126 - Go ahead, truth-drug me!

That evening, Niku said absently, “Why do people call this place the Yeoli words for House of Integrity? That seems a little… too… blunt.” A blade moon had just come over the mountain, autumn silver, making a shine catch on her shoulders and hair. We had not made love yet, since she had come back, the way a bruised wrestler hesitates to go back into the pit. Or perhaps we were both afraid of what it would mean.

Neither Surya nor my mother had called me Virani-e in Niku’s hearing, and nor had I explained. I did now, though without mentioning Komona. I should tell her all that had happened with Komona, but had no wish to, any time soon.

“Virani-e?” She turned it over on her tongue, like a morsel of a dish she’d never before tasted. “Virani-e. I like it.” But does it seem more me than that other name? Something in me shrunk from asking.

“So…” She had that most untypical thing in her eyes: fear. “Are you going to strike the signature? Or are we… speaking with someone?” I was competent again, and so could no longer duck it.

It was a curse that it had to be someone who didn’t know us; more than anyone I’d trust Surya. (Lovers are joined by lines of spirit that run between their auras, he’d told me once, and that was the source of feeling drawn to someone; it’s as if their soul is pulling yours towards it, as well as your own pulling too, on a rope. Of course he could see them.)

“We can talk to who we want if you strike the signature, or even if you don’t, if we want to… if we need to… right?” she said. I signed chalk. “I know who I would trust, more than anyone.”

“Who?”

“Surya.”

I couldn’t help but laugh, and so had to explain why. “But, love”—that habit—and yet Niku was my wife—“wouldn’t you worry that, since he’s my healer, he’d take my side?”

She signed charcoal. “I can’t imagine anyone less likely to take sides than him.”

“You’re right,” I said. “When I think about it, only those who cannot see and know another entirely have reason to take sides. I wish we all did.”

So we decided to ask Surya. He’d decided to let me off a session the next day just to rest me and give me time to settle back into the Hearthstone Independent—yes, I would be back to normalcy, read, hot-tub, tomorrow—but he’d be there for us next time.

The day after I moved back, the Committee called me in, unexpectedly.

The invasion of a foreign nation’s ways that follows invasion by its armies hadn’t only brought us bead clocks, Arkan brick, spawn-presses and perfect window-glass. Assembly was just in the middle of thrashing out how the Substance that Bestows the Fundamental Virtue, as they call it in Arko, should be used in our courts, and in our investigations.

At the outset, when they’d set out their strategy, the Committee had voted down the idea of using truth-drug on me, which had been proposed, as will not surprise you, by Linasika. But all through he’d kept raising the idea again, even threatening me with it when he didn’t credit my answers. Maybe he knew that sooner or later my patience would run out, and maybe he knew also what I would do.

†

Excerpt from the proceedings of the Chevengani Mental State Assessment Committee, etesora 83, Y. 1556.

Miniya Shae-Sima, Servant of Tinga-e-Pekola: Chevenga, I was reading back through our proceedings when I noticed something. We asked you about the origin of the death-belief, right after your father’s death, and you told us you’d never told anyone this incident in detail, but you also mentioned that you wrote about it. Was this in correspondence to someone?

Fourth Chevenga Shae-Arano-e: No… it is something I wrote… for myself.

Mi: Will you tell us more about that?

4Che: It’s part of a memoir I’ve been writing.

Mi: A memoir? You mean an account of your whole life?

4Che: Yes.

Mi: Is it complete to date?

4Che: No, not quite… it goes up to the time towards the end of my second term in Arko. I stopped writing it when I visited Surya the first time.

Mi: So it’s complete less four moons or so.

4Che: Yes.

Mi: And in it you recount every event, or at least every major event, of your life?

4Che: Yes.

Mi: In detail?

4Che: Yes.

Linasika Aramichiya, Servant of Michalere: Pardon me for interceding, but, Chevenga, we are two moons into an investigation for which we have been given a three-moon deadline. Now we find you’ve withheld from us even the existence of a written work that is clearly, as you describe it, a wealth of information for our purposes, and, from what I can tell, your intention was to continue to keep it secret from us, indefinitely. How do you justify that?

4Che: Well, I… I’m here, I’ve come willing to answer any and all questions, and I thought that was the best approach.

Li: But you were aware we resolved to take a broad approach to the mandate, and use every source of information available to us—were you not?

4Che: Yes.

Li: So why did you not come forward with this at the outset?

4Che: I… preferred… all right, Linasika, you’ve caught me dead to rights here. I’ve been remiss and I apologize to the Committee.

