The Binder's Road (The Sequel to 'Illumination')
Page 27
This world was made on a different model from the one he’d known. He could barely remember that world anymore. Understanding this one would be the work of a lifetime. It would keep him safe from himself.
He set off into it.
The world was more different than he knew.
He came into the fields where folk worked, and they drove him off. He came into the towns where people traded, and they shunned him. He lurked in ditches, behind walls, along byways, listening to them speak. He practiced softly to himself until he believed he had copied the patterns correctly. But when he approached travelers on the road, in daylight, simply to ask where work might be found, the men cursed him and drove him off with stones. Holding wads of cattail to his bleeding head, he crouched under a hedge and made a careful comparison. He was not garbed as they were. He was filthy and matted. They had meat on their bones. His stood out starkly. Bones and tatters looked right to him, but not to them. He must find better food, and better garb, and a place to bathe himself. Objects and structures were not the only constructs to be puzzled out. He must master folkways, too.
Food came first. In the forest there was enough to eat, but towns and tilled fields afforded little more than roadside fodder, and that wouldn’t fatten him up sufficiently to make him presentable.
He looked across the fields, the delicious greenness of new soy set out in neat rows against the rich black of turned soil. Too young to eat. He waited until his head stopped bleeding and the sun dipped below the edge of a rise. Then he made his way across the fields, careful of the tender plantings, and came silent on his unshod feet to the edge of the barnyard.
A dog eyed him wanly. He held out a hand and beckoned softly before it could bark. Suddenly it came toward him, tail giving one hesitant sweep and then its whole body bursting into a wagging wiggle as he scratched its ruff and stroked between its eyes. “Go on now,” he told it, voice low. “Go on to your bed now and lie down, there’s a good fellow.” With a last lick at his hand, it obeyed him.
He glanced around, sniffed, then went straight for the root cellar. Rich starches would be a good start for him, wrapped in leaves and baked in a fire’s coals until they could be chewed.
He was standing with a turnip in one hand and a white potato in the other, weighing which to choose and how to bag them, when he felt the tines of a hay fork in his back.
He went to sleep in the doughy woman’s arms, and when he woke up there were no thinsharps. There was a different softness under him, a different wonderful smell, sweet and rich and fresh. He sat up in a pile of long yellow bendable things. They were scratchy but they were good to lie on.
He turned his head. His eyes went wide and his mouth opened.
It was the biggest thing he’d ever seen. It stood on all fours, and instead of hands it had hard round feet, and its legs and arms bent different ways from his, and the arms seemed to be legs too. It had a long neck, and a long head, and its ears went straight up. It snuffled at his chest and his neck. Its nose was soft. Its whiskers tickled his face. He laughed, and it blew air through big nose holes and tossed its head and swung it down to the scratchy sweet things he was lying on. It started to eat them.
He tried one. It smelled good, but it didn’t taste good.
Then he saw the other. It was half the size of the big one, hiding behind it, peering out at him.
He looked into its dark, liquid eyes, and was filled with an aching sweet’ ness.
“That’s Purslane,” said a kind, low voice.
He did not look up. He could not tear his eyes away. Slowly, he held his hand out, with the long thing he’d been tasting, what the big one liked to eat. The little one came toward him on spindly legs. It sniffed the long thing but didn’t take it. It sniffed the wrappings on his hand. He dropped the long [211] thing so he could touch it and it clattered backward. But he kept his hand out. It extended its neck, took a step, took another step, and then its neck was under his fingertips and then his arms were around it. He pressed his face into it. It was warm. It smelled good.
“He likes you,” said the kind, low voice. “And a good thing, that. His mother slipped her stall again, the canny wench. She’s not supposed to be nosing around little boys we’ve laid down to sleep in the hay.”
He looked up, afraid they would take Purslane away. He looked up into eyes as dark and liquid and gentle as Purslane’s eyes.
“Have you slipped your stall, young fellow?”
