" - huh. I....don't know. Security, can we get a thought transcript?"

Message:  They could, but Security is guessing this is about the part where Carissa Sevar recently thought that she wished somebody had the job of telepathically telling her whether this was a good outcome?  Security did notice that part, what with him being telepathic but that not, in fact, being part of his job.

Oh. Right. Probably. 

Pilar will of course wait patiently for further instruction or questions.

"I thought a couple of minutes ago that I wished there was someone whose job it was to tell me if I'd done well or not. I have to say it's very weird that Cayden Cailean is watching my sex life closely enough to catch that."

"It's a very weird to be called upon by Cayden Cailean to give somebody else Asmodean theological advice when I'm not a priest of Asmodeus but... I kind of do think I know..."

"Should I say it, sir?"

"Go ahead."

"Ask your superior, the one set over you.  If Subirachs doesn't know, she'll ask the Most High or the Queen.  Your superiors will tell you how well you did, and then whatever they say is the truth, and you're done, and it's not your place to worry about it any more because that would be contradicting what your superiors told you."

"It's one of the nice things Asmodeans get to have.  That's not why Asmodeus wants it that way, but it's definitely what He wants."

"...Snack Service suggests you take a nap first, though."

" - all right. 

If your curse ever turns on us I'm going to figure out how to torture a curse and then I'm going to really really enjoy torturing it to death."

Pilar thinks, but doesn't say, that if Sevar managed to really really enjoy torturing anyone or anything to death it would probably be good for the condition of her soul.

...because saying that would be insolent to her superior.  That must be why Pilar isn't saying it.

Carissa will go take a nap. It probably is good advice, and, anyway, it's late.

PL-timestamp:  Day 17 (13) / Long Night

Carissa sleeps half an hour, wakes up, contemplates sleeping some more, decides that actually she's just dawdling.

Goes to Subirachs. 

Subirachs has had this matter brought to her attention by Security and has already reviewed transcripts.

Her judgment is that Sevar was not going into subspace, she was correctly estimating that this was excellent good news on the surface of things.

What lies underneath the surface of things remains questionable and it is unfortunately among Sevar's primary jobs as leader of Project Lawful to question it, so she cannot just relax and take her superiors' word about how well things are going.  Subirachs can confirm that Keltham's overt behavior looked like excellent news to her.  Subirachs cannot, and the Most High and the Queen probably cannot, speak to whether all of this is some incredible plot by Cayden Cailean of which Asmodeus is unaware.  If that's so, it would in fact fall to Sevar to not just watch for that possibility but think about it.  She cannot take on the duty of a simple slave, here, alas.

But if Sevar is wondering whether she was just imagining things, no, she wasn't, that looked like progress to Subirachs too.  Producing that kind of progress is not all of Sevar's given duty, but it is a large part of it.  Especially when it comes to the sort of duty that anyone has any idea how to do.  And by "anyone" Subirachs means the Chosen of Asmodeus, because nobody else seems to be able to make any progress on it except Pilar and Yaisa as prompted by Snack Service.

This particular progress felt almost entirely self-prompted by Keltham, maybe with some help from Her Majesty, whose letter he seemed to find fascinating. But it does seem like good news. Possibly corrupting Keltham will just work and in a couple of months they'll be able to mostly stop lying; they should proceed on the assumption that's not going to be the case, though.

Does Subirachs have advice or correction.

Intelligent slaves can sometimes learn to take joy in more complicated judgments of their superiors than 'you did that perfectly'.  There's also 'you did that as well as mortals ever do under their circumstances'.  Even Pilar, when she got back from Elysium, had Aspexia Rugatonn list out everything she did wrong, and was assigned punishment - before Aspexia Rugatonn told her that she'd done as well as mortals ever do, and reminded Pilar that pride was also among Asmodeus's domains.

If tomorrow this all ends and they all go to Hell for it, and learn that it only worked to Cayden Cailean's own plans in the end, Subirachs thinks that Hell would not account them disobedient, nor more incompetent than usual for mortals.  They did receive visions of Asmodeus and orders out of Hell, and they followed them, and worked as best they could at what seemed to be their task despite their doubts.  If you are past the whiny idea that Hell should accept that as a full excuse, and not punish you at all for failing, then Subirachs imagines that Hell would be accepting about it, if not forgiving.

Obedience and working diligently at one's task are what Asmodeus demands of mortals.  He is glad perhaps when His mortals succeed in advancing His interests, but obedience and diligence to His instructions are what it is Asmodeus's nature as a god to demand.

Sevar was instructed by her superiors to seduce Keltham to Asmodeus; she dangled before him the prize of her sexuality to conquer; he found himself challenged, driven, proud upon the matter; and Keltham has now, 'self-prompted', attached a heating stone to her while making sexual use of her, named himself her owner, and taken pride in how he's already reshaped her through torment.

Some types of slaves of Asmodeus - including, Subirachs thinks, Sevar herself - are more useful to Asmodeus when they allow themselves to ever feel pleasure about a job apparently well done.  You can see how it could go wrong if those slaves went around telling themselves about jobs they thought were well done, all the time; but when your superior tells you that you have been a good slave, it is just plain allowed to be proud of that, it is true because they say so, over and done.  This is what Pilar was trying to tell Sevar is one of the nice things that Asmodeans are allowed to have.

Pilar, being strong in her faith, was able to set aside her continuing fear of Cayden Cailean's machinations, after the Most High told her that she, Pilar, had done as well as mortals ever do, in willingly returning from Elysium - that Pilar had done her own part as a slave, well enough to deserve some pride, whatever the manipulations of gods around her.

