Gate of Horn, Book of Silk

by Michael Andre-Driussi

  7. At Hamer’s cell they convince him to convict Silkhorn. They warp back to Blue.

  8. Babbie enters courtroom, chases Hamer (VII, chap. 11, 228).

  9. Silkhorn owns the house that was Judge Hamer’s (VII, chap. 9, 177), so the trial is over and the revolution is won.

  Trivigaunte “the desert city well south of Viron” (V, list); “the city that intervened in Viron’s revolution” (VI, list). (See entry in LS Half.) Trivigaunte has a colony on Blue (Beled) and one on Green (Qarya).

  Onomastics: derived from “termagant.” See entry in LS Half for details.

  Turco “a favored suitor, long ago” (VI, list). From Salica’s story, “From the Grave.” He was her first husband.

  Italian: Turk/Turkish.

  Tuz “one of the travelers assembled in Pajarocu” (V, list). “Krait’s breath smelled of blood, Tuz’s” (V, chap. 16, 373). Tuz is a sentry on the lander when Krait snacks on him.

  Turkish: salt.

  two-hands spider an animal used in Gaon to kill rats (V, chap. 13, 321).

  Typhon what Pas was called on the Red Sun Whorl, told by Scylla to Auk, who told it to Silk (VII, chap. 6, 129).

  U

  Ugolo “a magnate of Blanko” (VI, list). The meeting on how to pay the mercenaries is at his house (VI, chap. 14, 222). When Incanto begins forming auxiliaries of boys and old men, the effort is jeered at. Ugolo is one of the ringleaders whom Incanto has chained to spikes in the dry sewers (223).

  Italian: uvula.

  Onomastics: Ugolo is also a Nigerian surname that is also used as a first name; and a Swahili word for “snuff/tobacco.”

  unnamed characters a non-exhaustive list:

  • BLIND MAN IN THE SEWERS.

  • The GOOD WOMAN.

  • The husband (CORN SEED MAN).

  • The MAN FANTASTICALLY DRESSED.

  • The MAN FROM URBASECUNDUS.

  • The wife (CORN SEED WIFE).

  Urbanita “a neighbor of Volanta’s” (VI, list). She gives Sfido a place to sleep (VI, chap. 15, 235).

  Italian: urbanity.

  Urbasecundus “a foreign town not far from New Viron” (V, list; V, chap. 2, 51).

  Presumably it was settled from Urbs, a neighboring city of Viron on the Long Sun Whorl. Because of The Book of the Long Sun, the people of this town (and Three Rivers) want Silk as their caldé (V, chap. 4, 96).

  Latin: second city.

  Commentary: an allusion to Chicago, famed as being “the second city” (after New York as first). See MAN FROM URBASECUNDUS.

  Uscita Incanto’s field cook (VI, chap. 16, 244).

  Italian: outing; trip.

  Ushujuaa a passenger on the lander that brought Horn to Green (V, chap. 8, 121; VI, list).

  Swahili: courage.

  V

  Vadsig “a servant girl in Aanvagen’s house” (VII, list). Her hair is as bright as a tangerine (VII, chap. 5, 94). She says she is 16, but Silkhorn thinks she is 14 (97). She has worked there for two years (VII, chap. 7, 145). In Silkhorn’s augury for her, using a sausage for sacrifice and brandy for blood, he sees, “A wealthy marriage soon, happiness, and many children” (VII, chap. 5, 95). As a favor for Silkhorn, she visits Hide in his house arrest. Hide seems to have proposed marriage to her (VII, chap. 7, 144).

  Silkhorn observes that she is possessed at the hearing (VII, chap. 7, 152) and confronts her later (VII, chap. 9, 177). It is Fava and Mora, through Mora’s dreaming (178).

  Vadsig marries Hide. As a member of the editorial team, she writes a lot of The Book of the Short Sun—see BOOK OF THE SHORT SUN.

  Dutch: indolence; lazy.

  Valico, Sergeant “a trooper in the horde of Blanko” (VI, list). He spots the enemy while on patrol and reports to Incanto about their location which might be reached by way of a pass through the hills (VI, chap. 11, 177). He comes to the sleeping camp after midnight and is drawn along in their warp to Green (VI, chap. 14, 212).

  Italian: a pass (through mountains).

  Vanished Gods “the gods of the Neighbors” (V, list). See GODS OF THE VANISHED PEOPLE.

