: I just can't think of any reason that The Deceiver would
: like to stay in the ice until the Light
: arrives...surely there are safer places. If there's a
: reason, I'll consider this a viable theory.
Are there any safer places? The Deceiver doesn't want to team up with Soulblighter this time--Balor had him bent to his will, but it was never an easy alliance and SB is about a dozen times worse (by which I mean in terms of personal relationships--the D had ties with Connacht, but not necessarily with Damas/Anshar etc--they probably knew each other but if you look at how happy he is to get "one of the murder" it looks as if there's bad blood there...). If he shows up wandering around the Province, somebody is going to snatch him up. In the ice he can just be himself... well, you know. Heal, recover, whatever, with a personal bodyguard of warlocks looking after him. He chooses this moment to get up because both Light and Dark are there, invading his space, and he has no choice but to pick a side. The light is bumbling berserks who have the scepter, the dark is mauls for god's sake and who wants to hang with mauls? They don't ever brush their tusks, even--so he picks the Light (any previous arrangements he may have had with Alric are strictly speculation).
The D always has his own agenda--there's no denying this. When he comes back on Alric's team his main motivation is the destruction of the remaining fallen lords--he goes to outrageous lengths to achieve this--and the prevention of new ones being created (i.e., the Summoner--either that, or he's still a big anti-Myrk proponent, which may be more likely). He goes straight for SB when this is an obvious suicide mission. He leads another suicide mission against Shiver--his outrage over the Lesotho dam thing may be because it could cost him a chance to do her in personally. He's very big on messing with the shades (former avatara and therefore potential Fallen). Coming out of the ice (yes, there is a point here) is the first step to achieving this end, so he's willing to forgive a little mispronunciation on the zerk's part. It was his choice to get off the glacier, not something the Light made happen. That's my opinion, anyway, which will get you a cup of coffee anywhere if you happen to have a buck ninety-five as well.
Oh, and I'm 99 and 44/100ths per cent dead certain that when he says "close enough" he means "you got the incantation close enough". Yes, the zerks are now close enough to transport out, but Occam's Razor (strangely enough, after William Ockham) suggests the former. See above about the value of my opinion.
