Earthborn

EIGHT - TRIALS

As soon as Didul reached the court, Pabul ushered him into his private chamber. "Did you see how many guards were stationed around the court?"

"I assume you've been getting death threats."

"I'm flattered by them-not a single bribe. They know I can't be bought. They're going to find out I can't be terrified."

"I can."

"You know what I mean," said Pabul. "I'm afraid, yes, of course, but my fear won't make me judge any differently than I would have."

"This trial is famous already," said Didul. "And it doesn't even begin till tomorrow."

Pabul sighed. "Everyone knows what's at stake. All the laws protecting the old order are being used to block the new. I have no idea what kind of defense Shedemei is planning, but I can't imagine what she'll say that can overbalance the plain truth that she's guilty."

"Guilty," said Didul. "Guilty of being a remarkable woman. Among the Kept in Bodika, she's already being touted as a martyr."

"I keep hoping that Motiak will take the matter out of my hands by simply announcing that the old laws are repealed."

"He won't," said Didul. "He's trying to stay above the whole thing."

"He knows he can't, Didul." Pabul fumbled through some of the barks lying on his table. "No matter what I decide, the loser will appeal."

"Even if you give Shedemei no penalty at all?"

"Have you met her?" asked Pabul sharply.

Didul laughed. "This morning, before coming here."

"Then you know she'll appeal even if I pay a fine to her. I think she's enjoying this."

"Poor Pabul."

Pabul grimaced. "We've dedicated our lives to being the opposite of Father. And now I have to sit in judgment on a follower of Binaro, just as Father sat in judgment on Binaro himself."

"Nobody will be burned to death this time."

"No-the treason charge is the one I can dismiss easily enough. But I still have to convict her of all the others."

"Isn't there some law about bringing false charges maliciously?" asked Didul.

"The operative word there is false. These charges are true."

"Malicious mischief. Trying to disrupt the public order of the kingdom. And as you said, the treason charge is there only to make it a capital crime."

"What are you suggesting? That I bring charges against the people who are charging Shedemei?"

Didul shrugged. "It might induce them to drop their petition against her."

"I don't know how likely that is," said Pabul. "But if I could find a way to complicate things further, so that there's no possibility of a clearcut victory or defeat for anybody... ."

Didul waited for a while, watching Pabul read bark after bark. Finally he patted his older brother's shoulder and made his way to Ak-maro's house. He came to the back, as he usually did, and waited in silence in the shade of a tree until someone inside the house noticed him. It was Luet who finally came out and greeted him. "Didul, why don't you just come to the front of the house and clap your hands like anyone else?"

"And what if it's Akma who answers the door?"

"He's never here. And so what if it is?"

"I don't want a quarrel. I don't want a fight."

"I don't think Akma does, either," said Luet. "He still hates you, of course-"

"Of course," said Didul dryly.

"But it's not... he's concentrating on other things."

"What I want to know is, does he have anything to do with these charges against Shedemei?"

"Isn't she wonderful?" asked Luet. "Have you met her?"

"This morning. It was rather grueling, actually. She practically held me to the fire before she'd finally believe that I wasn't a jaguar dressed as a turkey."

"She knew about your past?"

"As if she'd watched over my shoulder. Everything. It was terrifying, Luet. She asked me... ."

"What?"

Didul shuddered. "Asked me if I especially enjoyed it when I knocked you around."

Luet laid a hand on his shoulder. "That was unkind of her. I've forgiven you-what business is it of hers?"

"She said she was trying to determine whether it was really possible for a person to change. She was trying to find out if I was really vile before, and became a truly virtuous man now, or if I was vile and now merely pretended to be good, or if I was good all along, and merely misguided."

"What good would it do her to find that out?"

"Oh, I can think of several uses. Anyway, she's a moral philosopher. That's one of the great questions, whether human beings are really capable of change, or if all seeming changes are really a matter of framing the existing character in a different moral situation... you know. Philosophy stuff. I've just never had anybody actually try to test their ideas against the real world like that. At least, I've never been the real world they were testing against."

"She isn't much for good manners, is she?"

"Better than you," said Didul. "She invited me to eat with her at noon."

"You know perfectly well that you're already invited to have supper with us," said Luet, gently shoving him.

He caught her hand, laughing, then immediately let go of her and stood up, trying to hide his embarrassment.

"Didul," she said, "you are strange sometimes." Then, as she led the way into the house, she commented over her shoulder, "You don't mind that Edhadeya will be here tonight, do you?"

"Not unless I'll be in the way."

Luet only laughed.

In the kitchen, Didul and Luet talked with Chebeya as they helped her prepare supper. Akmaro came home with three young diggers who were trying to get him to take them on as students. "There aren't enough hours in the day," he said-obviously not for the first time- as they followed him into the house.

"We don't want you to stop what you're doing. Just let us follow you."

"Like shadows," said another.

"We'll be quiet," said the third.

"Maybe a question now and then."

Akmaro interrupted them and introduced his wife and daughter. Before he could mention Didul, one of them backed slightly away and said, "You must be Akma."

"No, I'm not," said Didul.

The digger, a young woman, immediately relaxed and came closer. "I'm sorry," she said. "I just assumed-"

"And there you see why I can't have you following me around," said Akmaro. "Akma is my son. If you believe the nasty rumors you've heard about him, I can hardly have you camping in my home."

"I'm sorry," she said.

"Don't be. It happens that at least some of the rumors are true. But you must allow me to have privacy and unless you're planning to stay for dinner... ."

The boy seemed perfectly content to accept the implied invitation, but the two girls hustled him away.

"Study with the teachers," said Akmaro as they left. "We'll see each other often enough if you do that."

"We will," said one of the girls-grimly, as if she were threatening some kind of vengeance. "We'll study so hard that we'll know everything."

"Good. Then I'll come and learn from you, because I hardly know anything." With a smile, Akmaro closed the door behind them.

"Now I do feel guilty," said Didul. "It seems I routinely get what they're begging for. And if having diggers around would cause problems with Akma, think of how he'd react if you tried to let me tag along."

"Oh, you're completely different," said Akmaro. "For one thing, you know as much as I do."

"Hardly."

"So we can discuss things as equals. That would never be possible with them-they're too young. They haven't lived."

"There's a lot I haven't done yet," said Didul.

"Like marry-there's a thought."

Didul blushed and immediately started carrying the cool clay mugs into the front room of the house. He could hear Luet behind him, quietly remonstrating with her father. "Do you have to embarrass him like that?" she whispered.

"He likes it," Akmaro answered-and not in a whisper.

"He does not" Luet insisted.

But he did like it.

