davids at kithrup.com writes: > The more I think about it, the more it seems to me that Vlad's > interrogation under the Orb was probably scripted such as to let him > walk. I mean, if they had an infallible method of determining the > exact truth to such statements as "Have you ever killed anyone using a > Morganti weapon?", wouldn't they have used it and nailed him on that > (at the very least)? I disagree on a number of points. Let us first take the idea of bringing up the topic of a morganti weapon and convicting an individual of its use when that is not what you are on trial for. Consider: even in today's egalitarian (well, sort of) society, a prosecutor cannot merely begin to wander off on a tangent without getting the defense all riled up. 'My client is not on trial for buying automatic weapons, Your Honor, he is on trial for murder.' "Objection sustained. Mr. Prosecutor?" Even more restrictive is the questioning of a noble. So the House of the Jhereg isn't particularly picky about its nobility. So the rank of Baronet is barely noble at all. The point of it is that, especially with the Empress sitting right there, the examiners are not going to wander off on a tangent, questioning you about morganti weapons when the issue at hand is the murder of a duke. Next, consider the idea of 'infallible method of determining the exact truth'. Except for a straight-out mind probe -- probably something illegal in and of itself -- there is likely no actual way of determining the exact FACT. Fact is not truth, remember; truth is relative, individual. 'Did you kill him?' "I think he committed suicide." From Vlad's point of view, Tagiwhateverchan killed himself by screwing around with Vlad -- sort of 'never laugh at live dragons', except it's 'never fuck with accomplished assassins'. The facts -- Vlad caused a wound by the use of a knife or whatever, said wound being the ultimate cause of the end of Tagitchan's life -- were not verified by the questioning of Baronet Taltos. There is a lesson here -- if you're ever going to prosecute, you want to establish facts, then establish that the individual in question has 'guilty knowledge' -- which is to say, knowledge of all the facts of the case. This is the proper use of the lie detector, whatever it happens to be -- voice stress analysis, polygraph, or mystic Imperial Orb. This is, however, a somewhat side issue; the fact of the matter is that Vlad is clearly a successful player of the verbal game that Steve Perry calls 'fugue' -- the art of saying something, but having something else understood. It is in such doublespeak that 'truth' gets twisted, bent, but never quite mutilated or broken. The Iorich, I expect, are not the experts that the Issola are in doublespeak, and they clearly underestimated a lowly Easterner Jhereg Baronet in regards to that game. You have to understand: a sharp player of fugue can avoid almost -any- answer unless the questioner is incredibly exacting. One person can ask another, 'Do you know what my location is?" and the other could answer, 'No' -- the hidden meaning being something like 'no, I don't know your precise latitude and longitude'. The Iorich questioners simply weren't exacting enough in their questioning, leaving Vlad enough squirming room to escape. Whether this was intentional or not (considering the Iorich, I don't think it was) may be material, but I certainly don't think it was scripted. Besides, I think the Empress had a good old time watching Vlad weasel his way out from under the Iorich. She clearly had ... 'fond' recollections of him. Knightmarshall Felix Surnamed Eisen, or "Iron Felix" Hand of Morr, The Order of Bones