Myskin is the Chamberlain at the Crag — Mordikhaan’s seat of power — and he is the best kind of antagonist: almost certainly correct in his assessments, utterly rational in his methods, and seductively coherent in his amorality.

He intercepts a private letter from Lycellis to Hawreth Vahd detailing Santaris’s condition. He reads it. He calculates the chaos that this information, if allowed to travel, will cause across Mordikhaan’s political landscape. And then he lets it continue on its way.

Because chaos, in the right hands, is useful.

Myskin does not have bad goals. He has efficient goals. He wants stability, and he has concluded that the most stable path to stability is controlled instability. He flees to Dancare by the book’s end — with his twin elite guards — having played his hand and withdrawn before the board collapses. He will be back. He always comes back.