Li: I thank you for the admission. Am I right, that you never intended to tell us of the existence of the memoir?

4Che: I hadn’t decided not to… I hadn’t thought about it.

Li: So you had no intention to tell us.

4Che: No, not so far, but I had not intention not to tell you either. I hadn’t thought of it either way.

Mi: Did you write the memoir with the intent of eventual publication?

4Che: Yes… posthumous publication.

Li: Pardon my intercession again but—posthumous? You were going to wait until you were dead and then hurl whatever accusations you want in writing when the person could not rebut you directly?

4Che: I—

Lanai Kesila, Servant of Issolai, presiding: I release the witness from having to answer this question, and ask the Servant of Michalere to recall that we resolved at the outset to treat Chevenga with sympathy rather than judgment. We have not seen the work so we have absolutely no evidence that it contains any accusations at all.

Li: Fair enough, but there is one point that I insist on making: it’s this tendency towards secrecy, towards omitting information from the public discourse that is very much relevant to it, that I find so disturbing in the public servant with the highest responsibility in the land. We know he withheld information that might cast doubt on his suitability, if not his ability, for the position, and accepted the position despite having that information; now we find he’s keeping from us this account of his life, even though it’s bound to be hugely enlightening in regard to his state of mind, whether he intends it to be or not, though he’s fully aware of our mandate.

La: We’ve heard your point, and thank you, Linasika; now I ask a minimum of intercessions as we continue the questioning.

Mi: Thank you, sib President. Chevenga, I would like to ask your permission for the Committee to peruse your memoir as part of our investigation. If we do that, of course, it—or whichever sections of it we choose to read into our proceedings or cite in our final report—will become part of the public record, and obviously not—All-Spirit and fate willing—posthumously. But when you publish it, assuming you do, I don’t think the originality of the work will be compromised, since we would only cite it piecemeal.

4Che: I…

Mi: Why the hesitation?

4Che: No, it’s all right, the Committee may review it. It’s all in Athali, and parts of it I’m sure are not the most legible… but I can clarify whatever might need clarifying.

Omonae Shae-Lemana, Servant of Thara-e-Tinanga-e: If I may intercede: do you feel a little shy about this, Chevenga, since you meant it only to be published after your death?

4Che: Yes… but I also did write it under the oath of the scrivener, so, really, there should be nothing in it that I can’t answer for and wouldn’t stand by.

O: Let me guess, you give opinions of people in it that wouldn’t matter so much if you were dead, but do if you are still alive.

4Che: (laughing) Yes, a few. But none I couldn’t substantiate. But it is also… very open about what I felt and thought, throughout.

Li: You’ve probably slagged me thoroughly.

4Che: No, actually, I don’t think I mentioned you in it by name at all.

Chanae Salhanil, Servant of Kaholil: If I may intercede, I am curious as to why you intended to wait until after death to publish it.

4Che: I wrote it before the knowledge of my… situation became public. My intention was to reveal that, and I didn’t want to do that until I was dead.

Li: So you’d never be called to account for it.

La: Sib Servant of Michelere, I ask you to retract that question, and caution you against further intercessions of this nature.

Li: I retract.

Mi: Chevenga, what is… what does the book emphasize? Does it concentrate on things military, or political, or does it go much into the personal?

4Che: It’s a mix… there’s much less detail on military matters than in My Part in the Arkan War or Lessons from the Lakans, which I intended to be instructional to warriors. It does go into the personal, very much.

O: If I may intercede: you used it to bare your heart about how life really has been for you, as you would never be able to anywhere else, in the hope of being entirely understood after your death at least, is that so?

4Che: Yes… as I thought I’d never be able to, anyway.

O: Yes, fair enough, you are able to bare your heart now, and indeed have no choice, as we’re compelling you. I think then when we discuss how exactly we will use it in our investigation, I will put forward a resolution that we do it with tact and sensitivity; does that reassure you?

4Che: That depends on whether that resolution goes chalk.

O: Fair enough, since obviously I can’t promise. But we did resolve at the outset to take an approach of sympathy in our dealings with you, and I think that essentially necessitates sensitivity and tact in our work with your writing, and so should inform all our votes on this. But we will see how it goes.

Mi: On behalf of the whole Committee, Chevenga, I thank you again for your openness and honesty.

4Che: You’re welcome, although I think that while you wish you were speaking for the entire Committee in this sentiment, you cannot.

Mi: A majority then.

4Che: That majority is welcome.

Li: Sib president, may I intercede to ask what I feel is a crucial question?

La: Go ahead, and I will judge whether I consider it to be justified.