Edhadeya arrived just before the appointed time. Didul had met her a couple of times before, and always under the same circumstances- dining with Akmaro's family. Didul liked the fact that she and Luet were such good friends. It pleased him to see that Luet wasn't just a tagalong, that in fact she wasn't at all worshipful or deferent, beyond the normal courtesy of friendship. Clearly Luet knew Edhadeya as a person and hardly thought of her as the king's daughter. And Edhadeya, for her part, was completely natural in Akmaro's house, with not a hint of affectation or authority or condescension. Her experience had always been different from other people's lives, but she seemed to be endlessly fascinated with other people's thoughts and observations, not regarding her own as superior in any way.

The conversation turned quite early to the trial, and Akmaro just as quickly begged them to talk of other things. So they spent a lot of the dinner talking about Shedemei. Didul listened in fascination to their impression of the school, and Edhadeya had so much to say that finally he realized that, unlike the others, she wasn't just remembering a single visit. "How often have you been there?" he asked.

Edhadeya looked flustered. "Me?"

"Not that it matters," said Didul. "You just seem to speak as one who is ... involved."

"Well, I've been back several times."

"Without me!" Luet cried.

"It wasn't a social visit," said Edhadeya. "I went there to work."

"I thought she said you couldn't," said Chebeya.

"She also told me not to wait."

"So did she let you help?" asked Luet. "If she did I'll never forgive you for not taking me."

"She has never let me do anything," said Edhadeya.

"But you still go," said Didul.

"I sneak in," said Edhadeya. "It isn't hard. It's not as if the school is guarded or anything. I go into the courtyard if Shedemei isn't there, and I help the younger girls with their reading. Sometimes I've had nothing better to do than take a mop and jar of water and wash down the floors in a corridor while everyone else was eating. A few times I've been in and out without Shedemei seeing me, but usually I get caught."

"I should think that the children or the other teachers would report you the moment you're seen," said Akmaro.

"Not at all," said Edhadeya. "The girls appreciate my help. And so, I think, do the teachers."

"What does Shedemei say when she throws you out?" asked Didul.

"It's quite colorful," said Edhadeya. "She keeps explaining to me that when she said I wasn't supposed to wait, she meant that I shouldn't just wait. That I should be actively involved in life, getting some experience to help me put my book learning into perspective."

"So why don't you do as she asks?" said Akmaro.

"Because I think that sneaking into her school and teaching without her spotting me is an excellent experience."

They all laughed at that. The subject eventually turned from Shedemei to speculations on what Rasa's House must have been like, back on the planet Harmony, and from there the conversation drifted to talking about people who had seen true dreams from the Keeper. "We keep talking about true dreamers as if they were all ancient or far away," said Luet, "but it's worth remembering that every single one of us has had at least one true dream. I haven't had any since I was little-but then, I haven't needed anything as much as I did then. Have you dreamed since those old days, Didul?"

Didul shook his head, not really wanting to talk about "those old days."

"I don't really dream,"said Chebeya. "That's not a raveler's gift."

"But the Keeper still shows you things," said Luet. "That's the thing we have to remember-the Keeper isn't just something that our ancestors believed in. She isn't just a myth." To everyone's surprise, tears suddenly came to her eyes. "Akma keeps saying that we're fooling ourselves, but we're not. I remember how it felt, and it was different from any other dream. It was real. Wasn't it, Edhadeya?"

"It was," said Edhadeya. "Pay no attention to your brother, Luet. He doesn't know anything."

"But he does," said Luet. "He's the most intelligent person I've ever known. And so vigorous in everything he says and does-he was my teacher when I was little, and he's still my teacher now, except for this one thing-"

"This one little thing," murmured Akmaro.

"Can't you make him see, Father?" said Luet.

"You can't make people believe things," said Chebeya.

"The Keeper can! Why doesn't the Keeper just... just send him a true dream?"

"Maybe the Keeper does," said Didul.

They all looked at him in surprise.

"I mean, didn't the Keeper send dreams to Nafai's older brothers?"

"If it makes any difference," said Edhadeya, "it was the Oversoul."

"I thought Elemak had at least one true dream from the Keeper," said Didul. "Anyway, there was also Moozh. The one that Nafai wrote about-Luet's and Hushidh's father. The one who fought the Over-soul all the way, but he was really doing the Oversoul's will the whole time."

"You can't imagine that Akma is somehow doing the Keeper's will!" said Edhadeya. "Hating the poor earth people and wanting to get them excluded from the kingdom!"

"No, I don't mean that, I just mean-that you can resist the Keeper if you want to. How do we know Akma isn't having true dreams every night, and then getting up in the morning and denying that the dreams meant anything at all? The Keeper can't make us do anything. Not if we're determined to fight him."

"That's true," said Akmaro. "But I don't think Akma is dreaming."

"Maybe he dreams true so much that he doesn't realize that other people don't," said Didul. "Maybe his intelligence is partly a gift from the Keeper, unfolding truth to him in his mind. Maybe he's the greatest servant the Keeper has ever had, except that he refuses to serve."

"That's a big exception," said Chebeya.

"All I'm trying to say is that it wouldn't necessarily change Akma's mind to have a true dream. That's all I'm saying." Didul went back to the sugared fruit Edhadeya had brought for dessert.

"Well, it's a sure thing persuasion hasn't done anything," said Akmaro.

Chebeya made a little high-pitched sound in her throat.

"What was that?" said Akmaro.

"That was me," said Chebeya. "Giving the tiniest possible laugh."

"What for?"

"Akmaro, Didul has made me see things in a new way. I wonder if we really ever have tried to persuade Akma."

"I know I have," said Akmaro.

"No, you've tried to teach him. That's another matter entirely."

"All teaching is persuasion," said Akmaro. "And all persuasion is teaching."

"Then why did we bother to invent two different words for it?" asked Chebeya teasingly. "I'm not accusing you of anything, Akmaro."

"You're accusing me of not even trying to persuade my son, when you know I've tried till my heart has broken." Akmaro was trying to keep his tone light, but Didul could hear the emotion behind his smile.

"Please don't be hurt," said Chebeya. "We all know you've done your best. But we've also left it up to you, haven't we? I've been content to be the loving mother who tries to keep the connection with Akma strong. I've left all the arguing up to you."

"Not all," said Luet grimly.

"Akma is here so little, I've been afraid to argue with him for fear of losing him entirely," said Chebeya. "But because of that, perhaps he thinks that it's only a matter between him and his father. That Luet and I are neutral."

"He knows I'm not," said Luet.

Akmaro shook his head. "Chebeya, there's no need. Akma will grow out of this."

