The Tyrant Philosophers/Terms
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Every entry currently tracked for this category.
| Entry | Appears in | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Acting-Sage-Inquirer | House of Open Wounds ch 48-51 | a rank within the School of Correct Speech (Inquirers); Prassel now holds it, elevated from Fellow-Inquirer |
| Alkhand | Lives of Bitter Rain ch 7-10; Days of Shattered Fait ch 1-50 | the Usmiat royal title; the "appropriate Usmiat title" for a ruling monarch |
| Almuer | Days of Shattered Fait ch 18-20 | a sage or wise man; literally "one whose ghost is worthy of preserving" |
| Appointments Secretary to the Commission | Days of Shattered Fait ch 41 | the Commission official who would name the next Perfector |
| Auntie | City of Last Chances ch 34 | |
| Awkward Questions | House of Open Wounds ch 17 | a drinking game Banders mentions playing |
| Bashonin | Lives of Bitter Rain ch 7; Days of Shattered Fait ch 2 | title held by Tarcomir as Lor's emissary |
| bell-making | House of Open Wounds ch 41 | Cosserby's derisive term for his Sonori work; used by Banders as a dismissal |
| bird-badge insurgents | City of Last Chances ch 11 | Shrievsby's dismissive term for the resistance cells operating in Ilmar |
| Blessed | House of Open Wounds ch 20 | a term for openly-consecrated priests of foreign gods serving in the Pal military; Pirisytes recognizes them "wearing the uniform. Actual priests of actual gods" |
| Bride of the Sea | Pretenders to the Thro ch 9 | a rank within the Fisher King cult; Vestry held this position before her defiance |
| chucker-outer | City of Last Chances ch 44 | the Vultures' (or the underworld's) term for a bouncer; Hellgram's role at the Anchorage |
| Claw of Ffen | Pretenders to the Thro ch 7 | the title held by the current champion of Eres Ffenegh, invoking the dead crab god Ffen; the Widow uses it mockingly to address Kiff |
| Cohort-Archivist | House of Open Wounds ch 11; Lives of Bitter Rain ch 1 | a teaching/administrative role; the refectory teacher holds this title with two other full-time jobs |
| Cohort-Inquirer | House of Open Wounds ch 23 | |
| Cohort-Invigilator | House of Open Wounds ch 23; Lives of Bitter Rain ch 2-5; Days of Shattered Fait ch 1-43 | sings a Pal marching song at a fire; Masty stops to listen and feels briefly better |
| Cohort-Monitor | House of Open Wounds ch 23-35; Days of Shattered Fait ch 42 | |
| Companion-Archivist | City of Last Chances ch 18 | a rank within Correct Erudition held by Nasely |
| Companion-Invigilator | Lives of Bitter Rain ch 5-6; Days of Shattered Fait ch 42 | rank; Benallers' rank; one below Fellow |
| Companion-Monitor | House of Open Wounds ch 48 | rank Prassel offers Festle within The Deathless |
| Custodian | Days of Shattered Fait ch 4 | |
| drill statlos | Pretenders to the Thro ch 40 | a military drill authority; the dead's stamping would make "a drill statlos weep" |
| Dusarch | Days of Shattered Fait ch 20-31 | title of the ruler of Lucibi, who died without heir, prompting the throne's auction |
| factora | Lives of Bitter Rain ch 4 | the Palleseen colonial term for a merchant's business premises or trading post in an occupied territory |
| Families | Pretenders to the Thro ch 5-17 | the term used for members of a clan in Eres Ffenegh; the two attackers are called "the Families man" and "the junior Families man" |
| Fammi | Lives of Bitter Rain ch 10 | a Palleseen term of familiar equals, equivalent to "mate" |
| Feggs | Pretenders to the Thro ch 41 | pejorative used by Fowlett for the Os-Fferegh; "She wants the Feggs to remember today for ten generations" |
| Fellow rank | Pretenders to the Thro ch 40 | the officer grade of the forward company officers Fowlett summons |
| Fellow-Archivist | House of Open Wounds ch 35; Days of Shattered Fait ch 7 | |
