Shuos Khiaz

**This article contains spoilers for Revenant Gun**.

> "*Do you think I'll hurt you?*"
> ― Shuos Khiaz
>
>

Heptarch **Shuos Khiaz** was a Shuos heptarch who ruled during most of the lifetime of General Shuos Jedao. She appears in Ninefox Gambit and is mentioned in Raven Stratagem and Revenant Gun.

## Appearance and Personality

Khiaz was shorter than Jedao, with long-lashed velvety eyes, a heart-shaped face framed by rippling dark hair, a languid smile, and a mouth that was beautiful but never kind.
She was a relentless and well-organized sexual predator, leaving detailed notes on her victims for the perusal of future Shuos heptarchs.

## History

Khiaz ascended to heptarch after Jedao was born but before he entered Shuos Academy. She remained at her position for over six decades.

Jedao was fast-tracked to Khiaz's office immediately after graduation to work as an assassin, but transferred to the Kel army as quickly as possible to escape her harassment. Khiaz let him think he had indeed escaped, allowing the transfer and waiting until much later to strike.

At an Andan party after Jedao's promotion to brigadier general and shortly before he met Heptarch Nirai Kujen, Khiaz cornered him in a dark room while wearing a taboo Kel uniform, putting his forbidden attraction to other soldiers on display for the other attendees, and raped him. During the act, Jedao concealed his long-nurtured secret plot against the heptarchate by pretending to confess a false fear of death. He considered suicide afterwards, but was talked down by his chief of staff. Though Khiaz was well known as a sexual predator, her position as heptarch ensured immunity and sly digs about her interest followed Jedao for the rest of his career. Kujen, himself a predator, taunted Jedao with having been one of Khiaz's "favorites."

Khiaz worked on the propaganda campaign during the Lanterner rebellion. Her results were so effective that High General Kel Garit felt there would be no public opinion problem with Jedao firing on the Lanterners' children.

After the massacre at Hellspin Fortress, Khiaz, enraged and remembering Jedao's "confession," signed him over to the Kel Arsenal and allowed Kujen to consign him to the undeath of the black cradle.

Many later citizens of the heptarchate and hexarchate remained unaware of Khiaz's predations. Her rape of Jedao did not appear in most accounts of his career, leaving his early flight from her office unexplained. A fictionalized version of Khiaz appeared in *A Labyrinth of Foxes*, a drama about Jedao's life which reframed their relationship as one of mutual seduction. However, her notes on her victims remained available to succeeding Shuos heptarchs and hexarchs.

During Jedao's mission to the Fortress of Scattered Needles, Mikodez posted an analyst surgically altered to exactly resemble Khiaz to Jedao's swarm as a reminder that the Shuos were watching him and a bleed-through test for his anchor, Brevet General Kel Cheris. Cheris later experienced Jedao's memories of Khiaz and could not look at the analyst's remains afterwards. In a conversation during the Hafn invasion, Mikodez said Jedao couldn't be entirely blamed for an attraction to fellow Kel after the way Khiaz had manipulated him.

After his resurrection, Jedao remembered that Khiaz had been the Shuos heptarch during his cadet years, but knew nothing more about her. His ignorance of her assault contributed to the way he explained his treatment of Major Kel Dhanneth to Cheris and the way she reacted to his account.

## Trivia

* Jedao was 45 years old when Khiaz signed him over to Kel control. 398 years later, at the Siege of the Fortress of Scattered Needles, Jedao was 448.

## References

1. ↑ Ninefox Gambit, Chapter 21
2. ↑ Ninefox Gambit, Chapter 19
3. ↑ Ninefox Gambit, Chapter 7
4. ↑ Raven Stratagem, Chapter 9
5. ↑ Revenant Gun, Chapter 1
6. ↑ Raven Stratagem, Chapter 25
7. ↑ Raven Stratagem, Chapter 22
8. ↑ Raven Stratagem, Chapter 9
9. ↑ Ninefox Gambit, Chapter 21
10. ↑ Ninefox Gambit, Chapter 21; Revenant Gun, Chapter 9
11. ↑ Revenant Gun, Chapter 21
12. ↑ Ninefox Gambit, Chapter 2,21
13. ↑ Raven Stratagem, Chapter 22
14. ↑ Revenant Gun, Chapter 11
15. ↑ Raven Stratagem, Chapter 9
16. ↑ Ninefox Gambit, Chapter 7
17. ↑ Ninefox Gambit, Chapter 21
18. ↑ Ninefox Gambit, Chapter 24
19. ↑ Raven Stratagem, Chapter 9
20. ↑ Revenant Gun, Chapter 1
21. ↑ Revenant Gun, Chapter 35
22. ↑ Revenant Gun, Chapter 2