Tears started slipping down Chebeya's cheeks. "No he won't," she said. "Not now. This whole business with Shedemei-"

"Akma doesn't have anything to do with that, does he?" asked Didul.

"The people who brought charges against her," said Chebeya, "they won't give up. It can't be a secret from them how the son of the high priest feels about things. They'll find a way to use him. If nothing else, they'll flatter him, agree with him. Akma is hungry to be loved and respected-"

"We all are," said Edhadeya softly.

"Akma more than most, in part because he feels that perhaps he has never had the love and respect he wanted at home." Chebeya reached out a hand toward her husband, as if to soothe him. "Not your fault. It's just the way things looked to him, from the beginning, from those awful days back in Chelem."

Didul looked at the ruins of his meal in front of him, his face burning as he remembered how he had treated Akma. The picture came so easily to his mind, more vivid perhaps now than it had been at the time. Little Akma crying and sputtering in fury as Didul and his brothers laughed and laughed. Then Akma crying in pain, a very different sound, a terrible sound... and still they laughed. Still I laughed, Didul thought. Does Akma hear that sound even now? If it's even half as clear in his mind as it is in mine... .

He felt a hand close over his. For a moment he thought it might be Luet who touched him, and he wanted to tear his own hand away in shame at his unworthiness. But it was Chebeya. "Please, Didul. You're so much a part of this family that we forget sometimes that you hear some things with different ears. No one blames you here." Didul nodded, not bothering to argue. Chebeya turned the conversation to other things, and the rest of the meal passed in peace.

When it was time for Edhadeya to go home, she asked Didul to walk with her. Didul laughed; he meant to seem amused but knew that he only sounded nervous. "Is it that you have something you want to say to me, or that everyone else has things they want to say without me?"

"He's so sweet, isn't he?" Edhadeya said. "He couldn't conceive of the idea that I might enjoy his company."

Once they were on the dark street, walking home by the light of the torch Didul carried, Edhadeya said, "All right, yes, there's something I wanted to say to you."

"Well, then," said Didul. "Here I am. Or is it so devastating you want to wait till we're nearer your father's house, in case I burst into tears, throw down the torch, and run away into the night?"

"You know what I want to talk about."

"I shouldn't come to Akmaro's house anymore, is that it?"

Edhadeya laughed, startled. "What! Why would I say that? They love you-are you so shy you can't see it?"

"For Akma's sake. So they can win him back."

"It's not you, Didul. No, I wanted to say the opposite. Or really, I wanted to ask you something first, and then say something-Didul, I wish I understood you better."

"Better than you do right now? Better than other people do? Or better than you understand other people?"

She giggled, very girlishly. Suddenly an image flashed into Didul's mind, of Edhadeya and Luet sitting on a bench together, laughing just that way. Schoolgirls.

"I'm listening now," he said. "I'll be serious."

"Didul, your life has been very strange," said Edhadeya. "You were unlucky in your father, but very lucky in your brothers."

"Pabul's done well. The rest of us struggle."

"You improved with age-which is better than most of us do. Most of us start out innocent and deteriorate."

"As low as my beginning was, Edhadeya, I had nowhere to go but up."

"I think not," said Edhadeya. "But please listen. I'm not harping on your past, I'm saying that you are much admired. Many people say it-Father hears reports from Bodika, you know. You are much admired. And not just among the Kept."

"That's kind of you to say."

"Yes, well, I'm repeating what others say. That you're a man of compassion."

"Whatever people tell me, I can always say I've done worse, the Keeper can still accept you if you change now."

"Please listen, Didul. I have to know something from your own lips. It seems that you love everybody, that you show compassion to everybody, and wit and a kind of easiness-everyone is comfortable with you."

"Except you."

"Because when you're with me-when you're with Akmaro- you're shy, you're not at ease. You feel-"

"Above myself."

"Out of place."

"Yes."

"So someone might wonder: How do you really feel about Akmaro's family? Do you love them? Or merely hunger for their constant forgiveness?"

Didul thought about this for a moment. "I love them. Their forgiveness I've had for years. The parents. Luet, when she was old enough to understand. She was very young, and children are very forgiving."

"So again, someone might wonder-if you are confident of their forgiveness, why are you so shy, so guarded when you're with them?"

"Who is doing all this wondering, Edhadeya?"

"I am, and be quiet. Someone might wonder, Didul, whether some of your shyness might be because you have some kind of special feeling for one of the family and yet you dare not speak of it... ."

"Are you asking me if I love Luet?"

"Thank you," said Edhadeya. "Yes, that's what I'm asking."

"Of course I love her. Anyone who knows her has to love her."

Edhadeya growled in frustration. "Don't play games with me, Didul!"

Didul held the torch farther up and away, so it wouldn't light his face as he spoke. "Can you imagine anything worse than the day Akma finds out that I'm marrying Luet?"

"Yes, I can," said Edhadeya. "The worst thing would be if Luet were to spend day after day, year after year waiting for you, and you never come to her,"

"She's not waiting for me."

"You've asked her?"

"We haven't spoken of it."

"And she never will, because she fears that you don't have any feelings for her. But she has them for you. I betray a confidence to tell you this. But you must make your choice based on all the information. Yes, it would gall Akma to have you for a brother-in-law. But this same Akma is already the enemy of everything his father stands for. And to spare his feelings, will you break the heart of Luet, who waits for you? Which is the greater wrong? To hurt the unforgiving one, or to hurt the one who has forgiven all?"

Didul walked beside her in silence. They reached the door of the king's house.

"That was all I had to say," she said.

"Can I believe you?" he whispered. "That she cares for me? After all I did?"

"Women can be insane sometimes in the men they choose to love."

"Are you? Insane?"

"Do you want to know how insane I am, Didul? When Luet and I were younger, we fell in love with each other's brothers. She finally settled on Mon, because he's always been the one I was closest to. And I of course loved Akma from afar." Edhadeya smiled mysteriously. "Then Luet grew out of that childish love and found something much finer in her love for you." Edhadeya laughed lightly. "Good night, Didul."

"Aren't you going to finish your story?"

"I did." She walked to the door; the guard opened it for her. Didul stood in the sputtering torchlight as the door closed. The guard finally spoke to him. "Are you from out of the city, sir? Do you need directions somewhere?"

"No, no ... I know the way."

"Then you'd better set out-your torch won't burn forever, unless you plan to let the flame run right down your arm."

Didul thanked him with a smile and set off for the public house where he was staying. Akmaro and Chebeya invited him for dinner, but never to stay the night. It would not do for him to be there, even sleeping, should Akma choose to come home.

