On the other side, I had used shades of gray, sucking the life and power out of the buildings, fading them into memories and fever visions, raddled with regret and melancholy.
The division between these was the word evrul: to judge, to assign blame and innocence correctly. I had written it vertically in gold leaf, lined in lamp black and edged it, gruesomely, in the little white blooms of the citrus fruit used for the ceremony of false witness.
"You put a lot of work into this one," Ajan observed.
"I had time," I said, sipping the broth and realizing how hungry I was. As usual I had missed dinner in my fugue.
"Do you really think guilt and innocence is so clearly defined? One or the other?" he asked.
I smiled at him, tired. "I think it feels that way to the soul who suffers."
"Oh!" he exclaimed and fell silent. After some time, he said, "Yes. No matter what it's like on the outside, it really does feel that way on the inside, doesn't it."
I made a polite noise of agreement and took a vegetable roll from the tray.
"You have been reading Shame's journals," Ajan said.
I glanced at the table and grimaced at the sight of it on the stand beside the bed, abandoned in the moment of inspiration that had driven me to my work.
"You forgot to put it away," Ajan said, smiling one of the first real smiles I'd seen out of him since Shame's flight. "I won't tell, then. Did the Emperor give them to you?"
"Yes," I said, surprised. "How did you guess?"
"He's the only one with the authority to do so," Ajan said, reaching for a roll filled with fish and spring greens. "Other than my master, and I know he didn't."
"I think he wanted me to know something of how Correction proceeds," I said, hesitant.
"You don't have to explain," the Guardian said. "Before I attached to the temple I knew nothing of it either. How much work it needs, and what it's like, and how different people are, their needs. If the Emperor wanted you to read it, you needed to understand too." He glanced at me. "It's helped, hasn't it?"
"I think so," I said, and added, "It has been somewhat intimidating."
Ajan chuckled, his voice low. "Yes. For us too, even though we're involved in it. There is a madness in my master's genius."
"He'll wake, you know," I said quietly.
"I know," Ajan said. "He would not leave those who love him bereft." He glanced up. "Will you rest?"
"In a little bit," I said. "It has been an agitating day."
"Eat, then," he said. "And have the tea. Then lie down, whether you're tired or not." He grinned faintly. "I seem to recall this advice being used on me."
I snorted. But I did finish the food and tea, and I did lie down, and I did sleep.
Several of you by now have mentioned seeing the hand of the Emperor in the goings-on in Qenain; indeed, you have recognized the subtleties of His intent in a way I did not at the time. It was only much later that I realized how many strands He was holding in his hand as He wove, and the delicacy and care with which He was doing so. O God of Civilization! How deft your hand! And yet we are not as simple as strands of silk thread, nor always as predictable.
The next morning, the physician arrived with a breakfast tray. As I received him, surprised, he said, "The Decoration is on a pedestal."
My ears flicked back. Behind me, Ajan looked up from his vigil, eyes narrowed. I accepted the tray, saying, "The display pedestal or..."
"She is being Corrected," he said, sitting without preamble on one of the chairs around the small table. To Ajan he called, "Any change?"
"No, Physician," Ajan answered.
The physician nodded and said to me, "Eat."
"What did she do to merit Correction?" I asked, taking up the bowl of consommé. Grasping for words past my surprise, I said, "It has only been half a day since the lady's arrival!"
"Less than that, I judge," the physician said with a sigh. "As to what she did... I have no idea, for it has not been shared with us. But no doubt it was some matter of speech, for she has been gagged."
I paused over my bowl, frowning. Fathriked did not speak, of course; ordinarily one would not bother to Correct a Decoration with a gag for that reason. I looked up at the physician, still wearing that frown.
"Yes, I know," the physician said with another sigh.
"I suppose her acts were somewhat irregular," I murmured.
"Her acts were irregular at our request," the physician said, "and because the lord's acts were irregular first. From him all this... irregularity... was proceeding. It galls me to see her Corrected."
"Because it is wrong?" I asked.
"Because it treats the symptom, and not the disease," the physician answered, irritated. I poured him a cup of tea and he drank from it, without even realizing he had it in his hand, I thought. "The cruelty or justice of it is immaterial in comparison to its effectiveness. Above all, Correction should be effective."
"So Shame would say were he awake," I murmured.
"And he is not, so we labor on without him," the physician said. "I came partially to see how he is getting on. But mostly because..." He trailed off.
"Because you felt alone in the knowing," I said. "I understand. Does Seraeda know of the Correction?"
