His crime was against kalothi, the worst of all crimes. He had taken Death as a slave to feed him power but should not Death serve only the rituals of kalothi? Who can safely keep Death as his personal slave? Thus the Liethe poem ended. The most omnipotent of Storm Masters was condemned to death by execution.
The beams of sunlight from the high windows of the Deliberation Chamber had turned through many angles and hues before the decision was composed. There had been a sunset and lanterns and the pastels of dawn and the direct rays of highnode and another sunset. Humility felt aged with tiredness, stumbling from the chamber with her platinum-headed cane.
She could be old, she could think and move with the cunning slowness of age, for she was a trained actress, but the process of the deliberation itself had aged her. She alone had had flashes of impatient need to pass through the tedious process. The Winter-storm Master’s crimes were monstrous. The decision could be made in the time it took for a nod of a head, and yet none of the crones had shown impatience. Only later was she thankful for their stern example.
It was easy to kill on command. A hand was only an instrument. A hand made no life and death decisions, weighed no moral issues, deliberated no consequences. She had once felt superior to the crones who ordered her to kill, and now the killing seemed the simplest of it.
The se-Tufi Who Rings the Soul’s Bell guided her with an arm around her shoulders to the crone’s quarters. “First a bath for you. Then you can be young again.”
Humility said nothing until she was in the tub, waited on by giggling Liethe children, each naked but for a belt and bead skirt, who poured pitchers of warm water over her and ran for more. Soul’s Bell was scrubbing her. Sometimes the crones were harsh, and sometimes they were kind to their charges. “Am I to assassinate’t’Fosal?”
“If you wish. There is no hurry. Whoever will do it, will do it. You would do it best.”
“I don’t think I could.” She shuddered. “Knowing why he dies, having condemned him, could I strike? Yes I could strike — but swiftly and cleanly?”
“Bear this in mind, little One-Who-Sometimes-Has-Humility: the Storm Master’s death will be no ordinary execution. He is the foundation stone of a large building, and does not a building fall when its foundation stone is removed? Perhaps on us. There is an art to such things so that the building falls into a heap and not out into the street. Knowing the nature of the building he supports will guide you. Remember that we do not wish to destroy ourselves.”
“Am I to have no help?”
“No. Should you fail we will mourn you at your Ritual Suicide in the Temple of Raging Seas.”
“I thank you for your confidence!” She flicked some water from her fingers at the smiling crone mother. It was impossible to be formal with a woman who was washing your body with a servant’s circumspection.
“You will succeed. Who else at your age has carried traceless justice to twenty men?”
“What happens to old assassins?”
Soul’s Bell rang with laughter. “They become judges. You know that now.”
“The nas-Veda Who Sits on Bees was at the Deliberation today. I’m sure of it.”
“Such is not for me to say.”
“I know her. She trained me. The red veil did not deceive my eyes.”
“The woman with the red veil is our Liethe Judge of Judges.”
“Here in Soebo?”
“We are having our own private Gathering.”
“Why do we do this?”
“We are aligned with the priests. We rise or fall as they rise and fall. If they become corrupt, will we not be destroyed with them? The priests must have their checks.”
The arrogance of that statement triggered a fury in the young assassin. “And what if we become corrupt?” she erupted, raising a tidal wave in her tub.
“Have you not noticed that one in every three Liethe has been replaced in Soebo? I am new here and was not ready for the hasty journey from Hivehome, I assure you. Thank God for the strength of the Ivieth! You are among the newcomers. Why do you think Fosal trusts a Liethe to murder at his command? Are we not the slaves of the Mnankrei?”
Humility was horrified. “I cannot believe the Liethe have lost their center!”
“Love a thief too long and you become a thief, it is said.” She motioned to one of the girls to bring a large towel. “Here. Let me mop you. I have a daub of perfume and we shall do your hair. Tonight you sleep with High Wave tu’Ama.”
“He is Flesh’s man, not mine. I have my own business to attend to!” Standing in the wooden tub, she glistened by torchlight.
“The High Wave should be the ruler of Soebo. A weakness in the councils, in Ama himself, allowed control to pass to the Swift Wind. When Fosal dies, others of the Swift Wind will replace him but Ama will fight them and you must know him well so that your calculations are exact. You will meet him as Comfort and you will like him. He is a weak man; again he will lose his fight, but he is sensible and just. He has his following. It may be possible to pass command to him and in that case we can dispense with our Kaiel option.”
“I should be meeting Fosal, not Ama. He has requested it.”
“He will wait.”
“He will wait in hot wrath and beat me when I arrive.”
“My child,‘t’Fosal expects you to deliver his blue vial to the camp of the Gathering. He will be patient with you this once.”
Humility felt the gentle toweling of the old crone. She, too, was being patient this once. She, too, depends on me. The nakedness of her wet body chilled the Queen of Life-before-Death to the verge of shivers. They were all depending on her to save their skins from both the Mnankrei and the Kaiel. Clans! Did a clan never think beyond itself! The burden was like a padded overcoat of the north, but there was no warmth to it. Was life to be like this, so serious?
Ah, she sighed, while the two breastless Liethe slipped a fluffy cloak around her shoulders. Life had once been as warm as this bathrobe. Reverie recalled the simple pleasures of the pillow and the table and the wit of a flirtation and even the thrill of a cunning murder stripped of its overwhelming consequences. Youth was passing so quickly!
50
You ask why the kolgame allows the violation of its rules? But are not rules subservient to strategy? and plans subservient to rules? and contracts subservient to plans? The player who fixates upon the rules has replaced his strategy with a lower strategy. He may be defeated by creating a condition under which an application of his own rules will abort his basic goal. The player who fixates upon plans has replaced his strategy with motions. He will find himself walking at the bottom of a river because his plans called for a bridge that was not there. The player who fixates upon contracts has replaced his strategy by a faith in the omnipotence of someone else, and will fail whenever that other man fails. Once strategy is set, rules, plans, and contracts become variables to be optimized continuously. Such is the way of victory,
A MULTI-JAWED VISE was closing on Joesai. During his reluctant idleness, the Mnankrei had slowly been building trenches and check points in strategic places. The whole camp might find itself isolated any day now. He sat fuming in the farmhouse attic, confirming the rayvoice message from Bendaein hosa-Kaiel. There was to be a delay in the forward deployment of the main strength of the Gathering. Deliberately? Joesai strolled to the window, examining his self-made trap with an expert eye. A hill. Good stone fences. An excellent defensive position but little else. By the hairs of God’s Nose what was Bendaein doing?