Luet stopped loving Mon, but Edhadeya never grew out of that childish love for Akma. That must be a difficult situation for her. At least the man that Luet loved was loyal to the cause of the Keeper. Edhadeya, a dreamer of true dreams, the daughter of the king, loved a man who disbelieved in the Keeper and despised the Kept.

Maybe I'm not the worst possible husband. Maybe I do have something to offer Luet, besides poverty and the fury of her brother and a memory of my cruelty to her when she was little. Maybe she should be given the choice, at least. Didn't he owe it to her, to give her the chance to hear him talk of his love for her and ask for her to be his wife, so she could refuse him and cause him a small fraction of the humiliation and pain he had once caused her?

He despised himself at once even for thinking this. Didn't he know Luet at all, to think she would want to hurt him or anyone else? Edhadeya said she loved him. And he knew that he loved her. Akmaro had made it plain that he would give his approval. So had Chebeya, in a thousand small ways, talking about how much a part of the family he was.

I will speak to her, he decided. I will speak to her tomorrow.

He doused his dying torch in the pail at the door of the public house and went inside to spend a few hours wishing he could sleep instead of rehearsing over and over in his mind the words he would say to Luet, imagining over and over the way she might smile and embrace him, or weep and run from him, or stare at him in horror and whisper, How could you? How could you?

At last he did sleep. And in his dream, he saw himself and Luet standing beneath a tree. It was heavy with a white fruit, but it was just out of reach-neither of them was tall enough to reach it. "Lift me up," she said. "Lift me up, and I can pick enough for both of us."

So he lifted her, and she filled her hands, and when he lowered her back to the ground she took a bite and wept at the sharp sweetness of it. "Didul," she whispered. "I can't bear it if you don't have a bite-here, from this place right beside where I bit, so you can taste exactly what I tasted."

But in his dream he didn't bite from the fruit at all. Instead he kissed her, and from her own lips tasted exactly what she had tasted, and yes, it was sweet.

The trial was so well-known that even before Didul was asleep, people were gathering in the large open court. At dawn, when the guards arrived, they had to herd the early arrivals to the front rows overlooking the court. The judge's seat was, of course, in shadow, and would be throughout the day. Some thought this was for the judge's comfort protecting him from the summer heat, but in winter it could be bitterly cold in the shade, with no scrap of sun to warm him. No, the shade was to help keep the judge more or less anonymous. People could see most clearly where the light was; the complainants and the accused were in light continuously, and if either of them had brought a lawyer in to speak for them, he would strut the length and breadth of the sunlit area. No lawyer, however, would step within the judge's shadow. Some thought this was out of respect for the king's honor as embodied in his deputy, the judge. But the lawyers all knew that to step out of the light made them appear clumsy, weak, unaware, and would dispose the people against them. Not that the people had any voice in the decision, officially-though there had been notorious trials in the past where it seemed the judge had made his decision based solely on which outcome would be most likely to allow him to leave the court alive. But the lawyers knew that their reputation, their likelihood of being hired for other cases, depended on how the onlookers perceived them.

The sun was halfway to noon when the accusers arrived, along with their lawyer, a loquacious angel named kRo. It was forbidden for an angel to fly in the court, but kRo had a way of opening his wings and sort of gliding as he walked back and forth, building up passion in himself and in the audience. It made him seem at once larger and more graceful than his opponent, and many human lawyers refused to take on cases that might put them head to head with kRo.

With the accusers in place and the gallery completely full, with hundreds more clamoring outside, pleading for imaginary spaces-"I'm not large! There's room for me!"-Pabul entered, with a guard on either side. In the event of a mob action against the judge, these guards would hardly be much protection, though perhaps they might buy just enough time for the judge to flee into his chamber. Rather they were there to defend against the lone assassin. It had been a hundred years since a judge was murdered in open court, and longer than that since one was mobbed, but the protections remained in place. No one expected that this case would turn to violence, but it was more heated than most, and the controversy made the onlookers view the guards in a different light. Not just a formality, no. They were armed; they were large, strong humans.

No one from the king's family was present. It had long been a tradition that if a royal person were present, he or she would sit beside the judge and, presumably, tell the judge the will of the king in the case. Thus from a trial attended by a royal person there could be no appeal. To preserve the rights of the accused, therefore, Ba-Jamim, Motiak's father, had begun the tradition of having no family member present at any lower trials, so that the right of all parties to appeal a decision could be preserved. It also had the happy effect of increasing the independence and therefore the prestige of the judges.

Akma, however, came to watch, and his sister Luet came with him. They had arrived late enough that they secured seats only in the back, behind the accused where they could see no faces. But two close supporters of the accusers, who had seats on the front row where they could see everyone's face, recognized Akma and insisted that he and his sister come down and take their places. Akma pretended to be surprised and honored, but Luet remembered how he had remained standing at the back until he was noticed, he knew that seats were being held for him. And by supporters of the accusers. Akma had definitely taken sides.

Well, why not? So had Luet.

"Have you met her?" she asked.

"Met whom?" asked Akma.

"Shedemei. The accused."

"Oh. No. Should I have?"

"A brilliant, remarkable woman," said Luet.

"Well, I don't suppose anyone would have noticed her if she was a fool," he answered mildly.

"You know I was at her school with Mother and Edhadeya when the book of charges was delivered," said Luet.

"Yes, I'd heard."

"She already knew the charges. Isn't that funny? She recited them to Husu before he could read them off."

"I heard that, too," said Akma. "I imagine kRo will make something of that. Proof that she was aware of her lawbreaking, that sort of thing."

"I daresay he will," said Luet. "Imagine charging her with treason for running a school."

"Oh, I'm sure that charge was just to make the whole thing more notorious. I don't think Father's little puppet judge will even allow that charge to be heard, do you?"

Luet cringed at the malice in Akma's voice. "Pabul is no one's puppet, Akma."

"Oh, really? So what he did to our people back in Chelem, that was of his own free will?"

"He was his father's puppet then. He was a child. Younger than we are now."

"But we've both passed through that age, haven't we? He was seventeen. When I was seventeen, I was no man's puppet." Akma grinned. "So don't tell me Pabul wasn't responsible for his own actions."

"Very well, then," said Luet. "He was. But he changed."

"He sensed the way the wind was blowing, you mean. But let's not argue."

"No, let's do argue," said Luet. "Which way was the wind blowing back in Chelem? Who had the soldiers there?"

"As I recall, our young judge had the command of a gang of digger thugs that were always ready to whip and claw women and children."

"Pabul and the others risked their lives to stop the cruelty. And gave up their future in positions of power under their father in order to escape into the wilderness."

"And come to Darakemba where, to everyone's surprise, they once again have positions of power."

"Which they earned."