  Vanished People “the Neighbors” (V, list). Term for them used on the Eastern continent (V, chap. 1, 38). They interview Horn after he meets He-pen-sheep (V, chap. 11, 266–72).

  Vent, Mysire Advocaat “the advocate assigned the narrator by the court” (VII, list). After the revolution of Dorp, Silkhorn made him a judge (VII, chap. 9, 192).

  Dutch: chap/fellow.

  Versregal “Captain Strik’s wife” (VII, list; chap. 7, 149).

  Dutch: “fresh regal,” but very close to versregel, meaning “a verse, or line of poetry.”

  Viron “the city of the Long Sun Whorl in which Silk, Horn, Nettle, and many others were born, also called Old Viron” (V, list). The streets seem to mainly run on the diagonal: Silkhorn imagines Viron “spread like a carpet below us, streets running northeast and southwest, and southeast and northwest, with the broad slash of Sun Street cutting across them, east to west, right through the oldest part of the city” (VII, chap. 10, 196).

  More details emerge regarding the time taken to leave Viron and arrive on Blue, when Silkhorn says they were three days in the tunnels and three weeks on the lander (VII, chap. 13, 279).

  Vivo, Colonel “an officer in the horde of Blanko” (VI, list). One of the two men Incanto chooses to witness the negotiations with the mercenaries of the saddle (VI, chap. 12, 184). The other is Bello.

  Italian: alive; brisk; vivid; intense.

  Vlug, Private “a legerman of Dorp” (VII, list). He is in the group arresting Silkhorn and company (VII, chap. 3, 57). He has blue eyes (63).

  Vlug’s dream of Incanto and Jahlee, while similar to that of Azijin, has a few striking details. Vlug says Jahlee is rejecting Incanto’s advice and will kill herself soon (VII, chap. 3, 63). He also says she is “an angry goddess” (64).

  In fact she does refuse to return to her body, edging toward suicide perhaps, and she becomes something of a goddess on Green.

  Dutch: quick/fast.

  Volanta “Incanto’s hostess in Blanko, Atteno’s wife” (VI, list; VI, chap. 15, 231).

  Italian: wheel.

  Volto “an unpopular trooper in the horde of Blanko” (VI, list; VI, chap. 2, 45). Featured in Inclito’s story “The Sentry and His Brother,” about Volto and Mano.

  Italian: face.

  Vulpes “an advocate of the Long Sun Whorl” (V, list; V, chap. 1, 25). (See entry in LS Half.)

  Zoology: the fox.

  W

  wallower a creature of Blue, the most prized game animal around Gaon (V, chap. 10, 225). A group of them is called a “silence.” A wallower is a dark-gray beast twice the size of an ordinary horse and six times its weight (226). It has a towering Y-shaped horn and big canine teeth (227). Hide, horn, bones, and teeth are all valuable.

  Commentary: this sounds like brontotherium, a very large mammal from the Cenozoic.

  Wapen “a discontented young man of Dorp” (VII, list). Son of the tavern owner (VII, chap. 7, 154).

  Dutch: weapon; (in heraldry) a coat of arms.

  warp mechanics this text uses the term “warp” to describe the ghostly teleportation activity of Silkhorn working in conjunction with an inhumu or inhuma.

  Silkhorn seems to believe that he is able to amplify a power that the inhumi already possess. He sees how the Vanished People are able to teleport, or go out of dimensional phase, or project themselves in spirit form. He then reasons that the inhumi have a small trace of Vanished People essence within them, from feeding upon them (VI, chap. 14, 214). Putting these together, it might be that the inhumi have a type of teleporting power that is only used at special times, accompanied by a lot of ceremony—that is, for their “flying” from Green to Blue, and back again, which is only possible for them at conjunction.

  Silkhorn establishes that during his warps their physical bodies do not teleport with them, since Valico sees the entire camp asleep in the snow after they have all gone to Gree
n (221).

  One problem that arises in trying to figure out the mechanics of this spirit teleportation is that there are time gaps, most notably in the case where Silkhorn transports the mercenaries to Green and they spend a day clearing out the City of Inhumi, yet it seems like they wake up on Blue only six hours after falling asleep.

  There is no question that warping is similar to dreaming. For example, we know that the warp party to Urth includes a Horn ghost and a Scylla ghost as well as living dreamers. We suspect that the MAN FANTASTICALLY DRESSED in Nessus is either a ghost or a dreamer, though he could be physically present. We know that the mercenaries are all dreamers. We know that the scout from Blanko walked into the dreaming camp and was drawn into the dream, so one need not even be asleep to be affected.

