“I’m doing everything wrong.” Alfred shook his head. “I’m a clumsy fool. And I can’t blame it on living among mensch. It’s just me.”
“But matters would have been different had our people survived. You would not have been alone. And you have been very much alone, haven’t you, Alfred?”
Her voice was tender, pitying, compassionate.
Alfred was very near to tears. He tried to respond cheerfully. “It hasn’t been as bad as you suppose. I’ve had the mensch . . .”
Orla’s look of pity increased.
Alfred, seeing it, protested. “No, it isn’t the way you imagine. You underestimate the mensch. We all did, I believe.
“I remember what it was like before I slept. We hardly ever walked among the mensch, and when we did, it was only to come to them as parents, visiting the nursery. But I have lived long among them. I’ve shared their joys and sorrows, I’ve known their fears and ambitions. I’ve come to understand how helpless and powerless they feel. And, though they’ve done much that was wrong, I can’t help but admire them for what they have accomplished.”
“And yet,” said Orla, frowning, “the mensch have, as I see in your mind, fallen to warring among themselves, slaughtering each other, elf battling human, human fighting dwarf.”
“And who was it,” asked Alfred, “who inflicted the most terrifying catastrophe ever known upon them? Who was it who killed millions in the name of good, who sundered a universe, who brought the living to strange worlds, then left them to fend for themselves?”
Two bright red spots blazed in Orla’s cheeks. The dark line deepened in her forehead.
“I’m sorry,” Alfred hastened to apologize. “I have no right … I wasn’t there . . .”
“You weren’t there, on that world that seems so near to me in my heart, and yet which my head tells me is long lost. You don’t know our fear of the growing might of the Patryns. They meant to wipe us out completely, genocide. And then what would have been left for your mensch? A life of slavery beneath the iron-heeled boot of totalitarian rule. You don’t know the agony the Council underwent, trying to determine how best to fight this dire threat. The sleepless nights, the days of bitter arguing. You don’t know our own, our personal agony. Samah himself—” She broke off abruptly, biting her lip.
She was adept at concealing her thoughts, revealing only those she wanted. Alfred wondered what she would have said had she continued.
They had walked a long distance, far from the Hall of Sleep. Blue sigla ran along the bottom of the walls, guiding their way through a dusty corridor. Dark rooms branched off it, rooms that would soon become temporary Sartan living quarters. For now, however, the two stood alone in the rune-lit darkness.
“We should be turning back. I had not meant to come this far. We’ve passed the dining area.” Orla started to retrace her steps.
“No, wait.” Alfred put a hand on her arm, startled at his own temerity in detaining her. “We may never have another chance to talk alone like this. And … I must understand! You didn’t agree, did you? You and some of the other Council members.”
“No. No, we didn’t.”
“What did you want to do?”
Orla drew a deep breath. She wasn’t looking at him; she remained turned away. For a moment, Alfred thought she wasn’t going to answer, and she apparently thought so, too, but then, with a shrug, she changed her mind.
“You will find out soon enough. The decision to make the Sundering was talked of, debated. It caused bitter disputes, split families.” She sighed, shook her head. “What action did I counsel? None. I counseled that we do nothing, except take a defensive stand against the Patryns, should we be attacked. It was never certain they would, mind you. It was only what we feared . . .”
“And fear was victorious.”
“No!” Orla snapped angrily. “Fear wasn’t the reason we made the decision, at last. It was the longing to have the chance to create a perfect world. Four perfect worlds! Where all would live in peace and harmony. No more evil, no more war . . . That was Samah’s dream. That was why I agreed to cast my vote with his over all other objections. That was why I didn’t protest when Samah made the decision to send …”