"If the priesthood becomes weaker, Nidor will fall apart into warring factions; if you try to strengthen the priesthood, you will force Nidor apart, as you are already beginning to do; if the priesthood becomes neither weaker nor stronger, then someone else will take control.
"I did not rebuild the Temple. So you tried. And if you had not, some other priest would have, tried. Or perhaps someone else would have, a Bank Keeper or a wealthy merchant. It doesn't matter."
Nibro shrugged. "That, I think, is a matter of opinion."
"Exactly!" said Ganz. And for the first time, there was a touch of excitement in his voice. "Exactly! You have put your finger on it! It is a matter of opinion!"
Nibro looked startled. Now he was quite sure the old man was mad. He was oddly reminded of the New Lawyer.
You think all who tell the truth are mad!
He pushed the memory from his mind as Ganz went on.
"For four thousand years—two hundred and fifty cycles—everyone on Nidor knew what his opinion should be. If he was a farmer, he farmed in the Way of our Ancestors. If he was a merchant, he bought and sold according to the same rules. There was no question as to whether or not it was right in his opinion. Everyone had the same opinion.
"And now? Everyone has a right to his own opinion, just as he did then. But now the opinions differ—and who is to say who is right? Each is of the opinion that he is right.
"And what can you or I or anyone do about that? Can you change everyone's opinion? No! And that leaves you as helpless as everyone else!"
Nibro's smile had become somewhat similar to Ganz peDel's. It was tolerant, but instead of a touch of bitterness, it was stained with a faint sneer. "It seems to me that you are trying to change my opinion. You want me to do what you have done—sit around and watch Nidor go to pieces. You want me to loaf and twiddle my fingers and look down my nose as you do. You want me to give up, too."
He stood up suddenly, and slammed his fist on the desk. "But I won't! I see through your stall! You have no intention of relinquishing control of your armed men, and you have no intention of leading them yourself!
"But I warn you! I am Elder Leader! I want those men!"
Ganz didn't even look excited. "I hate to see men lose their lives in useless battles. And these are older men—men with families and children."
Nibro was taken aback. "Old men! But why? The men who followed the Great Martyr weren't old men!" he shouted. "Why have you no young fighters?"
"We do have—a few. Those who couldn't get employment elsewhere." A glint came in the old man's eyes. "Why should young men join? What have we to fight? Kris peKym had something to fight! He was doing what he thought was right to save Nidor; he had a menace to combat! But for nearly two cycles there has been nothing."
"There's something now," Nibro said harshly. "There's a rebellion to put down. And this isn't the kind of rebellion Kris peKym led. This is a rebellion against the Council, against the Directorate, against the rightful rulers of Nidor!"
Ganz peDel attempted to say something, but Nibro continued without interruption. "I tell you, Ganz peDel, this thing has got to be stopped right here! A group of northern mountaineers led by an embezzling criminal cannot be allowed to override proper authority—or we will have no authority at all! If this is allowed to continue, Nidor will be in the throes of chaotic anarchy within no more than fifty days!
"And in the face of that, you refuse to give me the men to fight with because you think I should do nothing!"
Nibro had to stop temporarily for breath, and Ganz said: "You misunderstand me. I'm not refusing to give you the men. I'll sign the papers, give them their orders. They'll obey you as well as they would me."
Nibro blinked. He felt as though he'd been trying to push down a stone wall only to have it turn to fog. The sudden lack of resistance almost overbalanced him.
"You didn't listen," Ganz went on. "I didn't say that you should do nothing. I said it doesn't matter what you do."
The procession of priests and acolytes trotted northward, augmented this time by a complement of a hundred and fifty black-clad armed men.
Northward they went, their deests eating up distance with their easy, loping gait. The procession followed the broad highway that ran along the western banks of the mighty river Tammul, from Tammulcor to Gelusar. At Holy Gelusar, they crossed the Bridge of Klid to the eastern shore and headed northward, toward the headwaters of the Tammul, deep in the Ancestral Mountains, where the Sumay Pass gave access to the Province of Sugon.
Elder Leader Nibro peSyg. Ghevin rode at the head of the procession, staring squarely ahead. He felt quite confident. There was no need for a battle, really—and so it made no difference that the men of his army were somewhat past their prime.
They were able men, and the threat alone should be more than sufficient to silence the handful of men who had defied the Council.
The next project, Nibro thought, would be to get rid of the Directorate, and then—
Nibro peSyg chuckled softly to himself.
It was a lovely vision: the Temple proud and new in the heart of Gelusar, the Five Provinces sending their tithes, the Council supreme and Nibro peSyg controlling the Council—in the name of the Great Light, of course.
During the warmth of the day, the army rode steadily northward toward Sugon. At night, they sheltered themselves from the evening rains and made camp on the bank of the Tammul. This far north the Tammul was no longer a broad, easily navigable river, but a narrow winding trickle coming down from the mountains rearing ahead.
It was a few hours after dawn when the band approached the gap in the; foothills that led to Sumay Pass.
Grandfather Drelk peShawm said, "Do you think there will be much fighting, Elder Leader?"
Nibro shook his head. "None, I should say. Or, at least, very little. No one but a fool will fight in the face of an overwhelming group of armed and determined men."
It was a sentence destined to haunt him, to drift back mockingly a few hours later.
The longest electric communications line on Nidor was the line that ran from Holy Gelusar to Tammulcor; it had been constructed after the establishment of the Directorate, in order to keep the secular government in touch with the Council of Elders. Most "long distance" lines simply ran short distances to the villages surrounding large cities.
Across that line had come a communication to the Council, informing them that Elder Leader Nibro peSyg Ghevin was starting north at the head of an army.
A certain acolyte, on hearing the news, went quietly into the city. He spoke to another man.
Twenty minutes later, that man was on a fast deest, spurring his mount up the banks of the Tammul. He rode hard and fast, stopping only once to change animals at a small village near the foothills of the Ancestral Mountains. Then he rode through the Sumay Pass into the Province of Sugon.
When he reached his destination—a small Peacemen's Office at a mountainous Sugonese village—he dismounted and. ran in.
Within that building was the second longest line on Nidor—one which had existed only for a matter of a few days.
"Get the Keeper on the line!" he yelled. "The Elder Leader, is on his way north with two hundred men." The number had become exaggerated in the telling. "Get Korvin peKorvin!"
Ten minutes later, Korvin peKorvin Danoy, Keeper of the Bank of Sugon, had heard the message. He replaced the microphone of his instrument and smiled unworriedly. Then he lifted it again, "Get me the Priest-Mayor," he snapped.