Li: Chevenga… I asked whether you intended to reveal the existence of the memoir to us, and you said, “I hadn’t made a decision; I hadn’t thought about it.” Now you’ve told us that it contains a great deal of personal content, and specifically you bearing your heart on exactly the matter the Committee’s mandate is concerned with. So you’re telling us you hadn’t thought about it, that it never once went through your mind, “This book I’ve written could answer so many of the Committee’s questions, I should let them read it”?

4Che: Not that I recall.

Li: May I remind you you are under oath.

4Che: I have not forgotten I am under oath.

Li: Surely it cannot be that no other members of the Committee have difficulty believing this?

O: I do not, and that is based on my training in psyche-healing. It is quite possible for a person not to think of something in this way, not due to deliberate dishonesty but an unconscious wish to avoid the matter. In this case I’d say it’s most likely to be due to longstanding habit.

La: Linasika, you asked a question and the witness answered it, holding out inherently that it is the truth. That is for us to judge but we need not do so now.

Li: I’m sorry but this is beyond me to believe, and as well to me the whole matter of the memoir raises the question, what else might Chevenga be hiding?

4Che: Nothing. I’m hiding nothing.

Li: Accordingly I would like to put forward a resolution that we revisit the question of making use of Arkan truth-drug.

4Che: [baring his arm] Go ahead! Truth-drug me. I will say exactly the same.

La: There is no question of truth-drug. I would like to remind you, sib Linasika, of our vote at the outset in regard to using truth-drug, in which you were a defeated minority of one.

4Che: No, no, no! I’d like to respectfully request that the Committee vote again to overturn that result. I want you to truth-drug me. Always we talk about the dangers of truth-drug, and less about its one shining virtue: just as it allows liars to be proven liars, it allows those who are truthful to prove their truthfulness. I have been so often accused of lying in these proceedings that I think, frankly, the Committee owes me the opportunity to prove otherwise.

La: … Chevenga… I think your point is well-taken. Fair enough; that we re-vote on the question of whether to question Fourth Chevenga Shae-Arano-e, while he is under the influence of Arkan truth-drug, in consideration of his request of us to do so, discussion [crosstalk] Order! Order, gentlesibs! Servant of Thara-e-Kalanera.

Darosera Kinisil, Servant of Thara-e-Kalanera: I understand you’ve requested it, semanakraseye, but I also understand that’s only in exasperation due to the accusations and threats you’ve been subjected to by the Servant of Michalere.

4Che: I’d like to see a conclusive end to them, and it seems this is the only way to reassure Linasika of my honesty.

Da: There is no reason why you should have to do this to be considered honest. By no means should we make it a precedent that a witness can be threatened and brow-beaten into submitting himself to truth-drugging by a Committee of the Assembly of Yeola-e, or more exactly a single member of a Committee of the Assembly of Yeola-e.

Kusiya Aranin, Servant of Terera South: I concur as much as three members could, with that, and regret I have only one vote.

4Che: I’m not browbeaten, I’m angry.

Da: Goaded, then.

4Che: I just want this settled; who among you do not want to see an end to these accusations, which disrupt these proceedings, yourselves? And it’s no precedent when it’s by my will and my request, and I am but an individual witness, not a member of the Committee myself.

Ikrena Shae-Sansera, Servant of Tassumai: Myself I am astonished to see Chevenga making Linasika’s arguments (laughter)

Li: He and I both see rightly on this, because how can anyone not? He and I both want proof of his honesty; to reiterate his own question, albeit phrased a little differently, why don’t the rest of you?

Ku: I need no proof of his honesty; I am convinced (assent).

4Che: I request in total confidence that I will say exactly the same under truth drug as not, and that I will acquit myself well in answering any question that has not been asked already, because I have always been honest.

Li: Not quite always.

4Che: Then truth-drug me, for the love of All-Spirit! You can ask me about that if you want!

La: Order! I think further discussion will bring no further benefit, so – that we re-vote on the question of whether to question Fourth Chevenga Shae-Arano-e, while he is under the influence of Arkan truth-drug, in consideration of his request of us to do so, and that this vote constitute the re-vote also, all chalk, all charcoal, I see three chalks, three charcoals and one abstention, leaving me, much to my regret, giving a deciding vote. Now I did say and it’s in the record, that Chevenga’s point is well-taken; and I am thinking that we will get no peace on this matter until we’ve done it, either from the Servant of Michalere or the semanakraseye. So I will vote chalk and I hope I don’t end up regretting it, carried, thank you.

4Che: Thank you.

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