by Dave Duncan
“How do you feel about the spinster now, pilgrim?” Uriel asked.
“I worship her memory,” Quetti said very quietly. “Could she be restored to life, I would gladly pasture silkworms for her until nothing remained but my bones. Not for anyone else by choice, though.”
Uriel shuddered. “You claimed you had a token…?”
I was still staring at the shrouded figure of Michael and especially at those small pale hands. Wetlander hands. His face was a pale blur within cowled shadow.
“I had one,” Quetti said. “But I left the spinster’s web with nothing, not even a whole skin, as you know. Knobil had three!”
“Three?” Two archangels, one saint, and one angel all echoed the word in astonishment, or perhaps disbelief.
“Three! But he lost them in an ants’ nest.”
“Very convenient,” said Uriel.
Michael intervened sharply. “Tokens are not important! They are not necessary for admission and they do not guarantee it. Tokens help in recruiting, but they are mostly of value to us as a means of learning where the donors were. The marks on the back of a token back tell us that. If an angel is lost, we like to know how far he got… That’s all. What counts is not the token, but the man who brings it.”
“Nevertheless,” Uriel insisted, “I am going to ask. Tell us about yours, Pilgrim Quetti.”
“I was quite small,” Quetti said cheerfully, “paddling along in my kayak. I chanced upon an angel about to be eaten by a pack of ice frogs. He seemed to appreciate my help.”
“His name?” Uriel queried suspiciously.
“Orange-lime-orange.”
“I have his report here, Archangels.” Kettle was fumbling with his papers. “He has just returned from the Thursday venture, so we can easily call him in as a witness if you wish. He described the incident as ‘terrifying’ and an ‘extremely narrow escape’.”
Quetti returned Uriel’s glare with a smirk. “You gotta know where to hit ’em, that’s all.”
Uriel grunted, as if impressed despite himself. “Michael, this man is obviously a survivor. I recommend that we accept Candidate Quetti.”
“Agreed. Welcome, Cherub.”
“Thank you, sir.”
“As I said,” Michael continued, “I believe that wetlanders make the finest angels of all. We are loners by nature, yet our background has taught us to cooperate. We are not frightened by open spaces. Is this not so?” He laughed quietly, in an old man’s dry, cynical chuckle. “And we also have a streak of ruthlessness that can be very convenient at times—true?”
“Er…yes sir,” Quetti said, turning red.
I thumped him on the shoulder. “Congratulations!”
Uriel said, “The other candidate—”
“I am not a candidate, Archangel.”
Quetti spun around on his chair. “Knobil!”
Uriel sighed. “Then I am saved the duty of refusing you. You are about twice the age we require, and a cripple. And a herdman!” He hesitated. “But I admit I would like to hear how a man collects three tokens in one lifetime.”
I saw Michael’s hands clench.
“Violet-indigo-red gave me one…” For a moment I recalled my old, old dream of marching triumphantly into Heaven, and of Violet coming forth to welcome me and declare me a cherub. Nothing remained of that dream, nothing at all.
“Why?”
“He saw me running from a tyrant—perhaps it was a reward for intelligence? He was a little crazy. The second I got from Brown-yellow-white, because I rode a great one up the Great River. But hundreds of others did the same right after. The third…the third was only a promise, not an actual token. From Orange-brown-white—”
Quetti shot me a startled glance but said nothing. Michael’s fingers unfolded slowly.
“Orange-brown-white?” Saint Kettle sat up eagerly. “Where? How long ago? Why only a promise?”
“A promise because he had no tokens to give me. He had nothing left but his skin, and not as much of that as feels good. He promised me a token if we escaped. It was humor—not very funny humor, but then we had very little to laugh about.”
The audience exchanged glances, and Uriel leaned across the table as if he wanted to bite me. “Orange was a slave? You are saying that those ants had the audacity to enslave an angel?”
“Is that worse than enslaving a herdman?”
“Well, if—no, I suppose not.” He obviously thought that it was, though. “We shall need a detailed report. He’s dead now?”
