by Gene Wolfe
As we spoke, the flier rose above the masts again, leveled its flight, and spread its wings, so that we felt we stood upon the back of some great bird.
The woman who had addressed us before said, “Now you have an adventure to recount to your shipmates when you return to your ship. There is no cause for alarm. There will be no more tricks, and you cannot fall from this craft.”
Gunnie whispered, “I knew what you were going to tell her, but can’t you see they’ve found the real one?”
“I am what you call the real one,” I said, “and I don’t know what’s happening. Have I told you — no, I haven’t. I carry the memories of my predecessors, and indeed you may say I am the predecessors themselves as well as myself. The old Autarch who gave me his throne went to Yesod too. Went as I’m going — or rather, as I thought I was going.”
Gunnie shook her head; I could see she pitied me. “You think you remember all that?”
“I do remember it. I can recall each step of his journey; I feel the pain of the knife that unmanned him. It wasn’t like this at all; he was taken from the ship with the proper respect. He endured long testing on Yesod, and at last was judged to have failed, as he judged himself to have failed.” I looked to where the woman and her companions stood, hoping I had attracted their attention.
Purn was beside us again. “Then you still claim you’re really the Autarch?”
“I was,” I told him. “And yes, I will bring the New Sun if I can. Will you still stab me for that?”
“Not here,” he said. “Probably not at all. I’m a simple man, see? I believed you. Only when they caught the real one, I knew you’d been yarning me up. Or maybe your wits are mixed. I’ve never killed anybody, and I wouldn’t want to kill a man for yarning. Killing a Port o’ Lune man’s worse — sure bad luck.” He spoke to Gunnie as though I were not there. “You think he really believes it?”
“I’m positive he does,” she said. After a moment she added, “It might even be the truth. Listen to me, Severian, because I’ve been on board a long time. This is my second voyage to Yesod, so I guess I was in the crew when they took your old Autarch, though I never saw him and didn’t get to come down till later. You know this ship moves in and out of Time like a darning needle, don’t you? Don’t you know that by now?”
I said, “Yes, I’m coming to understand so.”
“Then let me ask you. Isn’t it possible we’ve been carrying two Autarchs? You and one of your successors? Suppose you were to go back to Urth. You’d have to choose a successor sooner or later. Mightn’t he be the one? Or the one he chose? And if he is, what’s the use of your going through with it, and losing some things you don’t want to lose when it’s over?”
“You mean that what I do can make no difference to the future.”
“Not when the future’s already up at the front of this tender.”
We had talked as though the other sailors were not present, but it is never wholly safe to do that — one does it only with the sufferance of the ignored. One of the sailors to whom I had paid no heed grasped me by the shoulder and pulled me half a step toward him so that I could see better through the hyaline sides of our flier.
“Look!” he said. “Look at that, will you!” But for a beat of my heart I looked at him instead, suddenly aware that he who had been nothing to me was everything to himself, and I only a supernumerary to him, a lay figure permitting him, by sharing his joy, to double it.
Then I looked, because it would have seemed a species of betrayal not to; and I saw that we were turning, slowing, in a wide, wide, circle, above an isle set in an endless sea of blue, translucent water. The isle was clearly a single hilltop that rose above the waves, and it was dressed in the green of gardens and the white of marble, and it wore a fringe of little boats.
There was nothing to be seen so impressive as the Wall of Nessus, or even the Great Keep. Yet in its way, the isle was more impressive, because everything about it was beautiful, without exception, and there was a joy there that towered higher than the Wall, as high as a thunderhead.
It came to me then, seeing that isle and the stupid and brutal faces of the men and women all about me, that there was something more I did not see. A memory rose, sent by one of those dim figures who stand, for me, behind the old Autarch, those predecessors whom I cannot see clearly and often cannot see at all. It was the figure of a lovely virgin, clothed in silks of many hues and dewed with pearls. She sang in the avenues of Nessus and lingered by its fountains until night. No one dared to molest her, for though her protector was invisible, his shadow fell all around her, rendering her inviolate.
Chapter XVII — The Isle
IF I were to say to you, who were born upon Urth and have drawn your every breath there, that the flier landed like a huge waterbird, you would imagine a comic splashing. It did, and yet it was not so; for on Yesod, as I saw from the sides of the flier a moment or two after we were down, the water birds have learned to drop onto the waves so gently and gracefully one might think the water only a cooler air to them, as it is to those little birds we see beside waterfalls, who hop into the falls to catch minnows and are as much at home there as another bird could be in a bush.
So we did, settling onto the sea and folding our immense wings even as we touched it, gently rocking while it seemed we still flew. Some of the sailors talked among themselves; and perhaps Gunnie or Purn would have talked to me, if I had given them the opportunity. I did not, because I desired to absorb all the wonders I might, and because I sensed that I could not speak without feeling still more keenly my duty to tell those who held another prisoner that it was myself they sought.
