"Oh, the inciting incident was something else entirely; I just also pissed Cairn off on my own recognizance before I had no remaining options but to read the Edict in question.  Or do I misunderstand to what you are referring by that?"

"Just that my guess is that it doesn't matter who it's ostensibly punishing - Cairn or Azure would be much the same, maybe after the first flush of power. It's the fear of the Edict itself that seems the most likely culprit, since for the oldest and strongest that's really all that's still around."

"Oh, I was talking about something else entirely - whether the power would go towards the Edict if my myth - standing against Cairn without Kyros's Edict, despite the danger, and, well, almost winning - overtook it, I guess.  If I have such a thing; it's hard to tell from the inside."

"Oh, that's an interesting thought. Quite possible. But on the other hand, they might feed into each other. Stories are strange that way."

The thought of feeding her own power from the collective belief in Kyros's strength...

There is a subtle shift in her mannerisms, as Lantry catches the gleam in her eyes and the sudden hitch in her breath.

If Fatebinder Ophelia Vaudelle looks like anything in this moment, she looks like a predator that has just caught the scent of prey, ripe for the hunting.

"Perhaps it shall," she positively purrs.  "Good thought~.

"Though, of course, one must be cautious with such things...

"But~," she continues, leaning in to murmur quietly,

"I do think that my story is already tied quite enough to the actions of Kyros...  So why not take advantage of that fact to strike with Kyros's full weight~?  The hand of a god holds the god's own power, and the voice speaks with the same authority...so why shouldn't I?"

She straightens herself upright, still with a different mien than her Fatebinder persona, and continues -

"That, though, is a matter for the future; in the present, despite my desire to shape my own story, there are other tasks to which we should attend more immediately, given today's goals.  Drafting a kata code, for communications in lieu of more direct messaging, and making sure all parties expected to use it know what each signal means, being the most pressing.  That will likely not be many signals; Verse is not one to make use of the written word to allow some vast tabulation - but she does have a keen wit, when it's well-aimed."

Well, there's one excellent reason, and his name is Kyros, but there's no need to mention the obvious. Maybe two if you count Bleden Mark separately.

"If she's done spy work for the Voices like I'd expect, she might learn it quick - he's got this complicated pictogram code he has the illiterate learn. Not a cipher, it's not writing per se, but it's close. I'm not conversant in it, but I have seen some in passing and it was quite complex."

"Interesting.  I did not know she knew that.  Then again, it is not like I have been asking her about that part of her background; it's...well.  You've seen how she thinks of Nerat.  I do not wish to inflict that upon her without dire need.

"That makes it more likely that we can do some complex things...but we'll need Verse for that part; she's the only one who knows the code and could plan correspondences.

"...And I actually imagine that stealing the definitions from Nerat's purposefully constructed pictogram-language is useful for - not reinventing the wheel.  Say what you will about his general awfulness, he has to be blasted smart to pull it off.  And he's Archon of Secrets.  He's hardly going to half-ass his spy code."

"I'd feel safer working out a pictorial code as an aid to her memory, rather than trying to steal pieces from Nerat. It's surely a good system, but I wouldn't be shocked if he's proprietary about it, and since this is the Voices we're talking about, 'proprietary' might well mean it has teeth. Or it might just be protected by no one wanting to cross the Archon of Secrets, but I didn't get this old by taking those kinds of uncharted risks."

"He's already crossed us.  And, for that matter, Kyros.  But I mean more like...hmm.  Stealing the concepts, not the pictograms.  Still, if it bites me...I can bite right fucking back."

"Your prerogative, of course. I'm habitually the voice of caution."

She nods.  "As is good and proper.  Someone ought to, and my line of thought is that I can't end up worse than dead, given everything that's happening right now."

"Not for long, at least. Well, hopefully. Nerat's as stuck here as us."

"You can take over Nerat in the worst case, anyway; if he tries to eat me, I'll make him choke on it."  The utter confidence that has filled her ever since the conversation took the turn to the strange that it had is peeking out from behind her re-donned Fatebinder's mask, it seems; while she is still reserved in bearing, the faint sense of an impending lightning-strike accompanies the single dramatic gesture she allows herself to make.

"Well, I could hope to."

"You could," and the gleam in her eyes is probably more than he ought to be comfortable with; "and you know far more Secrets than I, no matter that I fully believe what I've stumbled upon could shake the heavens, some day."

"...I will not ask you to try, though."

"I lack your confidence I understand the mechanisms at play. Certainly not well enough to subvert them, contesting against someone who, besides being a ruthless monster and genius, has had centuries to learn the ropes. I won't tell you you're wrong - it seems like a very plausible model - but I certainly would advise against betting your life - self? - on it."

"Is Nerat a genius, though, or has he merely stolen his knowledge from those who are?  He may have force of personality...but I find even his cunning to be rather lacking, not even to consider his grievously underperformant intellect.  What master of spies so trivially loses his gambling face as to, after repeatedly failing to break our own diplomatic masks, shatter his own for the merest - I cannot believe his ego so inflated that he broke into a rage at the merest thought of a challenge to his presumptions.  In the middle of a parley!

"No, while Nerat's reputation for uncanny knowledge is well-earned, he has earned it by being nothing more than an uncommonly powerful and sadistic thug.  Not some master intellect.

"You see...if he was smart, he would not have faced me on my preferred battlefield.  He would not have dared.

"And he thought me a mere sophist.  Some, 'pissant sacrificial goat', I do believe he said.

