there an Arodenite saint or two who hangs around in Axis doing evil for good worse than Aroden?"

First, to the Fiducia. "I was motivated by the simplicity of matching Cheliax's history. We could renew the charter of the Order of the Pyre, and separately charter an arm of the Glorious Reclamation if they desire, and separately set up an inquisitorial office, without requiring that they coordinate except through the minister of the interior or his deputy. In my experience at the Worldwound, paladins and Hellknights coordinate best at arm's length, and both prefer membership in a chartered knightly order to direct submission to the government."

Second, to the Lord Marshal. "While there is value in simplicity, the world is large and contains many surprises. I would give the Queen and country the ability to notice exceptions--evil powers that are not destructive enough to civilization to be hunted down, and can instead be peaceable neighbors in an Osirani way, or neutral powers that are destructive enough to need dedicated opposition. Besmara was first on my list as well, though I do not think her worship is common enough in Cheliax for the issue to be urgent. I struggle to imagine a good power who could deserve this treatment, but my knowledge of theology is far from complete. But I would not make the mistake of Taldor in opposing Sarenrae for political reasons, and we could require that the list not contain any powers Pharasma judges to be good.

Further, the firmament is not fixed, yet changes, and if this is truly the beginning of the Age of Glory, our government may be an active player in changing it. I wished for the handling of forbidden churches to be a flexible tool for Queen and country to reflect this. If a demon rises to the status of demon lord and their claws can pierce through to the material, I would rather that be noticed once and spread among the agencies, rather than require it to be confirmed multiple times.

If you have an alternative method for maintaining the list, I would be happy to hear suggestions."

He knows some perfectly good Besmara worshippers, actually. They are, admittedly, a small minority, and a few of them would probably support making Her worship illegal.

"I don't think this is the right committee or the right tool with which to address piracy. But that's a minor concern, and if we decide to additionally proscribe the worship of Besmara I will not oppose it.

With regard to Aroden's saints, there are a great number of religious practices of which I disprove, practices which I think should be discouraged, but which are not a danger to society in the same way that a cult to a demon lord or archdevil or Norgorber is. Laws written to address the former will be inadequate for the latter; laws appropriate for stamping out the cult of Nocticula will be excessive if applied equally to the cult of Calistria.

I would have no complaint about a royal office tasked with coordinating between cult-hunting groups, and telling them of any newly arisen demon lords, dukes of Hell, or other Evil powers. My concern is only with such an office empowered to forbid the worship of nonevil powers. Perhaps there are some nonevil, nongood powers whose worship is dangerous to permit to the same degree and in a similar manner to the worship of demon lords, but I believe those powers are few enough that it's likely better to explicitly proscribe them by statute, either now or in the future."

He'll nod. "Perhaps statute or decree? We do not know what form the rest of the government will take, and it is not obvious to me that there will be a legislature well-equipped to handle questions of this type." 

If the church is in favor, he can't very well be against. He does, of course, want to end the worship of the infernal powers. But conceiving of the worship of infernal powers as a problem of rooting out cults seems confused. The number of people who have received almost no instruction in the worship of non-infernal powers is still really quite significant. Without a strong element of education, which they have less of than ever before, they will probably end up punishing a huge number of people who were trying to follow the rules. Restart the project of rooting out heresy, and it's very easy to imagine the people withdrawing from explaining any of their confusions with a belief system they have almost no exposure to.

He can't say that. Some things are very much not safe for him to say. Possibly he can talk to Cansellarion in private later, even if it will be too late.

"I think we need to be very careful about editing the list of those forbidden. I'm inclined to say that it cannot include anyone Good, and that it takes the Queen's personal act, in addition to the assent of any appropriate legislature we create, to ban one who is Neutral or allow one who is Evil, or to reverse either decision. In that nothing which is not significant enough to be worth the Queen's scarce attention and time ought to be changing. Any means we provide for approving an Evil power must be resilient against a legislature under strong outside influence; particularly I don't want Vyre's Norgorberites bribing or blackmailing their way into permission, tools which they have been frustratingly skilled at wielding against the Chelish nobility for many centuries. The Lord Marshal's concern that relegating Gorum to the full legal status of demon cult may be unwise and best avoided seems fair as well, but I don't know what that status will mean."

"The details of the organizational charters and for what behavior they can be revoked also matter a great deal to whether it's good for the kingdom on net; inquisitions are, notoriously, typically Evil and significantly destructive even without current Chelish people staffing them. I care that they conduct themselves very Lawfully, especially if not Good; if the Queen reapproves the Hellknights for this I would concur, but not for most other other knightly orders not following Good gods. But I agree that it needs to be done in some form and His Grace's suggestions indicate to me that we can all come to an agreement."

Oh, good, the Archduchess is capable of sometimes being reasonable.

"It sounds like we're all agreed about the need for such a policy, and most of our disagreements are about the specific details of implementation. It might be best to adjourn for the day and discuss more specific language when we meet tomorrow."

He does want to get it to the floor tomorrow. But he wants more that it be wise and correct, and he's busy tonight, and the sooner the committee adjourns the more time he has to prepare for that. Hopefully a day's delay is not another Norgorberite murder. 

"I defer to the chair on how to spend the committee's time, but perhaps we should split tasks for the creation of that more specific language. As I understand it, the Queen has given the Hellknights interim permission to continue basic operations, but the question of their rights and responsibilities has been left to the Convention to decide, and so it is acting in deference to Her Majesty's will to give it our full consideration. I will ask the Hellknight orders to put forward proposals for our review, or to give testimony in committee as expert witnesses.

Lord Marshal, I understand the Glorious Reclamation to have be primarily focused on military matters instead of these investigative ones, but do you believe there are members of it who would join or be competent to found a Chelish knightly order focused on the investigation of proscribed worship? If we are to empower Hellknights and others in a detailed way, one of the important details will be who those others are. Perhaps you could ask for volunteers, and the committee could know roughly what shape the investigative forces will have while setting policy for them."

Inquisition is a job that simply must be done; the experience of Mendev is clear on that point, even if Cheliax is only engaged in a hot war with the Abyss in its Sarkorian territories. The more paladins they can get for it, the fewer concessions to Hellknight tactics they will have to make.

"Ideally we'd get input from the Order of the Torrent, which is a small Kintargan Hellknight order which is not only Lawful but actively Good, but I don't expect to be able to bring their delegate here until Moonday. I will send a letter to Lictor Sabinus by teleport regardless and pass on any reply. I assume the Iomedan inquisitors of Lastwall are too busy to consult?"