Chapter 42 #3
“I know,” Lyric answers, though he’s unsure which part of their current circumstances she’s talking about.
“It’s a terrible legacy,” she whispers, one hand clutching at him, fingers crawling down his arm to find his hand.
Lyric holds her closer. “To do this, to remake the world like this, it’s so terrible.
But I have to now, and how stupid is that?
Not just because of Eliri—who died for this, to teach me this.
Not just because of the earthquakes. No, I want to—I want to know if I can.
I see it, Lyric. I see it so clearly. Me, make the miran!
I hate them. I hate it, what the world was like, even though there were parts that were so good. Do you understand that? Can you?”
Lyric takes a deep breath. The water is cool, and everywhere she touches him scorches.
“To me, the difference in what parts are good is selfishness or selflessness. What is good are selfish things. My sister, my friends, having enough to eat and beautiful gardens, knowledge at my fingertips. But outside of myself, my immediate needs, things were bad. Not for everyone, but for enough.”
“Yes!” Water jostles loudly as she turns in his arms and climbs to perch on one of his thighs.
“You do understand. It’s so complicated.
How do you think about it from outside yourself?
How do you act against your own interests?
My interest is design, is, is being alive and happy, and that means you alive, too, and making a future where the people I care about were alive even if they did die.
But it’s also such a bad idea. Making the mirané people, tearing this place into pieces so it can be remade in perfect balance?
It’s so good for design, but not for everyone. ”
Iriset’s gaze is afire, too close for Lyric to fully focus on.
“I’ve done too many terrible things in my life,” she says frantically.
“I want to do this, because it’s wild and incredible, but maybe that’s a reason not to do it!
Because it’s reestablishing something flawed.
Why not reach for something better, even if it changes everything?
If I have the power to do it, how can I be selfish and make it for me, instead of for people? ”
Lyric doesn’t really know how to answer, especially because Iriset’s words are ever so slightly slurred. She’s too drunk for this. “What people?” he asks.
She laughs. Touches her forehead to his, but it’s too hard and their skulls clunk together. She groans, rubs his forehead instead of her own. “Let’s not do it.”
“All right,” Lyric says easily. “Let’s go back to the Hehet valley and live as long as we can. Let them figure themselves out. History will take its own course.”
Shock drives Iriset back, and she stares at him with round eyes, her hands gripping his shoulders like she’ll disappear otherwise.
“Lyric! We can’t! History taking its course will shake the whole crater apart!
Because of the array spike we brought here, everyone in the city could die! Tens of thousands of people!”
Lyric shrugs, his hands finding her waist. “Is that more people than the empire kills in the next four hundred years?”
Iriset gapes at him.
Lyric waits. She closes her mouth, opens it, several times. “I…” she begins. Then she frowns very deeply. “Well, I didn’t do that. So that’s not me, but if I, if I don’t complete the array, that is me. More directly. So…”
“So you’d rather I’m the one responsible,” he offers softly.
Iriset grabs his face. “I’m tired of making choices.
Choosing to act or not, or being made to make choices, to do things I don’t want to do, or things I really want to do but shouldn’t.
I’m tired of the future on my shoulders, having responsibility.
” Her breath is hot on his neck. “I just want to work in a giant library with all the supplies I’ve ever needed and make designs and invent what I want. Others can make decisions. Be leaders.”
Lyric holds her, gathers her hair into a thick wet tail, and holds it in his hand. “All right. If we make it through this, I’ll tell you what to do for the rest of your life.”
Iriset laughs against him, her whole body trembling. “Oh, yeah?”
“Yeah,” he whispers, unsure she can even hear him. “It’s what I was taught to do. Weigh options, make decisions for others. I didn’t ask for that, but I would do it for you.”
Her arms tighten around his neck. Water laps against their ribs. She says, “Don’t you just do what Aharté wills? What you think she’d will? Follow the Holy Design into eternity?”
There’s no bitterness in her voice, thanks no doubt to drunkenness, though Lyric can imagine it.
“I did,” he admits slowly. “But I understand that Holy Design is a—a template. It’s a design.
I don’t think it can be perfect, or without nuance.
Especially when it is us making it, or any person or people.
In the absence of Aharté, we have to decide for ourselves what is holy, what the future should be. ”
“I corrupted you,” she whispers. “That’s great.”
Lyric laughs, breathlessly. But it fades into sorrow as he thinks of Setka. “I believe in it, still. As an ideal. The Holy Design isn’t perfect, but it is meaningful. It should… guide, not condemn.”
“I really hope I remember this in the morning,” Iriset laments.
Smiling, Lyric lifts her half off him, turning to where Saff enters with a tray of food and tea. “It will help if you feed yourself,” he tells Iriset. “Then you can sleep, and wake up to do what you do best.”
“Fuck everything up?” she says as she drags herself over the rim of the tub, water splashing everywhere.
“Design,” he answers simply, and Iriset darts her mismatched glance at him in surprise. Then she slowly smiles.