On our world, a few thousand years ago, there were philosophers who felt that pure thought could arrive at all truths. They were certain that with their minds alone they could deduce everything there was to know about the universe around them. They were, some of them, quite persuasive; people heeded their words and accepted them as fact, since learned men had said so.

I’m not going to go into the details of the physics, for worry that things don’t behave the same way between our universe and the World Tree; such details would only confuse the issue.

But when, much later, people actually sought to test this ancient wisdom – to get past the blockade of “someone hundreds of years ago said so” and learn if they had said right – they were wrong.

Even observational science can go awry. Biologists here spent a while studying the behaviours of animals in the wild. Whenever a pair would mate, even if they were thought to be both male, the assumption would be made that the observation of their gender had been in error; that one was male and the other female, and maybe the female had erroneously developed male coloration or what-have-you. But on closer examination, with more reliable methods of telling the animals apart, even that was overturned.

Sythyry, no amount of pondering can ever be sure to arrive at the facts of the world – and that assumes you are thinking with an open mind to begin with. Your first exposure to the matter, way back when – a conversation you wrote in your own journal, with Dustweed, 27 Thory 4261 – suggested that you might actually be into other Zi Ri as well, if you met one who would be suitable as a paramour. But since you started meeting with other traff deliberately, you haven’t been giving the matter thought, not in anything you’ve noted down – you’ve been telling yourself it’s all one or all the other.

Kantele is closer to the mark too – she referred to the “popular” (read:loudly-proclaimed) notion of traff as being attracted to all and only the other prime species as mythical. Could it happen? Possibly – but that doesn’t make it the norm.

You are faced, here, with a counter-example, and are telling yourself that it can’t possibly be that.

There’s a word for that here, and it’s not a very nice word. There are a few. About the kindest is “denial”. But “denial” is really a specific form of “delusion”.

*-eyes and Lithia are not thinking clearly on this matter. You do neither of them favours with your own opacity of thought.

Consider, at least for a time, the notion that the popular truth is wrong. It has happened before, and it will doubtless happen again.

After all, the popular notion in Eigrach is that you were exiled from Vheshrame and from Ketheria, at best semi-voluntarily, at worst in utter disgrace.

Examine your thoughts. You’re declaring something as invariable truth because it’s been said so. You’re applying it to yourself, not because of experience, but, again, because it’s been said so. If ever another Zi Ri *does* make a pass at you, it’d be a shame to push zir away by habit of thought – and a habit that’s been a century and more in establishing itself can do strange things to the mind and body, and override more natural inclinations.

For another one: Everyone knows Sleeth are fickle, self-serving, cruel half-monsters. But even our treatise includes mention of Sleeth who have stuck to their few, precious friends to the bitter end, when even Cani would scatter(if only to try to regroup and try another way).

You cannot prove, by thought alone, that a thing does not happen. The only way you can “prove” it is by deeming counterexamples irrelevant – just as you are doing here. And that is not proof.

And Doomed-Eyes knows something’s wrong with Lithia — she asked Sythyry about it. Sythyry told her that it’s so bad that there’s nothing more that zie can do about it. A health related issue popping up should *not* be a surprise to her.

Not to mention that contracts aren’t oaths, or vice versa. ‘Sign this contract’ means ‘I don’t trust your current intentions and want legal recourse if you screw me’. ‘Swear this oath’ means ‘I want you bound to this no matter what happens’.

If she was honorable at all, her oath would bind her. She’s not, though — she’s a stowaway and helped Dorze break his contract.