“Is it in accord with doctrine?”
“I’ve never been told it’s forbidden.”
“Which is not the same thing,” Ilze sneered. “I’ve other stuff on my plate just now, student. I will remember you are here, however, when my current task is done.” He turned away in contempt, and when he turned again, the man was gone. Ilze threw himself down on the piled rugs and waited, not patiently.
When the day had half gone, a flier pushed into the room, perhaps the same one who had led Ilze here. “Sliffisunda of the Talons will see you, human. Follow me.” Which Ilze was hard-pressed to do. Twice he had to be lifted in the claws of the fliers before he was deposited at last on an elevated ledge above a yawning gulf. A jagged hole led to a space among the stones where Sliffisunda stood before a curtained opening. Ilze was not invited to enter, and he shivered in the chill wind of the heights.
“You wish to report heresy,” it croaked at him. “Heresy, Laugher?”
“There’s that woman, Pamra Don,” Ilze snarled without preliminary chat. “She’s guilty of heresy. This crusade of hers is a heresy. The Talkers—all the Thraish—will soon learn to regret it.”
“We have listened to what she says, Laugher. It is nothing much. Meantime, pits are full. Fliers find much meat.”
“You have listened to what she says in the public squares, Sliffisunda. You have not heard what she says in the Temples.”
“Tower people tell us, nothing much.”
“Then Tower people lie.”
Sliffisunda hissed, head darting forward as though he would strike. “Why would they lie?”
“Because they have been corrupted, stolen from the faith. They are not believers in Potipur. They dissemble, Talker. Pamra Don is a heretic, and she leads a band of heretics.”
“And yet pits are full.”
Ilze gestured impatiently. “Of course. For a little time. Until she gains strength. Then there will be no more bodies in the pits at all.”
Ilze had expected rage. There was no rage. The Talker hissed once more, then turned his head away. For a time there was silence. “How long, Laugher, before this crusade does, as you say, gain strength’?”
“Years,” Ilze admitted. “It moves slowly, true. And yet, not many years. It will get all the way around the world in twelve or fifteen years, if it continues at its current pace.”
“And in that time, we may expect pits to be full?”
“Probably. But that’s temporary, and purely local. Only where the crusade is passing at any given time.”
“Ah.” The Talker turned away again, hiding his face so the human would not see his expression. One might let the crusade alone. In fifteen years, when it had rounded the world, the Thraish would be ready to strike at them all. In the meantime, many humans would have died and been eaten, the fewer to fight later. However, Thraish numbers could not be increased on the basis of purely local plenty, and if some accident happened, if breeding stock were lost to winter cold, then fifteen years might be too soon.
On balance, it might be better if the crusade were stopped. On balance, it might be better if things were as usual for the next few years. Peaceful. The humans kept biddable and quiet. It was something for the Stones of Disputation, something he could discuss with his colleagues of the Sixth Degree.
“You wish to stop this thing, Laugher?”
“I can stop it, yes.”
“How?”
“Pamra Don is being taken by Jondarites to the Chancery. You Talkers must demand she be turned over to you. It was she, after all, who emptied the pits at Baris. You have just ground for complaint. Demand she be given to you. Then give her to me!”
If Sliffisunda could have smiled, he would have done so. Transparent, this one. And still as fiery as when the Talkers and Accusers had done with him, before he was made a Laugher. Set on the trail of Pamra Don, nothing would stay him, not even his fear of the Talkers.
“Do you not fear us?” he asked now. “We gave you much pain.”
“Necessary,” Ilze said with an angry flush. “It was necessary. Not your fault. Pamra’s fault.” There was a little fleck of foam at the corner of his mouth. He felt it there, wiped it away, struggling to remain calm.