| Fellow-Broker | City of Last Chances ch 37; House of Open Wounds ch 50; Lives of Bitter Rain ch 7 | unnamed officer on Scaffesty's staff; shoots at Lidlet in defiance; dies from the withdrawn blessing |
| Fellow-Inquirer | City of Last Chances ch 37-40; House of Open Wounds ch 23-51; Lives of Bitter Rain ch 1-6; Pretenders to the Thro ch 29 | the rank Angilly holds at the chapter's start, before promotion |
| Fellow-Invigilator | House of Open Wounds ch 32-35; Lives of Bitter Rain ch 2-5; Days of Shattered Fait ch 42 | a rank within the Invigilators; Ostrephy's rank; Angilly calls her "Magister" |
| Fellow-Lodge | Days of Shattered Fait ch 8 | |
| Fellow-Monitor | City of Last Chances ch 37; House of Open Wounds ch 43; Days of Shattered Fait ch 42 | |
| Fellow-Trustie | City of Last Chances ch 49 | a rank imposed by the Pals on Gownhall masters, making them simultaneously responsible to the Pals and to their colleagues; Vorkovin is the first mentioned holder |
| Fellows | House of Open Wounds ch 45 | a rank; Maserley's and Thurrel's level |
| Flossy | Lives of Bitter Rain ch 6 | the nickname used for Professor-Invigilator Flockersly outside his office; "It breeds complacence that he can use against his interdepartmental rivals" |
| Gabble | Lives of Bitter Rain ch 4 | old soldier's slang for valuable-but-religious loot that might bring you before Correct Speech if found in your pack |
| Gak | Days of Shattered Fait ch 42 | a contractual word/clause; Caecelian writes it into her binding, and speaking it after the transfer causes Wattery's head and one arm to fall from her body; it is the lethal clause of the contract |
| ghost work | House of Open Wounds ch 39 | Prassel's term for the classified assignment "Higher Orders" have put her on; she "always wanted ghost work. Until now" |
| God the grudging healer | Days of Shattered Fait ch 40 | the God Loret formerly followed; his followers "did not even defend themselves" against the Dead Companies; Loret "displeased God" and fled |
| God-fevers | Days of Shattered Fait ch 8 | the Usmiat name for illnesses that strike foreigners in Usmai, blamed on local deities taking offence; Kilbery, as a Pal, rejects the explanation |
| god-smuggling | House of Open Wounds ch 24 | Jack's former trade in Ilmar: spiriting deities out of the city to keep them from the Decanters; the charge for which he was imprisoned |
| gone native | City of Last Chances ch 11 | the condition afflicting those trapped in the Reproach; they shed their former identities, adopt courtly titles and an antique Maric idiolect, and lose all reaction to the physical threats around them |
| Grand Moerend | Days of Shattered Fait ch 5-18 | |
| Heir | Days of Shattered Fait ch 18 | |
| Hellieur | City of Last Chances ch 16-43; Pretenders to the Thro ch 5 | (not in this chapter text; listed in reference only) |
| hooley-hooley-hailey | House of Open Wounds ch 17 | Palleseen imitation of Maric speech; used as a racial caricature in the authorised play; Jack asks if it is a thing |
| Hop to! | Pretenders to the Thro ch 12 | the Loruthi command to activate batons fitted with Loruthi tablethi. |
| Hullseer | Days of Shattered Fait ch 50 | title of the leader of the Cotto pirates; held by Orhuhst |
| Incorrect Exchange | City of Last Chances ch 1 | the crime of begging or unlicensed trade; Yasnic risks it |
| Incorrect Speech | City of Last Chances ch 1; House of Open Wounds ch 45 | the crime of speaking against Occupier orthodoxy; arrests made for it |
| Izzy | Pretenders to the Thro ch 35 | familiar nickname for Istreddy used within the Heretics |
| Junior phal | Lives of Bitter Rain ch 1 | |
| Junior sympaticos | House of Open Wounds ch 3 | a couple of Alv's students washing bloody clothes from the previous day |
| Kama | Days of Shattered Fait ch 28 | a nickname Gorbudan used for Dekamran; Dekamran refuses to let anyone else use it |
| Keeper of the Fifth Key | Days of Shattered Fait ch 4 | a title held by Coregan; "a very grand way of describing a relatively minor personality within the administrative hierarchy of the palace" |
