“Administrator,” Shan-wei said, “your ‘established policy’ overlooks the fact that mankind has always been a toolmaker and a problem solver. Eventually those qualities are going to surface here on Safehold. When they do, without an institutional memory of what happened to the Federation, our descendants aren’t going to know about the dangers waiting for them out there.”
“That particular concern is based on a faulty understanding of the societal matrix we’re creating here, Dr. Pei,” the Archangel Bédard said. “I assure you, with the safeguards we’ve put in place, the inhabitants of Safehold will be safely insulated against the sort of technological advancement which might attract the Gbaba’s intention. Unless, of course, there’s some outside stimulus to violate the parameters of our matrix.”
“I don’t doubt that you can—that you have already—created an anti-technology mindset on an individual and a societal level,” Shan-wei replied levelly. “I simply believe that whatever you can accomplish right now, whatever curbs and safeguards you can impose at this moment, five hundred years from now, or a thousand, there’s going to come a moment when those safeguards fail.”
“They won’t,” the Archangel Bédard said flatly. “I realize psychology isn’t your field, Doctor. And I also realize one of your doctorates is in history. Because it is, you’re quite rightly aware of the frenetic pace at which technology has advanced in the modern era. Certainly, on the basis of humanity’s history on Old Earth, especially during the last five or six centuries, it would appear the ‘innovation bug’ is hardwired into the human psyche. It isn’t, however. There are examples from our own history of lengthy, very static periods. In particular, I draw your attention to the thousands of years of the Egyptian empire, during which significant innovation basically didn’t happen. What we’ve done here, on Safehold, is to re-create that same basic mindset, and we’ve also installed certain … institutional and physical checks to maintain that mindset.”
“No, nooooooo,” Clyntahn moaned. Five or six centuries, thousands of years?! It was lies, it was all lies! It had to be!
But the voices went right on speaking, and he couldn’t look away.
“The degree to which the Egyptians—and the rest of the Mediterranean cultures—were anti-innovation has been considerably overstated,” Shan-wei told the Archangel Bédard. “Moreover, Egypt was only a tiny segment of the world population of its day, and other parts—”
* * *
His torment lasted more than the hour the hellish woman had promised. It lasted a century—an age! They made him watch it all, made him absorb the blasphemy, the lies, the deception. And, far worse than that, they made him realize something more dreadful, more hideous than any torment the Punishment had ever inflicted upon the most hardened heretic.
They made him realize it was the truth.
“Lies,” he whispered, staring up at them from where he’d slid down the wall to hunker on the floor. “Lies.” Yet even as he said it, he knew.
“Go on telling yourself that, Your Grace,” Athrawes said as the woman slid the object back into her belt pouch. “Be our guest. Tell yourself that again and again, every step of the way between this cell and the gallows. Tell yourself that when the rope goes around your neck. Tell yourself that while you stand there, waiting. Because when that trap door opens, when you fall through it, you won’t be able to tell yourself that any longer. And how do you think the real God, the true God, the God men and women like Maikel Staynair worship, will greet you when you hit the end of that rope?”
Clyntahn stared at him, his mouth working wordlessly, and the seijin—the seijin, he knew now, who was a young woman a thousand years dead—smiled at him while his companion—the same dead woman!—unlocked the chamber door once more.
“Tell yourself that, Your Grace,” Merlin Athrawes said as he turned to follow Nimue Chwaeriau through that door. “Take it with you straight to hell, because Schueler and Langhorne are waiting for you there.”
* * *
Greyghor Stohnar sat on the reviewing stand beside Cayleb of Charis. Empress Sharleyan sat on the Emperor’s right, with Aivah Pahrsahn to her right, and young Prince Nahrmahn Garyet and King Gorjah of Tarot sat with them. The Duke of Darcos and his wife sat on the rows below theirs, and so did Earl Thirsk, Archbishop Staiphan, Archbishop Zhasyn Cahnyr, Archbishop Klairmant Gairlyng, Archbishop Ulys Lynkyn.…
It was a very long list, scores of names. And for every name on it, there was another name that wasn’t there. Gwylym Manthyr, Mahrtyn Taisyn, Dabnyr Dynnys, Clyftyn Sumyrs, Samyl and Hauwerd Wylsynn, even Erayk Dynnys. As he sat there in the crisp, cold morning sunlight, bundled in his warm coat, wearing his gloves, his breath rising in a golden, sun-touched mist, he thought about all those missing names. The men—and the women—who couldn’t be here to see this morning, to know that justice had finally been done in their names.
Justice. Such a cold, useless word. It’s important—I know it’s important—but … what does it really achieve? Does it bring them back? Does it undo anything the bastard did?
He remembered the cold contempt in Clyntahn’s eyes as the verdict was finally read. Remembered the arrogance, the way he’d stared at all of them secure in the knowledge—even now, after everything—that the final victory would be his. That he truly had served God. He’d wanted to vomit that day, but today would be an end. And as he thought that, he realized what justice achieved.
It’s not about him, really. Oh, there’s vengeance in it, and I won’t pretend there isn’t. But what it’s about—what it means—is that we’re better than he is. That there are some acts, some atrocities, we won’t tolerate. That we will punish them to make our rejection of evil clear but we won’t resort to the butchery, the flaying knives, the castration, the white hot irons, or the stake that he used on so many people. We will remove him from the face of this world, but with a decent respect for justice and without—without—becoming him when we do. That’s what this morning is about.
A trumpet sounded. The background murmur of conversation died, and the only sound was the snapping of the banners atop Protector’s Palace and the faint, distant cry of a wyvern. Then the door opened, and the escort, an enlisted soldier chosen from every army that had fought against the Group of Four—and from the Royal Dohlaran Army, the Army of God, and the Mighty Host of God and the Archangels, as well—came through it, surrounding the prisoner in the plain black cassock.
Stohnar watched them come, and his eyes widened slowly as Zhaspahr Clyntahn drew closer. The arrogance was gone, the shoulders slumped, the hair was wild and uncombed, and he walked like an old, old man, eyes darting in every direction. They fastened on the tall, blue-eyed seijin standing behind Cayleb and Sharleyan, and the smaller seijin standing behind the Duke of Darcos and his wife, and even from his seat, Stohnar could see the terror in their depths.
They reached the foot of the gallows stairs, and Clyntahn stopped. The escort paused, and he raised one foot, as if to set it on the lowest stair tread. But he didn’t. He only stood there, staring now up at the noose swaying in the breeze, and not at the seijins standing post in the stands.