Litany of the Long Sun

by Gene Wolfe

  "Accept, O Obscure Outsider, the sacrifice of this fine ram. And speak to us, we beg, of the times that are to come. What are we to do? Your lightest word will be treasured. Should you, however, choose otherwise…"

  He let his arms fall to his sides. "We consent. Speak to us, we beg, through this sacrifice."

  The ram's head burst in the fire as he knelt to examine the entrails. "This god speaks to us freely," he announced after a protracted study. "I do not believe I have ever seen so much written in a single beast. There is a message here for you personally, Auk, by which I mean that it carries the sign of the giver. May I pronounce it now? Or would you prefer that I impart it to you in private? I would call it good news."

  From his place on a front bench. Auk rumbled, "Whatever you think best, Patera."

  "Very well then. The Outsider indicates that in the past you have acted alone, but that time is nearly over. You will stand at the head of a host of brave men. They and you will triumph."

  Auk's mouth pursed in a silent whistle.

  "There is a message here for me as well. Since Auk has been so forthright, I can do no less. I am to do the will of the god who speaks, and the will of Pas as well. Certainly I will strive to do both, and from the manner in which they are written here, I believe that they are one." Silk hesitated, his teeth scraping his lower lip; the joy that he had felt a moment before had melted like the ice around Orpine's body. "There is a weapon here as well, a weapon aimed at my heart. I will try to prepare." He drew a deep breath, fearful, yet ashamed of his fear.

  "Lastly, there is a message for all of us: When danger threatens, we are to find safety between narrow walls. Does anyone know what that may mean?"

  Though his legs felt weak, Silk rose and scanned the sea of faces before him. "The man sitting near Tartaros's image. Have you a suggestion, my son?" The man in question spoke, inaudibly to Silk.

  "Would you stand, please? Let us hear you."

  "There's old tunnels underneath of the city, Patera. Fallin' down in places, an' some's full of water. My bunch hit one last week, diggin' for the new fisc. Only they had us to fill it in so nobody'd get hurt. Pretty narrow down there, an' everything shiprock."

  Silk nodded. "I've heard of them before. They could be a place of refuge, I suppose, and they may well be what is meant."

  A woman said, "In our houses. There's nobody here that has a big house."

  Orchid turned in her seat to glare at her.

  "In a boat," suggested a man on the other side of the aisle.

  "Those are all possibilities as well. Let us keep the Outsider's message in mind. I feel certain that its meaning will be made apparent to us when the time comes."

  Maytera Marble was standing at the back of the manteion with a pair of doves. Silk said, "Auk has first claim on the sacred meal. Auk? Do you wish to claim all or a portion of it, my son?"

  Auk shook his head, and Silk swiftly divided the ram's carcass, casting its heart, lungs and intestines into the altar fire when everything else was gone.

  Maytera Marble held one dove while Silk presented the other to the Sacred Window. "Accept, O Comely Kypris, the sacrifice of these fine white doves. And speak to us, we beg, of the times that are to come. What are we to do? Your lightest word will be treasured. Should you, however, choose otherwise…"

  He let his arms fall to his sides. "We consent. Speak to us, we beg, through this sacrifice."

  A single deft motion severed the head of the first dove. Silk consigned it to the flames, then held the fluttering, crimson and white body so that the blazing cedar was sprayed with blood. At first he thought the staring eyes and open mouths of the mourners and the throng who had come to worship or in hope of sharing Orpine's mortuary sacrifices no more than a reaction to something that had happened at the altar. Perhaps his gauntlets or his robe had taken fire, or old Maytera Rose had fallen.

  MAYTERA MARBLE SAW the Sacred Window blaze with color, and heard an indistinct voice. A god spoke, as Pas had in Patera Pike's time. She fell to her knees, and in so doing involuntarily freed the dove she had been holding. It shot toward the roof, and then, seeming almost to ride the sacred flames, rose through the god gate and was gone. An unshaven man in the second row, seeing her upon her knees, knelt too. In a moment more, the bespangled, brilliantly dressed young women who had come with Orchid were kneeling, too, nudging one another and tugging at the skirts of those who still sat transfixed. When Maytera Marble raised her head at last to see, for what would almost certainly be the final time in her life, the swirling colors of present divinity, Patera Silk was beside her, his hands lifted in supplication.

