"Are the glaziers Dushau?" asked Krinata.
"Some are. We've gathered here artisans in every trade. That's why Jindigar's so important to us, for he'll be our greatest expert on Sentient computers, as well as our Active Priest to form a new Oliat—if he survives. With an Oliat we might achieve the industrial base for orbital flight in a thousand years, and Sentient computers within fifteen hundred—by the time the new galactic government discovers us."
Krinata couldn't help contrasting this with the women's ambitions for a water heater and power pump to fill the cisterns. The Dushau perspective was dizzying, yet familiar. For the first time in days Takora was with her, quietly, without fuss, making this alien community seem like home.
They emerged into an open court circled by a cultivated area where Dushau were transplanting saplings that would, in the blink of an eye, perhaps only a few centuries, grow into a circular wall of trees shading the two buildings within.
Two large buildings, virtually identical, faced one another. Each was half-roofed, a pile of shake shingles beside the longest wall. Zannesu took her to a front entry of one building while the gardeners peered at her unhappily.
There was scaffolding over the entry they took, and a craftsman was carving words beneath a replica of the lightning flash over the portal. Krinata was a slow reader in Dushauni but had seen that particular quote before.
SIXTH OBSERVATION OF SHOSHUNRI
Fidelity is the most demanding Law of Nature, thus the most highly rewarded.
From: Purpose and Method
by: Shoshunri,
Observing Priest of Aliom
Now she knew Shoshunri's title meant he had once been an Oliat Center. Her eyes lingered on the quotation, as if Takora felt it was important.
As she followed Zannesu between the overlapping walls of the entry way, it suddenly dawned on her. Jindigar had never, ever been loyal to the Emperor, the Empire, or his friends, as she had always thought. He strove for a higher virtue, fidelity. It explained so many of his contradictory actions; he kept his oaths, regardless of how he'd misjudged a situation. He'd abandoned the Emperor only after the Emperor had broken fealty. If she knew all the Aliom oaths a priest took, she'd have understood his reticence.
With that insight came a deeper one. Aliom rejected Inversion because it was resorted to when one had lost the fidelity between one's internal model of the universe and the external, objective reality, and thus could not find one's place in the overall pattern. After having misjudged the pattern, a person was tempted to Invert to correct that mistake by forcing the pattern to conform to their presence.
If fidelity was a law of nature, men Inversion was a breaking of that law, unless one's internal model -of reality had absolute fidelity, and one was in fact in me" proper place—and the pattern had become distorted. One might then Invert to restore the pattern expecting to survive it, as Jindigar had.
She rounded the last curve into the Aliom temple, desperate for time to think, but about two dozen Dushau were looking at her. They sat on the floor in a circle, most holding strange Dushau musical instruments. Jindigar's whule reserved a place just before Krinata. Beyond the circle, where the roof was still open and sunlight shafted down between uncovered rafters, a huge carving that would eventually be the Oliat symbol, the X supported at the crux by an arrow, stood half-finished. Piles of construction debris had been swept aside to clear the floor.
In the center of the Dushau's circle under the finished roof, there was a fireplace and chimney of smooth river stones. Despite the warmth of the day a fire burned in the center of the raised hearth. She saw Jindigar lying on his side under a thermal blanket, surrounded by Darllanyu and several others.
"Jindigar!" she gasped, and dashed to him, heedless of protocol. Kneeling, she took his hands, which were clenched to his chest, and felt the tremors shaking him, as bad as when Desdinda had died. She glanced around at Zannesu and accused, "You didn't tell me he was like this!"
A male who sat opposite the door stood and said in Dushauni, "You see, she's not stable enough to attempt duad-grieving. This is no time for dangerous experiments with ephemerals. I can't permit this. That's my final judgment."
Krinata understood him and the general murmur of agreement from the others but was certain he didn't know it. She fought the splash of cold needles that prickled her skin at the vision of Jindigar dying, because his peers rejected him– because of her. Then she blinked aside a dizzying sense of deja vu, more Takora's than her own, though it seldom seemed that Takora was really a different person anymore.
Darllanyu put her hand over Krinata's and searched her eyes, whispering, "What is he worth to you?"
"My life," she answered without hesitation. 'Tell me what to do!"
Darllanyu squeezed the human hand with soft, napped fingers, rose, and faced the others. "You have the right to refuse to risk your lives for the community Raichmat's zunre have started here. Perhaps you can constitute an Oliat without me or Jindigar, but it could hardly be more than a heptad subform!"
"Even properly grieved and freed of the Archive, Jindigar would still be an Invert," answered the leader. "Who here is willing to balance with an Invert Archivist?"
Someone challenged, "Jindigar's no Archivist." The man came around the circle to confront Darllanyu. "That was settled when I tapped Grisnilter's Seal and discovered it had been breached. We all know what Jindigar is and what he's done. He should be allowed to go to dissolution/death without taking anyone else with him."
Darllanyu replied, "Your own grief for Prey colors your feelings, if not your skills, Threntisn,"
"You will leave my son out of this! I'm Senior Historian here, and—"
Not Frey's father! The Historian Darllanyu had expected to lift the Archive from Jindigar was Prey's father.
"You're in first grief," countered Darllanyu. "You're forgiven. Perhaps you truly can't do anything for Jindigar."
"Darllanyu." It was the leader. "He is Senior."
Another man rose to stand beside the leader, who seemed to be about to walk out. "Threntisn is right. If we try this, we could all be lost in the Archive—and wife an ephemeral, there's hardly any chance of success."
One of the darker indigo, thus older, women scoffed, "Who told you pioneering would be safe! Ephemerals have been doing it for millennia, without complaining of the risks. What are you, a bunch of duomorphs? Can't you see we need Jindigar?" Her eyes stopped on Krinata, and she shifted languages. "Do you know what the dangers are? What it could be like to be lost in such a large Archive?"
"Not exactly, but I'm willing to risk my life—which is not the same," she granted, "as you risking yours." Under questioning she told them all she remembered of her last brush with the Archive, the banishing of the Desdinda Loop, ending, "And I died with Takora—I really thought I was dead until I woke up." —and found Jindigar dead. "I'm still not sure what was real and what wasn't. I'm not sure how Frey died."
"We'll have to go through that with Jindigar," added Darllanyu. "Find out exactly how Frey died."
Find out that I killed him? She swallowed and knew she'd do even that public penance to revive Jindigar. Will they label me zunre-killer and shun us both?
Darllanyu cut through a general dissension, saying, "Jindigar is in crisis. Krinata came to help him, even though she doesn't need to grieve Frey to survive this. I won't let her stand alone! I'll grieve with them!"