Gidula sighed. “Billy turned his coat and threw in with the loyalists. We thought he meant to dissuade us from recalling you. But no man can be impaired in the mind and still be standing after a battle with Ekadrina Sèanmazy.”
“What man unimpaired would engage her in first place? Besides, we were barely standing.”
“Barely is more than her other opponents have stood.”
“Ravn slain,” he said, “we see red; go berserk, fight like madman. Which,” he added in a different voice, “is appropriate, seeing as we are a madman. Perhaps facing prospect of certain death focus our minds most wondrously.”
Gidula said nothing for a moment. Then he crooked a finger and summoned the fey once more to his side to refresh his mug. This time, he took a deeper draft and set it on the waiting tray with a satisfied sigh. “You’ve hardly touched your drink,” he pointed out.
“I just woke up,” the Fudir said.
“It’s a stimulant. Tell me, Gesh: why will you not join us? It’s not for lack of inducements. Vengeance for what the Names did to you. The glory and honor of your name. Not even for Terra! I’m certain Oschous Dee took you to the mountaintop and showed you Terra. I’m disappointed.”
He really did sound disappointed—but the nature of that disappointment remained elusive. “True Terry-fella, me. But Oschous no Terry-man.”
Gidula invited details with his silence. So the Fudir recited the Terran rhyme:
“There be no fur-face foxes among the races of Terra.”
“Did Oschous claim to be a Terran? That surprises me. Dee Karnatika is generally more careful in his lies.”
The Pedant mulled over the conversation in the fox’s shipboard sanctum. No, Donovan decided, Oschous never had made that specific claim. The best lie is the one you induce your hearer to tell himself. “His promise was smoke. Terra can never be truly free,” Donovan said. “Not in the Triangles. She stands too near to Dao Chetty and Delpaff, to Old Eighty-two.
“Too close for one to escape domination by another. It requires only a would-be conqueror with enough swagger in his step—or enough steps in his swagger.”
“Would you rather it be Terra dominating the others, as in the ‘golden age’? I’m sure the Delpaffonis or the Eighty-seconds have other perspectives.”
Donovan sat forward in his chair. “Those with a stake in the status quo might feel some disquiet at the thought of change.”
“A great deal depends on the nature of the change, does it not? Most change is for the worse. Delpaff and Old Eighty-two—and a dozen other worlds beside—may chafe under Dao Chetty’s thumb, but they’d not exchange it for Terra’s. As for those worlds far from the centers of power—Henrietta, for example—they find the yoke endurable and the checkreins lightly held.”
“The worst sort of slavery is when the slave does not feel the collar.”
“Is it? I would have thought that the best sort.” Gidula raised a hand just so and the fey scurried over without the carafe.
“Yes, Law Gidula? How may I serve you?” The contralto would have served either man or woman. It was drawled, halting, uncertain. The face was ageless; the eyes were old.
Gidula smiled at him, patted his cheek, groomed his hair. “Tell me, Podiin. How long have you been in my service?”
“Sir? Aw my life. Seven years an’ fawty, each basking in the sun of my law’s ray-dee-ents.”
Gidula gathered both the fey’s hands and clasped them between his own. “You have served me well, Podiin. I have thought of freeing you.”
The fey’s mouth gaped open. He fell to his knees, grabbed Gidula’s left hand, and bestowed kisses on the back of it. “Please, Law Gidula! Do no do tha’ to me!” Tears coursed down his cheek, and he moaned. “Please, my law, have I naw serve’ you well? Don’ sen’ me ’way!”
“But you would be free, boy!”
The fey sobbed. “No, my law! Will freedom feed me? Will it care for me? Will it ensure me again’ sickness? No, Law Gidula, only your gen’rous and open han’ cares for me—as I care for you.”
Donovan noted to his own astonishment the tears wetting Gidula’s cheeks. “Ah, no, my boy, no,” the Old One said stroking the servant’s head. “I’ll not do such a thing to you. You will stay at my side; and when the gods call me, you alone will scatter my ashes.”
That sent the fey into further paroxysms, only the tears now were those of joy. He bubbled his thanks, covered Gidula’s hand with kisses. Gidula with his free hand produced a kerchief from a sleeve and dried first his own eyes, then the servant’s. “Here, now,” Gidula said, “stand up, boy.”
When the servant was once more erect, Gidula twisted a ring off his right hand and gave it to the servant. “Here, Podiin. Wear this with pride.” The fey might have collapsed once more into weak-kneed delight, but Gidula held him up. “With pride, I said.” And the fey nodded and visibly braced his shoulders.
“Now bring the Donovan and me a selection of fruits and light-meats. Hurry along.”
When the servant had vanished, Gidula sniffled, turned to Donovan, and spread his hands as if to say, There. You see?
“Trained from birth, was he?” Donovan said. “Small wonder freedom terrifies him. He’s known no-but else.”
“It’s not a bad life for his ilk. They are suited by nature to serve others.”
“His ilk … The feys?”
“What? No. Feys are no more servile than foxies or clappers or any other race of men. But they have their share of the mentally slow. Podiin can follow simple instructions, act on his own in familiar, structured environments, but he would be lost without the direction of others. What do you do with them out in the Periphery? Kill them at birth? Toss them on the street to fend for themselves?”
“It was a nice performance. I noticed he got a black pearl ring out of you.”
Gidula shrugged. “A man may be slow but nonetheless reach his destination. He is retarded, not stupid. But enough. I take it my point is made. You might not find Terra so eager to be ‘free.’ Our society is a tightly woven network of obligations.” He interlocked his fingers and tugged. “I am as much in Podiin’s service as he in mine. No, do not sneer, Gesh. You have lived too long among the Peripherals and their anarchies. A tightly woven web, I say, of beliefs, customs, tales, fealties, and the like. Our law books are thinner than the Peripheral’s because we are led by living words and not by dead legalities. When right action is needed, a parable is a surer guide than a statute. It is what gives us stability. It is why the Confederation is still what it always was, while the Periphery is constantly stumbling about.”
“‘Still what it always was…,’” said the Fudir. “But there was a Commonwealth, once.”
“Ah, the fabled Commonwealth of Suns. You Terrans look back at it misty-eyed, and I grant you it scaled greater heights than either the Confederation or the League has attained. But the Commonwealth was arrogance at the center, with the reins held loose. That is not a happy formula. If you value the lightly held leash, modest fellowship is best advised. But if you would strut your boots on other men’s faces, clench the reins tight and never relax.”
“The Commonwealth was not like that!”