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Sophie would like it on the record that, when she accepted the job, she didn't know that the Librarian had to do so much bloody politics. She could be out healing the sick, like Natan in his day. She would love to be out healing the sick. Instead, she's in one of the innumerable studies of Hush House, searching for a book for Hokobald, even though she wishes dearly that she could toss him out on his shiny arse. She doesn't mind helping out Yvette, or Arun, or really most of the others. It's just Hokobald in particular who should really go fuck himself. But it is her duty to remain strictly neutral, and she takes that duty seriously. So she'll find his damned book, and watch like a hawk while he reads it. And should he happen to violate that neutrality himself, well, she might have a few things in her pockets to introduce him to. (Swaddled Thunder isn't casual to make, nor the Rubywise Ruin in case of violence. But she's made them enough to feel they're replaceable, at least.)
Luto is pretty sure that some of the stuff Ridaya is saying is different from how Zan or Uma would explain this stuff?
...thinking about it just makes her want to cry, though.
Eternal damnation, eternal reward. How the Solar Church would have loved that.
"Loving and doing things for gods is not... good," she says. "Not all of the time. Not most of the time. The people who love the gods are sad and hurting. But they chose it."
She nods. "I think - devils, demons, and deamons are really really not okay, and will probably never be okay. But... I have talked to angels and azata and agathions and aeons, and they were all... doing okay? Not sad, not hurting, doing things because they want them."
Hmm, how to put it... "I think that... when those kinds of outsiders do what a God wants, it is because they think they want what the God wants, and that the God can see how to get it better. And... I think they are usually right? Gods give mortals God-magic*, when the mortals want and do things that those Gods like" oh wait she should explain alignment!
She circles the top line of the tic-tac-toe board with her illusion and points. "The word for this is Good-aligned**. And... Good-aligned Gods give mortals God-magic for doing things like - healing the sick, helping those in need, saving people from each other, or disasters, or other people who want to harm them. And people who also want those things tend to go to the Good-aligned outer planes, and become outsiders there." Hopefully that makes sense?
*: when talking about magic before, Ridaya sometimes used a modifier word that Sophie didn't have any other context for. Here, she's using a different one, which via the grammar rules of this language is clearly related to the word for Gods.
**: 'Good' is the word for good (as the opposite of bad, thumbs-up emoji, etc etc), but with a proper-noun/specific-concept marker
How... bizarre? Yet somehow adorable?
"We have no Good gods. Maybe we have some Bad gods, but mostly we have Not-Good Not-Bad gods. Who do not care about helping, but do not care about hurting us."
That sounds horrible?
"...I think that would be... sad, and scary," Ridaya says. "Evil-" (she illusion-circles the lowest line of the tic-tac-toe board and highlights the Lower Planes on the sphere) "-aligned Gods and Evil-aligned outsiders are... very very bad, and make many many problems. Many are badly hurting all the time, themselves."
She circles the middle row. "Not-Good, Not-Evil is NeutralG/E. The NeutralG/E-aligned Gods are..." she shrugs vaguely, her knowledge of religion struggling. "They want and care about things that are not helping all or hurting all, I guess? There is a NeutralG/E-aligned God of merchants and moneychanging" (illusion of a key, in a different color than the outsiders are, goes into the center-left square), a NeutralG/E-aligned God of mountains and winter" (illusion of a snow-capped volcano erupting, center of the grid), and..." hmmm, who is else NeutralG/E...
She was about to remember that!!
"...Pharasma, the God who sorts Souls, is NeutralG/E-aligned." A set of scales goes into the center box, next to the volcano.
(Sophie miiight be getting the impression that although Ridaya is really quite knowledgeable in general, she isn't especially educated on Gods in particular.)
Sophie's used to it. People specialize, because they have to. Even she has to specialize, to an extent! That extent is reduced by her mystical bond to the most powerful library in western Europe, but she isn't omniscient!
"We have about three dozen. They care about things like snakes, or doorways, or when people eat people. Not things like merchants."
She tilts her head in thought. "I think we have Gods that care about all of those things, but not... only those things? And I don't remember which, I'm not -" (her face twists and her voice catches) "- our Gods-knowing person, that was..."
"I could have helped," Sophie mutters. "Would you like a weapon, Ridaya. Would you like to talk about what to do, Ridaya. Would you like to see if I can make your friend be here like I can make tea, Ridaya."
Then she looks at Sophie, eyes wide, having processed what she just said. "Can you? Bring them back?"
"No! That is stupid! But so is going back to where she was burning to death! And so is calling her a coward for not doing that! Everyone is stupid!"
She looks crushed at the 'no', like she's about to say something when Sophie (incorrectly) calls Ridaya stupid, and like a wilting plant when she (correctly) calls Luto stupid, because, augh, yeah.
"-I didn't mean it," she says quietly, miserably, like it could fix anything.
After a beat, she remembers that she should also say "-she didn't go back, though. She - she wouldn't. I - think she's just calming down. She - she hates being angry at any of us." Even when I deserve it, she doesn't add, but she's not trying to hide that she thinks it, either.
"I will believe you when I see her. Ugh. I thought, learn the language first, no one is going anywhere – no! Stupid! I know enough language! Where are we!"
She gets up to examine the walls for doors.
A stone square room, twenty feet to each side. There's doors on the north and south sides, though they don't look like they've been opened recently.
On the other side of the thick door, she's panting, shaking, trying not to scream.
She hears Luto scream her name. She ignores it.
Coward. Coward. Coward. The sound of it echoes in her mind.
It's stupid, is what it is. So what if Ridaya has one more teleport prepared today? Taking them back in this condition would kill them both, or all three of them if Sophie wanted to commit suicide with them, and for what? Because Luto feels guilty for not parrying the dragon? He was enormous! Ridaya doesn't think all five of them could have beat him well-rested!
So why - why does it hurt so much - why can't she breathe
Sophie shoves a cup of tisane into her hand.
"Drink the tea. Slowly. Think about the tea. Not about your problems."
She accepts the drink with a cowed nod. "Sorry."
Siiiiip. Focus on the tea, not - focus on the tea, focus on the tea,
Sophie retreats back into the room and sits down again.
"Sorry for shouting. We will talk when everyone is calm."