Thus I stared out (as I believed) through the sides of our flier, and tasted the wind, that glorious wind of Yesod that carries the fresh purity of its saltless sea and the perfume of all its glorious gardens, and life with them, and found that the sides, which earlier could not be seen, could not now be felt, so that we rode as though on a narrow raft, with our wings for a canopy overhead. And I saw much.
As was to be expected, one of the sailors pushed her companion into the water; but others farther down our long hull drew her out again; and though she complained loudly of the cold, the water was not so cold as to harm her, as I found by stooping and dabbing my hands in it.
Then I cupped them and drew up so much as they would hold and drank of it, of the water of Yesod; and though it was chill, I was glad when some ran down my chest. For I recalled an old tale in the brown book I once carried in memory of Thecla, and how it told of a certain man who, crossing a wasteland late one night, saw other men and women dancing and joined them; and how when the dance was through he went with them and bathed his face in a spring never seen by day, and drank of its water.
And how his wife, counseled by a certain wise device, went to the same place a year later to the day, and there heard wild music and her husband’s voice singing alone, and the sound of many dancing feet — yet saw no one. And how when she questioned that device concerning those things, she was told her husband had drunk of the waters of another world and washed in them, and would return to her no more.
Nor did he.
I held myself apart from the sailors as we trooped up the white street that led from the mooring to the building at the top of the hill, doing so by walking nearer the three and their prisoner than any of them dared to. Yet I myself did not dare to tell the three who I was, though I began to do so a hundred times at least, without making a sound. At last I spoke, but it was only to ask whether the trial would be held that day or the next.
The woman who had addressed us glanced back at me, smiling. “Are you so eager to see his blood?” she asked. “You will not. The Hierogrammate Tzadkiel does not sit in his Seat of Justice today, so we will have the preliminary examination only. That can be carried out in his absence, if need be.”
I shook my head. “I have seen much blood; believe me, my lady, I’ve no itch to see more.”
“Then why did you come?” she
inquired, still smiling.
I told her the truth, though it was not the whole truth. “Because I felt it was my duty. But tell me, suppose Tzadkiel is not in his seat tomorrow, either. Will we be permitted to wait here for him? And are all of you not Hierogrammates too? And do all of you speak our tongue? I was surprised to hear it on your lips.”
I had been walking a half step behind her; and she, as a consequence, had spoken to me more or less across her shoulder. Now with her smile grown wider, she dropped behind the others to link her arm in mine. “So many questions. How am I to remember them all, much less to answer them?”
I was ashamed and tried to mumble some apology; but I was so unnerved by the touch of her hand, warm and seeking as it slipped into my own, that I could only stammer.
“Nevertheless, for your sake I will try. Tzadkiel will be here tomorrow. Were you afraid you would be unable to return to your mopping and carrying soon enough?”
“No, my lady,” I managed. “I would remain forever, if I could.”
Her smile faded at that. “You will remain on this isle for less than a day all told. You — we, if you wish it — must do what we can with that.”
“I do wish it,” I told her, and in fact I did. I have said she was an ordinary-looking woman of middle age, and so she was: not tall, a few wrinkles apparent at her eyes and mouth, her hair touched at the temples with frost. Yet there was something I could not resist. Perhaps it was only the aura of the isle — so some common men find all exultant women attractive. Perhaps it was her eyes, which were large and luminous and of the deep, deep blue of her sea, unfaded by age. Perhaps it was some third thing, sensed unconsciously; but I felt again as I had when, so much younger, I had encountered Agia — a desire so strong that it seemed more spiritual than any faith, its flesh burned away in the heat of its own yearning.
“…after the preliminary examination,” she said.
“Of course,” I answered. “Of course. I am my lady’s slave.” I hardly knew to what I had agreed.
A wide flight of white stone steps flanked by fountains rose before us with the airy lightness of a cloud bank. She looked up with a bantering smile I found infinitely attractive. “If you were truly my slave, I would have you carry me up this stair, halt leg or none.”
“I will do it gladly,” I said, and I stooped as though to pick her up.
“No, no.” She had begun to climb, and as lightly as any girl. “What would your shipmates think?”
“That I had been signally honored, my lady.”
Still smiling, she whispered, “Not that you had deserted Urth for us? But we have a moment before we reach the court, and I will answer your questions as well as I can. We are not all Hierogrammates. On Urth, are the children of sannyasins holy men and women themselves? I do not speak with your tongue, nor do any of us. Neither do you speak as we do.”
“My lady…”
“You do not understand.”
“No.” I sought for something more to say, but what she had told me seemed so absurd that no reply was possible.
“I will explain after the examination. But now I must require a small service of you.”
“Anything, my lady.”
“Thank you. Then you will lead the Epitome into the dock for us.”
I looked at her in bewilderment.
“We try him — we will examine him now — with the consent of the peoples of Urth, who have sent him to Yesod in their stead. To show it, a man or woman of Urth, who will represent his world just as he does though in a less significant way, must conduct him.”