| Kepishi | Lives of Bitter Rain ch 8-10; Days of Shattered Fait ch 4-40 | a term for Palleseen people; Gorbudan calls them "killers of gods, devourers of ways" |
| know Gil | Days of Shattered Fait ch 4 | |
| Lemon blood fever | House of Open Wounds ch 19 | a wasting disease with "a gauntness" and "yellowness to the skin"; Ollery carries a tonic that can stave it off |
| Louse Speaker | Days of Shattered Fait ch 8-33 | |
| Maestra | City of Last Chances ch 37 | |
| Maestro | City of Last Chances ch 35-37 | Gownhall teachers Shantrov invokes as potential leaders; Vidsya dismisses them |
| Magister | House of Open Wounds ch 3-51; Lives of Bitter Rain ch 6-8; Days of Shattered Fait ch 2-38; Pretenders to the Thro ch 23-29 | a form of address; calling Banders "Magister" would be a court-martial offence as "Disrespect to the uniform" |
| Man of peace | Pretenders to the Thro ch 5 | term the demon uses for Jack, apparently a descriptor tied to his Maric identity |
| Mesne-Lord | City of Last Chances ch 5 | a title from Allor's pre-Occupation social order; Blackmane would have held it had the Pals not conquered Allor. |
| Misericord | House of Open Wounds ch 11 | a dagger; Prassel refused to use one to cull extra corpses from the convalescence wards |
| Necromantic Unnatural | House of Open Wounds ch 27 | classification applied to a person who is a walking corpse animated by a bound ghost (applied to Festle in the reference list; the chapter shows the phenomenon directly) |
| No kings, no masters | Pretenders to the Thro ch 42 | the motto of Hell's revolutionaries, spoken by Caeleen, echoed by Devil Jack and Niev |
| Old Cause | Pretenders to the Thro ch 35 | regimental nickname for The Old Cause / Fowlett, short for "of Death"; used by her own people |
| Old Eyeball | House of Open Wounds ch 45 | epithet for Scaffesty |
| Orcoba period | City of Last Chances ch 5 | a historical/artistic period referenced in Ivarn's note describing a stolen desk. |
| Oslamn | Pretenders to the Thro ch 12 | |
| Pal company conjurer | Days of Shattered Fait ch 24 | a type of practitioner who summons monsters for military use |
| Pel phrase | Pretenders to the Thro ch 27 | the single-word command trigger for a Palleseen charged rod; "the first word of the language so many foreigners learned" |
| Peost | Lives of Bitter Rain ch 7-10; Days of Shattered Fait ch 5-48 | a name used for the Palleseen state and its advisors; "Those men and women clustering about the Peost throne with their hand about that nation's throat, they were advisors" |
| Perfector | City of Last Chances ch 10-40; House of Open Wounds ch 7; Lives of Bitter Rain ch 3-10; Days of Shattered Fait ch 1-42; Pretenders to the Thro ch 7-40 | the title and office held by Culvern over Ilmar as individual occupied territory; appointed by the Temporary Commission of Ends and Means |
| phantom velvet | City of Last Chances ch 12 | a euphemism for death; "They will be wearing the phantom velvet already" means they are already dead |
| piutarma | House of Open Wounds ch 17 | an Ilmari word meaning both "auntie" and "someone who runs a gang, a criminal boss" |
| plum post | Days of Shattered Fait ch 2 | slang for a desirable, low-risk foreign posting |
| Political Oversight | House of Open Wounds ch 49 | a function exercised by a Fellow-Inquirer who visits the camp; mentioned only by title |
| Pragmatic Flexibility | Days of Shattered Fait ch 7 | "The term from Pal philosophy" for Drathel's quality of believing and disavowing things in the moment; "the scholars were still out on whether it was a good thing or not" |
| Priestess of the High Fane | House of Open Wounds ch 46 | Tallifer's former religious title, restored when Mazdek chooses her |
| Probationary Citizen | City of Last Chances ch 5 | a title the Palleseen occupation authorities apply to Blackmane, marking his legal precariousness. |