He blinked, then turned his face back in to the warm sweet neck, but Purslane pulled away and shoved his head up under his mother. A hank of hair on his backside twitched back and forth.
“He doesn’t understand,” the doughy woman said. She was standing by the man with the low voice. He was nearly as big as she was, but darker. “I don’t think he’s understood a word I’ve said to him.” She knelt down to bring her round face level with his face. “I’m glad you were all right waking up on your own. I shouldn’t have left you, but we didn’t want to wake you with all our talking. Are you all right?”
He nodded; then, overcome by a yawning empty hole opening inside him, he reached his arms out to be held—then yanked them back, terrified that he would fall, and scooted against the wall, his heels digging into the hay. He wanted to punch himself. He balled his fists.
“None of that now, love,” the woman said. “Hug yourself. Like this. That’s right. Hug yourself tight.”
He did, and he felt better. She scooped him up the way she had before, and she and the man with the low voice sat next to each other on squares of old hay, and she held him in her lap, and the man gave him a soft thing to eat. It wasn’t as sweet as the warm things the woman gave him before, and it had harder things inside it that crunched between his teeth, but right now it tasted even better.
“Will you keep him, then?”
“Of course.”
“If I could ...”
“I know you can’t.”
“Just till his parents are found.”
“I don’t think we’re going to find his parents.”
There was a long silence, with just the sound of his own crunchings, and Purslane’s mother munching hay.
“He must have run wild for days. I can’t imagine what he ate.”
“He’s had a hard time of it, that’s clear enough. But there’s something about him. Something ...” The man sat up very straight.
[212] He shrank back against the doughy woman, but the man took his chin in one hand and lifted his face. The hand was warm, and gentle, but firm, not to be pulled away from.
“Eiden strike me,” he said. “I know this child.”
The Knee
“Who is he then?”
“I don’t know what they called him. He’s Pirra and Alliol and Ellerin’s.”
They looked down at him, then at each other.
“No reaction to the names,” the woman said. “Are you sure?”
“They died on Ve Galandra. This boy’s been untended at least that long.”
“I never saw that child of theirs. Hardly believed they had one.”
“They didn’t let him roam.”
“He’s never seen a horse before, so that much rings true. And if he saw it happen ... well, that would explain some things. But how would you know? What would a stablemaster be doing visiting the Ennead’s head warders?”
There was longer silence then, and he looked up, trying to make sense of what was passing between the man and the woman. Something strained, strung tight. And then it relaxed.
“I fostered this child to them,” the man said. “He takes after his father, though he has his mother’s coloring. I know where he came from. But those are names he can’t ever bear. Nor are Alliol’s and Pirra’s and Ellerin’s, now they’re gone.”
“Should we send him away?”
“He’s too little. Five and some, if I reckon the years right. It would be difficult to get him out of the Holding. They know the warders had a child. They’ll want him, if he shows a light.”
&
nbsp; [214] “Can you hide him?”
“I’ve done it before.”
“He’ll be happy here. He’s in love with that foal.”
“He’ll need a name.”
“You choose. You’ll be his father now.”
The big man regarded him with pursed lips, then said, “He reminds me of a man I knew, good man named Mellas, loved his horses better than he loved himself. That’s a common name, a Heartlands name. He looks a Heartlander. It’ll bring no attention on him.”
The big man laid a hand on his head, and he leaned into its warmth, its strength and protection, and the doughy woman shifted him into the man’s arms, and it felt a safer place, though not as soft.
“You’ll be Mellas, my boy, and we’ll make a runner of you, and keep you as safe as we can here until you can make your own way. Safe from the Ennead, at any rate, and spirits willing you won’t show a light. You’ll be all right, Mellas. You’re with Bron now.”
Louarn flung the girl away and held his hands before him as if seared.
“Mellas,” he said, testing the name. So like, so like the thing he was supposed to say, and yet that wasn’t it. But close. Close enough. “I’m Mellas.” It shocked the man and the woman, because he hadn’t talked before, and their faces made him laugh, and then they laughed, too, and he knew it would be good here. “I’m Mellas!”