“Very.” I outlined how Orange had died soon after my capture, long, long ago. It had been about then that I had lost all hope that Heaven would ever, or could ever, do anything about the ants, but now suddenly I realized that in this case they might at least try, inspired by my tale of the captured angel. My mouth began to water at the thought of Hrarrh dying at my feet, slowly and painfully.
Uriel looked over Michael’s head at Kettle. “Is there a mine recorded near the Gates of the Andes?”
The fat man nodded. “I believe so. I’d have to check, but it seems to me it is one of the poor ones, not exploited in every cycle.”
The snortoise took another giant lurch forward. The room rocked and creaked. Then came the bellow.
When silence returned, Michael was already speaking, or thinking aloud. “…a Friday Freeze due, but latest word is that the seafolk are already on the move… I could free up more men there, at least until the ice actually closes… The Thursday party’s back—Have we the equipment, though? That’s the problem!” He rose and the others followed, the angel straightening up from the wall.
I was astonished by the little man’s authority, by the way he could make larger men than he behave like herdwomen around their master. How did he do that? I saw that there might yet be things I could learn in Heaven—things that would assist me in my planned revenge. Even if nothing came of this proposed attack on the ants’ nest, I might want to stay around for a while and observe.
Michael was not done yet. “Kettle, tell Gabriel I want a full report on that location. Two-green, you get one from Raphael on ordnance—and check it yourself. Uriel, you’ll administer the oath to Cherub Quetti? I want to hear more details from Knobil.”
The others scuttled around like beetles. I stayed safely in my chair, not yet trusting my balance on so uncertain a flooring.
As the door closed behind the others, the tiny man in the bulky white robe came around the table and turned to face me. By coincidence, the clouds were clearing on the skyline, and a smoky yellow light began to brighten the casement. Michael threw back his hood, and for a while the two of us just stared at each other.
His hair was silver, yet thick for his age. He was not as pale as Quetti had become in the spinster’s lair, but still unusually light, his skin roughened by long weathering. And his eyes were brilliant flecks of sky.
Then he smiled. “The promise from Orange made four,” he said, stepping close. “There was already a third token.”
I just nodded, gazing stupidly at him. Could I really remember? He was certainly much smaller than I would have imagined.
He held out two hands, as if expecting me to take them. “I never dreamed! They told me two wetlanders. When I heard your dialect, I knew you were never from Dawn… Then I realized that I had heard your name before… Knobil! After all this time!” He blinked rapidly.
“I remember you.”
“You do? I find that hard to believe. You were very small.”
“But you frightened me. I was not accustomed to seeing my mother used so.”
The offered hands were withdrawn. Michael studied me now with a hard blue stare. Then he hooked a chair to him and sat down, his feet between my outstretched legs. I am sure that my own gaze was no softer than his.
“It was an accident,” he said. “I’d been sent to tell the wetlanders that it was safe to move south again. I was told to go by the grasslands and estimate the herdfolk population. On my way home, by mere chance, I arrived at a
camp I had visited on the way out.”
“And you broke your own rules by tumbling the same woman again.”
He pursed his ancient lips, thin lips, turning them white. “I really wanted to play with you, but you wouldn’t come near me. Do you know why angels have that rule?”
He reminded me a little of Jat Lon—a smarter man than me, seeking to mold me to his own purposes, and certainly very devious. I wanted a favor, a ride to the grasslands, and now I knew who made decisions in Heaven.
“I don’t think I care. Nothing could so justify the demeaning manner in which angels use women.”
“Indeed? So Uriel was wrong when he surmised that two imposters had been accepting that sort of hospitality?”
I dropped my gaze to the hummocky, whorled floor of scuffed snortoiseshell. “Mostly I left that part to Quetti,” I muttered.
“But not always, surely? Some resolutions are harder to keep than others… You must certainly have been invited.”
I nodded in bitter silence.
“And you had to stay in character for an angel.”
“Damn you! Yes—I did what they asked! And yes, I enjoyed it.”
