"The three who cheated?"

"On the path to godhood.  Aroden, it seems clear, could have ascended long before, and only waited until He was best-placed for it and to become a more powerful god after.  Cayden Cailean, Norgorber, Iomedae?  They but crawled along behind Him, licking up His dropped crumbs of ascension."

"What a wonderful turn of phrase.  Perhaps someday I'll have a chance to tell Cayden Cailean that to his face, ideally, right before I finish eating him.  Is it cheating if you ascend by eating another god who ascended by Starstone?"

"What an interesting question."

"Well, young lady, do tell me your tale.  Is it yourself who seeks a teacher of growth through pain?"

"I... don't know.  I may be - past the point - where that teacher is, the next thing, that I need..."

"I have twenty students in need of such teaching.  Possibly myself too.  Our last teacher... left us."

"Twenty, hm?  I have not been impressed with the temper of Chelish folk, for a country supposedly ruled by and for Hell.  Twenty is enough that one survivor might prove to have some little talent, but my time is valuable and I will not do the winnowing.  Train harshly, and when only one of you yet remains alive, I may test them to see if they are worth a little teaching."

"I have twenty students who can take what you have to teach them, and not break of it."

"You do not have the slightest notion of what you are saying."

"I was led to them as I was led to you."

"I have many questions."

"I have disappointingly few answers."

"You work for the government of Cheliax, you say.  In what capacity?"

"I'm not really sure how to describe that... I could say, spy-taker, or hiring assistant, but that doesn't really cover what I do at all.  Conspirator, I'd maybe have said, before..."

"What sounds least false is to say that I'm a student of Law."

"Who commands you?"

"The Grand High Priestess of Asmodeus, Aspexia Rugatonn."

"Directly?"

"There's somebody else above me on the organizational chart, but I actually hired her a few hours ago and she is not the one in charge of this current operation..."

Pilar realizes, with a stab of disorientation that she'll deal with later, that she does not, really, have a well-defined place in Cheliax anymore, except that she still ultimately answers to Church and Crown.

"Your teacher left you, you say.  Who was that?  A cleric of Asmodeus?"

"She was a - priest of Irori, without powers, as I understand it, for a time.  Lawful Evil, to be clear.  She renounced Irori, though, and then -"

"- had to go about other business."  Pilar remembers, barely in time, that Carissa Sevar's defection is a secret.

"Oh, she had come far enough to renounce Irori?  Tell her I congratulated her on that, do you see her again."

"I - don't know if I will.  Congratulate her.  I will probably see her again, one way or another."

"Sometimes you must leave your students if you do wish them to prosper.  If she told you that you must now seek your own Way, I would not cooperate in your attempt to seek another teacher in her place."

"I suppose it's been hinted to me that I'll need to seek my own Way.  But I'm very sure the twenty students need a teacher."

"You're not telling me the whole story."