"An absolute riot he is, if he had been trying to make of himself a joke by how badly he underestimated me.  And this with having had enough foresight to attempt to spy on me over the prior spans!  And hardly could I have had the loyalty of his agents in that matter!  They could and should well have reported things that could adequately gauge me!  If he truly thought me to have come here unprepared for every eventuality...If he believes, and I can only say that the events of that day cannot help but prove he does - if he believes in his heart that I am some mere upjumped insect with pretensions, not someone he needs fear because she can and will damn well kill all of him dead -

"He is an idiot, Lantry.  He's just well-read."

"The common wisdom about Nerat, among those few who studied the active Archons - and my brief acquaintance gave me only support for it - is that the Voices's brilliance is kept in check only by his madness. And, probably, by Kyros himself. His arguments weren't weak, that I overheard, only debatable; had they come to a trial, Archon's presumption would likely have protected him. It was his internal shift of perspective that gave you the clear opening. And that's a common story, though usually not so blatant; Nerat's plans are spoiled mostly by Nerat's other plans."

"It makes me nervous about Verse. Not that I think she's a traitor to our side, I don't. But from everything I know of Nerat, he'll have expected this, and have a plan for it. Is she a nascent Eye unwittingly? Is the ritual we're trying to make both known to him and likely to backfire? Does he want to set her up so that if we come against him personally she delivers the final cut, and plan to benefit thereby? Or is the goal merely to make us hesitate because we don't know his angle? You can go mad trying to outmaneuver him, but it's a sucker bet to assume it's safe not to try. There's a thousand minds in there that he can berate until they give him possibilities, and even if they're each just a confused mortal mind that makes for a terrifyingly flexible and imaginative strategist. If I could ask every Sage to give ten second's thought to every goal I contemplated and pick the best idea, I'd be a genius too."

"The most brilliant plan means nothing if you do not use it.  And Nerat's actions reveal much more than his words.

"Not that I discount him as a threat.  He is terrifyingly unpredictable, exactly because of what you mentioned.  But he's an idiot.  He reminds me of nothing more than some of the outlying Court brats; he is spoiled, he is greedy, he is used to getting his way, and he has just lost his game of soldiers.  They never know what to do without their toys.

"And besides, I know for a fact that I am correct on the matter of the Orphan Midwife's crimes, and he was wrong.  I read her case record.  That's - actually how I managed to cast my first spell, of that Sigil."

"Oh, but he does, many of them simultaneously; I really think you're underestimating him. Sometimes several work at once and it does something stupendously implausible; sometimes several collide and all succeed at their stated goals but foil all their true goals. I strongly suspect the failure of the Bastard Tier to hold together was one of his minor successes, the mercenaries usually had more cohesion than that. The major ones are mostly matters of history now - the Last Three Days of Silverwall in 378, the Thane's Beheadings at the start of the last Conquest. Obviously the Vellum Citadel was largely a failure, but he did get something out of it. The Scarlet Chorus rarely faces concerted opposition, because -  call them the Silent Chorus, perhaps - are always ahead of them, executing a hundred schemes. I'm sure there are several active in Vendrien's Well, setting Vendrien Guard against each other and against the peasantry. Most cities and citadels fall by betrayal, not force of arms, and he's surely been trying to arrange that. As for the claim Fifth Eye made - well, it seemed accurate in layman's terms, but I'm no student of law."

"In truth, I must admit that the actions of Kyros are hardly bound by anything so concrete as law to begin with.  But while it is something of an accurate summation of the effects of that case -

"I am certain that of all the principles of Kyros' Law, however non-binding they are upon the Overlord themself, Kyros' Peace was the one least entangled in the matters that lead to the Orphan Midwife's imprisonment, short of the Oldwalls ban.  And really, that's a special case of Forbidden Knowledge anyway, which the Midwife's crime was.

"Not that I truly think she should not have done it," she sighs.  "I would have, were I her."

"But I digress.

"The failure of the Bastard Tier to hold together -

"...I do not claim Nerat ineffective at what he does.

"But, as coordinator of the effort to ensure the Bastard City fell apart on cue...

"I think Nerat gets too much credit for work he is not personally involved with.  He has an eye for talent, I'll give him that - but he did not smuggle me through the City's walls, nor negotiate with the Wild Wrath.  The Chorus may have been built from a mold he created, but an extension of Nerat they are not, an extension they cannot be, not like Ashe's legions; not and feed that sick fuck's bloodlust.  They succeed in spite of him more often than because of him.  Because he negotiates like a common thug.  And he runs his organization like one, too.

"I am certain that had I had Nerat's remit --

"Ah, but he has different goals than I.

"Hmph."

"Regardless, he is not the only person upon Terratus capable of throwing everything they can at the wall to see what sticks."  She huffs a wry, sad laugh.  "Goodness knows I do."

"Mmmh," he says noncommittally, "He does seem to foment chaos for its own sake. I'm sure he'd say he thrives in a chaotic environment, and it might even be true, but I doubt it increases his effectiveness. It might hide which things are his schemes, which are happenstance, and which are failures entire... which for the Archon of Secrets may be a worthy goal, I suppose."

"It might well be.  If I believed that the nature of his power was founded upon secrets, rather than...

"What he recreated in the Chorus, actually.

"Grasping, taking, ripping and tearing.  Power over all, enforced at swordpoint.  Attempts at usurpation.

"Blood, and the spilling thereof; pain and its infliction.

"Really, observe what we know of how he gathers his knowledge.

"Secrets.  Pah.  If anyone truly thrives off of those, it's Bleden Mark, not Nerat, no matter Kyros' assignation of their Archonates."