Ruan's not there yet but a bunch of other Amentans want to know what's going on.

...We're not sure how to react to how she has been Enkindling people. There's a lot being said that doesn't go into words very well. Her detractors are saying it's - blasphemous? Profane, irreverent? Does that make sense as a concept? There probably won't be any violence.

"It makes... any sense as a concept but I'm not sure why they'd think of it that way? It sounded like it was going very well based on the reports out of Baravi."

There's... Spiritual feeling about our magic. Enkindling in particular is almost seen as... A maternal relationship by some. A rare gift not to be given lightly. A lot of us are shocked by how widely she is using it, given that.

"...A lot of people need it."

Yes. It is reducing suffering... Theologically, Enkindling is bringing others closer to the nature of Draak. That could be seen as good or bad depending on context... They are upset by the time she gave someone a magical power? ...Ah, she's going into magical jargon and confusing those who might agree with her, instead of presenting a coherent argument. Perhaps I should go help.

"I don't know if it matters but everything I've heard suggests the fellow with the magical power is thrilled."

Whether he is happy about it is relevant but not the primary concern.

...Seeker is weighing in so I don't need to. He's more respected. He says it could be good for the balance of the Onesong, and even if the new art she is describing is a change from the old ways - change is inevitable. They may argue for a while but the senate knew she was Enkindling people and told those with relevant experience to vote on what to do about it when we got here so at least it can be settled without a trip home.

"What might they do about it?"

I see three outcomes. Some or all of them join her work, they tell her to continue possibly with an observer, or they tell her to stop.

"...anything we can do to influence the result, there?"

Her tail swishes thoughtfully. Offering her asylum would make things tense... Speak of your pain. Speak of hope for the future. Speak of how you will need to expand less.

The Amentans dig up an astronomer with bad springs who haltingly approaches the argument.

They catch snatches of confusing telepathy, very much less in word-translatable format, as they approach. The Draak have organized into two sides which are making noises in sync almost like a song. Thoughts and feelings and imagery from dozens of sources-

STOP. An Amentan approaches.

(There's a flash of annoyance and dismissal - A green? Not one of the important ones.)

Be slient. We will listen to what they have to say and consider it. Thus is my command as an Elder.

"- thank you," says the astronomer in a small voice. "Um, I wondered if I could tell you or - maybe try to telepathy you? - what a bad spring is like - if that would help you decide things."

There's a murmer of feeling, silenced by the Seeker again.

We know as established fact that severe springs are unpleasant, but knowing a fact is not the same as Knowing. True wisdom draws from many sources. Refusing to see other viewpoints is a false and vain wisdom. To make a wise decision on this matter we should hear their song.

What is your name, o Amentan? We would hear what you have to sing to us. If you focus on what a bad spring is as if you were going to say it, as if you could speak feelings, we should be able to hear. If that fails, words work just as well.

"My name is Soante Sha." She's trying to do the telepathy thing now; "sha" means "star". "I'm an astronomer. I'm thirty-two now and it's much less bad than it was when I was younger. I have three kids and my whole life was - warped around needing them. I broke up with a boyfriend I loved because I didn't think he was ever going to earn enough to help pay for credits." She tries to think at them, remembering being five and weighing the idea of marrying a financially precarious musician whose parents were still paying off their second mortgage they took out to have him, spending the rest of her life with a spouse who would have loved her and sung to her and cooked dinner every night and gotten her one more spring of agony than the guy she eventually married instead, a chemical engineer who she's reasonably happy with at this point for his own sake but knows she wouldn't have looked at twice if he didn't have job security and good money sense.

She goes on. "I gave up hobbies to go after grants and didn't pick them up again till my children were done having children of their own. I tried to kill myself once the year we couldn't pay the guaranteed price and put in a bid anyway and lost, I had to stay in the hospital until summertime and we couldn't try again till two years after because we had to pay off the medical care and I'd missed so much work. My parents didn't know how bad it was until I'd gotten as much financial help as I could out of them because I thought if they knew my sister's springs were better than mine they'd think they should give her all of it instead and I did that even though I know they would have been right.