  When the mercenaries warp from Green to the duko’s palace on Blue, the duko is said to be sleeping. His guard might be sleeping at his post, too.

  All of this together suggests that everybody is in the same dream, either from sleeping or being drawn in while awake, with the result that time really is dreamtime and has no relation to real time. Thus the day of tower-to-tower fighting in the City of Inhumi could take place within the remaining hours of a half-spent night on Blue.

  Warren, Lieutenant “a mercenary officer” (VI, list). Wight and Warren are from the same town (VI, chap. 13, 205).

  English: a place where small game animals, especially rabbits, live and breed.

  “Washed Child, The” Fava’s first story (VI, chap. 2, 38–43). Fava says that two years before the time of the telling she had visited relatives in Soldo. While hiking alone on the hill one day she found a woman bathing a three-year-old boy in an icy stream prior to drowning him. She had too many children and this one’s father had left. Fava took the boy with her. The family decided to keep “Bricco” and gave the mother two geese. She came back every night until they refused to give her any more, and then she went to the law, accusing the family of stealing the child.

  The judge heard the stories and asked the boy. The boy wanted to go with Fava. So the case was dismissed.

  On the trip to Blanko they stayed at an inn and Bricco vanished. A year later, Fava went to Soldo to find any news of Bricco, and the neighborhood children told her that he was taken away by a highborn woman of the Vanished People. Sometimes they see him again. He is thin and pale, and vanishes like a ghost.

  Silkhorn’s interpretation of this tale is varied. First he is reminded of the CASE OF SERVANT GIRL CLAIMED AS DAUGHTER. But later he tells Mora that the boy was killed by Fava and the others (VI, chap. 5, 80). Thus the family court part was probably a lie. At least the Vanished People part was a lie.

  Commentary: this is complicated.

  The first context, as a story told by a girl, is a strange sort of fairy abduction/rescue. Either Bricco’s mother followed them to the inn with murderous intent and fairies rescued him, or Bricco’s mother was a fairy and other fairies came to take him.

  The second context, as a story told by an inhuma, is what Silkhorn’s interpretation is: the heavily veiled version of a child abducted and then bled to death.

  One way or another, Bricco’s ghost might be staying with the Neighbors on their strange plane of existence. Hide’s dream of hide and seek might have shades of Bricco’s presence.

  Water Street “an avenue in Blanko bordering the river” (VI, list). Where Atteno’s stationery store is located (VI, chap. 5, 84).

  waterhorse creature of Blue, one of which was sacrificed at the wedding of Hide and Vadsig (VII, chap. 20, 398).

  waveguide coupling the last piece needed to repair the lander on Green (VI, chap. 8, 126).

  Wavelily the yawl Marrow’s will leaves for Horn. Silkhorn renames it Seanettle because of Lily’s sad fate (VII, chap. 13, 273). See also SEALILY.

  Weasel “Capsicum’s grandson” (VII, list). She sends him to fetch Calf in order to identify the man claiming to be Horn (VII, chap. 13, 270). Later he is ring-bearer at the wedding of Hide and Vadsig (VII, chap. 20, 400). Though only a boy, he kills an inhumu and an inhuma in the inhumi attack (401). Grandson of Marrow.

  Zoology: member of the Mustelidae family of small, lithe, carnivorous mammals.

  West Pole the stern end of the Long Sun Whorl, where the surgeon gives Pig one of Silk’s eyes (VII, chap. 16, 330). Outside the hospital area it is a sandy, windy place (332). The inhabitants obey Mainframe at the east pole. It used to communicate with them directly by cable, but the cable was cut, and since then Mainframe sends Fliers or godlings as messengers (335). There seems to be a danger of exposure to radiation, as Silkhorn is given a dosimeter to wear. The people here are dark skinned, with Swahili names.

  Commentary: this is a play on how on old ships the “black gang” was the part of the crew that worked in the engine room and were blackened by soot and coal dust.

  Whorl, The “the generation ship from which the colonists came” (V, list). It orbits the star further out from Blue. Talking about a (punctuation-mark) colon, Silkhorn says, “The higher dot is this whorl, which is farther from the Short Sun; and the lower dot is Blue” (VII, chap. 12, 246).

  Silkhorn estimates that the area of Blue is ten or twenty times larger than that of the Long Sun Whorl (VII, chap. 8, 163).

