Chapter 10
While Minna ate, a young lady with wavy black hair stepped straight up to Minna’s chair, dropped to one knee, and stayed there with both eyes fixed on the floor in front of her. The sight of her robes stunned Minna for a moment. They were a bright red, which meant that somebody paid to involve a magician in their construction. Nature provided only grays, browns, black, and white cloth. The only dye available for cloth was purple, which royalty prohibited to commoners until the invention of magical dyes gave them options no commoner could afford.
“Rise,” Minna said around a mouth full of meat. She swallowed quickly then asked, “What is your service?”
When the woman stood, Minna found it hard to measure her weight underneath her curtain of robes. The roundness of her face suggested that she was heavier than most, though she certainly was no taller.
“My name is Lady Pienna,” she announced in a tone not unlike that Minna remembered from nannies that scolded her as a child. “My position in the temple, m’lady, is that of Advocate. It is my duty to speak on behalf of those brought before the Council on charges of violating Sif’s divine law.”
Minna felt a flush of embarrassment. “The Advocacy. I’ve heard of you.”
“Matron Deonta must have mentioned that I would need to talk to you about Zin Kussad. I’ve been here twice today and each time I was told that you were not accepting visitors. I was about to get an order from the Matron insisting on an audience. I really must speak with you.”
“Sit. Speak. Have something to eat,” Minna said, pushing the empty chair across from her away from the table with her foot.
The Advocate took the offered seat, plucked a piece of bread out of Cadlius’s unfinished meal and tossed it into her mouth. “I fear that this will be a short discussion, Varlet Minna. I was on the temple steps myself when my client pushed Lady Garrin. The law is quite clear; any who violate the sanctity of the temple or its servants shall be put to death. The corruption that infested the steps where Zin performed his crime is ample evidence of a violation. Zin refuses to give me anything I can use to help him. ‘Let the orc spawn execute me, for all I care. I would rather die free than live another day as their slave,’ he says. Unless you can think of something I can argue in his defense, he will get his wish.”
“If he wishes it, than it is no punishment that he dies,” Jeffers said.
Minna waved him silent. “I was told you would use the defense of insanity, possession, or charm. And I had hoped for a chance to argue, even before the Council hears his case, that he should go to Malikii with me. He is, after all, the Earl’s prisoner.”
The Advocate answered, “Unless a higher ranking noble specifically requests otherwise, a prisoner is to be tried in the region where he committed the most serious offense. There can be no crime more serious than attacking Sif through violence against Her representative on earth, as I’m sure you are aware. Perhaps, in Malikii, he faces charges at least as severe.”
Minna shook her head, “No.”
“So, that is not an option,” the Advocate said, grabbing a larger slice of bread. “Zin will have lost his head by the time we get any message from the Earl.”
“You can still argue that he was insane.”
“He doesn’t act the least bit mad. When he chooses to talk, his conversation is quite calm. He makes good sense. Granted, attacking a Lady on the temple steps in front of so many witnesses shows some defect of reason, unless he planned in advance that the pure stupidity of such an act would work in his favor—as a surprising many here are willing to argue. But I don’t think even the Matron believes he thought about what he was doing. He acted rashly, but was he insane? I don’t think so. And neither does the Council.”
“Then what do they want me for?”
“Because I am still going to do my best to save his life. That is my duty to Zin, to Sif, and to Justice. Justice can only demand the sacrifice of t hose that I, with my best efforts, cannot save. You, Varlet Minna, are the best source of information we have about Zin. I suspect that if you were to testify, you will prove Zin a fitting sacrifice to Justice. It violates my duties to advise you to violate K’non’s law, so I cannot ask that you refuse to speak of Zin’s past. However, I have heard that this is what you plan to do.”
Minna answered with a nod.
“I am forbidden to say how pleased I am to hear that.”
Jeffers smiled and shook his head slowly, attracting Minna to ask what he thought was so funny. He took advantage of the invitation and turned to the Advocate. “How about going before the council and arguing that Zin could not possibly be guilty because, in order to be guilty, he had to have the capacity to draw upon Will Power. Since Will’s power does not exist, he can not have that capacity.”
The Advocate shook her head. “There is no precedent for that in our law.”
“For every principle of law we now accept as precedent, there was once a time when it was first used. Besides, you’ve got all the precedent you need. Look at the law governing insanity, possession, and charm and tell me if it doesn’t say that no person who lacks the capacity to draw upon Will’s power shall be held guilty for a crime?”
“Our law makes no such claim,” Pienna said. “The law argues that I can prove Zin not guilty if I prove him insane, but nowhere in our law is Will’s Power even mentioned.”
“What is mentioned?” asked Minna.
