Work Text:
Zeinys stares at the pages spread out across his desk with a weight in his chest. The mystery is solved, and yet his hunger for answers does not feel sated, because now the way ahead is marred by the difficulty of the decision before him. The truth is his, and the truth to all the rest will be what Zeinys makes of it. If he reveals the murderer to be the Provost, all of his work at the University will be lost. His investigation into the Correspondence will be at an end, his career gone, and the answers of those sigils carved into the Bazaar will be out of reach. Even thinking of that makes pangs that are nigh physical. Zeinys is certain that his answers are integral to the Bazaar, the Neath, to all these tidbits that this mystery has led him to learn … he thinks of the Duchess' tale, the letters in the Bazaar's spires, the Masters looking down on him, and those words…look to love. Zeinys thinks of the researcher he heard of recently who went mad trying to communicate with the Sun.
Zeinys' answers are horribly, terribly close. Only a few days ago he woke up in the fountain at the Royal Bethlehem, quite literally treading his way back to clarity, but the answers are there. Zeinys needs them.
He goes to shul, because shul is a place for difficult questions, and Zeinys prays.
It is not, however, that Zeinys expects God to give him any answers. No, if God sees the Neath at all, Zeinys does not expect answers from God. He never has, which is likely for the better, as it has helped his faith to be a comfortable rock in his life as opposed to yet another thing to mindlessly pursue. There are no answers in faith; the rabbis have spent thousands of years on these things and Zeinys knows he cannot do more than them. He did nearly beg to to yeshuva as a boy, but science had always been his place. That was what he hungered for.
"Rabbi," Zeinys calls to the man. "I have a question of ethics for you."
The old man gestures him closer. "Of course, Gershom." The rabbi always seems to remember his name, even when Zeinys does not come often enough. "Tell me."
"I have been engaged to solve a murder…" Zeinys begins hesitantly. "And I have discovered the identity of the murderer. However, if I am to reveal the truth, an important line of research will be forever ended. There is a duty to serve justice … but this research will better lives. The knowledge has great power. Careers of innocents will be ruined if I speak the truth. I do not know what to do."
Zeinys is a liar, but after so long without the Sun, lying to his rabbi is the least of his concerns. His words are only untrue from a particular perspective. This knowledge is needed. It is needed by the Neath, the Bazaar, by London's people — by Zeinys. It does not matter if the career that will end will be his. Why is it unworthy to consider how it will affect him, as if he were not an innocent man trying to serve his society with science? It is only fair.
The rabbi hums thoughtfully. "I can understand why this troubles you. You worry that though you will see a murderer punished, the destructive elements of this reveal will harm others."
"Yes, Rabbi. I know it must sound foolish … to ask whether a murderer should be punished … but believe me that I would struggle if this work was not truly important."
"I believe you, Gershom." The rabbi said with a nod. "I expect you have already considered what i will say next … is it not possible this research may still continue, in a new home?"
"It is not impossible … but it is not likely." Zeinys said with a shake of his head. "It is possible the ruin may mean the researcher will never recover. I may be destroying it forevermore."
"And to destroy knowledge and the opportunity to learn weighs very heavily on your heart."
"It does, Rabbi."
"This murderer may kill again. One life is already a crime, but to let them free risks more lives most certainly."
"Most death is not permanent, here."
"I imagine you would not be wrestling with this dilemna if it was not a permanent death."
Zeinys does not respond, but he's sure his expression says it.
"Do you believe they will kill again?"
If the Provost needed to? "Yes."
"Can anyone else prove this murder?"
"No."
"I think …" The rabbi scratches his beard. "That you may have your answer."
But it is not the answer Zeinys wants. He looks away. "…thank you, Rabbi. I appreciate it."
He leaves shul feeling furious inside for the unfairness of it. But when he stands before the men and women of the University, he points at the Provost.
As predicted, his department is done for, his career in shambles. Zeinys is told in no uncertain terms that he is no longer welcome at the University, neither Sumerset nor Benthic.
He packs his office into boxes and leaves within hours. When the boxes are strewn about the floor of his flat, Zeinys stands amongst them and kicks the nearest, hard, throwing papers around.
Justice makes the heart go hungry, and it is not fair.
Zeinys takes over the observatory next door and recreates his old office at the University, plastering the walls with the letters of the Correspondence. He causes a few fires, that way, but it's his life's work and he needs it. He's in and out of the Forgotten Quarter again, desperate for more artefacts and more answers, but without the University's echoes it is harder and harder to fund expeditions.
When led into the Bazaar side-streets, even more of the Neath is open to him, and Zeinys spends a great deal of time there. Though he has lost the respect he carried as a guest-lecturer at University, he has begun to be a name known in the Neath. It had never been a goal of his, but perhaps it will serve his true goal. He brings a seeing-glass to examine the spires of the Bazaar from the streets and scribbles them down. On the side-streets, no one looks at him like he is mad, only like he is important. He sends jewels to Locke and he works madly. He puts down money for a ship and pieces together maps and he writes disparaging columns about the University's culture and their resistance to the real science.
And Zeinys is still hungry.