"You're talented, Waden Jenks, and you're constantly deprecating your own abilities, which makes you a liar, a slave, or a coward."
"Which am I?"
"Liar," Herrin said with the arch of a brow. "Because subtlety is a part of your talent for control. You are yourself capable of flattery; you flatter me. And of being invisible as the invisibles themselves. You are hated, because you stay here and others don't know what your talent is. You're the one they've never devised a class to instruct, but you take the whole University for your classroom."
Waden smiled and sipped at his beer, gestured toward him with the mug and set it down between them. "It is. It was created by the First Citizen to be that, do you see?"
"To gather sufficient talents together to provide a classroom for the heir to the State."
"Exactly so."
Herrin was thoroughly amazed; the possibilities ran at foundation level of all assumptions in the University. "By gathering the greatest minds and talents in the world in one place, under one set of instructors, under the eye of the First Citizen himself—and by the shaping of those talents—"
"To shape the course of the world."
"And by observing and learning them, to know potential rivals—"
Waden's grin became wider and wider. "Most exactly. You don't disappoint me, Herrin. I thought you would understand when your suspicions were jogged. I am delighted."
"And I am in danger."
"A key to successful manipulation is the dispensing of information. Had you stumbled on this thought unobserved, who knows what actions you might take? I am in potential danger. Hence this conversation. Do you feel threatened?"
Herrin sat back. "So you thought that I was on the verge of discovering this for myself."
"You have been steadily approaching that point, yes. I shall surmise, Herrin, that right now you're more than threatened, you are offended."
"I reserve judgment."
"It's an observed fact, is it not, that when adults want privacy and peace they dismiss the infants to the nursery, shut the door on them; that there's a certain amount of juvenile development that has to take place on that basis."
"The University."
"My father knows the hazard I am to him. Knows my talent, although when he began this project he was willing to have seen me destroyed, had I been weak. Indeed, the University he created would have devoured me—had I been weak. Had I failed, he would have selected the most apt as his successor."
"Myself, perhaps."
Waden laughed, picked up the mug, gestured with it before drinking. "I have no doubt it would have been you, none. But do you know, the older I grew, the more my father was certain that eugenics in my case had paid off. Oh, there are failures, a dozen little bastards farmed out and totally useless . . . I'll never threaten them because there's no need. I could swallow them whole. No, the older I became, I'll wager, the more Cade Jenks realized the sensible course was to occupy me. Had he seen to my upbringing, I'd have devoured him. No, instead, he sent me to the nursery—to University, collected this entire den of ravening and powerful intellects and set me out in it naked and unarmed but by wit. Survival of the fittest."
"So he has no prejudice for or against your survival."
"None. None. He simply wants to keep me here as long as possible, because on the day I emerge from this chrysalis, his existence is threatened. He knows that he can't keep power away from me. For one thing because of our kinship and my access to the Residency. He'll surrender his office, being pragmatic and having a strong wish to live. Indeed, he's intelligent enough to know that the world will benefit from the exchange, that the wisest course for him is to provide me the benefit of his experience and to step quietly out of my way. But that's in the future. I'm only beginning to do that other thing which the University makes possible."
"To remove rivals?"
Waden shook his head. "I have no rivals. There's not a one here I can't manipulate or intimidate beyond any possibility of harm; I know the University. Those stupid enough to despise me . . . are the most easily handled. Pride is useful only with those whose opinion we value, is it not? I don't value theirs. No, I'm gathering forces. Persons whose talents are not rival, but complementary to my own. You, for instance, an artist. Do you know, Herrin, that you are the one person in University to whom I shall admit these things frankly? You're the one mind, the one being who might rival me, if our talents were not, as they are, complementary. You create. Your supposition is correct, mat my talent is not creative; so I seek out one which is."
"No. On the contrary, you've simply delivered yourself to my search, Waden Jenks."
Waden considered a moment, and his eyes danced. "Oh, marvelous! This conversation is worth all the years in this dreary place. Do you know, for the first time I feel I'm talking with someone, with a mind quick enough to answer me."
"And you wonder if you can manipulate it."
The grin became wider. "Absolutely. Ah, Herrin, Herrin, you're a delight. As you're wondering can you use me, and which of us is likely to survive. I have native advantages."
"Indeed you do. Which argue that I should go cautiously. Likewise there were contradictions in your arguments that suggest a silent assumption."
"Were there?" Waden's smile was ingenuous.
"What do you suppose of me?"
"That you have ambitions. That they're artistic in foundation, as anything would be that passed through that intellect! of yours; but that they may not be limited to the creation of superlative statues, the inner vision made exterior, no. You' have a very strong reality, and the grasp of a generalist So am I, a generalist of sorts. I know how to respect one."
"You are a superlative generalist. You do what I do, but having captured the vision internal to each field, you store it, against need. And you will have power, Waden, indeed I believe it. I know that my talent doesn't lie in political manipulation."
"No, indeed, your hubris surpasses mine."
"Philosophy argues that hubris doesn't exist."
"But it does. There are offenses against the State."
"I purpose nothing against the State."
"No, your ambition is far greater."
"Then you know what it is."
"I know. It's Reality itself, isn't it? To impose your internal vision on all of Freedom. Herrin's reality. Herrin's perceptions. I believe you when you say you were searching. That you plan to use me. And I you. We balance one another. If I let you loose, if I let you perceive these things in your own time, Herrin Law, you might ally with some lesser talent, and you would either steer that talent against me, or you would be warped out of your true possibility. I offer you more than any other could: to be at the top, to have full scope for your ambitions. That's the business of a good ruler—to see that the best and strongest function to the fullest. I shall give you what you want; and you'll provide me the security of knowing you aren't inspiring some secondary talent to rise against me. That's what to do with complementary talents, Herrin, give them scope."