"Yes, but by doing what?" Akma grinned. "Don't try to argue with me, Luet. I was your teacher for too long. I know what you're going to say before you say it."

Luet wanted to jab him with something very hard. When they were younger and quarreled, she would pinch together her thumb and first two fingers to form a weapon hard and sharp enough for Akma to notice it when she jabbed him. But there had been playfulness in it, even when she was most furious; today she didn't touch him, because she was no longer sure she loved him enough to strike at him without wanting to cause real injury.

A sad look came across Akma's face.

"Why aren't you happy?" she said tauntingly. "Didn't I say what you expected me to say?"

"I expected you to jab me the way you used to when you were a brat."

"So I've passed out of brathood."

"Now you judge me," said Akma. "Not because I'm wrong, but because I'm not loyal to Father."

"Aren't you loyal to him?"

"Was he ever loyal to me?" asked Akma.

"And will you ever grow out of the hurts of your childhood?"

Akma got a distant look on his face. "I've grown out of all the hurts that ended."

"No one's hurting you now," said Luet. "You're the one who hurts Mother and Father."

"I'm sorry to hurt Mother," said Akma. "But she made her choice."

"Didul and Pabul and Udad and Muwu all begged for our forgiveness. I forgave them then, and I still forgive them now. They've become decent men, all of them."

"Yes, you all forgave them."

"Yes," said Luet. "You say that as if there were something wrong with it."

"You had the right to forgive them for what they did to you, Luet. But you didn't have the right to forgive them for what they did to me."

Luet remembered seeing Akma alone on a hillside, watching as Father taught the people, with the Pabulogi seated in the front row. "Is that what this is all about? That Father forgave them without waiting for your consent?"

"Father forgave them before they asked him to," whispered Akma. She could barely hear him above the roaring of the crowd, and then she could only make out his words by watching his lips. "Father loved the ones who tormented me. He loved them more than me. There has never been such a vile, perverted, filthy, unnatural injustice as that."

"It wasn't about justice," said Luet. "It was about teaching. The Pabulogi only knew the moral world their father had created for them. Before they could understand what they were doing, they had to be taught to see things as the Keeper sees them. When they did understand, then they begged forgiveness and changed their ways."

"But Father already loved them," whispered Akma. "When they were still beating you, when they were still torturing me, mocking us both, smearing us with digger feces, tripping me and kicking me, stripping me naked and holding me upside down in front of all the people while they ridiculed me-while they were still doing those things, Father already loved them."

"He saw what they could become."

"He had no right to love them more than me."

"His love for them saved all our lives," said Luet. "Yes, Luet, and look what his love has done for them. They prosper. They're happy. In his eyes, they are his sons. Better sons than I am." This was uncomfortably close to Luet's own judgment of things. "There's nothing they've achieved, nothing in their relationship with Father that wasn't available to you."

"As long as I admitted first that there was no difference in value between the tortured and the torturer."

"That's stupid, Akma," said Luet. "They had to change before Father accepted them. They had to become someone else."

"Well, I haven't changed," said Akma. "I haven't changed." It was the most personal conversation Luet had had with Akma in years, and she longed for it to continue, but at that moment a roar went up from the crowd because they were bringing in the accused, protected by eight guards. This was another old tradition, introduced after several cases in which the accused was murdered in court before the trial was even completed, or snatched away to have another sort of trial in another place. These guards still served that practical purpose-an in-court murder of an accused person had happened not ten years before, admittedly in the rather wild provincial capital of Trubi, at the high end of the valley of the Tsidorek. Not that anyone expected Shedemei to be in danger. This was a test case, a struggle for power; she herself was not regarded with particular passion by those accusing her.

"Look at the pride in her," said Akma, shouting right in her ear so he could be heard.

Pride? Yes, but not the cocky sort of defiance that some affected to when haled before the court. She carried herself with simple dignity, looking around her calmly with mild interest, without fear, without shame. Luet had thought that no one could be charged and brought to trial without feeling at least a degree of embarrassment at being made a public spectacle, but Shedemei seemed to be no more emotionally involved than a mildly interested spectator.

And yet this trial did matter to her; hadn't she deliberately provoked it? She wanted this to happen. Did she know what the outcome would be, the way she knew in advance the charges against her?

"Has Father told you what the puppet is supposed to decide?" Akma shouted in her ear.

She ignored him. The guards were moving slowly through the crowded gallery, forcing people to sit down. It would take a while for them to silence the crowd-these people wanted to make noise.

She wanted to personally slap each one of them, because their noise had stopped Akma from baring his soul to her. That was what he was doing. For some reason, he had chosen this moment to ... to what? To make a last plea for her understanding. That's what it was. He was on the verge of some action, some public action. He wanted to justify himself to her. To remind her that Father was the one who had first been guilty of monstrous disloyalty. And why? Because Akma himself was preparing his own monstrous disloyalty. A public betrayal.

Akma was going to testify. He was going to be called as a scholar, an expert on religious teachings among the Nafari. He was certainly qualified, as Bego's star pupil. And even though within the family and the royal house it was well known that Akma no longer believed in the existence of the Keeper, it wouldn't stop him from testifying about what the ancient beliefs and customs had always been.

She laid her hand on Akma's arm, dug into his wrist with her fingers.

"Ow!" he cried, pulling away from her.

She leaned in close to him and shouted in his ear. "Don't do it!"

"Don't do what?" She could make out his words only by reading his lips.

"You can't hurt the Keeper!" she shouted. "You'll only hurt the people who love you!"

He shook his head. He couldn't hear her. He couldn't understand her words.

The crowd at last was quieter. Quieter. Till the last murmur finally died. Luet might have spoken to Akma again, but his attention was entirely on the trial. The moment had passed.

"Who speaks for the accusers?" asked Pabul. kRo stepped forward. "kRo," he said.

"And who are the accusers?"

Each stepped forward in turn, naming himself. Three humans and two angels, all prominent men-one retired from the army, the others men of business or learning. All well known in the city, though none of them held an office that could be stripped from them in retaliation by an angry king.

"Who speaks for the accused?" asked Pabul.

Shedemei answered in a clear, steady voice, "I speak for myself."

"Who is the accused?" asked Pabul.

"Shedemei."

"Your family is not known here," said Pabul.

"I come from a far city that was destroyed many years ago. My parents and my husband and my children are all dead."

Luet heard this in astonishment. There were no rumors about this in the city; Shedemei must never have spoken of her family before. She had once had a husband and children, and they were dead! Perhaps that explained the quietness that Shedemei seemed to have in the deepest place in her heart. Her real life was already over; she did not fear death, because in a way she was already dead. Her children, gone before her! That was not the way the world should be.