That Pilar had done well was then unshakably true for her, not because Pilar believed the Most High was infallible, but because her superior had told Pilar so, and that is how slavery works under Asmodeus.  It wasn't Pilar's place to question her having done well.  That you can sometimes be certain of having done well, is one of the nice things that Asmodeans get to have; that's not why Asmodeus does it, but it's definitely how He wants it done.

Sevar has done well.

It feels - not dath ilani - and Carissa's first instinct is to just not think about that right now but it feels like it won't land like it should, like a complete and wonderful and comforting answer, until she's thought it through, so -

Can something be unshakeably true?

- obviously there is an objective fact of the matter about whether Carissa is doing well enough, and she and her superiors could be wrong about it. They could mistakenly think she is doing well enough, when actually she's not doing well enough and tomorrow it'll all come crashing down. 

But they can't be wrong about whether Carissa is a good Asmodean, whether she did a good job as an Asmodean, is what Subirachs is saying, what Pilar was saying. Because that's not an objective fact of the world, to be falsified by it. It's a - ownership-tag, like property rights, something about the world that is how it is because we say that's how it's so, and she hasn't yet worked out all the desirable properties that produced Asmodeus's specific system of tagging but -

- but the tag for Carissa says she did well, here, and even if she screws up tomorrow it'll say she did well up to this point, that is just true and Subirachs has the power to make it so.

Right.

"I think I understand, now. I am pleased to be of service to Lord Asmodeus and to Cheliax."

"I intend to commend this continuing progress to the Queen's attention, and suggest that she reward you by sending here a subordinate enchanter to assist on your crafting projects."

Oh, that would be nice. Both the Queen being informed part, which was obviously going to happen but still Carissa's pleased about it, and the project help, which will maybe let her only do the interesting parts of making the Glibness swords - if she can explain to someone else the obvious things you have to do when you're making a sword tiny...

Asmodeans, she thinks, aren't supposed to deserve rewards for good work? She doesn't ask, it'd be halfway insubordinate, but the question is there, if Subirachs is reading her mind.

"Asmodeans don't think they deserve rewards for good work.  You do it or you get punished, and you don't ever start thinking you're owed anything for your work."

"It is sometimes useful to your superiors, and at other times simply their whim, that you receive rewards even though it is impossible that you deserve them."

"On this occasion, it is useful because it will remind you that your superiors hold the power to reward as well as to punish, which is something that often matters to someone's emotions when it comes to it being made true that you have done right because your superior says so.  It is useful because it will nurture your pride.  There's also the fact that what you're actually getting is, in fact, assistance that will make you more useful to Cheliax, advance your project for Cheliax, and free up some of your time that was going to be spent on things less important to Cheliax."

"I am explaining all this explicitly, as should not usually be done with a slave, because it is something you must learn alongside the uses of pain - a little less urgently, perhaps, but it will not go well for the Project if you do not know how to use rewards alongside torment.  Including that the rewarding not be done in such a way as that it comes to feel deserved; which, for those less Asmodean than Pilar, often follows along immediately from reward coming to feel expected."

"I understand."

'as should not usually be done with a slave' reminds her of something that she doesn't know what to do with, something that still feels confusing, but she has no idea how to put it into words. It's something about how she's not Keltham's slave, because of how she's running an elaborate conspiracy against him, and actually she thinks that the true key to who Carissa is has as much to do with the conspiracy as it does with getting hit, but she's not not his, if he learned the whole truth tomorrow and agreed to stay then it really would be real - she isn't sure what answer she's looking for here, or even what question she has, but it's a vague uneasy that is not obviously just 'vague unease because I'm being a heretic' or 'vague unease because I stupidly fell in love'.

"You remarked earlier of how you were trying to really be Keltham's slave, because you desired that, if he wholly converted to Evil, you selfishly wanted for that Keltham, your greatest accomplishment, to consider your punishment warranted to be one you could withstand."

"You are being a true slave to that Keltham, the Keltham-who-will-be.  He would want his current self freed of his chains."

- nod.

"All right. I want to do one more practice run of 'Keltham gets around to asking questions about slavery', I think Asmodia wanted to do the predictions collector that Keltham told us about in lecture, I want to test the new arrivals in person on their understanding of the objectives here and -

- and I was thinking I should take my punishment for thinking dismissively of Asmodeus tonight, when Keltham's going to be noticing things consistent with my having been in pain in the morning anyway."

"You're also thinking you should take your punishment tonight, I would guess, because - I have not seen it in your thoughts and perhaps neither have you, but -"

"You saw that even Keltham was getting around to doing painful unpleasant things.  Part of you wondered deep down if you're really as strong as you think, having not yet gotten around to your own unpleasant thing, somehow.  You are better at enduring torment, but are you better at getting around to it?"

"You saw that Keltham was learning how to use torment, faster than you are, indeed.  Some inner part of you is feeling competitive.  Your inner part thinks it's because he's dath ilani, but it's not, it's because he's actually getting around to practicing and pushing his limits."

"You instinctively don't want to start expecting rewards.  You're justly afraid of what will happen to you if you do that.  There are wordless parts of you that are starting to appreciate that pain now has a use in preventing yourself from flying too high and incurring worse pain later.  That wordless part of you is in fact correct about that.  It is indeed wise for you to take your punishment now, after having just heard of your good work made true and your undeserved reward, given that it must come to you at some time or another."

"These are not certain guesses.  But they are obvious ones."