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This wasn't the first time such an argument had been used against nonhumans;
obviously one of the things that the Church absolutely needed in order to galvanize its
followers was an enemy. It was difficult to organize opposition to an abstract evil and
even more difficult to get people to admit that there was evil inside themselves. That
meant that the ideal enemy would be something outside the Church and outside the
members of the Church, and as unlike the human followers of the Sacrificed God as
possible.
Easy enough to point the finger at someone and say, "he doesn't look like you, he
doesn't believe in what you believe, he must be evil and your natural enemy," she
thought cynically, as she settled her hat on her head and let the crowd carry her along
toward Freehold. She had expected this; if the Church was snatching secular power away
from the High King, Lyonarie would be the place where it would show its truest
hand and that would be the place where the Church officials would take a stand showing
who they had selected to be the "Great Enemy."
What she had not expected was that here the Church was openly divided against itself.
When her patrons first began telling her about this, in discussions she had started
during the breaks between her sets, she had at first dismissed it as being a trick of some
kind. After all, why in the world would Priests openly preach against what was,
supposedly, Church canon? She couldn't come up with a reason behind such a trick, unless
it might be to lull the nonhumans into complacency but what other reason could there
be?
She decided to take to the Chapels herself to find out.
Thus far, she had discovered a pattern, at least. Chapels in certain
districts aggressively human-only always held Priests who followed the canonical
path. But Chapels elsewhere might just as often harbor Priests like Brother Brion back
there; Priests who preached the brotherhood of all beings, and stressed the similarities
among the most various of beings rather than their differences. They could have been
operating the kind of trick she suspected but they could not hide the feelings behind
their words, not to her, not when she chose to follow the music of their emotions.
And the music was of a sweeter harmony than that sadly under-talented choir back
there. These Priests truly, deeply, believed in what they were saying. And if the stories
her patrons told her were true, there were just as many Priests of this radical line as
there were who followed canon.
The crowd carried her up to the front door of Freehold, and she slipped out of the
stream and onto the doorstep. One or two others followed her there, but she knew after a
quick glance that these were patrons, not fellow staff, and she simply granted them a brief
smile before opening the door and taking the other hallway to the right, the one that led
to the back stairs rather than the stable. She really didn't want anyone to know that
"Tanager" her street-name and "Lyrebird" were one and the same. Especially not
customers.
But as she climbed the dimly lit back staircase to the top floor, she couldn't help
thinking about the words of that so-earnest young Priest, and all the trouble those words
must surely be causing him in certain circles.
And in her brief experience, Priests, no matter how well meaning and sincere, simply
did not do or say things that would get them in trouble with their own superiors.
Except that here and now, they were.
What, in the name of the Gypsy Lady and the Sacrificed God, was going on here?
T'fyrr tried to concentrate on the music coming out of his friend Harperus' miraculous
little machine, but it was of no real use. A black mood was on him today, a black mood
that not even music could lift.
He finally waved at the little black cube, which shut itself off, obediently. He turned
and stared out the windows of Harperus' self-propelled wagon at the human hive called
Lyonarie. Humans again. Why am I doing this? Surely I shall never interact with
humans without something tragic occurring!
He examined the scaled skin of his wrists, where the marks of his fetters were still
faintly visible, at least to his eyes. The invisible fetters, the ones that bound his heart,
hurt far more than the physical bonds had.
Why did I agree to come here? How is it that Harperus can charm me into actions I
would never take on my own?
Months ago, he had agreed to help Harperus in yet another of his schemes: a partial
survey of the human lands. All had been well, right up until the moment that he had been
caught on the ground by humans who claimed that he was a demon, a creature of evil, and
had fettered and imprisoned him, starving him until he was more than half mad. Their
intent had been to kill him in some religious spectacle
That was what Harperus said. I scarcely recall most of it.
Little had he known he had friends among the crowd assembled to see him die: a pair
of Free Bards, who had provided him with a distraction, the means to his escape.
Unfortunately, not everyone had been distracted at the crucial moment. A single
human guard had seen that he was about to flee and had tried to stop him.
To a fatal end....
That was the reason for his black depression. It did not matter that he had killed in
self-defense; the point was that he had killed. The man he had eviscerated in his pain and
hunger-madness had only been doing his duty.
In fact, no matter what Harperus claims, since he was doing his duty, to the best of
his ability, he was as "good" as I perhaps my spiritual better. Certainly he
is was not the one with blood on his conscience.
Could this mean, in the end, that the fanatics who had called him a demon, and evil,
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