Rod nodded, chagrined. "Probably right, too. Well, catch me in a good mood and tell me what you're thinking. Okay, son? I'd really like to know."

Magnus smiled with warm amusement. "Canst thou truly say thou wilt regard it as the confidence of a friend, and not seek to correct thy son in the error of his ways?"

Rod was silent for a few steps.

Then, finally, he nodded. "Yes. If that's what it will take to find out what my son really believes-yes. If you'll remember that my silence doesn't mean I approve or agree, I promise I'll just listen, and not try to talk you into seeing the truth."

"And show no sign of the hurt thou wilt feel?" Magnus shook his head. "Nay, my sire. I know not if I can find the willingness to wound thee."

Rod sighed. "Okay, let's try. Tell me your honest opinion of the governmental setup in this village."

"I cannot, for I have none yet-or rather, none that I trust. I have seen a raging priest, and cruel-hearted nuns, and a lass who chafes at the bonds of authority-but do not all, of her age?"

"Not . . ." Rod caught himself, and bit his tongue.

Magnus smiled. "Not all, thou wouldst say? Well, mayhap not. Yet, past that, I know not how the folk of the village feel about their spurious bishop."

"Well, I do-not a complete survey, you understand, just a brief sampling of public opinion, as heard by a tinker. But from what I can tell, most of them are quite happy with this arrangement. I'm sure there must be a few malcontents, such as that suicide who was buried yesterday morning and, probably, his father. . . ." A shadow crossed his face; he forced it past, and continued. "But most of them seem quite content to take orders from the priests and live their lives according to their version of the Bible. They don't even mind the priest yelling insults at them from the pulpit-they all want to know how unworthy they are, because that increases their chances of getting into Heaven."

Magnus shuddered. "Why, what a perverted catechism is this, that doth preach heresies as Holy Writ and perceiveth not its own hypocrisies!"

"Most people don't-that's why the real Church teaches that you have to be constantly examining your conscience."

" 'The unexamined life is not worth living'? " Magnus smiled. "The early Church fathers had been reading their Plato, had they not?"

"You disagree with the sentiments?"

Magnus shook his head. "At the least, the Church doth admire sound logic. This `bishop' careth only for that which hath a good feel inside him."

"Glad you said 'inside'-that poor teenager who got lambasted for being jealous about his girlfriend this morning sure didn't think the outside felt too good." Magnus gave him a sharp look, but he plowed ahead. "That kind of hypocrisy, I can't stand-preaching charity and love, then turning around and humiliating someone in public."

Magnus hated it, too, but hearing it from his father some how made him bridle and come to the nuns' defense, even though he thought very little of them. "There must be discipline in any social group, my father."

"Discipline, yes-but it can be administered without hatred, or pleasure in the victim's suffering. I don't have too much respect for someone who preaches love and understanding, and nurses a grudge at the same time. Needless to say, I'm sure that young man is one of the malcontents."

"I should think that he is," Magnus admitted. "Yet the bulk of them seem to see no conflict betwixt the preaching and the practice."

"None at all. It's as though they have two compartments in their minds-the one for `religion' and the other for 'practical necessities'-and they never see any conflict in living by both precepts. The `Church is fine, but business is business' mentality."

"Did not Christ speak to that? Summat about not letting the left hand know what the right hand doeth?"

"Which may come naturally to most people, but it's one hell of a way to play the piano. Yes, but you see-you're cheating. You've read the Book."

"Which these people have not," Magnus mused. "They have but heard as much of it as their priests do wish to tell them."

"There is that problem, yes. In addition to which, I'm not at all sure the local copy of the Bible is the same one the Church is using."

Magnus looked up, frowning. "Do not these people believe themselves to be Catholic?"

"Good question-and I asked it. The answer is, no, they think they're just generic Christians. Of course, that doesn't mean anything-anyone in Europe would have said the same thing, before the Reformation. But when I asked them if the Pope is infallible, they all said `Yes, and the Bishop speaks for the Pope.' "

"I wonder an His Holiness doth know of it," Magnus murmured.

"I have my doubts. In fact, when we get out of this forest, I'm half a mind to hunt up the Abbot of the Order of St. Vidicon and rat on them."

"To tell the Abbot, so that he may send a score of monks to convince this audacious prelate of the error of his ways?" Magnus looked up, scandalized. "Surely thou wouldst not, my father!"

Now it was Rod's turn to be confounded. "Why not?"

"For that thou hast said thyself that the bulk of these people are content with this form of government, and the monks would surely unseat this bishop. Worse!" His eyes widened at a sudden, horrible thought. "When they sought to, the bishop would claim that he is the Abbot's peer, and would set his people to warring 'gainst the monks!"

"Then they would leave, and come back with soldiers." Rod nodded, face grim. "Yes, there is that little problem. But I can't let him go on tyrannizing these people, can I?"

"Dost thou not truly believe the self-determination thou dost preach?"

"Not as thoroughly as you do, apparently-but, yes, I still think I do. On the other hand, there's the little matter of his brutalizing the ones who don't agree with him."

"Like that poor wreck of a father we saw yestermorn?"

"Well, yes, I was kind of thinking of him. But there was that boy at the school, and that girl Hester from the tavern, whom he's obviously in love with."

Magnus's face hardened. "And where there are so many as that, there may well be more. Yet should not the majority rule?"

Rod opened his mouth to answer, but realized the implications, and left his mouth open while he did some quick rethinking.

Magnus watched, managing to keep his face politely grave.

"Yes," Rod said finally, "but that doesn't mean the majority have the right to act as tyrants over the minorities."

"The tyranny of the majority." Magnus nodded. "Thou hast spoke of that before, and Fess hath taught me of it. Alexis de Tocqueville, was it not?"

"Still is-and I suspect Fess also taught you the counter to it." He certainly had taught Rod, repeatedly.

"Aye-that such tyranny is balanced by the individual's rights inborn. Yet those who dislike this bishop's rule are free to leave, are they not?"

"I certainly didn't get that impression, from that funeral sermon-if you can call that diatribe a sermon."

"I did not," Magnus murmured.

"I know-I did. But maybe we should talk to the object of that sermon, before we make any firm conclusions about the rightness of this nasty little theocracy they've got here."

"'Tis most assuredly a theocracy, as the word hath come to be used-a rule by the priests," Magnus countered. "But it most assuredly is not what the word doth mean literally-a government by God."

"No-the proper term is hierarchy, rule by the sacred-but that has come to mean only a social status-order." Rod shook his head in amazement. "And people say semantics doesn't matter! Come on, son, let's find that bereaved parent!"

Magnus halted. "By your leave, my father, I find I've little stomach for that."

"Why?" Rod looked up. "Don't want to put your ideas to the test?"