(We shall return to this matter anon, for the strange history of House Qenain is relevant to our story.)
I append here a map so that you might see. Forgive us its roughness.
Leaving House Elikim, then, we resumed our progress toward the edge of the city. Once outside the wall, the trip to the Gate would take two days. I task you, do not imagine a road through empty countryside (though faith, on some worlds the Gate is so isolate). The Gate brings trade, travelers, news... all intent on the hub of the empire. The Gate road—called the Ashumel, after the great vessel in the chest which brings blood to the heart—is lined with buildings and services, so many that it is as an extension of the capital, and a great headache and burden it is to the Regal house tasked with its oversight. I have heard that House Athurizin has taken to requiring the Winter Tryst of its members to grow the House to the point of comfortably undertaking the management of the Ashumel. Perhaps that is rumor, but I would not be surprised.
Earlier you will recall young Ajan mentioning Qenain being in Athurizin's district—now you know the word, the atani—and that it was crowded because of people approaching for the ascension festival. That festival, celebrating the day the current Head of Athurizin came to that exalted rank, was drawing people from the entire atani… yes, all the way from outside the city, all along the Ashumel. Not only were people coming in and out of the Gate for travel, but the people along the road were heading inward also, to attend. Even the most modest of families would try to send at least one of their number, not just out of respect, but because such a festival is a grand event, and who would want to miss such a thing?
It did make travel rather slow. So slow, indeed, that we were at times obliged to stop to make way for traffic. It was during one of these times that I disembarked to stretch my legs and feel the sun on my shoulders, and found Shame's Guardian at my side, rather than at his.
"Penokedi," I said. "It is a beautiful day."
His eyes were on the train of supplies making its way through the intersection, but from his shoulders and the strict rigidity of his ears and spine I could tell there was aught amiss. "So it is, Calligrapher."
"Do you wish to share what troubles you?" I asked.
He glanced at me, humor creasing his eyes. "You needn't be quite so formal, osulkedi, unless it is your custom."
"It is not, entirely, but there is no need to give offense."
"To one such as a Guardian?" Ajan snorted. "Some would say we have no sensitivities to offend."
"I beg to differ," I said. "Every Ai-Naidari is due consideration. I ask so that you can decline to share, if you wish. To compel you is unkind."
He glanced at me and smiled. "Not all are so considerate of the feelings of a son of Saresh."
"Being one of those trained to the god of aggression does not make you a brute," I said. "You stand with me, however, and not with your ward, penokedi. Why?"
"Ah," Ajan said with a sigh. Really he was not all so old as that. I could have been his father, perhaps… he looked the right age. Seeing him so made some paternal feeling arise. "Shame needs time to himself."
I squinted at him, then lifted my brows. "You have argued with him."
Ajan's eyes widened, and then he wrinkled his nose. "How did you do that?"
"Instinct," I said, hiding my smile. "So, it was so?"
Ajan said, "I wanted to stop at the temple for the night. He believes we have no such time to spare." He looked at me. "Do we?"
"Thirukedi did not give me a schedule," I said, hesitant. "Though I would not tarry on any mission He gave."
"Perhaps," Ajan said with another sigh. "But it would have been good to stop somewhere familiar and see the others."
"There are others?" I asked, surprised.
The youth laughed. "Ah, Calligrapher. Yes, there are several of us, and there is enough to keep us all busy. More than us, really, but Shame takes most of it on his own shoulders."
"You… do the work of Shame?" I asked carefully, for this skirted perilously close to impropriety.
From his glance, he knew my concern. Just as the old have an instinct for what the young do not say, the young have an instinct for what their elders fear. "We do not make Corrections, osulkedi. But we care for his equipment, and we collect information, so that Shame may make the proper judgments and have good tools to hand to effect them." He chuckled. "Had you told me that my duty as a Guardian would involve having my nose in a book so much, I would have laughed."
"I can imagine," I murmured. "So… these compatriots of yours are also Guardians?"
"And a fathrikedi," said Ajan, "who insists on doing the duties of a Servant, and does them, as one might expect, with indescribable grace."
"No doubt!" I exclaimed. Somehow the notion that Shame might have a Decoration seemed incredible. He did not seem the type to indulge himself in the contemplation of beauty.
"It is perhaps for the fathrikedi that I am most concerned," Ajan said. "For since The Day the osulkedi has not made use of him."
"The Day?" I asked.
Ajan looked at me, direct, and I knew then that this was no slip of the tongue. He had chosen, for whatever reason, to confide in me. "You heard about the execution."
My heart stilled in my breast, just a little hiccup between beats. "Of course," I said.
"Did you attend?" the Guardian asked.
"No," I said, looking away. My ears flattened. "I would give excuses, penokedi. But the truth is that I had no desire to see it. I spent the day in my studio, working. Or trying to."
"It was the Emperor's hand that struck the final blow, as it had to be," Ajan said, low. "But it was my master who struck all the ones before it. He has refused himself any indulgence since, no matter how healthsome, and went to the Bleak not long after. Since his arrival there he has rehabilitated many souls, Calligrapher, but none of them have seemed sufficient payment for the one he failed to save."
"I had heard that the Ai-Naidari who went to the execution vines was beyond any aid," I said, feeling cold in my joints despite the sun on my head. "That not even Civilization could have succored him."
"And yet, there is guilt," Ajan said.
I thought of the stark entry I'd read, the first in Shame's personal journals that had mentioned violence. The image of the words rose to mind immediately, crisp black letters rendered in Shame's austere penmanship. Needed to make blood payment for guilt.
Was that what drove him? Did he seek to bleed himself as penance? To do so was to skirt too dangerously near to self-Correction, unspeakable, unthinkable. He must be prevented, no matter the cost. But did the Emperor expect me to know how to put needle to the soul of a man like this?
