Has Chaotic Good considered doing things that aren't stupid. 

"There are starving children in other countries," she tells the empty room.

She eats the cake. It's pretty good.

Message from Security:  Keltham got put in a delay loop while you recovered from your stupid fucking incompetence in taking an optional-time torture session at a point where you still had work to do later.  Can the Queen of Cheliax and a number of other important people now be notified that you'll be ready to be surprised to see them shortly?

Unlike taking it at some other time when she wouldn't still have work to do later; 'not at work' sure does describe, uh, about ten minutes of her last three days. They engineered a lie they don't have an infinite reserve of to excuse her absence and would've needed to engineer another.

It's the wrong thought, and she tucks it away quickly; the primary point of the punishment was that her superiors are better than her, have more experience operating under these conditions and are absolutely competent to handle them, and that she is wrong, when she thinks she's right and they're mistaken. If they think she should've manufactured another excuse some other time then they're right, even if she doesn't see why. 

Anyway, yes, they can so be notified, and could've been notified an hour ago, Carissa is fine.

Security is personally of the opinion that sometime in the next three days, Sevar would have managed to find a time when the Queen of Cheliax wasn't waiting on her; or, you know, maybe just Abrogail Thrune II and not also the second, third, and fourth most powerful people in Cheliax too.

He doesn't send this to Sevar, but he does voice it aloud as commentary to the Security next to him.

The Security next to him says he's not actually sure that's true. He's heard rumors about what life on Project Lawful is like.  Supposedly Maillol, the project manager, committed suicide and had to be tortured severely in Hell in order to get him to consent to being Raised and put back to work on it again.

What did Keltham tell Carissa to do, what should the naive Carissa understand to be going on right now.

Sevar has been told to meet with Paracountess Isidre, according to the story Keltham has received; Keltham wanted to know why this wasn't lying; he did seem fine going along with a technical truth after it was explained that Sevar would, in fact, meet Isidre, and then the Queen shortly after.  Sevar, having been told to dress for properly meeting with a Paracountess, should show up wearing one of her nicer outfits, but that should suffice.

All right. She'll dress up nicely enough to meet a Paracountess of House Thrune, which isn't even that differently from how she'd dress to meet the Queen since she doesn't actually have a further reservoir of even nicer clothes, and do her hair accordingly, and then be escorted wherever this is happening. 

She feels a lot better, even though she can't really understand why important people would have delayed their schedules to let her have a nap she did not need. Well, they're smarter than her.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

- it's over?  Is it over?  That was way longer than an hour.  Keltham stopped checking his pocketwatch after it became clear that it was obviously broken or tampered with, but it wouldn't have been helpful anyways because it doesn't have a date function.

He should not have set himself up to do anything this awful and then need to do anything else immediately after that!  Except that he needs to do this as quickly as possible before he forgets anything and needs an etiquette lesson again.  Carissa's price is now 20% higher.

When he gets out, a palace Security is holding a piece of chocolate cake they've been instructed to give him!

(Pilar is not having a great day here - well, actually, it's been literally the best day ever, but not this particular hour - and needs to keep grinding down the tiny bit of herself that wants to be in any way cheerful about having been assigned the servant labor of going around giving useless fucking pieces of cake to people.)

It is delicious cake and Keltham will eat it.  He has, by his ass, earned it.

He does feel better afterwards.  Though, really, he could also use a nap; but even if he is important enough to keep the Queen and her advisors waiting he would prefer not to do that and spend the informal political capital he's earning.

Onward to his important meeting!  In which he will demand to Chelish Governance that they be prepared to deliver Sevar to him restrained and to be his owned object if she ever falls in love with the Queen of Cheliax!

...was Isidre lying about the entire Carissa sex thing in order to make him look like a lunatic and sabotage him in front of the Queen and her advisors no that would make no sense because he asked Carissa and Carissa said it was hot so this should be something they recognize as a totally normal way of thinking; and if not he will truthspell himself and then recount exactly what Isidre told him.

To the Queen's big fancy meeting room audience chamber!  It is time to unreasonably impress his girlfriend!

Great balls of flaming poop, that is one gaudy-ass doompunk supervillain giant fancy meeting room.

He doesn't say it out loud!  It wouldn't be 'etiquette'!

Also in the room is Isidre, the giant alien from the Nidal attack, Contessa Lrilatha in the armor that she apparently just wears, a kindly-looking old lady in a doompunk dress, and the Queen of Cheliax on a truly massive chair that still looks completely ergonomically wrong despite obviously being the most expensive possible model of whatever brand of chair it is.

Keltham properly kneels and bends his head to the Queen.  Everyone in this room except the actress playing Isidre can hear him thinking the dath ilani equivalent of 'Are we there yet?'

This isn't literally the best day of Aspexia Rugatonn's life but it sure is up there.

"To Her Infernal Majestrix, Abrogail Thrune the Second, the Queen of Cheliax and blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah, I present Keltham, Lawful Evil outsider of the Lawful Good realm of dath ilan, fourth-circle cleric of a Lawful Neutral deity, also enemy of Zon-Kuthon, now fallen, and enlightener of Cheliax," says the actress playing Isidre.

"Rise, Keltham of dath ilan, and approach the throne."

Yeah, he can do that part, anyways.

"Hi Keltham blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah," says the Queen of Cheliax.

...is she deliberately dragging this out.  WHY.

Oh, probably Carissa is a minute late or something.

Actually, Carissa's already here and waiting just outside, but since Keltham has done her the helpful service of thinking of such an incredibly plausible excuse, Abrogail will look apologetic and then keep talking.

"Blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah..."

IT'S ANOTHER TIME LOOP OH NO HE JUST GOT OUT OF THE LAST ONE -

Oh good, Isidre is leaving now, presumably to 'meet' Carissa and get her back, hopefully that doesn't take too long.

Actually is Carissa going to recognize the giant-ass gaudy doompunk supervillain doors to the giant-ass gaudy doompunk supervillain meeting room?  Hopefully not, they don't exactly have cameras here so not everybody should know what the Queen's meeting room looks like.  He does want to see the look on Carissa's face.

'Isidre' returns a moment later with Carissa at her side. Announces her, which absolutely no one in the room is paying any attention to.

- even naive Carissa, who would be experiencing the shock of her life right now, wouldn't be so childish as to let it show on her face. But Keltham is taking these baby steps into deeper Evil for her, for the delight of seeing how she reacts, and she wants to reward him for that, she wants having power over people to be something that he finds endlessly thrilling. And it's not like it embeds everything else in a lie; she can tell him afterwards that she would usually have tried to conceal her shock, but didn't, for him. 

So.