On Blue's waters

Gyrfalcon chuckled again. “Just like home.”

“Worse. Filth and flies. Rats. It isn’t just that the people want a caldé, though they do. We do. We’re businesspeople at base, all of us. Traders and merchants. Sharpers, if you like.”

“I must-ah,” Remora began.

“All right, all except His Cognizance, who never hedges the truth even a finger’s width. Or so he says.” Blazingstar gave Remora a scornful smile. “But the rest of us need to carry on our businesses, and it’s become almost impossible to do that in New Viron.”

Marrow added, “And getting worse.”

“Getting worse. Exactly.”

You asked, “Can’t one of you be caldé?”

Gyrfalcon laughed aloud at that; he has a good, booming laugh. “Suppose one of us became caldé tomorrow. How about old Marrow there? He wants it.”

“I feel sure it would be a wonderful improvement.”

Marrow thanked you. “For you and your family it would be, Nettle. What do think it would be for them?” He glanced around at Gyrfalcon, Remora, Eschar, and Blazingstar.

“An improvement, too, I think.”

“Not a bit of it.” Marrow had rapped the table before; now he struck it with his fist, rattling our mugs and plates. “I would take everything I could get. I would do my best to ruin them, and if you ask me I would succeed.” He smiled, and glanced around at the woman and the three men I had believed were his friends. “They know it well, my dear. And, Nettle, they would do the same to me.”

Eschar told you, “We need Caldé Silk here. I was the first to suggest it.”

“He’s still in the Whorl, isn’t he? And… I don’t like to say this.”

“Then I will.” Blazingstar reached across the table we had made to cover your hand with her own. “He may be dead. I left sixteen years ago, and by this time it’s certainly possible.”

“Hem!” Remora cleared his throat. “Theocracy, hey? I have suggested it, but they will, er, won’t. Not if-ah-me. But, um, Patera Silk, eh? Yes. Yes, to that. Third party. Still an augur, eh? Indelible-ah-consecration. So, um. Modified? A mitigated theocracy. We, um, two in concert. I concur.”

Gryfalcon summed up, “It’s that or we fight, and a fight would destroy the town, and all of us, too, in all probability. Show them the letter, Marrow.”

Hari Mau and I have formalized the court. Up until now, it seems, litigants have simply done whatever they could to come before the rajan (as their ruler was called at home) and made their cases. Witnesses were or were not called, and so forth. We have set up a system-tentative, of course, but it is a system-in a situation in which any system at all will surely be an improvement. Unless they choose otherwise, Nauvan will represent all the plaintiffs, and Somvar all the defendants. It will be their duty to see that evidence, witnesses, and so forth are present when I hear the case. In criminal cases, I will assign one or the other to prosecute, depending.

I feel like Vulpes.

They will have to be paid, of course; but demanding fees from both parties should encourage them to come to agreement, so that may work out well. Besides, there will be fines. I wish I knew more about our Vironese law-these people don’t seem to have had any.

Back to it.

I swore an oath, administered by Remora, with my left hand upon the Chrasmologic Writings and my right extended to the Short Sun. That is the part I wish very fervently that I could forget. I cannot recall the exact words-in all honesty, I am tormented more than enough as it is-but I cannot forget what I swore to do, and not one day passes without my conscience reminding me that I have not done it.

No more letters. What farce!

Gyrfalcon offered to take me to New Viron. While thanking him, I declined for three reasons that I might as well list here to show where my mind was when I left Lizard.

The first was that I wanted to speak to my family privately, and that I did not want to subject them-to subject you, Nettle darling, particularly-to the pressure Marrow, Blazingstar, and Gyrfalcon himself would undoubtedly have brought to bear.

I waited until supper, then longer so that we could dispose of the questions and gossip our five visitors had provoked. As I was carving the roast Sinew had supplied, he asked what had been said when you and I, Remora, and the others, had walked to the tip of the tail.

“You heard us earlier,” I told him, and continued to carve. “You know what they wanted.”

“I wasn’t paying much attention.”

You sighed then, Nettle, and I recalled your listening at the door when Silk conferred with the two councilors. I leaped to the conclusion that you had listened while I talked privately with Marrow and the others, and I was ready for you to explain everything to our sons when you said, “They want us to stop writing. Isn’t that really it?”

I thought it so ludicrously wrong that I could have laughed aloud. When I denied it, you said, “I was sure that was what it really was. I still am. You look so gloomy now, Horn, and you’re always such a cheerful person.”

I have never thought myself one.