| Professor-Invigilator | Lives of Bitter Rain ch 6 | the rank of Professor-Invigilator Flockersly |
| rasophore | City of Last Chances ch 1-19 | a title used by Ruslav to address Yasnic as a priest; no further gloss given |
| Regulars | House of Open Wounds ch 1 | native Palleseen soldiers; contrasted with Accessories. |
| Resident | Lives of Bitter Rain ch 5-10; Days of Shattered Fait ch 6 | the Palleseen diplomatic/military representative posted in a foreign land; the position Angilly is being sent to fill |
| robe-bearer | City of Last Chances ch 1 | term for a priest of the Mahanic Temple; Yasnic disclaims it |
| Sage-Archivist | City of Last Chances ch 6-40; House of Open Wounds ch 35-37 | murdered by the Indwellers; Fleance says "They'd murdered the Sage-Archivist" and that the event broke his control over the Game |
| Sage-Inquirer | City of Last Chances ch 37; Lives of Bitter Rain ch 3; Pretenders to the Thro ch 20 | the rank Meller holds; the highest Palleseen officer in the region |
| Sage-Monitor | House of Open Wounds ch 20; Lives of Bitter Rain ch 3 | once complimented Pirisytes's positive attitude |
| Sand Life | Days of Shattered Fait ch 8 | street slang among Sand Lanes kids for their knife-and-gang existence; "Half of them would be dead before they made two decades" |
| scar-mail | House of Open Wounds ch 23 | slang for the accumulated flogging scars on a person's back ("Got room for more stripes or is it all scar-mail already?") |
| senior phal | Days of Shattered Fait ch 10 | a level of schooling in Pallesand; Gil compares her breathlessness to "a girl in senior phal, sneaking out with a boy for the first time" |
| Serpent's Fang | Days of Shattered Fait ch 5-14 | |
| Sier | Lives of Bitter Rain ch 8-10 | a Palleseen title of address for a respected superior; Angilly uses it to avoid committing to a Usmiri category of address |
| simulacratia | Lives of Bitter Rain ch 5 | a class of demon Benallers considers for area surveillance; "a clutch of low-grade demons just released over a wide area with some basic pattern-recognition instructions" |
| Skystones | Pretenders to the Thro ch 12 | local argot for the Palleseen artillery rounds, equated with shooting stars and meteorites. |
| Sonorist | House of Open Wounds ch 8-34 | Cosserby's profession; a maker and maintainer of Sonori (and, in practice, prosthetics); the name derives from the Sonori's bell-like sound |
| Specialist | Pretenders to the Thro ch 16-40 | |
| Standard bottle procedures | City of Last Chances ch 37 | Nisbet's euphemism for Palleseen crowd-control measures; "may not suffice" against the labourers march |
| strategic withdrawal | House of Open Wounds ch 14 | the euphemism used in dispatches for what is plainly a retreat; Prassel uses the phrase acidly |
| sympaticos | House of Open Wounds ch 3 | students of sympathetic magic; Alv's students are washing bloody clothes |
| tab | Days of Shattered Fait ch 37 | slang shorthand for tablethi as a unit of value; "over a hundred thousand tab, all in" |
| the Alkhani | Lives of Bitter Rain ch 9 | title of the Alkhand's wife/wife-in-title |
| the demonist | House of Open Wounds ch 11 | epithet Maric Jack uses for the conjurer who saved him; Prassel hated this person; likely refers to Maserley |
| the Difficult Wives Club | Days of Shattered Fait ch 32-49 | humorous self-designation for Happy Jack (lover of Caecelian, "the Viper") and the Under-warden (husband of the centipede monster): "Jack the Viper's beloved and the Under-warden. The founder members of the Difficult Wives Club." |
| the duty Companion | House of Open Wounds ch 22 | a rank/role; Spinnerly holds it; Banders curries favour with him |
| the echo | House of Open Wounds ch 10 | Cosserby's word for the thing present but unacknowledged: the coming major battle |
| the falling priest | Pretenders to the Thro ch 34 | the demon assassin's epithet for Jack, referencing his former priesthood and current strait |