“I’m Louarn,” he said, reeling. He could feel the baker’s doughy embrace, the foal’s soft coat against his cheek, the stablemaster’s hand warm on his head, feel horror and tragedy loom in the next breath, and he threw an arm out as though he could ward himself, as though he could unmake the unbearable griefs if he could just stave off their return. “Louarn,” he said, “I’m Louarn. ...”
“Now, I hope you’re not thinking to eat those raw. Be in a world of sickness, you do that.”
The tines withdrew enough for him to turn toward the man’s voice.
“Made friends with old Skulk there, did you? He never minded me so well when I sent him to his bed.”
“He’s a good dog.”
“That he is.” The farmer gave him a wry once-over and set the hay fork on its points, propped against the cellar door. “What’s your name, then, lad?”
He looked down at himself, the shreds and tatters clothing him, his bare dirty feet, his hands holding the tubers.
“I ... don’t know.” He tried; he cast about inside for a name, but there was nothing. Only the shreds and tatters of another world. Pass through. “I think ... I’ve come from a dream.”
“Bollocks,” the farmer said with a laugh. “From a hungry place, I’ll [215] grant you that. May be a lot of those soon, with the light gone. If spuds were eggs, you’d be the old fox in the gooseyard, you would. Come along, young fox. Let’s get you warm, get some clothes on you. Took a knock in the head, looks like. You’ll be Louarn, then, till you remember, or until you become something else. ‘Louarn’ was a word for fox, in the Old Tongue. I remember that, from my prentice days. Never made a wordsmith, though I talk enough for three, wouldn’t you say? There’s a lad, now, sit on down there, we’ll fill a good hot bath for you before you tramp those feet inside the house. Yes, I prenticed as a wordsmith, though whatever passed for a light in me turned out too dim in the end, couldn’t cast for sprouts at my trial, and all the better for me when the light went, didn’t hurt me hardly at all, you’d not believe what it did to the mages hereabouts. But I remember, some. That’s all that trade’ll be good for anymore. You’ll be Louarn, and that’s an end on it. Wrap up tight now, that’s good thrice-shrunk wool, and give me these, you’ll have them back cooked flaky and tender, and fresh butter from the churn. ...”
“Louarn,” Louarn breathed, staggering back another step, then swaying forward and going to his knees. “Louarn ...”
never noticed the shy boy in the shadows
breaking the world in the saving of it
It’ll be soon, son. Too soon.
Father’s quill scritch-scritching on parchment, Mother’s hand smoothing him into sleep, Father’s weight on the bed until the weight of dreams took him. He loved bedtime. Now he huddled under the covers feeling that dreams were the only way he’d ever leave these chambers, and he woke alone and stumbled to the doorway and found
Father doubled over himself blackening and twisting like a lemon peel on a fire
a shadow of Mother in a bowl of dark water blackening melting
an opening in the wall, no floor beyond it, only little black stone not-floors, one after another, down and down, to ruffles whisperhole thinsharps
shivery air like a fizz of bubbles around a swimmer
Could he have dreamed awry, could the walls be softening? The only thing his dreams had ever wrought before was razored darkness. If he gave in to it, it would dissolve him where he stood. He would drown in memory as darkness pressed in and lose the only hope he’d ever have of making things right.
Don’t you know me? Was the pain so bad that you forgot who brought you to this?
