Shame was brilliant.
I had never personally met a priest who served Shame. As I discussed with Thirukedi, my experiences with Correction were few, both as instrument and as recipient. It is so with many Ai-Naidar: we require moderating words at times and we pay reparations as needed, but transgressions against the rules of society are not flagrant, nor so deeply-rooted that they require frequent Correction. That is part of the purpose of having the rules of society set to paper, after all... so that all may know their duties, their responsibilities, and their privileges.
But Kherishdar is an empire spanning three worlds and several colonies, and we are many and our culture old. With so many Ai-Naidar it is inevitable that some will transgress. And for the times when we do, then we call upon those who serve Shame to bring that virtue to us, so that we may once again remember our place and become good members of society.
Correction is not punishment. If it does not bring you to a deeper understanding of your role in Kherishdar, it is meaningless. And here is where Shame excelled. He crafted Corrections that addressed the heart of the transgression... that addressed the impulse that drove it rather than the surface crime. In his own hand, he documented his efforts, and while his commentary was terse and often broken, as if written by a mind speeding too quickly for the hand to follow, still I saw the genius there.
I made myself a cup of golden tea and sat on my studio's window-seat. There among the cushions I made company with the first of Shame's logs, and the sunlight fell on calligraphy so swiftly scrawled it seemed on the verge of unraveling... the first words so dark they were almost illegible, the pen loaded with ink so he would have to stop less frequently to dip, and the last words so pale they were read almost by their indentation in the paper rather than by their color.
I find it difficult to explain Shame's brilliance, but I will make the attempt. Take for instance the entry I found on the sixth page:
MALE, ANATHKEDI, half-brother to head of household well-liked gives permission to be touched, takes it away without warning...house Head thinks he is skittish of touch, needs touch-friend, learn to trust—??
Have studied, done interviews. Not trust issue, is, in fact, contempt for those he permitted. Did not think enough of them to withhold touch, did not think well enough of them to withdraw it properly.
Dressed him in no-one's clothes... took him to other household, had him shadow those in caste-ranks he thought so little of. Needed a week... no longer treats those caste-ranks badly. head of household pleased. Checked a season later... still behaving well. head of household offered a sasrithi.
This incident was remarkable in that it first required something not all Ai-Naidar are capable of: the ability to think as other castes do. I understand the duties of those above the Wall of Birth, but I do not truly empathize with them. Even a month's worth of study would not have acquainted me well enough with a Noble's mind to permit me to make the leap of understanding Shame has made here: that the Noble was not, in fact, shy of being intimate with others, but had fallen prey to an emotion poisonous in the nobility and regality, one so destructive to their purpose in society that it rarely has opportunity to flourish: contempt.
I would never, ever, have dared imagine a Noble capable of contempt.
Having come to this startling conclusion merely by observation, Shame then crafted a Correction that required the abasement of the noble completely. It is difficult for me to imagine the confidence and power of personality it would take to convince a Noble to bow his head to such a penance. Most Corrections are intimate conversations between the instrument and the recipient—revasil ekain, we call those, Corrections made with scenarios, with words. Vabanil, the Corrections of actions, are rarer, more potent, and more difficult to conceive and enact, since one of their most prominent features is that the recipient must be receptive to what he will learn.
And it was a fitting Correction, at that.
So then: thrice unusual, Shame, once for being able to be another Ai-Naidari simply by watching him, twice for bringing a Noble to a difficult Correction of action and thrice for having conceived one so well-suited to the error.
The fourth and final, of course, was that it worked so well that the Head of household gave him a sasrithi, a token allowing him to ask a future favor. Such tokens are not lightly given from a noble Head of household.
One of you asked, why it is that I found it a matter so piercing to be seen so clearly by Thirukedi, why I was honored. I must answer, then, that to be seen with understanding eyes requires not just great insight, but also great compassion. One might not see at all, lacking the former; or see and deny what is seen, lacking the latter. I began to suspect, from my first examination of these journals, that Shame… Shame had both these virtues, and they are rare when found together, and more precious thereby.
I continued reading as the day waned, rising only to bring a lamp to my window-seat. Though terse, each entry evoked a self-contained world in all its nuance: a twisted spirit or ungentle mind, the circumstances that had brought it to that sickness, and through each, like a thread of incense, the presence of the osulkedi, Shame's servant, who led each supplicant back to righteousness and cleansed their spirits. It was a record of redemption found in the pain of expiation and the darkness of confession, and I found it haunting, unnerving and irresistible.
I fell asleep there, leaning back against the pillows and twisted with knees raised so as not to drop the book from my lap; when I woke, my hand was resting on the edge, protective. I had neither packed nor washed in preparation for my journey, and hastened to both tasks, yet I am ashamed to say I kept the carriage-master waiting.
"Haste is not needful," the carriage-master said, his speech politely Abased: he was irimkedi, a Servant to the Emperor and several castes my junior. It was for him to accept such delays with aplomb, just as it was for me to not make such errors of ill courtesy. I sighed and moved so his assistants could load my trunk, then stepped up into the carriage with one of Shame's logs held against my chest. While I had the sense of his work from the first, I could not deny my compulsion. I wanted to know more. The carriage rocked beneath the boots of the driver as he climbed aboard and then we were underway. Settling into the pillowed bench, I opened the next volume and resumed reading.
The first mention of blood made me put the book down. I stared out the window; we had passed out of the capital and were now among the soft green fields outside it. The sunlight falling through the carriage window onto my wrist felt very real, very bright... the breeze, fresh with the newness of spring, did not seem to co-exist with the words in the entry I'd just read.
Knew talk would be pointless. Needed to make blood payment for guilt. Not a violent grief, so brought needles and made it slow.
