(He would have told her about the notes on immortality, but that definitely isn't a message he can relay via Ellitrea, who has no idea that Altarrin is - so much more than he appears.) 

Ellitrea will swing by after the briefing - it's now quite late - to update Carissa on the mission down south. (Or Caris, apparently, if that's who she - he? - is right now.) And she'll pass on Altarrin's other message. 

Carissa is Carissa right now, crafting in Altarrin's bedrooms. The update mostly doesn't - feel like anything. That's good. The point of this silly project of hers was to stop feeling emotionally invested in Altarrin when he evidently wasn't at all invested in her. The fact that he approves of the Emperor-seduction is more proof of that. She is grateful to him, for the place to land and the breathing room, but he doesn't want her and didn't show her any way to make him want her, and so she doesn't want to care about him. 

"I understand," she says calmly, in response to the message. She's not wearing her Thoughtsensing talisman, so Ellitrea can further read, if she wishes, that Carissa is mostly hoping that by the time Altarrin comes back she'll have new chambers and be out of his way.

...Yeah. It's not surprising. Altarrin probably won't find it surprising, even. 

"- He does care about you, you know," she says quietly. "Maybe - not in the ways that you wanted - but that is why he would help you. He wants you to be safe - he wants it very very badly, and - not just because you are useful to the Empire, he - thinks you are worth it more broadly. But," shrug, "he is the person he is. I think he would not have become Archmage-General if he did - personal attachments." 

As far as she knows the Emperor also hasn't shown previous signs of getting personally attached to his lovers, but presumably Carissa is aware of that, and still thinks her offer is good enough to sell him on, which isn't entirely implausible. 

She's not even looking for personal attachment, she doesn't think. She probably wouldn't have gone looking for anything else if Altarrin had visibly taken some pleasure from her presence, or from her suffering, or from her body, or anything. ...and then she wouldn't have taken her shot at the Emperor, so good for her that he didn't, she supposes. Maybe it was an elaborate sort of favor, showing her bland sad tired courtesy until she got herself together enough to go take something else. "He has been very generous to me," she murmurs blandly.

Sigh. "....I hope your plan works out. I - am also here if you need help with anything." 

And she goes. 

Carissa alternates crafting and Dick Practice and doesn't think of Altarrin again.

The news reaches them very quickly, when it happens, which is a candlemark past noon the next day. 

The initial report is not very informative, because as far as they know, no one on-site survived. 

There will be an investigation, of course. They're immediately sending a mage north who knows the pastwatching spell, and a military unit with a Mage-General in charge of securing the area. A full investigation will be conducted.

Based on Altarrin's final report before his presumed death in the explosion and mine collapse, it was almost certainly the work of extremist Vkandis-worshippers – and wow this has really not been a good year for that. Gods are the worst and their human worshippers are nearly as bad.

(There are faint hopes that the Archmage-General might have survived. He's exceptionally good at combat Gating and exceptionally cautious and goes around incredibly well shielded, and thus has made it through some very tight corners before, including at least a dozen assassination attempts. But he would have reported in immediately - or been spotted on scrying if he were badly injured but alive in the wreckage - and the faint hopes are pretty much extinguished by the time the news reaches the capital.) 

Carissa is not formally in any chain of command that doesn't run through Altarrin personally (and Caris is definitely not important enough to be updated immediately even if he were findable on scrying at that particular moment), and everyone has other things on their mind. 

It's an entire candlemark before Ellitrea, badly shaken and mostly hiding it, makes it over to the suite to inform Carissa of the news. 

(She's genuinely shocked. Altarrin has - always, in her mind, been close to invincible. She keeps replaying the last few days in her head. Should they have delegated the situation in the north to someone else? She understands why he didn't but - what a disaster - even the Emperor doesn't know just how hard Altarrin is to replace...) 

Because she's fundamentally a selfish person the thing that comes to mind is that all her eggs are back in one basket now. 

But she is sad. He had been - trying to mine spellsilver for her. Trying to fix his stupid world. The gods had assassinated him for it.

Of course he might no thinking about that with Ellitrea around and it doesn't change Carissa's strategy situation much anyway -

"My condolences," she says. 