  "Come back!" Silk implored the dancing colors and that gentle thunder. "Oh, come back!"

  MAYTERA MINT SAW the goddess's face dearly and heard her voice, and even Maytera Mint, who knew so little of the world and wished to know less, knew that both exceeded in beauty any mortal woman's. They were also very much like her own, and seemed to become more so as she looked, until at last, moved by reverence and superabundant modesty, she closed her eyes. It was the greatest sacrifice that she had ever made, though she had made thousands, of which five at least had been very great indeed.

  MAYTERA ROSE WAS the last of the three sibyls to kneel, out of no lack of reverence, but because kneeling involved certain body parts with which she had been born-parts that were now in a strict sense dead, though they still functioned and would continue to function for years to come. Echidna had blinded her to the gods, the goddess's just punishment, and so she saw and heard nothing, though the holy hues danced again and again across and down the Sacred Window. In the deep tones of the divine voice, tones that she found herself comparing to those of a cello, she occasionally caught a word or a phrase. Young Patera Silk (who was always so careless, and never more careless than when dealing with matters of the greatest importance) had dropped the knife of sacrifice, the knife that Maytera Rose had cleaned and oiled and sharpened now for almost a century, still dyed with the dove's blood. Stretching, Maytera Rose retrieved it. Its bone handle had not cracked; its blade did not even seem to have been soiled by its brief contact with the floor, though she wiped it on her sleeve as a precaution. Absently, she tested the point against the tip of her thumb as she listened and sometimes made out, or nearly made out, a short sentence played by an orchestra too wonderful for this poor whorl, this whorl which was, like Maytera Rose herself, worn out and worn away, past its time which had never come, too old, though it was not even as old as Maytera Marble and though it was so much nearer to death. Cellos of the woods of Mainframe, flutes of diamond. Maytera herself, old Maytera Rose who was so tired that she no longer knew that she was tired, had once played the flute. She had not thought other flute since the shame of blood. Pain's eaten it away, she thought, tortured it to silence, though once it sounded sweetly, oh, so sweetly, at evening.

  Somehow old Maytera Rose sensed that this goddess was not Echidna. Thelxiepeia, maybe, or even Scalding Scylla. Scylla was another favorite of hers, and this was Scylsday, after all.

  THE VOICE WAS stilled. Slowly, the colors faded like the beautiful and complex tinctures of river-washed stones, which fade to nothing as the stones dry in the sunshine. Still on his knees, Silk bowed, his forehead touching the floor of the sanctuary. A murmur rose from the mourners and worshipers and soared until it was like the roaring of a storm. Silk glanced over his shoulder at them. One of the rough-looking men sitting with Orchid appeared to be shouting as he shook his fist at the Sacred Window, his eyes bulging and his face purple with some emotion at which Silk could only guess. A lovely young woman with curls as black as Orchid's beads was dancing in the center aisle to a music played for her alone.

  Silk stood and limped slowly to the ambion. "All of you are entitled to hear-"

  His voice seemed nonexistent. His tongue and lips had moved, and air had passed them, but no trumpeter could have made himself heard above the din.

  Silk raised his hands and looked at the Sacred Window again. It was
a shimmering gray, as empty as if no goddess had ever spoken through it. Yesterday in the yellow house on Lamp Street, the goddess had told him that she would speak to him again soon, repeating soon.

  She kept her word, he thought.

  Almost idly it occurred to him that the registers behind the Sacred Window would no longer be empty, as he had always seen them. One would show a single one, now; the other would display the length of the goddess's theophany, in units that no living person understood. He wanted to look at them, to verify the reality of what he had just seen and heard.

  "All of you are entitled to hear-" His voice sounded weak and reedy, but at least he could hear it.