What guilt could be so desperate to require blood payment? And what kind of man could dole it out so methodically? Every other entry had evoked in me a rich sense of color and light, as if the bare words were just waiting for calligraphy. But this... had been flat to me. Words, naked words, their meanings unadorned in my mind.
I have never needed more than the mildest of Corrections. I could not imagine a world of such violent passions. How could I possibly be of service to a man capable of addressing such things?
And yet, Thirukedi had sent me. Of all His osulked, He had chosen me.
I had to believe I could help... but I did not pick up the log again. I spent the remainder of the journey with my gazed fixed on the new green of the fields, and my distraction was so complete I did not even wonder how I would mix the color on a palette.
And now a digression, for several of you have asked about tea, and I am delighted to oblige your curiosity. For tea is emblematic of our species, indeed!—we consider it the official drink of the empire. Many are the tracts that discuss its virtues.
Like the aunerai version, our tea is made from the leaves of a plant; in our case, an epiphytic vine, the let arva (directly, “tea vine”). It is found natively on First World, growing on the branches of a shrub that lives on the sides of hills and ditches: a very humble plant that one, we even name it so: gelme sherani, the humble plant; more on this in a moment. Without the tea vine, gelme shera are overwhelmed by direct sunlight and die. Likewise, the tea plant cannot survive without a host to suspend it, nor does it grow very high. It is well-suited to its partner.
Together, tea vine and host offer a considerable bounty: the gelme sherani’s leaves can be ground as an analgesic and its small berries are delicious; they are also crushed to form the basis for the pigment that dyes the stoles of Public Servants such as myself, a color adequately translated as "mulberry." The tea vine, of course, yields the tea leaves; like you, we cure and dry the leaves in many different ways, each one creating a different flavor profile. Unlike your beverage, let is a mild relaxant. It does not induce sleep, mind... only calms a troubled thought, if such a thought you may be holding. It is a bright, quiet sort of mind it fosters.
You can imagine, then, why we so value tea. It has inspired a host of words: let aidaremethil, or tea-plant symbiosis, is the state of working in tandem with another to achieve your mutual success. That success-gained-with-others also has a word: letenemii. Letshilva means something like "complete usefulness," and describes when every last particle of utility has been wrung from something: like the tea vine and its partner, the berries, the leaves, even the way the partnership itself, the location, everything contributes, without holding back. Ashlet is the word we use to describe someone or something who works harmoniously with another, complementing their strengths and compensating for their weaknesses. And ieleten is the word we use for the failure that comes from attempting to make one's way alone in a situation or environment where one absolutely needs aid; you may remember the world iekuvren, “destructive independence,” a flaw that leads to ieleten, failure, and finally akuvrash, the destruction of the local community. It is from that word for failure that we derive the name for the tea vine, in fact, for that concept came first; as a species, we faced dar ieleten, which is to say the failure of a people, for only when we learned to pull together in the traces were we able to survive. The partner shrub also takes its name from another venerable word: gelmesh, which is to say "foundation of a positive relationship," and this root also informs the word gelme, for is not humility to source of our ability to love?
In conflict, we speak of let raikash, “tea victories.” These are reached by compromise on the part of both parties, as in two enemies sitting at tea. The victory is impossible without both their contributions, so this word is both pleasing in symbol and act (for we do often make our treaties over a tea table).
So then: a very important plant, not just for its taste or history, but for what it means to us.
In flavor Ai-Naidari tea varies from grassy and astringent to smoky and earthy, but the mouthfeel is always clear; we do not mediate it with thick liquids except for a syrup we make for children. Though it was found first on First World, it is successfully farmed as far as Third. Let arva grows on the colonies, though not as easily... our farmers are at work on a cultivar that will thrive there, so that wherever Ai-Naidar dwell, they might have their tea. I have no doubt they will succeed.
You ask, perhaps, if there are words and symbols for endeavors and successes reached alone. And there are. But I have digressed long enough, for it is here in the story that I meet Shame. Let us continue.
Our arrival at the Bleak did nothing to assuage my doubts about my suitability for my assignment. You have not seen the Bleak, I imagine... it is not a place we would take aunera. Not out of any sense of shame, but because the souls remanded to its halls deserve their privacy. They pay here for their transgressions, and they are remade; when they exit the Bleak they do so as new persons, re-dedicated to society. Consider it almost a ritual, a spiritual and psychological cleansing. To gawk at such a thing would be cruel and inappropriate.
But having never seen the Bleak, you cannot know how it imposes. Entering the front hall, I cast a very, very thin shadow against the height of the stone room... a shadow that vanished when the great doors closed behind me. There was nothing crude about the architecture, though it was devoid of ornament, and we are a people who greatly admire ornament. It had been designed to diminish one to one's proper size: which is to say, not large at all when alone. There is nothing upon which to fix one's eye, no sound to distract the ear, not even the lingering smell of incense, so common even in the poorest of households... a dearth of sensation which leaves no choice but to contemplate oneself.
It is a rare Ai-Naidari who enjoys solitude as anything more than a passing necessity, like the breath that separates words so they can be properly discerned. And here I was, mender of a broken pot of a man who could abide in such a place for long months, living on the spaces between words and the aloneness between contact with other Ai-Naidar. Again, I could not fathom it... and almost I began to fear meeting Shame.
Before I could dwell too long on these thoughts I was rescued by a woman who seemed to resolve out of the dark of a nearly imperceptible hallway. By her expression she was perplexed by my arrival; she glanced at my stole and the mark of the empire on it, then met my eyes. "Osulkedi? May I ask what brings you here?"
She had addressed me first and in speech only slightly Abased, by which I understood she was also a Public Servant... perhaps only a few ranks beneath me. So I responded to her as a caste-equal, saying, "I have been sent to find the Public Servant who serves Shame."
