Steven Brust - Athyra

Savn waited for him to continue. After a moment Vlad seated himself on the cliff.

“Not stand apart in actions,” he said. “I mean, don’t be afraid to form general conclusions, to try to find the laws that operate in the actions of history, and to—”

“I don’t understand.”

Vlad sighed. “You should try not to get me started.”

“But, about the Athyra ...”

“Yes. There are two types of Athyra. Some are mystics, who attempt to explore the nature of the world by looking within themselves, and some are explorers, who look upon the world as a problem to be solved, and thus reduce other people to either distractions or pieces of a puzzle, and treat them accordingly.”

Savn considered this, and said, “The explorers sound dangerous.”

“They are. Not nearly as dangerous as the mystics, however.”

“Why is that?”

“Because explorers at least believe that others are real, if unimportant. To a mystic, that which dwells inside is the only reality.”

“I see.”

“Baron Smallcliff is a mystic.”

“Oh.”

Vlad stood abruptly, and Savn had an instant’s fear that he was going to throw himself off the cliff. Instead he took a breath and said, “He’s the worst kind of mystic. He can only see people as ...” His voice trailed off. He looked at Savn, then looked away. For a moment, Savn thought he had detected such anger hidden in the Easterner that it would make one of Speaker’s rages seem like the pouting of a child.

In an effort to distract Vlad, Savn said, “What are you?” It seemed to work, for Vlad chuckled slightly. “You mean am I a mystic or an explorer? I have been searching for the answer to that question for several years now. I haven’t found it, but I know that other people are real, and that is something.”

s<-\ guess?”

“There was a time I didn’t know that.”

Savn wasn’t certain how to respond to this, so he said nothing.

After a moment, Vlad added, “And I listen to philosophers.”

“When you don’t kill them,” said Savn.

This time the Easterner laughed. “Even when I do, I still listen to them.”

“I understand,” said Savn.

Vlad looked at him suddenly. “Yes, I think that you do.”

“You sound surprised.”

“Sorry,” said Vlad. “You are, I don’t know, better educated than most of us from the city would have thought.”

“Oh. Well, I learned my ciphers and history and everything because I filled the bucket when I was twenty, so they—”

“Filled the bucket?”

“Don’t they have that in the city?”

“I don’t know. I’ve never heard of it, at any rate.”

“Oh. Well, I hardly remember doing it. I mean, I was pretty young at the time. But they give you a bucket—”

“Who is ‘they’?”

“Mae and Pae and Speaker and Bless.”

“I see. Go on.”

“They give you a bucket, and tell you to go out into the woods, and when you come back, they see what’s in the bucket and decide whether you should be trained for apprenticeship.”

“And you had filled yours?”

“Oh, that’s just a term that means they said yes. I mean, if you come back with water, then Bless will try you out as a priest, and if you come back with sticks, then, well, I don’t really know how they tell, but they decide, and when I came back they decided I should be apprenticed to Master Wag.”

“Oh. What did you come back with?”

“An injured daythief.”

“Oh. That would account for it, I suppose. Still, I can’t help wondering how much of that is chance.”

“What do you mean?”

“How often a child picks up the first thing he sees, and ends up being a cobbler when he’d be better off as a weaver.”

“That doesn’t happen,” Savn explained.

Vlad looked at him. “It doesn’t?”

“No,” said Savn, feeling vaguely annoyed.

“How do you know?”

“Because ... it just doesn’t.”

“Because that’s what you’ve always been told?”

Savn felt himself flushing, although he wasn’t certain why. “No, because that’s what the test is for.”

Vlad continued studying him. “Do you always just accept everything you’ve been told, without questioning it?”

“That’s a rude question,” said Savn without thinking about it.

Vlad seemed startled. “You’re right,” he said. “I’m sorry.”

“Some things,” said Savn, “you just know.”

Vlad frowned, and took a step away from the cliff. He clasped his hands behind his back and cocked his head slightly. “Do you?” he asked. “When you ‘just know’ something, Savn, that means it’s so locked into your head that you operate as if it were true, even when you find out it isn’t.” He knelt down so that he was facing Savn directly. “That isn’t necessarily a good idea.”

“I don’t understand.”

“You’re so convinced that your Baron Smallcliff is invincible and perfect that you’d stand there and let him kill you rather than raising a finger to defend yourself.”

“That’s different.”

“Is it?”

“You’re changing the subject. There are things that you know way deep down. You know they’re true, just because they have to be.”

“Do they?”

“Well, yes. I mean, how do you know that we’re really here? You just know.”

“I know some philosophers who would disagree with you,” said Vlad.

“The ones you killed?”

Vlad laughed. “Well taken,” he said. He stood and walked over to the cliff again, and stared out once more. Savn wondered what he was trying to find. “But sometimes,” continued the Easterner, “when it’s time to do something, it matters whether you know why you’re doing it.”

“What do you mean?”

Vlad frowned, which seemed to be his usual expression when he was trying to think of how to say something. “Sometimes you might get so mad that you hit someone, or so frightened you run, but you don’t really know why. Sometimes you know why you should do something, but it’s all in your head. You don’t really feel it, so you have trouble making yourself do it.”

Savn nodded. “I know what you mean. It’s like when I’ve been out late and Maener asks what I’ve been doing and I know I should tell her, but I don’t.”

“Right. It isn’t always easy to act on what’s in your head instead of what’s in your heart. And it isn’t always right to. The whole trick to knowing what to do is deciding when to make yourself listen to your head, and when it’s okay to just follow your feelings.”

“So, how do you do it?”

Vlad shook his head. “I’ve been trying to figure that one out myself for the last few years, and I haven’t managed. But I can tell you that it works best when you understand why you feel a certain way, and to do that, sometimes you have to take things you know and question them. That’s one of the good things Athyra and philosophers do.”

“I see what you’re getting at,” said Savn slowly.

Vlad looked at him once more. “Yes? And?”

“Some things you just know.”

Vlad seemed about to say something, but evidently decided to let the matter drop. They fell silent, and Vlad went back to scanning the area below them.

After a while the Easterner said, “Who’s that lady wearing the green hat, talking to everyone in sight?”

“I don’t know her name, but she’s their priestess.”

“Of?”

“What do you mean, ‘of? Oh, I see. Of Trout.”

“Hmmm. No help there.”

“No help for what?”

“Never mind. Do you, also, worship Trout?”

“Worship?”

“I mean, who do you pray to?”

“Pray?”

“Who is your god?”

“Bless seems to be on good terms with Naro, the Lady Who Sleeps, so that’s who he usually asks things of.”