Able went back up to the municipal the next morning. Lark was still laid up, but Splendor Hatling was fussing over him, and that had managed to get him through many years of his life so Able needn't concern himself. Really needed to not concern himself.
The wind coming in from the sea was so strong it actually made the climb up the hill easier, but also made Able's hair whip him in the eyes. He should have tried trimming that too. Once in the shelter of the hall, he did his best to brush it out and back on the way to Prudent Nightwatch's office.
The old man looked up from a sheaf of papers on his desk. "Houser. I thought you had left town."
"I did, but I am back for now."
"I'm afraid I don't have anything for you to do, although..." The mayor leaned back in his chair and looked thoughtfully along his cabinets.
"I am happy for any work you can give me, but that's not why I came."
"Oh?"
"I realized I was being dense. You see, here I am searching haphazardly for records of this region's history, when all along the very first person I talked to when I landed is probably the one with an extensive collection of such books, am I right, Mayor of Three Hundred Years of Civilized History?"
"I see." Nightwatch bit on his smile as he looked down on his desk then flipped to the next page in the stack. "Yes, I may have a book or two you may wish to borrow, but I warn you they are all Dagobari authors, and I know Larbants don't much tolerate their philosophies."
"Are you kidding?" Able had to laugh. "I'd have no education without Dagobari authors. I'm particularly taken with the works of Thymehill and Cobbler."
"The moral skeptics, I see." Nightwatch arched his eyebrow high. "I should have known from your cold gaze."
"Oh no!" Able groaned, though he was thrilled at the reference. "You're in the camp of Eastrise, are you? So much for building rapport..."
Nightwatch shrugged. "What rapport might I build with someone whose head is up their ass about ethics?"
"Hey, my finding the logical consistency of their arguments satisfactory doesn't mean I won't agree to abide by whatever you consider ethical, or whatever ethics the culture considers absolute, but you must admit that, whatever those rules are, they will have no universal origin."
"No, every culture—every culture recognizes one rule: do not do to another that which is hateful to you. This only splinters when you begin to add the 'except when's."
"You may not be wrong, but you have to admit philosophy's greatest failing is that it has found no rational foundation that can support moral claims the way the mathematics and sciences have through numbers and method to support their—"
"So far up your ass."
"That's—" but Able reined in his argument and tried laughing it off instead. "That's fair enough. I'm looking for histories, anyway." And it would be a greater setback to lose access to them than to lose this debate.
"If you can help me get my tasks done," the mayor offered, "we can take an early lunch at my home, where said books are."
Nightwatch's home turned out to be a double-story affair on the high end of the city overlooking the sea. Most of the rooms were closed and boarded up, but he had kept the room with the best view as his personal study. The kitchen was on the ground floor, sparsely stocked and chilly. Nightwatch stirred the embers in the stove and added new logs.
"You live alone?" Able surmised.
"Never married," Nightwatch confirmed dispassionately, "and my nephews, whom my poor brother left in my care after a hard fight with an illness, both died in the war." He set about making lunch.
"I imagine the taxes are hard to manage."
"Bona fide ridiculous is what they are, but at this time I can still manage them. Helps that I don't worry about the commerce side of it with my line of work."
"Why stay? Why not go back to Dagobar and not worry about any of this, since it's just you and relocating—"
"I'm sorry, 'back'?" Nightwatch scowled.
"I uh..." Able stalled, then simply admitted, "I assumed you were a Westerman, from your name and education."
Nightwatch was unmoved. "What I am is a Borealunder. Born here, like my parents before me. This is my home."
Able held his hands up. "I'm sorry I struck a nerve. I'm still, uh, learning. Have a lot to learn."
Nightwatch just shook his head and put the kettle on the stove. "I didn't realize Lark Miles of all people was a Separatist. But he does practice Spirits, so I suppose—"
"I don't think he is," Able moved to clarify. "I was, well, the history I've gleaned thus far was mostly from talking with Heedful Fairweather."