"I wandered for a long time," Shedemei went on, "until finally I found a land of peace, where I could teach whatever children were willing to learn, whose parents were willing to send them."

"Digger-lover!" someone cried out from the gallery.

The time of noise had passed; two guards immediately homed in on the heckler and had him out of the gallery in moments. Outside, someone else would be let in to take his place.

"The court is ready to hear the accusations," said Pabul. kRo launched at once into a listing of Shedemei's supposed crimes, but not the simple unadorned statements that had been in the book of charges. No, each charge became a story, an essay, a sermon. He built up quite a colorful picture, Luet thought-Shedemei defiling the young human and angel girls of the city by forcing them to associate with the filthy ignorant children of diggers from Rat Creek. Shedemei striking at the ancient teachings of all the priests: "And I will call witnesses who will explain how all her teachings are an offense against the tradition of the Nafari-" that would be Akma, thought Luet.

"She insults the memory of Mother Rasa, wife of the Hero Volemak, the great Wetchik, father of Nafai and Issib... ."

Volemak was also the father of Elemak and Mebbekew, Luet wanted to retort-and Rasa had nothing to do with their conception. But of course she held her tongue. That would be a scandal, if the daughter of the high priest were to be hustled out of the court for heckling.

"... by pretending that she needs more honor than her marriage to Volemak already brought her! And to give her this redundant honor, she takes a male honorific, ro, which means ‘great teacher,' and appends it to a woman's name! Rasaro's House, she calls her school! As if Rasa had been a man! What do her students learn just by walking in her door! That there is no difference between men and women!" To Luet's-and everyone else's-shock, Shedemei spoke up, interrupting kRo's peroration. "I'm new in your country," she said. "Tell me the female honorific that means ‘great teacher' and I'll gladly use that one." kRo waited for Pabul to rebuke her.

"It is not the custom for the accused to interrupt the accuser," said Pabul mildly.

"Not the custom," said Shedemei. "But not a law, either. And as recently as fifty years ago, in the reign of Motiab, the king's late grandfather, it was frequently the case that the accused could ask for a clarification of a confusing statement by the accuser."

"All my speeches are perfectly clear!" kRo answered testily.

"Shedemei calls upon ancient custom," said Pabul, clearly delighted with her answer. "She asked you a question, kRo, and custom requires you to clarify."

"There is no female honorific meaning ‘great teacher,' " said kRo.

"So by what title should I honor a woman who was a great teacher?" asked Shedemei. "In order to avoid causing ignorant children to be confused about the differences between men and women."

She said this with an ever-so-slightly ironic tone, making it clear that no honorific could possibly cause confusion on such an obvious point. Some in the gallery laughed a little. This was annoying to kRo; it was outrageous of her to have interrupted his carefully memorized speech, forcing him to make up answers on the spot.

With a great show of patient condescension, kRo explained to Shed-emei, "Women of greatness can be called ya, which means ‘great compassionate one.' And since she was the wife of the father of the first king, it is not inappropriate to call her dwa, the mother of the heir."

Shedemei listened respectfully, then answered, "So a woman may only be honored for her compassion; all the other honorifics have to do with her husband?"

"That is correct," said kRo.

"Are you saying, then, that a woman cannot be a great teacher? Or that a woman may not be called a great teacher?"

"I am saying that because the only honorific for a great teacher is a male honorific, the title ‘great teacher' cannot be added to a woman's name without causing an offense against nature," said kRo.

"But the honorific ro comes from the word uro which can be equally a male or a female," said Shedemei.

"But uro is not an honorific," said kRo.

"In all the ancient records, when the custom of honorifics first began, it was the word uro that was added to the name. It was only about three hundred years ago that the u was dropped and the ro began to be added to the end of the name the way it's done now. I'm sure you looked all this up."

"Our scholarly witnesses did," said kRo.

"I'm simply trying to understand why a word that is demonstrably a neutral one, implying either sex, should now be regarded as a word applying to males only," said Shedemei.

"Let us simplify things for the sake of the accused," said kRo. "Let us Hrop the charge of confusion of the sexes. That will spare us the agony of endless argument over the applicability of ancient usages to modern law."

"So you are saying that you consent to my continuing to call my school ‘Rasaro's House'?" asked Shedemei. She turned to Pabul. "Is that a binding decision, so I won't have to fear being brought to trial on this point again?"

"I declare it to be so," said Pabul.

"Now the situation is clear," said Shedemei.

The gallery laughed uproariously. Her clarification, of course, had turned into kRo's humiliating retreat. She had succeeded in deflating him. From now on all his speechifying would be tinged with just the faintest hue of the ridiculous. He was no longer the terrifying object he had once been.

Akma leaned to Luet and whispered in her ear, "Someone's been teaching her a lot of ancient history."

"Maybe she learned it on her own," Luet whispered back.

"Impossible. All the records are in Bego's library, and she has never been there." Akma was clearly annoyed.

"Maybe Bego helped her."

Akma rolled his eyes. Of course it couldn't have been Bego, he seemed to be saying.

Bego must be of Akma's party, thought Luet. Or is it the other way around? Could it be that Bego instigated this whole nonsensical business about there being no Keeper at all? kRo went on, climaxing his arguments by pointing out, just as Akma had anticipated, that all of Shedemei's violations were clearly premeditated and deliberate, since she had been able to name all the charges against her when Husu brought the book of charges to her door.

At last kRo finished-with much applause and cheering from the gallery, of course. But nothing like the kind of adoration he usually received. Shedemei had really done a job on him, and it was obvious kRo was angry and disappointed.

Pabul smiled, lifted a bark from his table, and began to read. "The court has reached a decision and-" kRo leapt to his feet. "Perhaps the court has forgotten that it is the custom to hear the accused!" Graciously he bowed toward Shedemei. "Clearly she has studied a great deal and even though her guilt is obvious, we should do her the courtesy of hearing her speech."

Icily Pabul answered, "I thank the lawyer for the complainants for his courtesy toward the accused, but I also remind him that other lawyers, at least, are not able to read the minds of judges, and therefore it is customary to listen to the judge before contradicting him."

"But you were declaring your decision... ." said kRo, his voice trailing off into embarrassment.

"This court has reached a decision and because it is based solely upon the statements of the lawyer for the accusers, the court must ask each of the complainants individually if the speech just given by their lawyer represents their words and intentions as surely as if they had spoken for themselves."

So he was polling the accusers. This was highly unusual, and it invariably meant that the lawyer had made some gross mistake that would destroy the case he was speaking for. kRo folded himself inside his wings and listened in stoic fury as Pabul queried each accuser individually. Though they obviously had misgivings, kRo had in fact given the speech he had rehearsed for them the day before, and they affirmed that it was as if they had spoken the words themselves.