The tunnels turned, and the tunnels branched. How would he find the way? He had always known his way through the Holding, even in the dark where the torchman had neglected his duties. You dreamed these passages. They’re a reflection of you. It was a cruel mountain. It taunted him. This [216] was a cruel dream. The stone looked smooth, but the chalk bounced over tiny bumps and his lines came out raggedy. He could return to the passageways he’d dreamed and drown in memory or he could go as far from the Holding as he
knew no trade except for the fetching of mages but if some craftsfolk would take on a boy too old to prentice
the woodsman’s shack the farmer’s field the farrier’s wagon the cooper’s shop the saddler’s bench the ironsmith’s forge the tinker’s cart the weaver’s loom the chandler’s wax the
My name is Croy. Want to know about bricks, do you?
never noticed the shy boy in the shadows
breaking the world in the sawng of it
tried to burrow back into the dark, but it was beyond him now, and anyway there was no choice, his attention wouldn’t tear away
“I’m Louarn!” he cried, curled around a pain so terrible he thought it would break him. “I’m Louarn ...!”
The middle girl was sitting where he had cast her down. She had held on to him for a long time after the names came out of her. She had to hold on for a few breaths to get the full story, she’d had to do that with the Girdler, he remembered that, he remembered ...
The oldest was trying to drag her back, babbling something about names and killers. But the middle one wouldn’t be dragged. “Bad things ... bad things happened to them, they saw ... I can’t ...” She strained toward Louarn. He shrank away, but his body wouldn’t come with him.
“Leave him to me,” the sweetsmonger said. “He doesn’t look good. Ill or mad, he needs shelter and looking after. We’ll sort the rest when we’re settled somewhere.”
Louarn heard them as if down a long corridor. Their speech was conversation heard by a child with no interest or comprehension but remembered, interpreted, by an adult. His limbs seemed to be too large and very far away, but stunted, ill formed. The Girdlers stood guard, though one was digging for something in a pouch. He must not let them drug him. He saw a fist on the grass in front of his face. His own, at the end of a palsied arm. The other spasmed against his chest. His teeth were clamped. His drawn-up knees would not unclench. He could not control his body. He sensed through layers of other senses, overlays of sound-shadows and darkness.
“I’ve got to touch him again,” the middle girl said. “To be sure.”
Louarn heard a low keening come out of himself, but he was unable to move away from her.
“Be sure of what?” said the older girl, plainly terrified. “Names came off him, Pel, we know what that means—”
[217] “Not anymore. Not after them.” The girl crawled to him as if mesmerised. He could not stop her.
She laid hands on him, and went very still.
“Boys,” she said, blinking. “One had two years on you, Elora. One had a year on Caille. Another ...”
“He killed children?”
“Come away, Pel.”
“Sweet spirits—”
“No, it’s not like that, get back, get off him! They were dead, those boys. Except they weren’t. Their bodies went on and grew and got older. But it was the same body. The same person. I don’t know how to ...
I’m not Flin?
Of course you’re Flin, my sweet. You’re you, you’re Flin. ...
You’ll be Mellas, my boy, and we’ll make a runner of you. ...
You’ll be Louarn, then, till you remember, or until you become something else. You’ll be Louarn, and that’s an end on it. ...
The girl looked into him in awe, and said to her sisters, and the sweetsmonger, and the barrow boy, and the Girdlers:
“They’re all him. The haunts inside him are all him.”
His body convulsed. He felt hands on him—Jiondor’s, Nolfiander’s. They tried and failed to stretch him flat. One pried his mouth open to get at his tongue, lay a stick on it. He gagged, and writhed, and cried out horribly. He was all agony, one body with three vying to inhabit it, there wasn’t room for three, he would crack, he would burst. Louarn was reduced to a single cool point of clarity within a burning maelstrom. He could no longer control the man’s body, but he felt its torments as though they were his own. A crevasse of darkness opened, toothed with dark steps, little stone not-floors one after another, a void, an abyss, drynumb coldweary hunger, waking after waking with no escape, no progress, no certainty, no hope.
Vision filled with blood and dimmed to nothing. Bones snapped. A scream tore through the woods, in a voice that had been his.
Flin died in a fall down hard stone steps he did not understand. Mellas died of hunger and thirst lost in cold stone corridors he had dreamed within a dreaming mountain. Louarn had only suspended those deaths, delayed them, escaped them somehow for some temporary time. Now he would live them, and die at last.