orations. Dark-Grays often served as Constables or Procurators for the Curia. Phaethon knew nothing about Ynought.
Viridimagus Solitarie (or a reconstruction of him) was present as a representative of the defunct Green Scholum, all the more noticeable because he had no mansion but was projecting himself through a rented public intellect, an ordinary-looking man in dark trousers and a long emerald coat. He stood out, because he was the only plain-dressed man on this side of the chamber. The Green School had been the primi-tivists (if such a thing could be imagined) among the manor-born. If Viridimagus continued that tradition, he would surely disapprove of any innovations, would call star colonization an abomination, and urge a harsh sentence.
A throng of Black Manorials, from Darksplatter House, Grue House, Inyourface House, and Out House, and a dozen other Petty Houses and part-mansions of the Black School crowded the higher bench at the back of the chamber. They were dressed in splendid clothing, black tuxedoes and sable velvet gowns, but had all disfigured themselves with diseases or birth defects common to the Victorian era. Their most famous member was Asmodius Bohost Clamour of Clamour House, who had represented himself in a grotesquely obese body, at least four hundred pounds mass. His black coat was the size of a tent, and jeweled buttons strained along the circumference of a vast globular waistcoat. Asmodius Bohost would urge public humiliation, and the Feast of Insults, or the punishment known as Excrementation, but not exile. The Black Mansions loved mockery and confrontation, and never voted for exile, which (because it required them to ignore their victims) caused them agonies of boredom.
In the front row, the Silver-Grays were represented by Agamemnon XIV of Minos House, Nausicaa Burner-of- Ships from Aeceus House, and, of course, Helion of Rhadamanthus
House.
Even Helion was frozen in the time stop. Phaethon had been hoping to catch his father's eye, and maybe find a smile
or look of encouragement there; but Helion, true to his character, had not granted himself an exception to the strict protocol that formed the dreamscape rules here.
And that was the body of the College of Hortators. In disgust, Phaethon shut off the game-theory routine he was running. He did not need an advanced intellectual savant process to guess the outcome here. By his count, two manorials of the White School might vote for leniency; and Helion might, but only if he wished to scuttle his hopes for a Peerage and ruin his own future. Ironically, Phaethon could expect his greatest support (if it could be called that) from the Black Manorials, who would vote to keep Phaethon out of exile so that they could mock and torment him.
As for the others, possibly Kes Satrick Kes would support him. Maybe. The Warlocks might do anything. Everyone else in the chamber either disliked him mildly or hated him thoroughly.
What made the matter all the more confusing and unpredictable was the way in which the Hortators' votes were weighed. Nebuchednezzar was designed to estimate the social influence each Hortator would have by estimating how each and every member of the Golden Oecumene would react to that Hortator's particular urging. (Nebuchednezzar had memory space enough to know every mind of every citizen throughout the entire solar system quite intimately.) Thus, the same Hortator might have different voting weight with different issues, or at different times. Kes Satrick Kes, for example, represented a constituency whom he could always and predictably influence, on every issue; on the other hand, Asmodius Bohost's voting weight changed daily, even hourly. When it came to political opinions, Asmodius Bohost was ignored by his constituency, but, on matters of fashion, his vote would have much greater weight, since all the Black Manorials took their cue from him.
Phaethon turned his eyes forward.
Facing him across the expanse of the chamber, on a dais, seated on a throne beneath a canopy, was Nebuchednezzar Sophotech, represented as the Speaker of the Parliament, in
brilliant robes of scarlet trimmed with ermine, wearing a sash and medallion of office, and with a long white wig draping his head and shoulders, with the jeweled mace of office across
his knees.
In front of Nebuchednezzar, on lower chairs before the dais, facing Phaethon, were three more figures, the Master Hortators, one from history, one from reality, one from fiction.
On the left was Socrates, who stood for the Noble Lie on which all society is based, a cup of hemlock resting on the arm of his chair. Opposite him, was Emphyrio, who stood for the Truth, he whose voice calmed the anger of monsters sent to destroy him. His book of truth was in his lap. A bloodstained executioner's brain spike rested on the chair arm near his fingers. In the center, to balance these two opposites, was Neo-Orpheus the Apostate, pale skinned and sunken eyed, garbed in somber colors. He held, as if it were a scepter, the flail meant to separate the wheat from the chaff, true from
untrue.
Neo-Orpheus was the 128th iteration of Orpheus Avernus, the cofounder of the College; but, unlike the other emanations of the mind of Orpheus, he was one who refused to accept the reimposition of his original template. He became legally independent from the original Orpheus, downloaded into a physical body, and rejected the Aeonite School; but he later accepted employment as the emissary and factotum of the original Orpheus. It was rumored that the real success of Orpheus, and also his Peerage, were due to the original and creative work of Neo-Orpheus the Apostate; and that the original Orpheus was just a figurehead.
Their gazes met. With a shock, Phaethon realized that Neo-Orpheus was not time-frozen. The pale-faced Master was sitting still, patiently sitting and watching him, his eyes burning like sullen coals.
Phaethon straightened. Perhaps he should not have been surprised. Neo-Orpheus had so much prestige that he could ignore any and every social convention, and override Helion's protocols blithely.
Neo-Orpheus spoke. His voice was thin and cold, as if a sheet of ice were speaking: 'Phaethon has miscounted. The White Manorials dismiss his vision of star travel as madness, prompted by emotion; and the Black Manorials know Phaethon's reputation for stoic indifference would rob their sadism of all zest. The Warlocks will be persuaded by Peer Ao Aoen that, since the sun is in Leo, and since Pluto, if it still existed, would have been in syzygy with Earth at this time, the omens decree the harshest of penalties. The exile will be permanent.'
Phaethon realized that, with Orphic wealth at his command, Neo-Orpheus could have hired the entire Boreal Overmind to run a prediction program, and guess Phaethon's every thought with near-telepathic accuracy. But why was Neo-Orpheus bothering?
'What it is you want of me, Master Hortator?'
Neo-Orpheus spoke without inflection: 'Commit suicide. This will save us all from embarrassment and mild
