Page 44 of Queen Demon
The Light’s jaw tightened. It had an entirely different effect in their young body than it had in their old one. “If the consensushad known this, they would have achieved their decision much more quickly. As a rule, we do not look well on those who murder their allies in cool blood. And you are an immortal who acts in service to the lives of all; there are laws written in our sacred bones about this. If I were to list every moral principle this has broken—”
Kai interrupted, “That’s why you can’t tell anyone this part.”
The Light regarded him, and despite the younger face, the altered features, Kai knew that look. They said, “Kaiisteron.”
This was one of the reasons Kai had wanted to turn his back on the Rising World and go back to Avagantrum. “I don’t know if it was him, only that he was there with me in Benais House before whatever it was happened. And Ziede had no memory of it at all. He must have thought neither of us would remember any of it.” Kai thought,or maybe he just hoped we wouldn’t. Or maybe he didn’t care.“And he said that he thought we wouldn’t be harmed, just imprisoned like Tahren was.” That Ramad would release them once the conspiracy had been revealed and no one would know that Bashat had stood by and let it happen. That was what Ramad had said. But even if Kai believed him, there was no way to know if Bashat had revealed all his intentions to his vanguarder. “He may not have understood that what the Nient-arik and their expositor did would kill my body.” The Light looked elementally unconvinced by any of those equivocations. Kai persisted, “I’ve thought about this. I have to let it lie. I asked Tahren not to tell the council this part, and Immortal Marshall Saadrin doesn’t really know or care what happened to us before we called her to the stolen Immortal Blessed ship.”
The Light considered him gravely. It was hard to tell what they thought, they had always cultivated a deliberately opaque expression. Sitting in judgement of thorny moral problems was part of their reason for existence and Kai felt there was a great deal of judging going on right now. The Light said finally, “Then why tell me at all?”
“I can’t lie to you.” Kai let his breath out. He corrected, “I could, but I don’t want to.”
The Light tipped their head in acknowledgment. “Then what do you want me to do with this information?”
That was easier to answer. “If he kills me again, you’ll know what happened. And act as you feel warranted.”
“I see.” The Light digested that. It was a less fraught silence, but not by much. “And if he kills me?”
That was something entirely different. “Then I’ll bring the Enalin consensus his head in a bag.”
“So you would.” The Light’s gaze was ironic, but Kai thought they understood now. “And I should not do the same for you?”
That one was easy. “You believe in justice but you won’t take a life in exchange for a life.”
The Light sighed a little and leaned back. “And what about this expositor Arnsterath. Was she truly a demon, one of your kin?”
“In a way.” Kai dropped his gaze to the table. This part was still hard to talk about. “She was Arn-Nefa of Kanavesi Saredi.”
The Light considered that for a long moment. “One of your own people? You had no idea such a person still lived in the mortal world?”
“No, I had no clue.” Kai swirled the dregs in his cup. “I know some of the other demons released from the Cageling Court survived long enough to return to the underearth. She wasn’t one of them. I thought she had given up, and drifted from her human body. She wasn’t—” He had to stop and swallow down a lump of guilt and angry bile. “She gave me to understand that she would never seek another human host.”
The Light’s gaze went distant as if they tried to recall the events of that day. “Her opinions seem to have radically shifted since then. She has committed crimes by participating in the conspiracy, by subjugating a person, even an expositor, as a familiar. When you were Kai-Enna, did it seem that she lacked empathy for those who were different from herself?”
Kai stared at the carved wood of the couch’s platform, tracing the line of a kingfisher’s wing. “I didn’t think so.” Had he just never understood Arnsterath’s character, all those years ago when they were both Saredi?
The Light refilled both cups. “Would you find her to bring her to the council’s justice, or find her to see if she would accept your help?”
“Accept my help?” Kai knew what Ziede would say about that, and she wasn’t wrong. “Arnsterath abandoned me, when she was Arn-Nefa.” Saying it aloud scraped open an unexpectedly raw wound. He had never known if the Saredi would have rejected him because he had taken a host by force from an enemy. Arn-Nefa and the other demons had been all that was left, and they had rejected him, so it was hard not to believe he would have fared any better with Enna’s family.
“She did indeed,” the Light agreed, watching him with that far-too-knowing gaze. “You were barely more than a child.”
Kai almost snorted. “We remember that differently.”
“A youth, then,” the Light conceded. “She didn’t know if Bashasa would have exploited you, or killed you or allowed you to be killed.”
“She didn’t ask me to come with her.” Kai had never said that part aloud before. She had never given him a chance. “She tried to drain my life, like I was…”A legionary, an expositor, a Hierarch. An enemy.
The Light said, “She was as wounded and demoralized as you. She was not acting with a whole heart or mind. We all react to such things in different ways. Some of us are tested, and some of us fail.”
From anyone else, this conversation would have been filled with thorns and bitter annoyance, but Kai had seen the Light struggle not to fail their own tests. With so many of the Enalin’s chosen leaders already executed by the Hierarchs, the Light had been the one to lead Enalin and Nibet and the remnants of the northeastinto battle. But the real purpose of the Light’s existence had always been justice and reconciliation. Kai knew how difficult cleaving to that purpose had been, after the war when the destruction the Hierarchs had left behind had seemed insurmountable. Kai said, “You think I should give her the benefit of the doubt?”
“Not then,” the Light said. “She rejected you, you owed her nothing.”
“And now?”
The Light made an open-handed gesture. “It will depend on whether she comes to you as an enemy or not. If not, you have to ask yourself what we owe to each other as living beings.”
Kai rubbed his eyes and didn’t say,I don’t want to do that, I want everything to be simple. Nothing was ever simple. “I’ve answered your questions, now will you answer mine about the expedition?”