| the gap | Pretenders to the Thro ch 1 | what remains when a demon dies: not a body but "an absence made tangible," a hole where the demon "fell out of the world and back Below" |
| the Hammer | City of Last Chances ch 28-48 | the workers' action of abandoning the mills to confront the Duke and Armigers; "Wielding the Hammer was always just abandoning the mills to go remind the Duke and the Armigers who it was put money in their posh velvet purses" |
| the killing word | Days of Shattered Fait ch 47 | the activation word for a tableth weapon, spoken in Pel; firing a baton or rod requires speaking it. |
| The Knife Witch of Jarokir | Days of Shattered Fait ch 8 | Kilbery's invented nickname for Tally, the surgeon who runs the Fever Lodge; he fabricates a backstory of a king, a queen, and a slit throat |
| the Loopholes | House of Open Wounds ch 40-51 | shorthand for The Ninety-Seven Loopholes, the binding legal text of the poison-condiction scheme |
| the Louseocracy | Days of Shattered Fait ch 33 | Flint's derisive name for what the Tesemer would have made of Usmai had they succeeded in conquest five hundred years ago |
| The Old Knife | Pretenders to the Thro ch 2-34 | the fierce winter wind off the sea at Eres Ffenegh, named by poets; arrives as the siege stalls; "As much a part of the city as her sainted ancestor, and not banished so easily" |
| the option | House of Open Wounds ch 43 | the act of accepting God's healing, which renders a soldier unable to fight without dying; the prisoners in the barracks are those who took it |
| the Rain Life | Lives of Bitter Rain ch 2-9; Days of Shattered Fait ch 2-50 | a label for the Diplomatic Office's work, coined by a poet since excised from the approved canon; "what passes over a nation before the storm comes, putting out fires" |
| the ribbons | City of Last Chances ch 6 | powder-blue strips students must wear at their belts by Pal statute; a political signal, worn or removed by conviction |
| the ship of suspicion | House of Open Wounds ch 45 | Tallifer's metaphor for the point at which one is irrevocably marked by the Correct Speech crowd |
| the Tally officer | House of Open Wounds ch 6; Lives of Bitter Rain ch 2 | referenced as a figure of strict Palleseen bureaucratic accountability |
| the Tally's script | House of Open Wounds ch 6 | the soldiers' name for the marking system on a whipped man's back, in reference to the Tally Officer ensuring "every bad student completed their lines" |
| the Unclean | House of Open Wounds ch 45 | epithet applied to Lochiver |
| Third Degree Cap | City of Last Chances ch 15 | a Divinati hat, "the folded-over kind with a tassel"; locals call it "a sock" |
| Tiger-Crab | Lives of Bitter Rain ch 6; Days of Shattered Fait ch 5-15 | the creature involved in the previous Resident's fatal "hunting accident" in Usmai; Angilly has no context for it |
| twelveday | City of Last Chances ch 1 | old Ilmari calendar unit, now illegal to use |
| Unhappy Jack | Days of Shattered Fait ch 49 | the stage of grief Jack passed through after losing his wife, between "Happy Jack" and his current hollow grimness; characterised by weeping, red eyes, demands made of an absent God |
| Usmiri inclusive and exclusive we | Days of Shattered Fait ch 47 | Usmiri has a linguistic distinction Pel lacks: the "we" that includes the listener versus the "we" that is only the speaker and others. |
| Volunteers | House of Open Wounds ch 41 | euphemism for bound Whitebellies with tablethi strapped to their necks and empty coppers before them, to be commanded as ghost-ammunition sources |
| votaress | City of Last Chances ch 9; House of Open Wounds ch 49 | an Allorwen sacred intermediary between worlds who formalises agreements for the benefit of her people; Mother Semprellaime's former training |
| White Manor | City of Last Chances ch 12; House of Open Wounds ch 37 | used as a verb ("You do not know enough to come here and White Manor me"), meaning to attempt to extract premium prices or to affect airs of high-status dealing; the youth had been told he'd get thirteen pence "at White Manor" |