  All of you are entitled to hear yourselves speaking when you could not hear yourselves at all, he thought. All of you are entitled to know how you felt and what you said to the goddess, or wanted to say-though most of us never will. The tumult was subsiding now, falling like a wave on the lake. Strongly, Silk told himself, from the diaphragm. They had praised him for this at the schola.

  "You are entitled to know what the goddess said, and the name that she gave. It was Kypris; and that is not a name from the Nine, as you know." Before he could stop himself, he added, "You are entitled to know as well, that Kypris has previously appeared to me in a private revelation."

  She had told him not to speak of that, and now he had; he felt sure that she would never forgive him, as he would never forgive himself.

  "Kypris is mentioned seven times in the Writings, where it is said that she always takes an interest in-in-in young women. Women of marriageable age, who are young. No doubt she took an interest in Orpine. I feel sure she must have."

  They were almost quiet now, many listening intently; but his mind was still whelmed by the wonder of the goddess, and barren of cohesive thought.

  "Comely Kypris, who has so favored us, is mentioned upon seven occasions in the Chrasmologic Writings. I think I said that before, though some of you may not have heard it. White doves and white rabbits are to be offered her, which was why we had those doves. The doves were supplied by her mother-I mean by Orpine's mother, by Orchid."

  Providentially, he remembered something more. "In the Writings she is honored as the most favored companion of Pas among the minor gods."

  Silk paused and swallowed. "I said you were entitled to hear everything that she said. That is what is called for by the canon. Unfortunately, I cannot adhere to that canon as I would wish. A part of her message was directed to the chief mourner alone. I must deliver that in private, and I'll try to arrange to do that as soon as I am finished here."

  The sea of faces stirred. Even the mutes were listening with wide eyes and open mouths.

  "She-I mean Comely Kypris-said three things. One was the private message that I must deliver. She said also that she would prophesy, in order that you would believe. I don't think there's anyone here who does not, not now. But possibly some of us might question her theophany later. Or possibly she intended our whole city, all of us in Viron.

  "Her prophesy was this: there will be a great crime, a successful one, here in Viron. She spreads her mantle above the-the criminals, and because of it they will succeed."

  Shaken and trying frantically to collect his wits, Silk fell silent. He was rescued by a man sitting near Auk, who shouted, "When? When'll it be?"

  "Tonight." Silk cleared his throat. "She said it would be tonight."

  The man's jaw snapped shut, and he stared about him. "The third was this: that she would come again to this Sacred Window, soon. I asked her-you must have heard me, some of you. I implored her to come back, and she said she would, and soon. That-that's everything I can tell you now."

  He saw Maytera Marble's bowed head, and sensed that she was praying for him, praying that he would somehow receive the strength and presence of mind that he so clearly needed. The knowledge itself strengthened him.

  "And now I must request that the chief mourner come up here. Orchid, my daughter, please join me. We must retire to-to a private place, in order that I can deliver the goddess's message to you."

  He would take her out the side door and into the garden, and thinking of the garden reminded him of the heifer and the other victims. "Please remain where you are, all of you. Or leave if you like, and let others join in the sacred meal. That would be a meritorious act. As soon as I have conveyed the goddess's message, we will proceed with Orpine's rites."

  He had left Blood's lioness-headed walking stick behind the Sacred Window; he retrieved it before they started down the stair to the side door. "There are seats in the arbor, outside. I have to take off this thing around my leg and-and beat it against something. I hope you won't mind."

  Orchid did not reply.

  It was not until he stepped out into the garden that Silk realized how hot it had been in the manteion, near the altar fire. The whole place seemed to glow; the rabbits lay on their sides gasping for breath, and Maytera Marble's herbs were wilting almost visibly; but to him the hot, dry wind felt cool, and the burning bar that was the midday sun, which should have struck him like a blow, seemed without force.

  "I ought to have something to drink," he said. "Water, I mean. Water's all we have. No doubt you should, too."

  Orchid said, "All right," and he led her to the arbor and limped into the kitchen of the manse, pumped and pumped until the water came, then doused his head in the gushing stream.

