Tales of Midbar: Secret Priest
Controversial Mage - part 3

I was unable to get my mother alone to question her but I did have a private talk to my father.

“What do you know about Benai Nibeyim?” I asked trying to read his mind.

“We try to keep them out of trials as it complicates things,” he said, which wasn’t really answering my question.

“Maybe. The problem is the Benai Nibeyim really do seem to be involved, they may interfere with the legal process or continue to mess with me no matter what happens with the trials.”

“I don’t know of anybody who’s successfully taken legal action against them. To take legal action against any organization is problematic because you have to prove the leadership was at least partly responsible, not just one of the organization’s members doing something wrong. In the case of your school, this is easy. In the case of Benai Nibeyim, their central leadership is only semi-official, which means it counts when they want it to and not when they don’t. On paper, it’s a loose collection of small groups so you’ve got to figure out which group or groups was responsible and that’s pretty much impossible.”

“I was trying to replace out what you knew about them generally rather than just how to take legal action against them.”

“Well, there are a number of lawyers and judges who are members.”

“They have to keep secrets a lot.”

“Of course, I’ve told you that.”

“And so do doctors, priests, police, soldiers and politicians.”

“Yes but I don’t see how that’s relevant.”

“There are supposed to be a lot of people with those occupations in Benai Nibeyim. You said there couldn’t be a large conspiracy because large groups of people can’t keep secrets but, from what I’ve heard, a lot of the people in Benai Nibeyim have occupations that involve keeping secrets.”

He stared at me, trying to process that. “Well a lot of those people keep different secrets and few of those secrets are known to many people.”

“But Benai Nibeyim has lots of little groups so maybe only a few of them know any particular secret.”

“I don’t know. I’m not sure you’re right about the makeup of the organization. A big part of the problem is you don’t generally know who the Benai Nibeyim are. A lot of their members are rich and powerful people. Being a member is supposed to be helpful in your career but I never joined and I’ve been quite successful. My parents were members, their group included some Winemakers and some very dubious stuff went on.”

“Is that why you hate Winemakers?”

“I don’t hate Winemakers, I hate Winemakerism.”

“Is that why you hate Winemakerism?”

“Partly. I moved away from Ermish because they were trying to force me to marry a girl I didn’t like. I was offered a good job here, married a woman I loved, and still love, and never looked back. Why are you so interested?”

“Well, the fact your parents were members is yet another bit of evidence.”

“Present your evidence!”

“First I’d also like to know if there’s any connection between Benai Nibeyim and Yohoism?”

“Yohoism was an ancient religion. Although there aren’t any left, a lot of present religions are based on it to some degree. Even Trulist Yoho worship although Trulism is about as old as Yohoism, perhaps older. The name Benai Nibeyim is Semic, the language of Yohoists. I have heard there’s a conspiracy theory that says Benai Nibeyim is part of a Yohoist conspiracy but that’s really a load of rubbish. Is that what you heard?”

“I met somebody who knows a lot about Yohoism who claims Benai Nibeyim was originally a Yohoist organization.”

“Probably just a conspiracy theorist. I can’t see how that’s relevant. Now do you want to present your evidence?”

“Well you know Pendina claimed they told her to give me a negative infinity sex rating. Somebody told me Yoldasia and Narblo are high ranking members of Benai Nibeyim. They breed psychics and interbreed nibeyim with katcheyim every five hundred years in order to breed anavim. They claim to have bred Egrindreth and myself, you know we’re anavim?”

“Korbarim are only symbolic.”

“You’re a nibey, you must know that’s not true?”

“I know I get different feelings from certain people but I don’t think that proves anything.”

I knew he was being evasive here.

“I’ll reword it. Benai Nibeyim claim Egrindreth and myself are anavim and they bred us and therefore they have some authority over us. Egrindreth was given to Haprihagfen by the temple but Benai Nibeyim won’t let Haprihagfen help me or tell me things.”

“This is what Egrindreth told you?”

“She’s not allowed to help me or tell me things.”

“But she did?”

“She found a loophole.”

“I’d be very skeptical of what she tells you. For a start, I and Mum bred you! You look like a young version of me, always have.”