"Ahaaa, that makes sense." Nightwatch flagrantly rolled his eyes. "What did she tell you, that Dagobar staged a hostile takeover of the region by allowing the people here to elect officials who then themselves voted to join the empire?"
"Something along those lines. I've been going through the vote records up in Aimsby. I think you're right in that, while not ideal, the council wasn't abnormally corrupt."
"Therefore, as much as the Separatists hate to admit it, most people wanted to join."
"At least half, I'd guess, but..." Able rolled his own eyes back and tried to walk the progression of councilors through his mind, knowing them by nothing other than how they cast their votes. "...actually, even with a conservative margin of error, your uh, non-Separatists would have been the majority. I don't suppose any of your books profile the councilors since the founding of the National Council?"
"I have two that do that." Nightwatch exhaled, the fire settling back into his belly. He made his way around the kitchen, preparing their lunch in silence. Well, that wouldn't do. He had a lot to say when he was angry.
"But supposing," Able started, "as one side might claim of the other, that there was a system in place to ensure that the winning side was over-represented in the process, I mean more than you might suspect, how could that have been accomplished?"
Nightwatch stopped stirring the ingredients he had put into the bowl. Anger sparked, at least. He resumed his stirring with more deliberation than before. "You are, of course, referring to Separatist claims that Dagobari men deliberately targeted Native women with the intent of 'breeding' Native people into submission."
"She didn't frame it like that, quite."
"Then she has mellowed in her old age. Both my grandmothers were Native women, and both spent their adult lives harassed by their neighbors for the crime of loving a man with Western ancestry, one of which, I should mention, was also born here. My parents spent their childhoods plagued with taunts that they were illegitimate somehow or a scourge on our nation. Well, the Separatists can bitch and moan about it, but it turns out that sort of behavior was distasteful to most Borealunders, didn't it?
"Or perhaps not, as now we have 'half-bants', referring to children usually under the age of ten, they're hating on this way. Never mind we've had 'half-bants' like your friend Lark hither and thither for near a century all up the coast. That doesn't matter to these people. They just need someone to blame." Certainly, his pot was well-stirred by this point.
Able nodded to show, well, at least some understanding. "So, in your opinion, it is more likely that the Separatists hurt their cause with these tactics than actually had so many people to target with them?"
"I..." The mayor paused to note that he hadn't moved on to the next step of his recipe and shelved his anger to continue more professionally. "We don't actually keep track of who is 'Native' or not in any formal way, so I can't give you a statistic basis, but as I just said—"
"That distinction is highly subjective and not actually useful," Able quickly finished to show better understanding. "What of education, then? You could argue that the propagation of ideas out-paces that of organisms anyway. Children could have been enticed into ideology by people other than their parents."
"Implausible. Children only gained widespread access to the Dagobari education system as a result of joining the empire, therefore it could not have played a significant role."
"All right." Able leaned against the counter. "So, in your books at least, I should find nothing to support her claims."
"Of course not." He put his concoction on the fire and began to nod his approval until something stopped him cold. "...have you found something that does?"
"No, don't worry." Although it would be nice to back-up Fairweather's story about the threats against Grace Hawking, if nothing more than to justify the time he'd spent looking into the ancient woman's claims. And to not feel so foolishly credulous.
But that evening, as he settled into the bed in the dead woman's room with his selected tomes, he found he needn't have worried. Several of the councilors that shared seats with Hawking were patently vicious players of politics, and Hawking was one of several members that leveled accusations about them to a court that the text itself described as "ineffectual."
Able spent the evening reading the first book, the morning doing some work for the mayor, and the afternoon engaging him in conversation about what he had read. That evening he began reading the second book. As the factual details piled up, it became clear that Fairweather's subjective interpretation of the events was equally valid to Nightwatch's. And predictably, Able developed his own. If the fires fueled Aimsby's fight, the allure of peacetime made them want to put their troubles to bed, their principles negotiable when they could stave off further sacrifice and suffering. Not all fights can be won.