Chapter 15 The High Priest’s Judgment #5
“And he would never be publicly intoxicated, or commit adultery, or— His Highness is a good man!”
“Thank you, Irfan,” Faraj said, wistful. “I’m sure it is mostly that I have been an interminably dull man, with few inclinations for such exciting sins.”
“…I would not describe such sins as exciting, your Highness.”
“You are also a good man, your Eminence,” Najra said, almost begrudgingly. “Excruciatingly so. Or you wouldn’t find it so unimaginable that a good man might actually choose to sin against those holy precepts of yours.”
“Those very human holy precepts,” Kamil rumbled. “You say ‘adultery’ like it’s not proof that several folk want to get under your tail. Catfolk would brag about that.”
“Well, as a sworn priest, I am rarely one to endorse sin, let alone strategic sinning,” Shai Vishal said.
“But as sins go, an ordinary man on the street would find the indulgence of a forbidden cat-familiar to be a much more relatable and adorable sin than avarice, or drunken offenses, or even prophetically cheating at dice.”
“I’m not certain I could,” Faraj admitted in a very small voice. “Cheat at dice, that is. Not unless the stakes were so terribly high that I might have cause to.”
“We don’t have to tell the gamblers that,” Kamil said, with the very tip of his tail twitching, as though he saw some temptingly slow-moving prey.
“Your Reverence,” Irfan said, “we had agreed to ask your judgment because we believed you to be as incorruptible as any soul we knew. And to hear you speak so calmly of strategic sins… I question much, in this moment.”
“Good,” Shai Vishal said. “I am also questioning much. Lacking his Highness’ foresights, I throw pebbles of thought into the pool so that we may examine how the ripples of consequence collide.
How many of the common folk of the Empire do you truly believe will be more gravely offended by the sins of a shahzada who gambles and cheats, or by one who takes unwelcome liberties with his servants, or by one who adores and indulges his cat-familiar? ”
“If our beloved Highness were such a knave, I would not serve him with all my heart,” the Chamberlain said.
“But if he were such a knave, those who scheme to exploit his sins’ weaknesses would scheme against him, a well-guarded man of a size which cannot easily be swept into a sack, thrown over a shoulder, and carried off.
His cat and her tiny kittens are far more vulnerable. ”
“Rather like toddlers, at that. Except kittens are much sharper about their defenses,” Najra said, prying the hull off a pistachio with her silverpoint.
“But I have never heard anyone propose a nobleman should not father children because they make such tempting hostages to fate. Or even because toddlers with grasping hands can be more effective agents of chaos than kittens.”
“No one has ever needed to propose that to me,” Faraj murmured. “My peculiar inclinations have been as unlikely to produce unexpected children as to produce unexpected gambling.”
“Well, we have just discovered your inclinations are delightfully likely to produce unexpected kittens,” Najra said, grinning. “As recently demonstrated.”
“And the necromancer who bound them to your Highness’s soul, whom you have been so careful not to name?” the Chamberlain asked. “We simply trust that he is as incorruptible as the pure mountain stream and as invulnerable as the stone beneath it?”
“How is this so much more difficult for you to handle than his brothers’ courtesans?” Najra sighed.
“His brothers’ courtesans do not soul-bind.”
“Ask their wives about that. You’d think they were cats in heat.”
“Oh, no,” Irfan said, in a certain agonized dismay. “Your Highness, if your cat conveys her birthing-pangs to you, what will you experience when she seeks a sire for her next kittens?”
“Irfan!” Faraj buried his face in his hands and wished he thought he could fit himself under the low tea-table. Of all the things to ask in front of Shai Vishal— while he sat in judgment, no less—
“Don’t worry, I have ideas,” Najra said, busily scratching away with her silverpoint.
“Excuse me, I will worry about those ideas very much, thank you, Najra!” Faraj sputtered. “And why did you even have ideas?”
“Just because I’m not interested in bed-play doesn’t mean I’m not invested in you enjoying as much bed-play as you want—”
“NAJRA!” Faraj wailed.
Kamil huffed a very warm gust of amusement against the nape of Faraj’s neck.
Shai Vishal sipped at his chai for a longer moment than was necessary for drinking’s sake, most likely until he could be certain he would not chuckle.
When he trusted his voice again, he said, “More pebbles, then, and more splashing about. Your Eminence, how many more stones do you intend to throw, and in whose direction?”
