The question makes Palamedes' heart constrict, and he thinks carefully before replying. At hour forty-one after arriving, he had asked the same thing to the silence of his dark apartment after lying in bed awake for a miserable amount of time. No comforting answer had come.

Truth over solace in lies. Palamedes has gained a reputation as a Warden suspicious of tradition for tradition's sake, but he has always believed that, and it's what he offers now. "I don't believe so," he says slowly. "There could be a Lyctoral tie that I am unaware of that might offer some kind of signal. But given that the process, as is currently stands, erases the cavalier as an independent consciousness," here, Pal winces, "I doubt it. I'm sorry, I wish I had a better answer."

Briefly, Palamedes considers telling her what he means by as it currently stands. But there is truth, and then there is potentially devastating conjecture. For now, he sets that matter aside.

"Though if you want my entirely unscientific opinion, the Reverend Daughter is far too stubborn to do something as mundane as die."