If you don t judge, though, Kit said, or at leastdecide to dosomething , nothing gets done!
Tom sat still and looked out the window, where a cold wind was rattling some brown,unfallen beech leaves in the hedge beside his house. There you re right, he said. Not that that makes me any happier. But judgment calls are one of the other things we re here for: The One has better things to do than micro-manage us.
He looked back at Kit. So go do what you can, Tom said. Let me know how it comes out. But I want to really emphasize that you need to stay in the observer s role. This Ordeal is strange enough to get extremely dangerous, especially if you stray out of your appropriate role.
I ll be careful.
Tom s expression got slightly less severe. I ve heardthat one before, he said. From myself, among many others. But, particularly, I want you to watch yourself when you re inside his head. Talking to Darryl is a good idea but getting too synced to his worldview may make that more difficult, not less. Talking is something you do toother people; if he has trouble with that concept, you could get in trouble, too. And when you re inside someone else s head and using wizardry, no matter how careful you are, there s always the danger of rewriting his name in the Speech. Do that in such a way that Darryl buys into the rewrite, and you take the risk of excising something that makes the difference between him passing his Ordeal and him never coming out of it. Walk real softly, Kit. We will.