"I'm more tolerant of change than many of my kind my age. I've always been something of an outlier in that respect, but I confess I have several lost months I can't account for after the fact." He has made attempts to retrace his steps to no avail. It will likely always remain a mystery. "I must have been in some sort of fugue state."

He shakes his head. "Their oaths of vengeance are absolute. Our quarrel spans centuries. Only our magic thwarted them, and much like any who long desire something and finally see a path to it, they will not be swayed." Nor would he ever expect or ask such quarter. Should he ever make it back home, that's one of many daggers poised for his back.

"It isn't long. We haven't had the luxury of mourning. My own feelings are mixed. There was much rot at the heart of the pyramid. Some who died were no personal loss to me or the world, but it was..." He frowns as he tries to settle on the best explanation.

"From the outside we were bastions of stability and organization. The other clans, as much as they hated us, also took inspiration and found security in our ability to present a united front. We were a pillar of a treaty that lasted centuries. Our fall has many questioning the value of the treaty at all, and if that dissolves, there's nothing but more death and chaos to come of it. Yet it does present us an opportunity to bring something of more value out of the ashes, one we'd never have managed with the stultifying power of the eldest among us at the top."