In the offices of Jhamlees Zoe, head of the Office of Security and Acceptable Doctrine, the man responsible for the affairs of the Friary was undoing, for the third or fourth time, a packet which had arrived a considerable time ago. Inside was a wad of printing beginning, as did all communications from the Hierarch—or even putatively from the Hierarch—“Dear Brother in Sanctity.” And so on and so on, wah, wah, wah. Pages of it, spewed out of a cleric-all, dull as porridge and meaningless as peeper song. The real meat was in the middle of this manuscript, two pages inserted there which were written in a familiar hand:
“My dear old friend Nods. By the time you read this, I will be the new Hierarch of Sanctity.” Which was interesting. Cory had always said he would be Hierarch someday. When they had been in seminary together as boys, Cory had said it; even then, Jhamlees Zoe nodded. It just went to prove how ruthless Cory really was.
He read further:
The Hierarch past, one Carlos Yrarier, has for some esoteric reason picked his nephew Roderigo to go to Grass and find out whether there is plague or a cure for plague on your world. Pay attention, old friend. Though it is still policy to deny it,there is plague here, as there is everywhere else.If Yrarier finds no help upon Grass, we may have to depend upon the machines to resurrect us after the danger has passed. Some of us, at least Thee and me, old friend. As you know, it has never been Sanctity’s intention to resurrect many! Why bring all that fodder to life again when it did so little the first time around?
Jhamlees nodded once again. That was sound doctrine, though not doctrine ever shared with the masses. If the machines ever woke them into some new world, it would be a very selective waking, Jhamlees’ cell-sample was in machine “A,” along with a few hundred thousand others. The other billions could be roused if needed, but such need was doubtful.
The letter went on:
However, since there is a chance you have no plague on your world, I plan to come to Grass with such personnel and so equipped as to do all that must be done in the shortest possible time to find a cure. But, we will do it quietly.It is not our desire that either information about the plague or the cure, assuming we find one, be widely disseminated.There are those among the Elders who see in this plague the Hand of God Almighty wiping out the heathen to leave worlds clean for Sanctity alone to populate. Hasten the day. While I am less inclined to see the Hand of God, I am no less willing to take advantage of the chance.
The information Sanctity initially received was that a person or persons had arrived on Grass with the disease and departed without it. In the serene hope that this is true, I am coming to Grass very soon. Too precipitous a move would betray our purpose, therefore I must take more time than I like. Still, I should arrive not long after Yrarier himself, having first taken time to make ritual stops here and there—the putative reason for my journey. If necessary, some of these ceremonial visits may be cut short. At the first inkling that Yrarier has found something, even if only a hint, you are to send word in accordance with the itinerary enclosed.
Jhamlees unfolded the itinerary, then finished the letter.
Needless to say, we want no premature soundings of alarums. All is poised here as on the point of a needle, swinging wildly as a compass does when it finds no pole. As I write this the old Hierarch is dying of plague. Your old friend and cousin is not touched yet, and is determined to come to Grass in order that he may never be touched by any but the hands of friendship. Let me know what is happening!
It was signed by Cory Strange, Nods’ oldest friend, a friend from the time he had been Nods Noddingale, which was many decades before he had become Jhamlees Zoe.