“Very well, then, culture reinforces biology,” Pakt said. “And an organism must learn how to function within its society. A wild dog and a tame dog are both created with the same physical makeup and basic instincts, but the behavior of the two will differ radically depending on what is expected of them by the other animals in their pack or the humans who have adopted them.”

“But that’s my point,” Nolan said. “You say a gulden woman is happy in a life where all she does is care for others, and that may be so. But not because she was created that way. Because she was conditioned that way. And if she had the chance to make a choice based on free will and not the dictates of her society, would she make that choice? Would she be happy with such a limited life?”

“But who among us ever makes a choice based wholly on free will?” Pakt demanded. “Did you? Are you going to stand there and tell me that, abandoned in some cave from the day you were born and raised all on your own, with no input from other human creatures who could teach you their system of values, that you would be the same person I see before me today? Prejudices intact, all knowledge gained through personal observations? I doubt it! You may think you have come to many of your conclusions and deeply held beliefs all on your own—and perhaps you have—but my guess is that the very pattern of your thoughts has been outlined by the information you learned from your mother and your grandmother and all their ancestors before them. Heritage is just as hard to escape as biology—though you can throw off the effects of either one with varying degrees of success. But both of them go deeper than I think you realize.”

Nolan put out a hand as if to ask for silence, and Pakt obligingly paused. But he could not think of another way to phrase his argument, and he could not be sure Pakt was not entirely right. “I have a headache,” he said at last, and the guldman laughed.

“You are not used to thinking,” Pakt said. “In your household, that little chore is left to women.”

“That’s not true,” Nolan said with a small smile. “I think, but not about questions like these.”

“I think about them all the time. And I concluded a long time ago that we are mostly what we have been made. It takes a cataclysmic event, I think, or great strength of will, to overcome our early training. And most of us are not burdened with either.”

“Well,” Nolan said, handing Pakt the box of choifer soldiers, “it’s certainly been instructive talking with you, anyway.”

Pakt smiled and took the box. “Go to sleep. The morning will come sooner than you expect.”

And it did.