(Ellitrea is not actually reading Carissa's mind right now. It's - Altarrin didn't want that, he wanted Carissa to - have space to have goals and ambitions and not have to constantly prune all of her thoughts into a shape that doesn't make her look like a threat. He wanted Carissa to be powerful, and, well. She's making some headway on that.) 

"We did get the most recent spellsilver shipment before - this - happened," she says, in lieu of anything more contentful because what are you supposed to say. "We have seventy pounds here. I think - that should cover your work for a significant length of time, no -?"

(She does not say out loud that it'll stretch longer if Carissa is spending half of her time on, instead, seducing the Emperor. Honestly the seduce-the-Emperor plan is seeming like less of a wildly disastrous idea than it did before? If one follows the gossip and has also received a private report from a certain junior Thoughtsenser, it sounds like actually be oddly compatible.) 

"Yes. I owe the Emperor another shipment of headbands this week and then intended to start work on the translation rings he requested. - I'd have someone else deliver them to the Emperor on my behalf, if that can be arranged. I shall be in mourning." No one has actually made the Caris-Carissa connection -- Carissa is an unusual and foreign name, but Caris isn't, and not that many people know Altarrin's girl's name and the gossip about her died down a while ago. And it's impossible by the local laws of physics. But if she shows up before the Emperor there's the chance he'll still pick up on something, and besides he'll feel more tricked if he's known her in both guises. She doesn't want him to feel tricked. She wants him to feel conquered.

"Of course." 

(Has Carissa not told the Emperor yet? Wasn't the plan that she would– ...Not her problem, right now, she has five thousand other problems and also everything feels unsteady and awful and it's going to be fine, she knows that, the Empire has survived stupid pointless wasteful violence from the gods before - at least Altarrin dealt with Taymyrr first, before this happened, it could have gotten substantially out of control if someone else had needed to get up to speed...) 

She'll leave Carissa to mourn. Or scheme, or whatever. 

The Emperor is not having emotions. 

He mostly doesn't have to make judgement calls, either. There are processes in place for responding to a disaster like this. There will be some very awkward diplomatic ramifications with Iftel, if - when - they get more formal confirmation that followers of Vkandis were involved. Iftel will predictably deny involvement and even have credible documentation that it couldn't have been their people and he does not buy that at all. Anyway, he has diplomats to handle that, and mage-experts to handle the investigation, and a competent mage-general to put in charge of security in Isk because clearly the fact that Isk was annexed a century ago doesn't mean it's secured. 

He's the most powerful man in the Empire, plausibly in the world, and he still couldn't stop this and he can't fix it

- he isn't exactly in the mood for a lighthearted walk in the gardens, but he...does want to see Caris, apparently. (This is unusual. Normally he doesn't want to see his lovers when other things are wrong, or - complicated.) 

He dispatches a messenger with a note. His deepest apologies, can they reschedule for two candlemarks later and meet at his suite. 

If Caris didn't know the circumstances the response would be slightly snarky. Not a refusal, obviously, but a - chiding for the inconvenience and a demand that'd cause one of the Emperor's servants some rushing-around. Perhaps he would write that he'd had evening plans to acquire a white peacock from a different admirer and would be delighted to see the Emperor instead assuming the Emperor could make up the white peacock. 

Since he does know the circumstances he doesn't do that, obviously. He replies that he'll be there. 

They may step up palace security. She should tell the Emperor tonight. Except he's going to be in a mood, presumably, about Altarrin, and she was aiming to get some more dates in first, and -

- and now that it's her only shot it's much more frightening to consider telling him. She'd meant to present her proposal with a sort of delighted indifference. I'll be your lover and bear your children, or I'll find someone else and send you monthly expensive invoices, the choice is yours. 

It has to be a game and it doesn't feel like a game right now. 

She's not sure whether she'll tell him or not. It depends what he's like when she arrives.

The Emperor is there to open the doors to his suite for Caris and usher him in himself (presumably one of the guards she passed gave him an advance warning when Caris was getting close.)

