LITMIR.BIZ

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driven into his brain.

      I must not hate him, he thought. I must not hate.

      ‘I am glad to see … for myself what you have become,’ Danlo said. He gazed into Hanuman’s eyes, and he disappeared into a world of memory and pain.

      ‘You shouldn’t have returned, you know. But you always had to follow your fate, didn’t you?’

      ‘But, Hanu, it was you who always spoke of the need to love one’s fate.’

      ‘And you who wanted to love one’s life.’

      ‘Truly, to love life, itself … yes.’

      ‘Is that why you’ve returned, then, out of love?’

      The strange turn of this conversation amused Danlo, but it also disturbed him deeply. He felt the eyes of a hundred lords searching his face for falsity or truth. From the chair next to him, Malaclypse Redring watched like a tiger for any sign of hesitation or weakness, and Bertram Jaspari stared at him as well. It was unseemly to hold such an intimate discussion with all the Lords of Neverness and the whole universe watching and waiting. But if his fate had truly led him to such a strange moment, then he would embrace it, wildly, with all the force of his will.

      ‘I still love you,’ he said to Hanuman without shame. In his marvellous voice there was an utter openness and truth. ‘I always will.’

      This simple statement fairly astonished the lords. It astonished Hanuman, too. He looked at Danlo, and for a moment all the hurts and betrayals of the past years evaporated like ice crystals beneath a hot sun, and there was nothing between them except the truth of who they really were. For a moment, there was love. But then there was the other thing, too. Hanuman couldn’t bear the light in Danlo’s dark, wild eyes, and he wanted to look away. It was his hell that he could not. It was both their hells that Danlo always reminded him of the one thing in the universe that he feared above all else.

      How he fears, how he hates, Danlo thought. And I have made him hate; I have made him who he is.

      Without another word, Hanuman bowed to Danlo and then stepped over to take a seat at the table nearest Lord Pall’s. From this central position he could easily observe the faces of Danlo and the others sitting near him, or turn to exchange meaningful looks with Lord Pall.

      ‘We will now hear from the Holy Ivi Bertram Jaspari, as he calls himself,’ Lord Pall said. ‘And then I will ask the warrior-poet to speak. And lastly, the ambassadors from the Fellowship. I invite any lord to interrupt with questions as necessary. This may seem an unprecedented barbarism, I know, but these are unprecedented times. Never in our history have we held a conclave with so many different powers. And never – not even during the War of the Faces – has the potential for power to destroy us all been so grave. So then, Holy Ivi, if you please.’

      Bertram Jaspari, sitting in his chair next to Danlo, smoothed out the folds of his clumsily-dyed red kimono. He opened his little mouth to speak, but precisely at that moment, Danlo interrupted him before he could give voice to his first word.

      ‘The Holy Ivi of the Cybernetic Universal Church,’ Danlo said, ‘is Harrah Ivi en li Ede. This man tried to murder her and take her place.’

      At this, Bertram Jaspari glared hatred at Danlo for a moment, but said nothing.

      ‘That may be true,’ Lord Pall said. ‘But he comes to us as the leader of the Iviomils whose fleet of ships has set forth among the stars. For the time, we’ll respect whatever title he chooses to bestow upon himself. So then, Holy Ivi, if you please.’

      Bertram Jaspari adjusted the padded brown dobra covering the pointed bones of his head and again began to speak.

      ‘My Lords of the Order of Mystic Mathematicians and Other Seekers of the Ineffable Flame,’ he said with grave formality. ‘You must know that we Iviomils are the true Architects of the Infinite Intelligence of the Cybernetic Universal Church. You must know that the name of this Intelligence is Ede, the God, the Infinite – the Master Architect of the Universe.’

      At the saying of this name, the Ede hologram glowing above Danlo’s devotionary computer flashed Danlo a knowing look and actually winked at him. Danlo had set the computer on the arm of his chair in plain sight of Bertram Jaspari, who had seen millions of such computers on Tannahill. But he had never seen a hologram of Nikolos Daru Ede programmed to act in such an intimate – and irreligious – manner. For the moment he seemed affronted and deeply suspicious. And then he returned to his speech.

      ‘In our holy Algorithm it is written that, “No god is there but God; God is one, and there can be only one God.” You must know that it is the gravest of errors for any man or woman to try to become a god in emulation of Nikolos Daru Ede. To become an accursed hakra and challenge the divinity of God, Himself – could there be a worse negative program than this? However, it is an error all too easy to fall into, which is why our Church has taught compassion for any and all who might become hakras. Is it not written that, “It is a thousand times easier to stop a thousand men from becoming hakras than to stop one hakra from poisoning the minds of a million men”? This is why we of the Church have come to the Civilized Worlds, to help you through this difficult time when many are tempted to write their own programs and become hakras.’

      Bertram Jaspari delivered these devious words smoothly, devoutly, and with great energy. Having learned the Language of the Civilized Worlds only on his journey from Tannahill, he spoke with a heavy accent, but he had no trouble communicating his meaning to the Lords of Neverness or to Danlo or Demothi Bede. To these two ambassadors he implied that the Iviomils would make natural allies with the Fellowship if the Order should fail to restrain the greater ambitions and hubris of Ringism. And, as slippery as a water snake, at the same time, he appealed to the Lords of Neverness, promising that the Iviomils could help the Ringists temper their doctrines to bring their new religion in line with Ede’s Program for the Universe. But beneath his seeming congeniality and reasonableness coiled the threat of naked power. At first he was loath to show this power for what it was. He didn’t wish to shock anyone into an unreasoning opposition. He spoke only in promises and platitudes, telling the assembled lords of his hope of returning the peoples of the Civilized Worlds to Ede. As he reminded Lord Pall and everyone else, Nikolos Daru Ede had been born on Alumit, and all peoples everywhere must return to the truth which He had first shown the Architects of Alumit – and all the other Civilized Worlds.

      When he had finished speaking, the lords sat muttering and looking at each other, not quite wanting to believe this Holy Ivi’s immense effrontery. And then Danlo, in his clear, strong voice, said, ‘On Tannahill, during the war that the Iviomils inflicted upon their families and friends, the Iviomils often talked of returning people to Ede. This meant … murdering them.’

      At this, Lord Pall flashed Hanuman a quick look and then sucked in a quick breath between his black teeth. He looked at Danlo and said, ‘If you please, will you tell us what you know about this war?’

      And so Danlo told the Lords of Neverness about the War of Terror and his part in this latest schism of the Cybernetic Universal Church in which Architect had murdered Architect. He described his friendship with Harrah Ivi en li Ede; it was this remarkable woman, he said, who had found the courage to redefine the Program of Increase and the Program of Totality, the two doctrines which had led the Architects to destroy the stars of the Vild.

      ‘Bertram Jaspari never accepted Harrah’s New Program,’ Danlo said. ‘And so he began a facifah and brought this war to every part of Tannahill. He … destroyed the city of Montellivi. With a hydrogen bomb, he murdered ten million people.’

      Just then a pain shot through Danlo’s head as if his eyes were still open to the light-flash of this bomb. Lord Pall watched as Danlo pressed his palm to his forehead, and told him, ‘Please go on.’

      ‘But Bertram Jaspari … couldn’t kill every Architect who fell against him by exploding bombs,’ Danlo said. ‘When he saw that the war was lost, he fled Tannahill. All the Iviomils fled. He assembled a fleet of ships and disappeared into the stars. But before

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