The Advocate stared at the ceiling. “Well, you’ll actually find a few different phrases if you searched through the whole of our law. The most common version says that a person ‘must lack a substantial capacity either to appreciate the wrongfulness of his conduct or to conform his conduct to the requirements of law as a result of mental disease or defect, charm, or possession.’”
“And you don’t think this ‘substantial capacity’ that your law is testing for is the capacity to draw upon Will’s Power?”
“That’s a theory,” Pienna answered. She had pulled Cadlius’s plate over to her chair and was finishing off the last of his meal. “Whatever this capacity is, they have a test for it. I would rather say that this capacity is whatever this test is testing for. It doesn’t matter what you call it; if they pass the test then they are guilty, if not then they are innocent.”
“How convenient?” Jeffers said in mock amazement. “A test nobody can ever question. Since no test can ever fail to distinguish ‘that-which-passes-this-test’ from ‘that-which-does-not-pass-this-test,’ nobody can ever approach the Council with objections to this test. What can we say? ‘Those who pass this test do not pass?’ It would be a contradiction from the start.”
Pienna continued to eat as if Jeffers was not even in the room, and Jeffers went on speaking as if the Advocate was listening. His voice did not carry any hint of anger. It was as if he thought he was sharing a joke with those at the table. “I can devise a test like that. In my test, I throw a ball at somebody and see what hand they use to catch it. If they catch it in their right hand, they are innocent, and if I catch it in their left, they are guilty. Does my test really measure something relevant to guilt or innocence? Well, I also hereby proclaim that the difference between guilt and innocence lies precisely in the ability or inability to pass my test.”
The Advocate gave Jeffers a vicious scowl.
Jeffers looked meekly away. “That is what you said. Look, you can’t just define something into existence. Whether it exists or not is a fact about the universe, and quite independent of the words we use to describe it.”
“Explain this test to me,” Minna stated. She no longer had attention to spare for her own meal, though she continued to hold her knife and fork in her hands like weapons.
“An example,” Pienna said, nodding off Jeffers. “We had a man here seven or eight years ago who killed a couple of men. He had none of the traditional motives for such a crime; he got no money from their deaths, it didn’t advance his social position, they were not competitors for the attention of the same woman, they were strangers. Was he insane? Well, he admitted that there was a time when he was following a man he wanted to kill through the streets. His prey happened to walk up to a couple of Watchmen. Our man hesitated, waiting until the Watchmen moved on. There you have proof that the criminal understood the wrongness of his conduct and was able to conform his conduct to the law. We executed him.”
Waiving her fork dangerously, Minna answered, “What you have proof of is the existence of counter-balancing desires capable of influencing conduct under some circumstances but not strong enough to control the person’s behavior under all circumstances.”
“Are you done with that?” Pienna asked, eying the Varlet’s plate.
“No, I’m not done with that!” Minna took a bite of her food, more out of self-defense than genuine hunger, and spoke as she chewed. “The counter-balancing desires you found evidence for could not have prevented him from acting when guardsmen were not present. If they could have, then they would have. The mere fact that a person performed the criminal act is sufficient proof that he lacked the capacity not to perform it.”
“That sounds like defining as true what you want to believe if you ask me,” the Advocate said.
Minna rose from the table and motioned for the Advocate to follow; Pienna pushed herself out of her chair with effort and followed, palming the remnants of Minna’s brad as she walked past. Jeffers and Cadlius came up close behind her. Minna tossed two gold coins on the right pan and four copper on the left; the scales were nearly balanced but favored the gold.
“I gave this demonstration to the Matron and her friends yesterday,” the Matron said. “The fact that these coins have the capacity to lift the pan with the gold off of its stop does not prove it has the capacity to outweigh the gold. The fact that a desire influences conduct in some circumstances does not prove that it has the capacity to influence conduct in all circumstances; not unless you introduce some kind of magical force whereby something can ‘at will’ increase its weight.”
Jeffers quickly added, “Your test, about whether a person has the capacity to conform his actions to the law when no guards are around, by showing that he has the capacity to conform his behavior to the law when guards are present, is like showing that a log has the capacity to burst into flames when locked in ice, by showing that it has the capacity to burst into flames when thrown into a fire. It is as senseless and barbaric as the test from my world that involved throwing witches into a well and saying that those who did not sink were guilty and should be executed.”
The Varlet turned to Pierra and leaned back against the bar. “Your test is a lie, Advocate. You state that this test determines the difference between innocence and guilt, but that is true only if guilt rests in having a desire in this middle range where it is sometimes effective and sometimes not, rather than an extreme case where it is so strong that it is always effective. What is it about having a midstrength desire that makes one worthy of punishment?”
After a long pause, the Advocate said, “You think I can argue that Zin lacked the capacity to conform his conduct to the law.”
“You can argue it, because it’s true.” Minna said, scooping up her coins.