"Very well," said Pabul. "At eight different points in this speech, the lawyer for the complainants violated the law forbidding the teaching of doctrines contrary to the doctrines taught by the high priest now in office."

A loud hum arose from the crowd, and kRo unfolded himself from his wings and fairly launched himself toward the judge's shadow, stopping just short of the line of darkness in the sand of the courtyard. The judge's guards immediately stepped forward, weapons ready. But kRo now threw himself backward into the sand, his wings open, his belly exposed, in the ancient angel posture of submission. "I have said nothing but to uphold the law!" he cried, not sounding submissive at all.

"There is not a person in this court who doesn't know exactly what you and the other accusers are doing, kRo," said Pabul. "This entire charade was designed as an attack on all the teachings of the man that Motiak has appointed high priest. You are trying to use the teachings of former high priests, and customs of long standing but no merit, to destroy Akmaro's effort to unify all the people of the Keeper as brothers and sisters. This court was not deceived. Your speech exposed your malice."

"The law and long precedent are on our side!" cried kRo, abandoning his submissive posture and rising again to his feet.

"The law affirming the authority of the high priest over all teachings of doctrine concerning the Keeper was established by the voice of the Hero Nafai, the first king of the Nafari, when he established his brother the Hero Oykib as the first high priest. This law has precedence over all other laws dealing with correct teaching. And when Sherem defied this law and opposed Oykib, and then the Keeper struck Sherem dead as he spoke, the king declared that the penalty for defying the teachings of the high priest would from then on be the same death that the Keeper chose for Sherem."

Akma leaned to Luct and whispered furiously, "How dare Father use those ancient myths to silence his opponents!"

"Father knows nothing about this," Luet answered. But she did not get her voice low enough, and several around them heard her. Of course they all knew who Akma and Luet were, and they could read the scornful disbelief on Akma's face as clearly as they heard Luet's denial that Akmaro had any part in Pabul's decision. Akmaro would definitely be part of the rumors that would fly after the trial.

"Because this is an ancient offense," said Pabul, "I declare it to take precedence over the charges against Shedemei, since if her accusers are guilty of the greater crime, they are forbidden to bring accusation against her for a lesser one. I declare that the charges against Shedemei are nullified and may not be brought again by anyone until and unless her accusers are cleared of the charge against them. And I declare that you, kRo, and all the accusers who affirmed that you spoke their words and intentions are guilty, and I sentence you to death as the law demands."

"No one has used that law in four hundred years!" cried one of the accusers.

"I don't want anyone to die," said Shedemei, clearly dismayed by this turn of events.

"The compassion of the woman Shedemei is commendable but irrelevant," said Pabul. "I am the accuser of these men, and all these people in the gallery are witnesses. I decree that everyone in the gallery must give his or her name to the guards as you leave, so you can be called as witnesses if, as I expect, there is an appeal to the king. I declare this trial to be over."

Because they had been sitting at the front, Akma and Luet were among the last to leave. It took nearly an hour, but during that time they studiously did not say a word to each other or to anyone else. They both knew, however, that if Akma had been allowed to testify, the things he said would also have constituted the same offense that now had kRo and his clients under sentence of death.

"What has Pabul done to me!" Motiak roared.

Around him in the small room were gathered Akmaro, Chebeya, and Didul, representing the House of the Kept; and Aronha and Ed-hadeya, because Aronha was heir and could not be refused access while Edhadeya was, well, Edhadeya, and couldn't be refused either. They all understood Motiak's consternation; none of them had an easy answer.

Aronha thought he did, though, and offered it. "Dismiss the charges against Shedemei's accusers, Father."

"And allow them to reinstate their charges against Shedemei?" asked Edhadeya.

"Dismiss all the charges," said Aronha with a shrug.

"That is foolish counsel," said Motiak, "and you know better, Aronha. If I did that, it would have the effect of repudiating my own high priest and stripping him of authority."

Aronha said nothing. Everyone there knew that Aronha, like his brothers, like Akmaro's own son, thought of that as a happy outcome.

"You can't put them to death," said Akmaro. "So perhaps Aronha is right."

"Do I have to listen to nonsense from you, too, Kmadaro?" demanded Motiak. "I suppose I should take this matter officially before my council."

"That isn't the way it's done," said Aronha. "This is a trial, not a war or a tax. The council has no authority."

"But the council has the virtue of spreading the responsibility around a little," said Motiak dryly. "Remember that, Aronha. I have a feeling you're going to need to do that when you're king."

"I hope never to be king, Father," said Aronha.

"I'm relieved to know that you hope for my immortality. Or is it simply your own death that you expect?" At once Motiak repented of his sarcasm. "Forgive me, Aronha, I'm out of sorts. Having to decide matters of life and death always puts me out of sorts."

Chebeya raised her hand from the table and spoke softly. "Perhaps you should do as Pabul did. Study the case of Sherem and Oykib."

"It wasn't even a court case, strictly speaking," said Motiak. "I already read it over, and it was more a matter that Sherem kept showing up wherever Oykib was trying to teach, to argue with him. Which, come to think of it, is what these pollen-brained accusers were doing to you, Akmaro."

"Using Shedemei as a proxy, of course," said Akmaro.

"It was really just a public argument between Oykib and Sherem. Until Sherem challenged Oykib to give him a sign, and the Keeper of Earth apparently struck Sherem down on the spot, allowing him to live only long enough to recant. But the king-it was Nafai's grandson by then, Oykib lived to be very old-the king declared that what the Keeper had done this time, the law would do from then on. Anyone who interfered with the teaching of the high priest would be struck dead as Sherem was. The law was only invoked twice after that, and the last time was four centuries ago."

"Is that how you intend to govern, Father?" asked Aronha. "Killing those who disagree with your high priest? That sounds rather like what Nuab did to Binaro. Or should I call him Binadi after all, since apparently he also broke this law, interfering with Pabulog's teachings as Nuak's high priest."

The comparison of Motiak to Nuak was unbearable. "Get out," said Motiak.

Aronha rose to his feet. "I see that this kingdom has changed since I was young. Now I am expelled from the king's presence for showing him exactly what he is about to do."

Motiak stared straight forward as Aronha left the room. Then he sighed and buried his face in his hands. "This is very messy, Akmaro," he said.

"It can't be helped," said Akmaro. "I warned you from the start that it would be very hard to take this people from a place where diggers were hated and enslaved, where women were kept silent in public life, and where the poor had no rights against the rich, to a place where all were equal in the eyes of the Keeper and the law. The surprise is that it took them this long to bring their opposition out into the open."