I nodded. “I’ll do it for you, my lady, if you’ll show me where I must take him.”
“Good.” She turned to the man and the other woman, saying, “We have a custodian.” They nodded, and she took the prisoner by the arm and pulled him over (although he could easily have resisted her) to where I waited. “We will bring your shipmates into the Hall of Justice, where I will explain what is to take place. I doubt that you need that. You — what is your name?”
I hesitated, wondering whether she knew what the Epitome’s name ought to be.
“Come, is it so great a secret?”
Soon I should have to confess in any case, although I had hoped I would be able to hear the preliminary examination first, so that I would better equipped to succeed when my own turn came. As we paused at the portico I said, “It’s Severian, my lady. Is it permitted that I ask yours?”
Her smile was as irresistible as when I had first seen it. “We have no need of such things among ourselves, but now that I am known to someone who does, I will be called Apheta.” She saw my doubt and added, “Never fear, those to whom you say my name will know of whom you speak.”
“Thank you, my lady.”
“Now take him. The arch is to your right.” She pointed. “Go through there. You will find a long, elliptical corridor from which you cannot stray, since it is without doors to either side. Convey him to the end, then out and into the Examination Chamber. Look at his hands; do you see how they are fettered?”
“Yes, my lady.”
“In the Chamber you will see the ring to which his fetter is to be fastened. Lead him there and chain him — there is a sliding link, you will understand it at once — and take your place among the witnesses. When the examination is complete, wait for me. I will show you all the wonders of our isle.”
Her tone made clear what she meant. I bowed and said, “My lady, I’m wholly unworthy.”
“Of that I shall judge. Go now. Do as I told you, and you shall have your reward.”
Bowing again, I turned and took the giant’s arm. I have said already that he was taller than any exultant, and so he was, nearly as tall as Baldanders. He was not so heavy, but young and vigorous (as young as I had been, I thought, on the day when I had left the Citadel through the Corpse Door bearing Terminus Est). He had to stoop to pass beneath the arch, but he followed me as one sees a yearling ram in the market follow the shepherd boy who has made a pet of him and now means to sell him to some family who will wether him to fatten for a feast.
The corridor was of the shape of the egg conjurors stand on end upon the table, having a high, almost pointed arch overhead, widely curved sides, and a flattened walkway. The lady Apheta had said that no doors opened from it, and she had been correct, but there were windows on both sides. These puzzled me, because I had supposed it to wind about a courtroom in the center of the building.
I looked out of them to right and left as we walked, at first with some curiosity about the Isle of Yesod, then with wonder to see it so like Urth, and at last with astonishment. For snow-capped mountains and level pampas gave way to strange interiors, as though I looked from each window into a different structure. There was a wide, empty hall lined with mirrors, another even wider where standing shelves held disordered books, a narrow cell with a high, barred window and a straw-strewn floor, and a dark and narrow corridor lined with metal doors.
Turning to the client, I said, “They were expecting me, that seems clear enough. I see Agilus’s cell, the oubliette under the Matachin Tower , and so on. But they think you’re me, Zak.”
As though my speaking of his name had broken a spell, he whirled on me, tossing his long hair back to reveal his blazing eyes. The muscles of his arms stood out as though they would burst the skin as he strained against his manacles. Almost automatically, I stepped past his leg and threw him across my hip as Master Gurloes had taught me so long ago.
He fell to the white stone as a bull falls in the arena, and the crash seemed to shake that solid building; but he was on his feet again in a moment, manacled or not, and running down the corridor.
Chapter XVIII — The Examination
I RAN after him, and soon saw that, though long, his strides were clumsy — Baldanders had run better — and he was handicapped by having his arms pinioned at his back.
His was not the only handicap. My lame leg seemed to have a weight tied to its ankle, and I am sure our race gave me m
ore pain than his fall had given him. The windows — charmed, perhaps, or perhaps merely cunning — crept by as I hobbled along. A few I looked through consciously, most I did not; yet they remain with me still, hidden in the dusty chamber that lies behind, or perhaps beneath, my mind. The scaffold where I once branded and decapitated a woman was there, a dark river bank, and the roof of a certain tomb.
I would have laughed at those windows, if I had not been laughing at myself already so that I would not weep. These Hierogrammates who ruled the universe and what lay beyond had not merely mistaken another for me, but now sought to remind me, who could forget nothing, of the scenes of my life; and did so (so it seemed to me) less skillfully than my own memories could have. For though every detail was present, there was something subtly mistaken about each view.
I could not stop, or at least I felt I could not; but at last I turned my head as I limped past one of these windows and truly studied it as I had not any of the others. It opened into the summerhouse on Abdiesus’s pleasure grounds where I had questioned and at last freed Cyriaca and in that single, long glance I understood at last that I saw these places not as I had seen them and remembered them but as Cyriaca, Jolenta, Agia and so on had perceived them. I was aware for example when I looked into the summer house, of a horrible yet benign presence just beyond the view framed by the window — myself.