  Wichote a riverine village on Blue’s western continent (the list for volume V incorrectly gives it as being on the eastern). The last outpost of civilization on that river leading to Pajarocu (V, chap. 12, 296), it has 20 or 30 rough wooden houses and about 100 crude little huts of bark and hides (295).

  Onomastics: a surname and personal name, meaning not found.

  Wight, Lieutenant “a mercenary officer” (VI, list). Warren and Wight are from the same town (VI, chap. 13, 205).

  English: (archaic) a human being.

  Wijzer “a master mariner of Dorp” (V, list). Marrow tells Horn of Wijzer who knows the way to Pajarocu (V, chap. 4, 109). They meet him in New Viron.

  Wijzer came from the Long Sun Whorl nine years ago (V, chap. 4, 117).

  He hires Taal to defend Silkhorn (VII, chap. 11, 228) and is warped to Urth from the trial (227).

  Wijzer is on the boat with Silkhorn from Dorp to New Viron (VII, chap. 11, 225). It is Wijzer’s boat (229). He gives away the bride at Vadsig’s wedding (VII, chap. 20, 398). He kills five inhumi in the attack (401).

  Dutch: pointer.

  Windcloud a Neighbor who takes the witness stand at Silkhorn’s trial in Dorp (VII, chap. 11, 231). He is the one who gives Silkhorn “the cup” (the silver chalice in the ruins near Gaon), which is when he first meets Silkhorn, even though Silkhorn does not see him (231). Windcloud says of Silkhorn, “We became better acquainted when he was living in my house, some distance from here [in Dorp]” (232). Taal asks if he invited Silkhorn. “No. Another ‘man’ who was living in my house brought him. He was not afraid of me, as the others were” (232). This sounds as though Windcloud is referring to Inclito’s house near Blanko, with the implication that he observed Silkhorn without being seen. This is when Silkhorn often senses the presence of Neighbors (VI, chap. 25, 381).

  Windcloud was in a group that visited the Whorl when it first came into the Short Sun system, and met many humans (232). The Neighbors infected the Long Sun Whorl with inhumi (235).

  He says that Silkhorn serves him, which surprises Silkhorn (231). When Wijzer follows up on this later by asking point-blank if Silkhorn serves them, Silkhorn says, “No. They are my friends, not my employers” (VII, chap. 11, 228).

  Onomastics: it is a name involving air, fusing the invisible force of wind with the almost illusory substance of cloud. This seems to be in keeping with the ghost-like quality of the Neighbors who, like the air itself, are always around yet rarely seen.

  woman, the see CORN SEED WIFE.

  X

  Xiphias, Master “an elderly fencing master of Viron” (VI, list; chap. 1, 18). (See entry in LS Half.)

  Zoology: the swordfish.

  Y

  Yksin “the traveler wh
o robbed and deserted Sinew” (V, list). He is the stranger who mentioned Sinew to Horn at Wichote, wherein he claims Sinew has the needler (V, chap. 12, 296). In fact he took boat and needler (V, chap. 14, 345). Name given and said to mean “alone” (V, chap. 14, 355).

  Finnish: alone.

  Z

  Zeehra “the daughter of the Rajan’s head gardener” (V, list; V, chap. 13, 321). Her father is Mehman; her son is Lal.

  Arabic: flower (also an Arabic/Turkish name meaning “bright light,” “adding to family”).

  Zepter, Lieutenant “a mercenary officer” (VI, list). One of the mercenaries in the warp to Green (VI, chap. 13, 198). He is burly, with a fair mustache (VI, chap. 13, 188–89).

  German: scepter.

  Ziek “a merchant of Dorp” (VII, list), met on road with Nat (VII, chap. 1, 28). To solve the quarrel among the four travelling merchants, Silkhorn sent Ziek second, after Nat (29).

  Dutch: sick; ill.

  Zitta “Inclito’s wife and Mora’s mother, long dead” (VI, list). She had eight suitors, including Inclito (VI, chap. 10, 167), which makes her sound as beautiful as Salica. She died on the lander (VI, chap. 1, 31).

  Italian: silent/quiet.

  Zwaar, Private a legerman of Dorp, not listed. He is in the group that arrests Silkhorn, Jahlee, and Hide (VII, chap. 3, 65).

  Dutch: heavy.

  Appendix 1: Pagination of

  The Book of the Short Sun

  (first edition, hardcover)