“But yet you feel guilty? How curious.” Michael considered me for a moment in silence. “Few would. Well, so I bent the Compact. I gave your mother a token for you. I doubted that she would even remember it when the time came, and I certainly had no real expectation that it would ever reach Heaven. Even hope died a long time ago.”
“I did not exactly come by the fastest route.”
“Obviously! I want to hear your story, all your story—son!” He laughed. “How strange to say that word! I am very grateful that you did not speak of the token.”
“You’re not supposed to make angelbrats, are you?” I was recalling Violet then.
“We’re not supposed to recognize angelbrats!” Michael said. “The more we make, the better. But they’ll guess soon enough. I don’t usually condone my lads dying in mysterious circumstances. I saved your life just now, you know?”
“No.”
“I did. Uriel was going to take you both out and shoot you.”
I started to protest and he waved a thin pale hand, like a dead child’s. “Don’t be any stupider than you must. You and the other one killed Red—it’s quite obvious. I twisted Uriel’s neck to get that acquittal. They’ll gossip. They’ll guess. We have records. I was the only wetlander on the grasslands two months ago. Longer ago, maybe? Anyway, there are records, so they’ll know. I can offer you hospitality, son, but no more than that. The Great Compact…but let’s leave it to the saints. You can’t be an angel, obviously.”
The only reason I had not asked to be a cherub, as Quetti had, was that I did not want to be a cherub. Yet now I felt an irrational spasm of annoyance. So I would have been refused? Did he think that my disability disqualified me? I had already proved that I could do anything an angel could do, in chariot or elsewhere. Still, the last thing I wanted was to be an angel.
I had been staring absently at the dusty, sun-gilded casement. I turned a wary eye on the shrewd little spidery man before me, hunched in his white robe, gently rubbing his tiny hands as he watched my thoughts roll. If I antagonized this long-lost father of mine, I would not be able to collect on the debts he owed me.
“You look tired, and I expect you are hungry,” Michael said. “We’ll have to put you in with the cherubim, for we have no guest rooms. The food is plain, but plentiful.” He stopped, frowning. “But I forgot. You won’t be able to manage the ladders.”
“I can! I did! I may be slow on them, but I can manage.”
“You came up. Going down may be harder. If you fall, you’ll snap your pelvis for certain.”
“I’ll manage.”
Michael was not accustomed to argument. Anger flared in his wan cheeks. “Ice can build up on those rungs at any time, with no warning. Cherubim fall all the time, and angels, too. Broken legs are one thing, but a broken back—”
“I’ll manage,” I said flatly.
He scowled testily. “It’s your pelvis! But I don’t suppose you’ll be here long… When you’ve rested, we’ll talk again. You’re going to have many eager audiences during your stay, Knobil. And you will be very useful to one of my little campaigns…” He rose then. Chairs are difficult for me, but I eventually restored myself to vertical without having to ask for help.
“Angels cross the grasslands often,” Michael was saying while I struggled, “as you might guess. I’ve been trying to persuade them to hand out tokens there. They do it everywhere else! All those loners—such a waste! I could use them here. They’d certainly have enough heft to make good wood-chopping seraphim, even if their brains are too woolly for angels.”
I stared down at him in silence.
Despite his pale skin, he did not blush. He chuckled instead. “Ah! You see? Even I do it!” He reached up and squeezed my shoulder. “Accept my apologies, Knobil. Please? Then go and show my lads that herdmen are human, too.”
I trusted him even less when he tried to be charming.
—2—
MICHAEL LIVED AND WORKED in a building borne by a snortoise named Throne, which happened to be one of the smallest and therefore a fortunate choice for my first attempt at descending a ladder. While I was still wrestling with my borrowed furs on the porch, peering out at twilight fading before a gathering snowstorm, and wondering how I could find a bed, I heard a chorus of barking and shouting. Three dogsleds came into view, racing through the trees. Four young men scrambled up the steps and burst in upon me, armed with ropes and pulleys.
Two-green-red had sent them, they announced breathlessly, to lower a cripple down to ground level.
