What I mean is, it doesn't seem possible that it can talk, and it must be terribly hard to get close to it, even for a Water Seeker.
You don't need to get close to it. I can contact the deeps-dweller from any part of the ocean as long as I'm submerged.
Oh! So that's how you asked its permission to do this interview?
Yes. I waded out to the towers and ducked my head underwater.
And it heard you? Even though it's days of sail away?
Gorles was able to contact it all the way from Tokled, and that's almost the other side of the world, isn't it?
Sage Zimmira... You understand how unbelievable that sounds, don't you? How does something with no mouth and no ears speak and hear at all, let alone across distances of multiple
Gaps?
Oh, it doesn't, not through words. It communicates using memories. For instance, to ask its permission I had to specifically recall first my feeling of hesitancy during our earlier conversation, and then--to explain my hesitancy--a time when Shemda was angry that I talked to someone about her. It gave its permission by bringing to my mind moments when my children were infants and I spoke on their behalf because they weren't able to speak for themselves.
Bringing to your mind-- That's what you said? Do you mean, it made you remember a thing that you hadn't been thinking of?
Yes, that's exactly how it works.
*pause* I can see how you might think so, but I know what being wrung feels like, and it isn't at all the same as when I'm communicating with the deeps-dweller.
I'm not seeing the difference! You just told me it was looking through your memories! How do you know it's not changing them?
Well... Sometimes it does, but the key difference is that there is no deception. When I first encountered the deeps-dweller, it gave me memories from someone who had drowned decades earlier. I remember them now as something I experienced, but not as something that actually happened to me.
That isn't helping me feel any better about it. What you're describing is exactly what Kezlaf wanted the Wringers to do, and Seeker Istlourn has told me that even he couldn't do it except in a brute-force way that usually left irreparable damage!
What Kezlaf wanted was complete control over others' minds. It's possible the deeps-dweller might have that ability, but it doesn't have the same desires. It doesn't think like humans do. It collects experience as its vocabulary because experience is the only way it has of communicating with us.
But if it's as good at wringing as you say it is, what would stop it from deciding to remove your memories entirely to keep for itself?
What reason would it have to do that? If it stole my memories, it would lose me as a mediator. It has a much harder time expressing what it wants to when it presents me with experiences that I don't recognize. And by losing me, it would lose contact with Ralcondray and have to return to relying on the dwindling amount of the natural holdurnose in its environment. Like anything else alive, all the deeps-dweller wants is to continue existing. We're its only source of additional nourishment, and that gives it more than enough motivation not to harm any of us.
Just because it doesn't mean harm doesn't mean it can't cause harm! And even if you're right...aren't there likely to be other colonies of tree-animals out there? What if one of them gets big enough to be just as intelligent and capable of stealing memories from anyone who happens to go swimming?
Ours would certainly notice. Which means it's all the more important to keep up this friendly relationship and make sure it stays healthy. I believe completely that the deeps-dweller is our ally and the best defense we have against anything in the ocean that might be a threat.
I wish I also could. But if it's a good enough Wringer to replay your own memories for you, it's good enough to come up with a lie so good you'd never suspect it.
Then consider this: The conduit between Ralcondray and the Cluster Islands is the longest ever built. End to end, it stretches entirely across uninhabited ocean and is impossible for the Allied Isles to patrol constantly. Yet in the last decade it's suffered none of the sabotage that still troubles the tracks to nearer outlying islands. It's the deeps-dweller we have to thank for that. It monitors the water alongside the conduit and prevents unauthorized vessels from approaching.
How? By taking away their memory of what they planned to do?
Oh no, much simpler than that. It raises waves to sweep invaders away from the conduit.
I suppose you could think of it that way.
A worker strong enough to control water as far away as the Cluster Islands? While it's physically stuck to the bottom of your bay?
Those are the facts of it, yes.
That's horrifying.
*sigh* And you're not the first to tell me that. I understand that all this is very difficult to settle in a coil. Perhaps that's why the original piece never was updated. I hope you'll take up that challenge. Thank you for taking the time to aske me these questions.
You're welcome, Sage Zimmira. I'm glad I did, even if I never can sleep again. End recording.
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