The Totem-Maker (part thirty-two)

The Totem-Maker

Chapter Four

To Be and to Choose

(part thirty-two)

“If the master sends his slave to injure bodily an enemy, the master is at fault, but the slave does not escape the law. Yet let us propose that the enemy meets the slave and begs the slave do him no harm.”

Here, Lady Nyma was silent a long moment. We sat, and thought of what she wished us to think. The Prince grunted. I feared he would interrupt, remark a stupid thing.

I felt him eye me…

I had squirmed, I suppose. He said nothing.

“The case I cite is known to many, that of the slave Hanit. Hanit was sent bearing a gift of wine to the marriage feast of Vlan Androchas. The wine had been poisoned with seeds of the rosira tree. Lord Tahme, Hanit’s master, first ordered this errand of his steward, whose habit of thieving some portion of fine wines for himself—

“Led to his death. Hanit witnessed this, but was told by Lord Tahme, hurry, dry your tears, the feast will be on! Yes, you…seal your lips, or you die. Hanit saw him brooding on his deed; in the time she ran to his rival’s, he would decide her death best…the task done, and no value in her higher than his freedom. Before the wedding party, she confessed to Androchas. Can I believe you? he asked. Hanit’s voice failed her. But his father said, pour the wine among the fishes. Androchas went to the fountain, and all the company followed.

It was proved that Tahme’s slave spoke the truth. You will stay with me in my house, Androchas said.

“The slave is capable of choice by conscience; so the case of Hanit instructs. Any of us, placed as Androchas, would desire this. Further, Hanit owed the greater obedience to the law, for the law states that we cannot take what we cannot give. Human life is granted by the gods, and only the gods by miracle may restore it. The human intellect, of imagination, of wit, is not molded to a type, not constrained, not altered, by status. Lord Tahme was not a good man for being free and noble. Hanit was not corruptible for being enslaved. We cannot make a sorcerer’s talismans of designations. We must find our reasons by logic—by which we derive principle, by which we derive law. Any enslaved person who may prevent evil is expected by speech or act to do so. We desire this; we benefit from it. We have, by a thousand examples beyond Hanit, demonstrated that we believe, too, in the principle at hand, that the law governs every person.

“Citizens, the Petitioner seeks to avenge a death, as our law of Challenge permits. There is no question of obedience to the master, for Cime Decima makes no claims, and has before you all sworn so.

“Vlanna,” Lady Nyma said to a minister at her left. “I ask you now to speak.”

34

To Be and to Choose

The Totem-Maker (part thirty-three)

(2018, Stephanie Foster)