I rejected that offer with a few corrosive expressions I had learned in the ants’ nest, which earned their instant approval. Then I went outside, lay down on the platform, and prepared to break my back on the ladder or the jagged tree stumps below it. I didn’t, and by the time the cherubim were tucking me in on a dogsled, they were already addressing me as Old Man. They had been too considerate to offer sympathy, but they had granted me patience, which was all I wanted. They must have spread the word afterward, I suppose, and it must have become an immediate tradition, for thereafter the cherubim always behaved that way toward me.
We set off then on a hair-raising twilight ride through fungus jungle and dead trees, through looming rocks and flying snow. Snortoises bellowed unseen all around, dogs yowled, and young men yelled insults. I just sat with my eyes closed and a fixed smile on my face until we arrived at the cherubim feeding trough, a room invariably referred to by the name of its snortoise, Cloud Nine.
There I found Quetti already boxed in a corner, being plied with beer and questions by a dozen or so cherubim and a few angels. Forced from his usual reticence, he seemed mainly to be telling more lies about me. As soon as I had taken the edge off my hunger and thirst, therefore, I began to relate some of Quetti’s own exploits. His prowess with women was noteworthy, as I have said, but I raised it now to the status of legend, making the younger cherubim in the audience wide-eyed and their more discerning elders purse-lipped. Quetti’s less salacious tales were soon finding few listeners and no believers.
In one hundred cycles Heaven has seen almost anything possible, but imposter angels were new. The audience varied as men came and went, and the two of us were kept there talking until we were both ready to fall off our chairs. I felt as if I had recounted my whole life story three times before we were at last released and escorted over to Nightmare, the snortoise that bore the cherubim’s dormitory.
Heavenly beer is not especially potent. Quetti and I had learned during our long trek to accept hospitality with moderation, so I am certain we had both been discreet when describing the death of Red-yellow-green. Yet before that long meeting ended, the cherubim, with deadly intuition, were addressing Quetti as “Snake.” He accepted the name with placid amusement, as if it were a compliment, and Snake he remained until he became an angel.
<
br /> I was the Old Man. Some time later, while learning to use snow-shoes, I earned a second name. Snowshoes are tricky even for a man with real knees. Although I eventually became proficient on them, my early attempts caused me to thoroughly lose my temper. One of the spectators, a young swampman named Tiny, grew intolerably raucous over my tangled efforts to walk.
“Faster than the wind,” he exclaimed, “it moves over the grasslands in mighty bounds!”
I swung at him, missed, and fell headlong. Thereafter I was still the Old Man, but I was also known as Roo.
─♦─
Then there was Kettle. Right after a long first sleep and a hearty second meal, Quetti and I were taken in hand by the saints. I think Quetti was given his first reading lesson, but Gabriel was howling for information on the ants’ nest, so I was cross-examined by a team of six. They came at me in relays, hurling questions until my head spun. It seemed to take half a lifetime.
That was in the scriptorium, an unusually large and bright room, well outfitted with windows and drippy skylights, but always so crowded with chests and desks that there was barely room to move. There the saints fought an unending battle to copy out ancient records before the damp of Dusk rotted them all away. The air reeked of mold, and there were insects. Young men with good eyesight struggled alongside old men with experience, striving to decipher crumbling paper or sodden leather. The most valuable texts have been transcribed onto gold-plated shell slabs, but there is a limit to the weight the snortoises can transport.
Weight has always been Heaven’s problem, as Kettle explained to me soon after the questioning had ended.
He took me off to his own cell, a nook of highly irregular shape that was even more cluttered than the scriptorium. Bundles of old manuscript were mixed in with discarded garments, and there was barely room to stand, let alone sit. The bed itself was heaped with books and a laptop desk and brass instruments for observing the stars. I was never to see it in any other state, and I eventually concluded that Saint Kettle, if he slept at all, must sleep standing up. He cleared a place for me on the end of the bed and squeezed his portly form onto one corner of a chest. And beamed at me.