"And it wouldn't have happened now, either," said Motiak, "if my sons and yours hadn't let it be known that as soon as I'm dead, all these innovations would be swept away."

"They haven't said anything publicly," said Akmaro.

"Ilihi brought me word from a man who is at the heart of this; they would never have taken action like this if they hadn't had assurances that all my likely heirs were opposed to you, Akmaro. All of them. The only surprise is that they didn't send an assassin to kill me."

"And make a martyr of you?" said Akmaro. "No, they love you- that's why it took them so long. They know that you are the reason Darakemba is at peace, the reason the Elemaki don't dare to attack except those annoying raids on the border. They're trying to destroy me without harming you."

"Well, it's not working," said Motiak. "They can't destroy you without harming me, because I know that what you teach is true. I know that it's right. And I'm not going to back down."

Didul raised one hand a little from the table. The others deferred to him. "I know that I'm only a priest from one of the provinces... ."

"Skip the formalities, Didul, and get to the point," said Motiak impatiently. "We know who you are."

"You are king, sir," said Didul. "You must decide in such a way that your power to govern, to keep the peace, is not damaged."

"I hope that you aren't just pointing out the obvious," said Motiak. "I hope that you have a specific plan in mind."

"I do, sir. I have also read the book of Oykib, and the two later cases that were tried under the Sherem law. And both times the king turned the case over to the high priest to be tried. I think it was that very precedent that Nuab used in consulting with his priests during the trial of Binaro."

Akmaro stiffened. "You can't be suggesting that I should sit in judgment on these men and pronounce a sentence of death on them!"

Chebeya chuckled grimly. "Didul begged you not to make him come with you, Akmaro, but you insisted that you had dreamed of him sitting with you in council with the king and made him come along."

"There was a true dream involved with this?" asked Motiak.

"There was a dream!" said Akmaro. "You can't do this to me!"

"It's an offense against the religious authority," said Motiak. "Let it be tried by the religious authority."

"This solves nothing!" cried Akmaro. "The case is still a miserable knot!"

"But as Didul pointed out," said Motiak, "it removes it from a place where it can damage the authority of the king and the peace of the kingdom. I'll have my decision written up on a bark immediately, Akmaro. The case can only be tried by the high priest, and you have full powers of disposition."

"I won't put them to death," said Akmaro. "I won't do it."

"I think you had better think about the law before you make rash decisions," said Motiak. "Think about the consequences of your decision."

"No one can be one of the Kept if he follows the Keeper out of fear of execution!" cried Akmaro.

"It will all be in your hands," said Motiak. "Akmaro, forgive me, but whatever happens, the consequences will be less terrible for your having made the decision and not me." Motiak arose and left the room.

In the ensuing silence, Akmaro's voice came out as a rasping whisper. "Didul, don't ask me to forgive you for turning this on me."

Didul blanched. "I didn't ask your forgiveness," he said, "because I was not wrong. I agree with you completely. No one should die for speaking against the doctrine you teach."

"So in your infinite wisdom, Didul, do you have any suggestions for what I should do?"

"I don't know what you should do," said Didul. "But I think I know what you will do."

"And what is that?"

"Declare them guilty, but change the penalty."

"To what?" demanded Akmaro. "Dismemberment? Removal of the tongue? Public flogging? Forfeiture of property? Oh, I know-they have to live for a year in a tunnel with the diggers they despise so much!"

"With all your authority from the Keeper," said Didul, "you can't give someone back a missing hand or tongue, you can't heal the wounds from lashes on their back, you can't make new land or property. All you have the power to give them is by way of teaching them how the Keeper wants all his children to live, and then bringing them through the water to make them new men and women, brothers and sisters in the Keeper's House. Since that's all you can give them, then when they refuse those teachings isn't that all you can rightly take away?"

Akmaro looked at Didul with a steady gaze. "You thought this out before, didn't you? This was already in your mind before you came here."

"Yes," said Didul. "I thought that was how things would work out."

"But you didn't bother to say any of it to me until you talked the king into dumping the whole thing into my lap."

"Until the king gave the case to you for trial, sir, I had no reason to make any suggestions to you about its disposition."

"I have brought a snake into my house," said Akmaro.

Didul flinched at the words.

"Oh, don't take offense, Didul. Snakes are wise. They also shed their skins and become new men from time to time. Something that I'm apparently overdue for. So I make a declaration that the only penalty for preaching against the high priest is that you are turned out of the House of the Keeper. What then, Didul? Do you realize what will happen?"

"Only the believers will remain."

"You underestimate the cruelty of men and women, Didul. Without the threat of criminal penalties, the worms will come out from under their rocks. The bullies. The tormentors."

"I know the type," said Didul softly.

"I urge you to leave for home at once," said Akmaro. "When this decree is made tomorrow, you'll want to be in Bodika to help the Kept there deal with what will surely come."

"You speak as if this were my fault, sir," said Didul stiffly. "Before I go, I have a right to hear you admit to my face that I have done nothing more than tell you what you would inevitably have decided yourself."

"Yes!" said Akmaro. "And I'm not angry at you anyway. Yes I would have made exactly this decision because it's right. But what will happen to the Kept, to the House of the Keeper, I don't know. I fear it, Didul. That's why I'm angry."

"It's the Keeper's House," said Didul. "Not ours. The Keeper will show us a way out of this."

"Unless the Keeper is testing Darakemba to see if we're worthy," said Akmaro. "Remember that the Keeper can also decide to reject us. The way he rejected the Rasulum, when evil triumphed among them. Their bones cover the desert sand for miles."

"I'll keep that cheerful thought in mind all the way home," said Didul.

They arose from the table. Akmaro and Chebeya hurried out; Edhadeya stopped Didul at the door. "Did you decide anything about Luet?" she asked.

It seemed to take Didul a moment to realize what she was talking about. "Oh. Yes. I decided last night that I'd speak to her today. Only... only now I have work to do. It's not a good time for love or marriage, Edhadeya. I have higher responsibilities than that."

"Higher?" she asked nastily. "Higher than love?"

"If you didn't think that service to the Keeper is the higher responsibility," said Didul, "you would long since have joined with Akma out of love for him. But you haven't. Because you know that love must sometimes take a second place." He left.

Edhadeya leaned against the doorpost for a long time, thinking about what he had said. I love Akma, and yet it has never once occurred to me to join with him in rejecting the Keeper. But that isn't because I love the Keeper more, the way Didul does. It's because I know what I know, and to be with Akma I would have to lie. I won't give up my honesty for any man. Nothing as noble in that as Didul's sacrifice. Unless perhaps my honor is also a way to serve the Keeper.