[27]

What follows is my attempt to understand what was wrong in Naomi's philosophy. How her sect went from grace to error, even error unto death. I fear I will do poorly.

Most of this I had in my mind already at the time, but it was confused, a muddle, inarticulate, mixed up with fear and pain and grief and my own sin.

Some came later from Tara. Some came later still, from our priest, Fr. Phaedo of Velgrad. Yet even priests may err on subtle things. I ask that you task a sage to my correction, if there is one whose duties may be spared.

❖ ❖ ❖

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First I would put aside the obvious mistake. That honesty is virtuous, therefore disclosure is always good. I do not think they believe that. If Naomi said something like it, it was just an accident of rhetoric. Or more likely, I misunderstood what she meant. I think their doctrine on this is not unlike the catechism.

Next, malign influence. I have no doubt the influence was there, and deep, and vile. Far deeper than Naomi believed. Yet once there must have been a sane man or woman, brave, honest and very nearly good—who chose to forget the prohibitions of the Church and the warnings of all his ancestors—who was the first of them the xenos twisted.

And Naomi's arguments were not mad. Wrong, but not mad.

She spoke of how lies poison everything, practically and morally. That is true, and the Church teaches it. There were two insights, she said. First, that honesty could heal what lies had sickened. Second, that honesty had to be inward as well as outward. The truth was a painful cure, and part of the pain was the loss of comfort from unexamined beliefs.

She made it seem that trust was a necessary, but temporary, casualty in the painful cure. You could trust again, as she could trust her comrades—as I could trust my Sisters—once dishonesty was purified away.

At the time, I could not see how she could be wrong—except that she had to be wrong, because of the horrible result. And she explained herself much better than I do. When she spoke of truth and falsehood, she was like a philosopher from a book, or a theologian from the catechism, not a normal person talking.

She said other things, too: about doubting institutions, and about how they must be conquered by people willing to endure the pain of truth. That was the part where she most wanted to convert me, I think. Or not conversion, exactly. But to make me believe that we, the Sisterhood, had always been on her side.

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But I think the mistakes come earlier than the dogma. All the way back at the start.

I see two errors, though maybe there are more. They are small but fatal, like letting your gun be seen around a corner from an angle that your eyes do not yet see.

The first is mistaking a part of the cure for the whole thing. Thinking that the act of contrition—the steadfast saying of truth—was the cure. When it was repentance that cured her labor camp, even though truth was what made repentance real in the world.

The second has to do with the nature of knowing itself. What is knowing without trust? If I trust no one, not even myself, what shall I use to know the truth? And how terrible shall be my world? I shall be alone, without even myself for company.

I think that is the end result of the Fear. A man alone, cut away from everything known, unable to trust friend, family, the Church, even his own mind. That is why they value it. Why they think it is permissible to use, and why it helps their goals. To them, it is not horror and madness and an inversion of all that is good. It is a shove towards sanctification.

I think even the short time of the battle of 198.738 may be enough to leave a wound in Gaervalt's soul that lasts a hundred years.

Maybe truth needs facts, but also something like what we pray in Mina's rite—something like honoring the martyr, tending the fallen, defending the innocent, and walking in the light. Or something like praying together with your friends. Or perhaps that is the Emperor, and I am getting Him and His truth confused. Or are they the same, in some way beyond what I can comprehend?

I am sorry that I cannot express it better. I err. I know that I err, and yet when I try to grasp the truth, it slips from my fingers.

I believe Naomi strove for what she thought would be a better world. I believe she was honest and brave and kind. I pray for her soul. After I killed her, I longed for confession. Much more than the other times that I have killed, or even the others that I killed that day. I did not believe I acted wrongly, but the longing remained. I hope the Arvontists are right, and we will meet again in a life that follows death.

I wonder if I would kill those Sisters burning children in the pict. Perhaps I would.

I wonder what circumstances might make me one of them, and my soul recoils.