Advocate Pierra laughed; a long, loud laugh that rang through the large room and drew stares from everybody. “That’s ripe. Matron Deonta will have a fit. I can hear her screams now. She will accuse me of turning the hearing into a circus.”
“You’ll turn the hearing into what a hearing should be, an arena within which only truth should stand victorious at the end.”
The Advocate’s laugh dwindled to occasional snickers. “As it turns out, in this case, I have nothing else to argue if I am to save Zin from the guillotine. I’ll speak with the Matron. No doubt she will answer that the existence of an ability to draw upon Will’s Power is assumed under the law, and my arguments before the council must be made consistent with that assumption. No doubt Zin will be dead within two weeks. But I will do my best to make my case. Besides, Matron, I must also consider the possibility of you becoming a future customer. You’ll not testify that Zin had the capacity to choose.”
“Not in the sense that the Council will ask the question. Zin has the capacity to measure the value of different options according to his own desires, the possibilities of their outcome, and to choose the most desired. He has no capacity to close his eyes and draw upon some mystical force to make choices outside of his desires. And I find it shocking that if I tell the truth, I am punished for lying, and I can save myself from punishment for lying, only by being guilty.”
“Orc snot!” shouted a man at a table nearby, pushing himself away from his half empty plate. He rose, sloshing wine out of his cup as he scooped it up to carry with him. “You think nobody does anything except what they think is in their own interests. Orc snot, ladies and gentlemen. I fought in the Troll Wars, in the Laurellan Skirmishes, and even tried to get to Ravensflower to fight in Thane Tiempko’s War; ah, but the bloody Thane ended it before I could get there. I met some of the people who fought it though. You won’t have me believing there weren’t some genuine sacrifices made there; people who gave up their own good so that others can live free of Thrakutter’s yoke. True heroes, they were, and I won’t have their deeds spat on by foolish young minds with foolish ideas.”
The barkeep hurried to the drunk man’s side and whispered to him, though in a voice all could here, “Sir, I think you should go back to your seat. Do you know who you’re talking to here?”
“I’m talking to people who don’t know no respect.” he growled, pulling himself from the boy’s grip and nearly falling.
Minna stepped forward and gave a deep bow. “I beg your forgiveness, sir. Few appreciate what you and those like you have given to us at their own cost.”
The shock on Pierra’s face at the sight of a noblewoman showing humility before a drunk made her appear as likely to fall over as the old man. She made a motion of protest but Minna gestured for her to be silent. Bowing again to the veteran, Minna continued, “I beg, sir, that any insult you may have inferred from my statements was not intentional and, I hope, can be shown to be nothing more than a mere misunderstanding.”
“Misunderstanding my ass. I heard what you were saying, that those who put themselves up against arrow and sword did so only because they thought they would be made better off by it. Nonsense.”
“Nonsense it is, my good man. You did, indeed, hear me say that men do that which best fulfills their desires. But, noble sir, you did not hear me say that men only desire that which benefits them. No, indeed, a man can and often does desire the well being of others as much as his own; more so, perhaps. And a man who values the welfare of others, or of the Emperor, or of his country, or of Sif, the way your friends obviously did are truly heros.”
The man snorted and nodded. “Damn right,” he answered, though he wore a look of complete confusion. Deciding he must have won his challenge, he turned and went back to his table.
Pienna lead the way back to Minna’s table. While they had been away, the inn keeper had cleared the table of dishes. He had not yet cleaned the table off.
The Advocate pressed her finger into some bread crumbs and licked off those that stuck. “That man did have a point. If there is no blame to be handed out for the evil that people do, then there is no credit to be handed out for the good that they do either. Heroes and villains both vanish, if what you say is true.”
“Why?” Minna asked. “Tell me, does a sunset have to choose the colors that it sends across the sky to be beautiful? I don’t know about you, but I don’t need to think that a rainbow or a mountain meadow must have free will to be awed by its beauty? Nor do I think that a person needs access to free will for his character to be beautiful or ugly.”
The Varlet half expected the grimace that twisted Jeffers’s face. The Advocate pointed towards Jeffers and said, “You’re guardian seems to disagree.”
“Not I,” Jeffers answered immediately. “But I fought in Thane Tiempko’s War. I was at the battles to recapture Silent Knight where Phal Thrakutter’s surprise attack besieged Thane Tiempko’s army, where we fought side-by-side with Laurellans who had been giving secret assistance up to that point. I was thinking of the things I heard the Laurellans say.”
