...it's impossible to tell, with thoughts so glancing, were those slave accomodations, or not? Merrin didn't think they were and the glimpses via Detection suggests that Merrin was hardly being treated as a slave by Cheliax's standards. By dath ilan's? It's so hard to tell at this remove. Merrin was, in theory, much wealthier than anything that she tried to draw in the way of 'living expenses', but what kind of living situation that corresponded to - could Merrin actually have had more wealth than she needed, could it actually have been that -
No! Merrin thinks of herself as too small of a person for somebody who would have been first called to a portal, for somebody with so many elite sadistic 'boyfriends', who had crowds cheering her and betting her in some arena. The Keepers weren't keeping Merrin poor, that would have been a ridiculous and meaningless economy for a slave this important. They were keeping Merrin weak, unaware of the power she could have held or garnered for herself. Merrin has no awareness of wealth as anything that can be used for ends besides personal luxuries, she has no thought that wealth foregone is power foregone, and that's why Merrin never tries to use the wealth she thinks she has. Maybe Merrin does hold vast wealth, legally, there if Merrin ever looks for it, which she never will; the Keepers may not bother with keeping wealth, in a place like dath ilan, so long as they keep power.
Amazing they just wear the name openly like that.
...and now she has to face the agonizing decision between whether to try to matching her own wits against Merrin's makers, to make Merrin realize what was done to her, for Cheliax to offer Merrin everything that was taken from her, in exchange for a damnation she never needs to know is coming. Or just take advantage of her incredibly convenient brainwashing.