| Working Against the Perfecture | City of Last Chances ch 24 | the charge on the official poster condemning the healer, Ruslav, the student girl, and Ivarn Ostravar; the chapter notes no common crimes were smeared on them, unlike usual Palleseen practice |
| baton-fodder | House of Open Wounds ch 35 | slang term for expendable soldiers; Thurrel tells the demon to "round us up another batch" |
| bawd | House of Open Wounds ch 7 | the operator of a circle house; Mother Semprellaime's trade |
| birds | City of Last Chances ch 10 | |
| bludgeons | Days of Shattered Fait ch 30 | Flint's term for large wooden tankards (as opposed to "small sticks," i.e. standard cups) |
| brute-work demon | Days of Shattered Fait ch 38 | a classification of demon suited to labour and violence, which Pel (designed for easy learning) suits as a language |
| camp followers | House of Open Wounds ch 37 | the profession and legal fiction by which those purveying "mortal or infernal flesh" register as seamstresses and laundresses in the Pal census |
| comedy horse | House of Open Wounds ch 36 | Lidlet's term for the stretcher she and the other bearer carry ("the comedy horse that was their stretcher") |
| demon chit | House of Open Wounds ch 45 | epithet for Caeleen |
| excursion permit | House of Open Wounds ch 23 | a document invented by the Landwards Battalion Logistics Department, not present in Forthright Battalion or elsewhere |
| foul-shot | House of Open Wounds ch 33 | Tallifer's term (with uncertainty: "Or that's the word") for the Loruthi ammunition; implies that if nothing gets septic, there is a deeper problem |
| god smuggler | House of Open Wounds ch 2 | a charge brought against the prisoner; a crime that does not exist on the usual list and had to be invented for him |
| idiot passes | House of Open Wounds ch 26 | an additional document that Landwards Battalion instituted for Accessories to carry when entering a city; Palleseen Regulars and officers do not need them |
| Islerwoman | Days of Shattered Fait ch 1 | term used by the Cotto pirate for a foreigner from the islands/Archipelago; used "like a title of honour" |
| knocking shops | House of Open Wounds ch 31 | brothels; "one of the various knocking shops around here" |
| living curse | City of Last Chances ch 17 | the Old Duke's last wickedness, foisted onto the man who was hanging him; a term the narrator uses without full explanation |
| negotiators | House of Open Wounds ch 50 | |
| niece-cousin | Days of Shattered Fait ch 8 | a Cotto kinship label for very distant familial connection that still carries obligation |
| phal education | House of Open Wounds ch 36 | formal military or institutional education; Lidlet has "No phal education but top-grade credentials from the schools of life and military regulations" |
| quacksalvers | City of Last Chances ch 10 | practitioners in Mirror Allor; along with fortune-tellers and curse-mongers |
| seachild | Days of Shattered Fait ch 36-40 | the Cotto epithet for Loret, marking her as holy through the Fisher King's consecration; "sacred to them" because "all the blood shed for either cult ran into" the same ocean |
| statlos | City of Last Chances ch 1-36; House of Open Wounds ch 2-9; Lives of Bitter Rain ch 1-2; Days of Shattered Fait ch 12-33; Pretenders to the Thro ch 40 | a social/military rank below officer status; Angilly's father was "a mere statlos" |
| succubus | House of Open Wounds ch 9 | A type of demon in a woman's shape, made to be "a mirror to desires"; Caeleen is one |
| the meat grinder | House of Open Wounds ch 45 | colloquial term for the interlocking arms of the Palleseen war machine |
| trustie | City of Last Chances ch 8-26 | Hoyst's assistants at the scaffold; they "hauled the levers in perfect unison, practised as clock-tower figures" |
| wineglass | Pretenders to the Thro ch 10 |