She didn’t do it for political reasons.
No, she did not.
Which means it’s not political.
Ynpharion’s frustration was almost a balm.The reasons behind an action seldom matter to those who attempt to read beneath the action’s surface. Itisa political decision.
But that’s not why she did it!
The reasons make little difference; the results are the only thing Mellarionne will see. As she will never explain the whole of her reasoning, Mellarionne has no choice but to view the invitation as the criticism it was, and is. Do you believe that politics are like your games of cards? That one must consent to play, with intent to win, the game offered? That if one declines, if one refuses to play that game, one is therefore immune to the criticisms and consequences decided by those cards?
Ynpharion already knew the answer.
You use the wordpoliticsto denote the actions of the powerful of whom you disapprove. You use it as an accusation or a dismissal.
This was true. It was a way of discussing men and women who were much more powerful, much more significant, than Kaylin herself had ever been, or would ever be.
What you fail to understand is that they are—as we are—all Barrani. They are all people. They have desires that are very like ours, but access to different tools with which to enact those desires. The fact that An’Mellarionne is likely in league with either the Adversary or the outcaste inRavellondoes not mean he has become incomprehensible; his is a desire for power. But people want power because they feel it will make them safer.
Among the Barrani?
I will accept your skepticism. Yes, even among the Barrani. You do not agree with the choices made to gain power. You do not agree with the tools used. But the act of attempting to build a secure stronghold should not be incomprehensible. Especially not to you. The Consort’s desires are different. But her actions are nonetheless explicable. She wished to entrap your cohort not because she believed they were too dangerous, but because she believed that they might accomplish the desire that has been at the heart of her reign. They were, and are, the tools that came to hand.
Kaylin said nothing.
It is not the desire for power that renders us villainous in your mind. It is the tools used to achieve that power. It is how that power is spent. The Consortispowerful. The High Lord is powerful. The Lord of the West March is powerful. An’Teela is powerful. And yes, Lord Calarnenne is powerful; in no other way would he now hold one of the three. Understand that their lives have been defined by their desires. If we all wanted the same thing, if we defined power in the exact same way, things would be simpler. That is, however, a daydream.
When Kaylin failed to respond, Ynpharion continued.Politics is the state of overlapping and conflicting desires between any group of people. It does not require wealth. Nor does it require any absolute measure of power; it requires a measure ofrelativepower. And you should know this. Is it not your duty to assess crimes?
Yes.
And you believe that it is the consequence of the crime, the breadth of its reach, that is the defining factor? Things are political only when they affect many?
Did she? Was that what she believed? No, not when she thought about it. But the uncomfortable truth was yes. Yes, when she didn’t think about it, that was exactly what she felt. People at a distance who had power over her were somehow political. Marcus, who was on the ground with her, was not.
People who were subject to the law, people who couldn’t easily buy their way out of the consequences? They weren’t political, to Kaylin. They were part of her life, part of her job, part of her responsibility. They were within her reach; they were on the ground with her—but frequently doing stupid or angry things.
You are a Lord of the High Court. To the Barrani outside of this city, youarea power. You have what they lack, what they desire, what they are too afraid to consider achieving for themselves. You do not consider yourself a power.
She didn’t.
That is what you have failed to grasp—but grasp it now. Very, very few consider themselves a power; they are objectively powerful because of the tools within their grasp, but they reach for those tools for the same reason mortals reach for daggers. You are a political force, for better or worse.His tone made clear which one he believed it was.Everything that has occurred in the past week, the past two weeks, is political in nature. If you wish to navigate the undercurrents of the High Court, attempt to understand the nature of the fears that inform it. Know your enemy.
Our enemy is the thing beneath the High Halls, she replied.
And not the Barrani who appear to be in league with it?
The Consort led Kaylin, accompanied by a very martial Teela and a very alert Severn, to her personal quarters. The rooms were guarded, but the guards parted instantly, a living curtain of armor and weapons. The Lady seemed to have gathered weight as she walked, to have pulled gravity toward her until she was its inescapable center. Kaylin found it hard to look away from the Consort’s back.
Ynpharion had taken up the rear, and he was joined, on what felt like a solemn funeral procession, by three more guards. His internal diatribe vanished. She was the Consort, yes, and incredibly important to the Barrani race—but even in the High Halls, she was not safe.
She was safer, Ynpharion said,in your dwelling than she will ever be here. Especially now. It is only in the Hallionne that her safety can be taken for granted; there, guards are merely decorative. Here, we are not.
He didn’t have to tell her the fate of those guards should she be attacked and injured.
Surprisingly, no, I don’t.
Kaylin was lucky that eye-rolling did not cause muscle sprains. Her familiar was sitting on her shoulder, but his wings were folded, a sign that he considered any danger to be contained entirely by what Kaylin could naturally see.