He's not disheveled, exactly - he's clearly someone used to keeping his appearance immaculate - but it's also sort of noticeable that he hasn't had time to preen and pick out a fresh evening outfit.

He's tense. It's not incredibly noticeable - he has a lot of composure, presumably decades of practice at it - but compared to how he was after their last meeting, it's glaring. 

(He's able to summon some of the happynervous feeling again, but mostly he's...off balance, in a completely different way from before - the ground just shifted under him and it feels like he didn't know it could do that, not like this, though of course that's stupid, assassinations and gods are an occupational hazard here and Altarrin is - was - very very good, but he's rolled the dice so, so many times, and it's not like Bastran was expecting to have him for his entire reign - it's not like Altarrin was expecting that and he's always been very responsible about making sure the move to his successor would go smoothly, if it were needed - but. It doesn't feel allowed.) 

"Caris." He doesn't quite bow, but - ducks his head in a deep nod that's sort of bow-adjacent. "I - can I get you anything, have you eaten yet -?" 

"Thank you. I'm not hungry." Well, it doesn't look like an obviously dangerous mood. "Are you well?" 

"I–" 

And he abruptly doesn't want to keep wearing this face. He's...not sure what face to wear instead. It's not like it even makes sense to say there's anything real underneath the face he's deciding to wear Also, probably being miserable about a totally-not-unprecedented and fully recoverable situation is - unattractive? 

He shrugs, slightly, ducks his head again. "I'm - as well as I can be, given the day it's been."

Does Caris look bored or annoyed - no - he's actually having a hard time reading what Caris is feeling but not bored or annoyed, he doesn't think.

"- I hate gods. It's so - wasteful - I don't understand why anyone worships them, it's just - always things like this, or like Taymyrr -" He cuts himself off with a faintly embarrassed headshake. "I don't mean to bore you," he still really really wants to say my lord and it still feels like it would sound completely stupid out loud. "It's– we can find a more cheerful topic, if you prefer." 

"I wouldn't've asked if I didn't want an answer. Let's sit down, though."

- it would be nice if Caris, like, led the way on that, but also he's seen one room plus a hallway in the Emperor's suite and it's unreasonable to expect him to know where is appropriate to the mood. 

He'll - reach out to take Caris' hand, in a way that manages to come across as shy despite the fact that he has not switched off his imposing Emperor-presence - and walk with him to the parlor. Which incidentally (not accidentally, at all, he did some planning here) involves walking past the half-open door to his bedroom, the inside dimly lit by a permanent mage-light on its lowest setting, imitating candlelight. It doesn't feel right to go there just yet - and he can't let go of the fantasy of being carried there although probably it's unreasonable to expect Caris to guess something that specific - but Caris is very clearly clever and observant and...experienced in seduction, or something like that...and might, maybe, notice? 

The parlor is very fancy - moreso than the library - and is small, appropriate for groups of two to ten people, but has a range of seating options, from armchairs around a little table to a long settee to a cozy loveseat beside the fireplace. 

It's kind of astonishing how little the man wants to decide but maybe it gets pent-up if you're Emperoring for decades. Caris has considered it and actually thinks he, too, would eventually get kind of weird if no one could hit him. 

He picks the cozy loveseat.

He takes a tray with wine-cups and a bottle from the cabinet. ...Pours a cup for himself, because he's not actually quite yet in the mood where it would be appealing to instead wait on Caris' permission or something, but he'll leave the bottle and second cup easily within reach rather than make that decision for Caris. 

"Today was - unfortunate, but recoverable," he says, after a few beats. "Not worth ruining our evening over. I just - haven't quite managed to relax yet, I guess."  

(He's - calm, poised, smiling apologetically - but definitely saying this like someone who is trying to convince himself more than Caris, and who may or may not have an enormous pile of emotions that he is mostly unaware of and definitely not letting himself look at directly.) 

That doesn't sound like a second date kind of problem, it sounds like a ...fifth date kind of problem. He reaches for, and squeezes, the Emperor's hand. "I hate the gods too. If I had that kind of power I'd do cool things with it."

That gets a startled smile, and returning hand-squeeze. "Oh? What sorts of things would you do?"