"I was physical science track already when I was a kid but I specialized hard in astronomy as soon as I went back to school, my first spring, I just - I needed to spend most of my time every day thinking I could be helping somehow with fixing it maybe not in time for me but for my kids or my grandkids - I have a grandson who has it as bad as I did. He kept calling people in a panic in the middle of the night, when spring would hit, fighting himself about it because most of him wants to go for the get-rich-quick schemes he knows are fake without sanity-checking with anyone else first, he has his girlfriend hold his finances for him these days. That's with the huge doses of drugs his doctor has him on to keep him stabilized, he starts taking them in the middle of winter so they'll be full strength in the new year and they make him throw up sometimes and it's still better than going without. Sometimes I think I shouldn't have - shouldn't have stayed in the hospital and kept trying, since, of course that happened, of course it's genetic, why wouldn't it be. They didn't have the Soft Spring Project yet when I was having children but I couldn't have borne using it if it had been there because I'm one of those people who needs the babies to be mine. - and since Bloom started seeing people in Baravi I've been saving up money again but this time I wanted to buy my grandson a visit to her when she started taking foreign patients." She rubs a little at one of her eyes.

There's a silent moment when she finishes, and then-

-See how it distorts their entire lives, drives them to madness-

-Not madness but merely their nature-

-How can that be anything but madness when feeling drives such actions-

-Is it not mad how much we seek out Treasure then?-

-Outweighs every other positive thing to such an extreme degree-

-Cannot make such decisions based on one unpleasant story-

-Perversion of the Onesong to share our essence with an entire species-

-This story repeats one million times and more but we cannot listen to all of them-

-Will swallow everything in time and hate us forever IF AND ONLY IF WE DO NOTHING-

-We would lose all that makes us holy and special and this will lead to our kind's total destruction-

-Changing Nature and developing new magic are both things that have been done and were good-

-Don't understand this pairing off business but it's important to them?-

-Don't bring the larger politics into this, this is just about Enkindling-

-Creepy and uncanny to apply as lightly as a feather, such a thing has never been done-

-Can never say for sure what the future holds. We can only make bets-

-Work to make things better instead of hiding in fear of making them worse-

And then silence.

I am shielding you from the cacophony. We may have questions in a minute or two. Will you wait for now?

"- all right," says Sha.

Be warned, he says after some time has passed. This is a deliberately provocative question. I am asking it so they can feel your response.

What would you think of us if we decided helping Amenta was wrong, that Amentans gaining space travel was intolerable, and that we should leave and never return? What would your friends, your leaders, think?

"- well, we'd - we were working on it ourselves. And now we know it's possible," she says. "...if you were specifically hoping we'd never get it I think we'd be worried you'd come back and kill us all before we could."

A couple of blues at the edge of earshot start muttering at each other in alarm. "Sha," one calls, "you're not really supposed to be doing this sort of -"

It was a hypothetical, he tells those blues. And it was informative. I will not take what she says as the position of Tapa's government.

And just to Sha he says, This is another leading question. Would you find it reasonable in that case that some countries on Amenta might seek to become more powerful than the Draak, and possibly to destroy us so we cannot be a threat? That it might lead to a horrible war?

"...that's what I'd expect to happen if my daughter were telling me she was writing a script about this premise?"

Not quite the answer he was hoping for but he can work with that.

Do you see, my kin? This is a path that certainly leads to suffering, uncertainty, and fear. This is the kind of thinking that may lead to a third tailless war! I still weep for our old home. Such a thing cannot be allowed to happen. The Onesong is a crucible of creation and destruction, but creation and harmony remains better than destruction and discordance. It is not a natural way for our kind to think, but by helping another you can help yourself.

-I am shielding you again, he says more privately. Thank you for speaking to us, Sha. I think that is all you should say for now. I am sorry if you are offended that I used you to make a point. But it helped.

"I'm not offended," she says. Nervous, sure, but not offended.