At All Costs

He turned to gaze at the Archbishop once more, and there, too, he found the alien mingled with the utterly familiar. He recognized Telmachi's personal faith, and his genuine welcome, and Sullivan had deliberately immersed himself in studies of comparative theology since Grayson had been wrenched into the galactic mainstream. He saw in Telmachi the current heir to an apostolic succession stretching clear back to the dawn-the source-of their shared faith in God. And yet, Telmachi's spiritual authority was far less than his own. His Church had seen its uncontested primacy broken long before Man ever left Old Earth, and it had come to terms with that. It had evolved, survived, reached out to the stars along with a multiplicity of other religious beliefs and ways of thought which would have been totally bewildering to any Grayson. In many ways, he knew, Telmachi was far more... cosmopolitan then he himself was, but was that strength, or was it weakness? And in Telmachi, did Sullivan see the Reverends of Grayson's future?

That lay in God's hands, the Reverend told himself. One of the cardinal elements of the New Way, perhaps the cardinal element, was the belief that the book was never closed, never ended. God was infinite; Man's understanding was not. And so, there would always be more for Man to learn, more for God to teach him, and as the doctrine of the Test taught, it was best to pay attention to one's lessons, whatever the form in which they might come.

Like his visit here, today.

"Actually, Archbishop," he said, "you're right. I see Monsignor Davidson's description of your own intelligence was accurate. I do have many pressing and completely valid reasons, as Father Church's spiritual head, for meeting with as many Manticoran religious leaders as possible. For almost a thousand years, Grayson has been effectively a theocracy-a closed theocracy. Given our doctrines, our people have tended, by and large, to see the opening of the doors of our temple, as it were, as yet another of God's Tests. There's been some friction, but less, I suspect, than there would have been on almost any other planet under similar circumstances.

"Still, as we've become more and more integrally involved with the Star Kingdom on a secular level, the influx of foreigners with their very foreign belief structures has swelled steadily. I see no reason to believe that tendency will reverse itself, and so I think it's probably past time Father Church reached out his hand to the Star Kingdom's religious leadership. There will undoubtedly be misunderstandings, or at least points of difference, but we must embrace the religious toleration which has always been a part of the Manticoran tradition. To that end, my visit to Manticore will have great significance for Father Church's members back home on Grayson.

"Yet, while all of that is true, the reason I specifically asked to meet with you had less to do with the fact that you are, whether you choose to admit it or not, what I suppose I might think of as the senior member of the Manticoran religious establishment, than it did with a pastoral concern."

"Pastoral." Telmachi smiled. "Let me see," he murmured. "Now, what could it possibly be about? Hmmmm.... Could it be something to do with Steadholder Harrington and certain members of my own flock?"

"Monsignor Davidson didn't do you justice, Your Grace," Sullivan said with an answering smile.

"It wasn't very difficult to guess, Your Grace," Telmachi replied. "Especially not in light of Dame Honor's stature on Grayson and the rather poisonous commentary of one of our less than scintillating examples of journalistic professionalism. Of course, the fact that she's neither Catholic nor a member of the Church of Humanity Unchained does leave both of us in rather a gray area where she's concerned."

"She may not be a daughter of Father Church," Sullivan said quietly, his eyes level, "but of my own experience, I can tell you she is most certainly a daughter of God. I'll be honest with you and admit that nothing would give me greater joy than to have her embrace Father Church, but this is one woman for whose soul I feel no concern at all."

"That accords well with my own impression of her," Telmachi said seriously. "I believe she's a Third Stellar?"

"She is. Which presents me with something of a problem, since the Third Stellars appear to have no organized hierarchy in the sense your Church or mine does."

"The Third Stellars are actually rather like I suppose the Church of Humanity might have turned out without a firmly established hierarchy," Telmachi said. "When the representatives of all their congregations meet for their General Convocation every three T-years, they elect a leadership for the Convocation, and also the membership of a Coordinating Committee to function between Convocations, but each congregation-and each individual member of each congregation-is personally responsible for his or her relationship with God. I'm on quite good terms with several of their clergy, and one of them compared their General Convocation to an exercise in herding treecats."

Sullivan chuckled at the image, and Telmachi nodded.

"They agree about a great many core doctrines and issues, but beyond those central areas of agreement, there's room for an enormous diversity."

"I'd gathered that impression from my own conversations with Lady Harrington and her parents," Sullivan agreed. "And I believe you're probably correct-the... individualism the Third Stellars encourage does have many resonances with our own doctrine. Indeed, I've often thought that was one of the reasons Lady Harrington's been so comfortable with Father Church, despite our inevitable differences.

"However, the problem to which I referred was my inability to identify some one individual member of the Third Stellar clergy with whom to discuss my concerns. My impression of their doctrine is that it is extremely... inclusive, but I must confess I'm less familiar with it then I could wish."

"If your concerns are what I suspect they are, Your Grace," Telmachi said, "I think you don't need to worry. However, I'd be very happy to suggest two or three of their theologians with whom you might discuss your thoughts."

"I would deeply appreciate that," Sullivan said, bending his head in an abbreviated bow of thanks. "But that, of course, brings me to the reason I specifically needed to meet with you."

"Reverend," Telmachi said with another chuckle, "Mother Church has learned a few lessons of her own over the mille

"So, here you are," Dr. Allison Harrington said severely. "And just what made you think you were going to be allowed to stay at a hotel, if I may ask?"

"The Royal Arms Hilton is scarcely a mere 'hotel,' My Lady," Jeremiah Sullivan replied mildly as he stepped past a solemn Harrington armsman into the foyer of Honor's Jason Bay mansion. He smiled, then bent over her hand and kissed it in approved Grayson style.

"Piffle!" she shot back. "I'll bet it was really just that you pla

The armsman seemed to cringe slightly, obviously awaiting the thunderbolt, but Sullivan only smiled more broadly as her eyes twinkled at him.

"It was the soap, actually, My Lady," he said solemnly.

"I knew it!"

She gurgled a laugh and tucked her arm through his as she escorted him into the house.

"It's good to see you," she said more seriously. "And while I'm sure you really would have been perfectly comfortable at the Royal Arms, Honor and Benjamin would both have wanted my scalp if I'd let you stay there. Besides, I wouldn't have been that happy about it myself."

"Thank you," he said.

"Nonsense." She squeezed his arm tighter, and the laughter in her eyes was momentarily quenched. "I still remember how comforting you were when we all thought Honor was dead."