Phantom: Chainfire Trilogy Part 2

Her watery gaze hesitantly drifted to Richard. He knew. He had been there. He knew what it was like.

"I was redeemed," she whispered in a broken voice, "but it was far from easy."

Jebra looked encouraged by what Richard knew was no real encouragement. "But it worked for you," she said, "so maybe it will work for others."

"She is different from most of those under the spell of the Order," Richard said as he gazed into Nicci's blue eyes, eyes that betrayed the naked emotion of how much he meant to her. "She was driven by a need to understand, to know, if what she had been taught to believe was true or if there was more to life, if there was something worth living for.

"Most of those taught by the Order have no such doubts. They block out those kinds of questions and instead tenaciously cling to their beliefs."

"But what makes you think that they won't change?" Jebra didn't look ready to abandon the thread of hope. "If Nicci changed, then why can't others?"

Still gazing into Nicci's eyes, Richard said, "I think they're able to block out any doubt in what they believe because they've internalized their indoctrination, no longer viewing it as specific ideas that have been drilled into them. They begin to experience the ideas they've been taught as feelings, which evolve into powerful emotional conviction. I think that's the trick to the process. They are convinced within their own minds that they are experiencing original thought rather than those discrete ideas that have been taught to them as they grew up."

Nicci cleared her throat as she looked away from Richard's gaze and turned her attention once more to Jebra.

"I think Richard is right. I was aware of that very thing within my own thinking, aware of that inner conviction that was actually born of a carefully crafted manner of instruction.

"Some people who secretly value their lives will join in a revolt if they can see that there is a realistic chance to win — that's what happened in Altur'Rang — but if there isn't that chance then they know that they must repeat the words that the followers of the Order want to hear or risk losing their most valuable possession: life. Under the Order's rule, you believe as they teach you, or you die. It's as simple as that.

"There are people in the Old World working to join together those who will revolt, working to set the fires of freedom for those who want to seize an opportunity to control their own destiny. So there are those who truly want a chance at freedom and will act to gain it. Jagang, too, knows of such efforts and has sent troops to crush those revolts. But I also know only too well that most of the people of the Old World would never willingly cast off their beliefs; they see doing so as sinful. They will work to ruthlessly crush any uprising. If need be, they will cling to their faith right into their graves. The ones — "

Shota irritably lifted a hand, cutting Nicci off. "Yes, yes, some will, some won't. Many wiffle-waffle. It doesn't matter. Hoping for a revolt is pointless. It's just idle wishing for salvation to arrive out of the blue.

"The legions of soldiers from the Old World are here, now, in the New World, so it's the New World that we must worry about, not the Old World and what the mood for revolt might or might not be. The Old World, for the most part, believes in the Order, supports the Order, and encourages the Order to conquer the rest of the world."

Shota glided forward, directing a meaningful look at Richard. "The only way for civilization to survive is to send the invading soldiers of the Order through that doorway to their longed-for eternity in the world of the dead. There is no redeeming those whose minds are lost to beliefs they are eager to die for. The only way to stop the Order and their teachings is to kill enough of them that they can't continue."

"Pain does have a way of changing people's minds," Cara said.

Shota gave the Mord-Sith a nod of approval. "If they come to truly understand without any doubt that they will not win, that their efforts will lead to certain death, then perhaps some will abandon their belief and cause. It very well could be that despite their faith in the teachings of the Order, few of (hem actually, deep down inside, really want to die to test it.

"But what of it? Does that really matter to us? What we do know is that a great many really are so fanatical that they welcome death. Hundreds of thousands have already died, proving that they really are willing to make that sacrifice. The rest of these men must be killed or they will kill us all and doom the rest of the world to a long, grinding descent into savagery.

"That is what we face. That is the reality of it."

CHAPTER 16

Shota turned a hot look on Richard. "Jebra has shown you what will happen at the hands of these soldiers if you don't stop them. Do you think those men entertain any rational notions of the meaning of their lives? Or that they might join in a revolt against the Order if given a chance? Hardly.