Note: spoilers below.
Summarizing previous messages:
Jag wrote:
> [Why didn't Aliera and Adron psionically communicate about her
> arrest?]
Another possibility that occurs to me is that Aliera may have been too
proud to tell her father about the arrest, since that might have a
taint of cowardice ("Oh Daddy, I've been arrested, come save me!").
But maybe not. See below.
Gametech wrote:
> [The prisons have black phoenix stone, which prevents such
> communication.]
On Tue, 26 Nov 2002, Andrew Bailey wrote:
>
>Not really. Given that they are different buildings :)
>
>They may have used Black Phoneix stone in the old building, but then
>they may not have, since psionic communication wasn't particullary
>common.
>
It was uncommon, but it was known. There may have been some
situation, early in the history of the Empire, where the ruler needed
to be sure that prisoners who were also sorcerors were unable to
communicate at all with the outside, and the only way to do that was
to use black phoenix stone. So it may be a traditional component of
all prisons, not just the one in Adrilankha.
Indeed, perhaps gold phoenix stone is used as well. After all, if
there isn't anything, what is to prevent a sufficiently competent
sorcerer from simply breaking out?