a letter to Quentin.

via columba secundus Shame 425—

Quentin filius Calamus Mollis of House Cristofér Perdix Carbonis Loreatus sends greetings. If you are well then it is well for I am well. I have such fond memories of the autumn of 417. Your presence at our little salon was always welcome and I hope you took something of value from the conversations to be had there. We have since left Evansendia and returned to the wide wet valley of our homeland. I am a member of the Order’s newest covenant Nemus Animæ which is quite a change as you might imagine from our modest suite in the Vicus 17th. My nominal duties are those of crumens though there is much work to be done yet in making true the Prince Ventria’s dream of bringing Love and Reason to his people and I find myself quite awe-struck by this undertaking. They are all still so in thrall to ancient superstitions whose grip is yet quite strong. In considering upheavals and disruptions my thoughts turn will-I-nill-I to the matter of House Derleth and the squabbles that have consumed it since its very founding. I suppose it is only natural as it is only six years old and still trying to find its way but when I look to the various factions I find them forbidding with their emphasis on who may not rather than who may. While the Elizabethen faction of Mavis is honorable in its persistance who could really be said to have met the accomplishments of that astonishing woman? While Abelard’s intellectual purity is a stance to be commended in the abstract it not only when examined closely raises the question of whether it only succeeds in repeating the mistakes it claims to repudiate but also the practicality of such a restrictive outlook so early in the life of the House. And we need not express our distaste at Old Traditionalists whose spokesman’s folly has done so much to cast doubt on our universities. Perhaps it is strange to turn our thoughts to such matters when there is so much to occupy us here and now but after all the debate seemed so abstract when we were in the thick of it. For I was of House Manere and my future was secure. We look forward to what response you care to make and urge you Quentin to take care to fare well.