  Outside again, he handed Orchid a tumbler of water, sat down, and filled another for himself from the carafe he had brought. "It's cold, at least. I'm sorry I don't have wine to offer you. I'll have some in a day or two, thanks to you; but there wasn't time this morning."

  "I have a headache," Orchid said. "This's what I need." And then, "She was beautiful, wasn't she?"

  "The goddess? Oh, yes! She was-she's lovely. No artist-"

  "I meant Orpine." Orchid had emptied her tumbler; as she spoke she held it out to be refilled, and Silk nodded as he tilted the carafe.

  "Don't you think that was one reason why this goddess came? I'd like to think so anyhow, Patera. And it might be true."

  Silk said, "I had better give you the goddess's message now-I've already waited too long. She said that I was to tell you that no one who loves something outside herself can be wholly bad. That Orpine had saved you for a while, but that you must find something else to save you now. That you must find something new to love."

  Orchid sat silent for what seemed to Silk a long while. The white heifer, lying beneath the dying fig tree, moved to a more comfortable position and began to chew her cud. The people waiting in Sun Street, on the other side of the garden wall, were chattering excitedly among themselves. Silk could not understand, though he could easily guess, what they were saying.

  At last she murmured, "Does love really mean more than life, Patera? Is it more important?"

  "I don't know. I think it may be."

  "I would've said I loved a lot of other things." Her mouth twisted in a bitter grin. "Money, just for starters. Only I gave you a hundred cards for this, didn't I? Maybe that shows I don't love it as much as I thought."

  Silk groped for words. "The gods have to speak to us in our own language, a language that we are always corrupting, because it's the only one we understand. They, perhaps, have a thousand words for a thousand different kinds of love, or ten thousand words for ten thousand; but when they talk to us, they must say 'love,' as we do. I think that at times it must blur their meaning."

  "It won't be easy, Patera."

  Silk shook his head. "I never imagined it would be, nor do I think that Kypris believed it would. If it were going to be easy, she wouldn't have sent her message, I feel sure."

  Orchid fingered her jet beads. "I've been wondering why somebody-Kypris or Pas or whatever-didn't save her. I think I've got it now."

  "Then tell me," Silk said. "I don't, and I would like to very much."

  "They didn't because they did. It sounds funny, doesn't it? I don't think Orpine loved anybody except me, and if
I'd died before she did…" Orchid shrugged. "So they let her go first. She was beautiful, better looking than I ever was. But she wasn't as tough. I don't think so, anyhow. What do you love, Patera?"

  "I'm not certain," Silk admitted. "The last time that we talked, I would have said this manteion. I know better now, or at least I think I do. I try to love the Outsider-I'm always talking about him, just as Auk said-but sometimes I almost hate him, because he has given me responsibility, as well as so much honor."

  "You were enlightened. That's what somebody told me on the way here. You're going to bring back the Charter and be Caldé yourself."

  Silk shook his head and rose. "We'd better go inside. We're keeping five hundred people waiting in that heat."

  She patted his shoulder when they parted, surprising him.

  WHEN THE LAST sacrifice had been completed and the last morsel of the sacred meal that it had provided parceled out, he cleared the manteion. "We will lay Orpine in her casket now," he explained, "and close the casket. Those who wish to make a final farewell may do so on the way out, but everyone must leave. Those of you who will accompany the casket to the cemetery should wait outside on the steps."

  Maytera Rose had left already, to wash his gauntlets and the sacrificial knife. Maytera Mint whispered, "I'd rather not watch, Patera. May I…?"

  He nodded, and she hurried off to the cenoby. The mourners were filing past, Orchid waiting so as to be last in line. Maytera Marble said, "Those men will carry it, Patera. That's why they were here. Yesterday I happened to think that there would have to be someone, and the address was on the draft. I sent a boy with a note to Orchid."

  "Thank you, Maytera. As I've said a thousand times, I don't know what I'd do without you. Have them wait at the entrance, please."

  Chenille was still in her seat. "You should go, too," he told her, but she appeared not to have heard him.

  When Maytera Marble returned, they lifted Orpine's body from its bed of ice and laid it in the waiting casket. "I'll help you with the lid, too, Patera."