“How have I become the target of your inquisition, your Reverence?”
“It’s not an inquisition,” Shai Vishal said.
“A sin against your God-Emperor’s edicts is not a crime in Tel-Bastet, and it is not the place of Upaja’s High Priest to punish a crime.
It is not even for me to task penance, unless one of you feels need of a corrective practice.
You have asked me for my judgment in the matter of his Highness’s soul-binding to a cat-spirit who is at least as likely as any other cat to claim ownership of her person.
In my judgment, we who have gathered here are five of the most notable powers in this city, and conflicts among the greater powers create disproportionate waves for those around us.
So, in my judgment, we must find a way forward together that causes the least splashing-over upon the people, this city, and the many contrasting faiths within the Empire.
And so: Your rocks, if you please, your Eminence. ”
“If order is not enough, and the holy writ is not enough, and the threats against his Highness’ mind and soul and well-being are not enough, and you judge what is true and holy by the wagging tongues of alley-gossip, then I have nothing else to defend him with,” Irfan said raggedly.
“But, Kamil, I had hoped you at least would understand.”
“I do understand. You want him safe just as badly as I do,” Kamil said. “That’s why I haven’t clawed your face off.”
Despite the Chamberlain’s diplomatic training, the tremor of his voice took a moment for him to control. “And you do not find the alteration in his Highness’ demeanor a matter for concern?”
“I find it understandable,” Kamil said. “Sometimes irritating, but understandable.”
“Because he has been bonded to a cat’s soul.”
“No, because for once he has seen the seedy and disreputable underside of the city for himself, without palanquins or guardians or ministers to intervene,” Kamil said dryly.
“I don’t need to be a prophet to know what his kind heart would do with what he has seen of the differences between the haveli and the Catsprowl. ”
“You took him to a place like that? Why?”
“I was born in a place like that,” Kamil reminded him, tail twitching in irritation. “And you both have a duty to all of his brother’s Empire, not just the parts of it that smell good.”
Faraj clasped his hands together under the table, because he had to hide the restlessness; he could keep his face bland from years in the courts, but his fretful hands gave him away, and Irfan knew him too well, and Kamil was walking the finest edge of truth, cat-careful with his words, but the gap between the Catsprowl and a slip that might bare Master Asharan’s name was so very narrow…
…oh. His rings reminded him — there was something he’d neglected, in all his fretting. At least this time his hand-fretting could be useful, he thought, wriggling a pearl and garnet ring loose from his index finger and hiding it in his palm.
Irfan’s face did something very complicated, diplomacy battling with frustration and with devotion.
“You would not tell me more, Kamil, and I would not ask, because his Highness must trust your discretion even more absolutely than my own. But I don’t know how to endure the fear that I must now ask his Highness every time, about everything.
Or that you may feel you must lie to me. ”
“Whom will you say this to?” Shai Vishal asked him.
“No one outside this room.” Drawing himself straight, in a tattered dignity, the Chamberlain said, “Even if it is only a matter of time before the priests and the courtiers hear of this, I still would not hand further weapons to those who would use his vulnerability against him.”
“There,” Shai Vishal said, leaning forward. “There. That is a foundation of bedrock that we can agree to build upon, all of us. Your Eminence, I am grateful that you hold that devotion even more dear to your heart than your righteousness.”
“How could I not?”
“Oh, quite easily, if you held your God-Emperor’s writ and your horror of soul-bonds to be more imperative than his brother’s heart, or his well-being,” Shai Vishal said.
“Or the protective defiance the people of this community feel over every cat and her kittens, let alone their own shahzada’s.
Or the theocratic power-struggles that would be provoked in the Greater Convocation if the God-Emperor’s prophet was judged unworthy to celebrate in Bastet’s Temple, because a cat-spirit who had entrusted her life to him came to harm under his protection.
Do you see how those ripples spread beyond the court and the God-Emperor’s own priesthood? ”
“…I’m not a priest.” Irfan’s voice shuddered as though the weight of his guilt had claws sharper than Kamil’s. “The Ministry of Orthodoxy would chide me for my sacrilege, but I cannot hold my faith as purely as a priest, in the end. That is my sin, my own weakness.”
“Weakness?” Najra said, incredulous. “I don’t have to threaten to undermine a whole theocracy for just anybody, you know. You’re formidable when you get your teeth in.”