Minna tried to stop Jeffers from saying more, but he plowed over Minna’s warning. “According to the Laurellans, beauty and ugliness can also be measured purely in desire; they are the things that certain types of creature are attracted to or repulsed by. The smell of an orc, as foul as the smell of excrement itself to the human nose, is to another orc the finest bouquet. The beauty you speak about finding in a rainbow is not visible to a pegasus, who can not see colors at all. Instead, they are awed by the sight of clouds at midday, with the light playing off of them. Why consider the pegasus to be blind to true beauty by their inability to see color, when it makes just as much sense to say that colors create an illusion through which we are the ones who fail to see true beauty? Colors, after all, are not out there independent of the way our eyes are made to function; they exist for us precisely because our eyes and brains are built with a particular structure. When it come to the beauty or the . . . . What word best works here? The ‘ugliness’ of a person’s character the Laurellans would ask how much that, too, depends on the structure of the eye and brain of the perceiver. Such measures, though useful in certain circumstances, should never be made the measure of moral worth. No person’s moral weight should depend on whether his character is such as to appear beautiful or ugly to this or that creature.”
Pienna asked, “So how do they measure the worth of a man? Or do they hold that the lusts of a rapist are to be regarded as equal to those of the Samaritan?”
“The Laurellans have this strange idea that the values of all creatures are to be taken equally, that the best desires are those that can exist in harmony with others, and the worst desires are those are inherently in conflict with those of others. A desire to hurt others is, to them, the closest thing to inherent evil. Desires to help others are the highest virtues. The desire for retribution, I fear, ranks fairly high in their list of vices. The rapist is evil; he desires that the desires of others—his victims—are thwarted. The vampire is not necessarily evil; his taking an occasional mouth full of blood from somebody willing to give it up does not disturb harmony.”
The advocate made a grimace as if she was about to be sic. “You set them right, of course.”
“Of course. I told them how Sif formed human perception and human minds so that we perceive the true value of things directly. If a human perceives value in something, then that is to be taken as evidence that the value truly is there.”
“And how did they answer you?”
Jeffers waived his hands in dismissal. “You know the Laurellans; they don’t hold that there is a real value out there for human sensibilities to see. They say there’s no evidence for it; there’s only evidence for the desires of different types of creatures. Human sensibilities have no priority over those of any other type of creature; and the differences within a species, the differences among humans for example, are to be regarded the same way as the differences between species.”
Minna watched Pierra carefully. Jeffers had tried this tactic before, crediting his own beliefs to somebody else while disowning them, and was still charged with heresies. The advocate listened with her eyes on the table, her expression empty. Jeffers continued, “I told them the Word as it was delivered by Sif’s prophets and asked them to explain why the prophets and Sif herself would lie. At that point, I’m afraid our discussions got a little heated. I refused to sit and listen while they called the prophets of Sif liars. The Greater Glory, I felt, would be just as well served by slaying these heretic Laurellans as the Thrakutter invaders. In the end we agreed not to discuss the issue further. It was fortunate, since we could ill afford to lose any soldiers with Thrakutter’s army outside the wall.”
With a thoughtful stare at the ceiling high above, Pierra said, “I have often wondered why, if the Laurellans think us so misguided, they fought for us during Thane Tiempko’s War.”
Minna cut off Jeffers’s answer. “That is irrelevant. We are here to discuss the case of Zin Kussad. I am proposing that you argue that Zin lacked the capacity to conform his behavior to the law. You have offered your objections and we have answered them. If you can think of any more objections the Council might offer, tell them to us now and we will answer them too.”
“If we can,” Jeffers answered. “We should not assume our infallibility.”
“If we can,” Minna added.
“Only one,” Pierra said as she sat up. “And I doubt if you have the answer to this one. If you are correct, it will mean radically changing the way we deal with criminals. Radical changes do not happen easily, nor should they happen if the improvements that comes from them are slight and superficial. The laws that govern society, Varlet Minna, are as binding as those that govern the movement of physical bodies. Your best reasoned conclusions that a mountain should be in one place and not another makes no difference at all to the cartographer.”
“The wrongness of sacrificing a man to a godling that does not exist is not reason enough to move the council?”
Pierra stood. “We shall see, Varlet Minna. In the case of Zin Kussad, I am afraid that Zin himself has slammed shut the doors leading to all other options. But do not expect good news tomorrow,” she said. She gave a deep bow, then turned for the exit.
A few steps away she hesitated and turned back. “Varlet Minna, I have an appointment with the Matron tomorrow. If she has any questions about this idea of yours, I believe you will be better able to answer them than I. Bless us all, but I may have more questions myself then answers by the morning. You should come with me.”
The Advocate asked no question or favor. She simply stated her case. Minna answered, “I’ll be happy to go with you. Send somebody for me when you’re ready.”
Again, Pierra bowed and turned away. The instant she was out the door, Minna had Jeffers by the sleeve and was dragging him upstairs. “Come on, I want to make sure I know what I’m talking about when I face the Matron tomorrow.”