by Gene Wolfe
The bald man pointed as before. "That was mine."
Together, they walked to the spot. "I've been away a long time." The words had almost stuck in his throat.
"The quarter burned," the bald man said.
"I wasn't here then."
"Neither was I, I was way up north fighting Trivigauntis. Did you ever come into my shop in the old days?"
"Yes. Yes, I did."
The bald man moved half a step to his left, seeking a better angle. "Parietal? Was that your name?"
"No." Better, surely better, not to say too much too soon. "You lived here? In the Sun Street Quarter?"
"That's right. I had a wife here and children, four boys and three girls. Our house over on Silver burned too, but they got away. Went outside to one of the round whorls."
"You had a son named Horn, didn't you?" It was harder than ever to speak.
"That's right, my oldest. You knew him?"
"Not as well as I should have."
"He was good boy, a hard worker and brave as Pas's bull." The bald man held out his hand. "If you were a friend of his back then, I'm pleased to meet you. Smoothbone's my name."
They clasped hands. "I am your son Horn, father."
Smoothbone stared and blinked. "No, you're not!"
"My appearance has changed. I know that."
Smoothbone shook his head and took a step backward.
"There was a loose floorboard, right over there. After we closed, you'd pull it up and put our cashbox under it; and put a box of ledgers on top of it."
Smoothbone's mouth had fallen open.
"You didn't want me to know about it, and you were angry when you found out I had spied on you; but you continued to put it there. I know now you did it to show you trusted me, but at the time-" Tears and embraces prevented him from saying more.
When they separated, Smoothbone said, "You're really Horn? You're my son Horn, come back?"
He nodded, and they went down the street to a tavern in a tent, where the bar consisted of a plank laid across two barrels, and there were three tables, three chairs (one broken) and an assortment of stools and kegs. "You've changed out of all reckoning," Smoothbone said.
"I know. So have you. You were a big man when we went away." Memories came flooding back. "You said I was brave, but I was afraid of you. So was Mother. We all were."
The barman asked, "Wine or beer?" and looked surprised when Smoothbone asked for wine.
"How is she, Horn?"
"Mother? She was well the last time I saw her, but that was some time ago. Oxlip's taking care of her."
"I've married again. I ought to tell you."
For a moment, there was nothing to say.
"I guess you wondered why I didn't come."
He shook his head. "We thought you'd been killed."
"Not me, Horn."
"That's good." He was sick with embarrassment.
"You did all right out there?"
"Well enough. It was difficult, but then it was difficult here too. Difficult for you, I mean; and it would have been difficult for Nettle and me, if we had stayed here. It was no worse there, just different. Our donkey died." He laughed. "I don't know why I said that, but it did. That was the bottom-the worst time we had. After that things got better, but only slowly. Years of hard work. Nothing to eat, sometimes."
Smoothbone nodded. "I know how that is."
"People say there's always fish. I mean on Lizard they say that. We live on Lizard now."
"I never heard of it. Just Blue or Green is what they say."
"It's on Blue-a little island. We have a house there, a house we built ourselves, and a paper mill." Suddenly he smiled. "You have three grandsons. No, more, but the others aren't mine. Mine are Sinew, Hoof, and Hide."
Smoothbone smiled too. "This is Nettle? Nettle's sprats?"
"That's right. We married. We'd always planned to, and old Patera Remora married us there a few days after the lander put down. Do you remember Patera Remora, Father?"
"Remora?" Smoothbone tugged an earlobe reflectively. "It was Pike. Patera Pike. Then Silk, that was calde after."
He nodded.
"We went to sacrifice with him, I suppose it must have been three or four times."
"More than that."
"You and your mother, maybe." Smoothbone drained his glass. "More wine, son?"
"No, thank you." His glass was half full.
"I'll have another." Smoothbone signaled the barman. "You know, I ought to have written all that down. I wish I had."
"On Blue, I wrote a history of Silk. Nettle and I did, I ought to say."
"Did you now!"
"Yes, Father. Nearly a thousand pages."
"I'd like to see it. My eyes aren't what they were when I was shooting Trivigauntis, but I can still read with a lens. Were you wanting to get paper and pens at our old shop, son?"
He shook his head. "I simply wanted to see it. To stand there for a little while and remember." He paused, considering. "Now that I know just where it was, I'm going to go back there and do it. It may be the only chance I'll ever have."
"Will you now?" The barman brought the wine; Smoothbone paid as before. "If you want something, I could take you to the new place. I'll give you just about anything you want there."
"No, thank you."
"Box of pencils? Pen case, maybe, with a little paper to put in it?"
"That would be nice. You're very kind to me, Father. You were always very kind to me-I'll never be able to thank you enough for all that you did to teach me our trade-but no, I couldn't impose upon you like that."
"Sure now?"
"Yes. I don't need those things, and I wouldn't feel right if I accepted them."
"Well, if you change your mind you just let me know." Smoothbone rose. "I've got to-you know. Excuse me minute?"
"Certainly."
"Promise you won't go away? I want to ask you about my grandchildren and tell you about your brothers. Half brothers, anyway. Antler's ten and Stag's eight. You wait right there."
"I will," he said.
Afterward they had talked for over an hour; and later, when he returned to the place where their shop had stood, he found a pen case, used but still serviceable, on the steps in front of it. It was of thin metal covered with thin black leather, and very like the pen cases that had been sold in that shop twenty years before. It was like the pen cases used by students in the schola, for that matter.
"I am here before you," he told Olivine, "but I am going to offer a funeral sacrifice for myself, nevertheless-for my body on Green, which lies there unburied as far as I know. I couldn't do this in a manteion. In fact I couldn't sacrifice in a manteion at all, though I might assist an augur. There has been an exchange of parts. You, I think, will understand that better than a bio would."
She nodded, perhaps a little doubtfully.
"Very well," he said; he looked up, thinking of the Aureate Path and Mainframe at its termination, although the Long Sun was hidden behind the shade. "My body does not lie here, nor is it to be found in this whorl. We offer it to you, Quadrifons, and to the other gods of this whorl, in absentia. We offer it also to the Outsider, in whose realm it lies. Accept, all you gods, the sacrifice of this brave man. Though our hearts are torn, we-the man himself, and your devoted worshipper Olivine-consent.
"What are we to do? Already your have spoken to us of the times to come. Should you wish to speak further, whether in signs and portents, or in any other fashion, your lightest word will be treasured. Should you, however, choose otherwise-"
He raised his arms, but only silence answered him.
He let them fall. "We consent still. Speak to us, we beg, though these sacrifices."
Picking up the loaf that Olivine had filched from the kitchen in which she had been born, he raised it. "This is my body. Accept, O Obscure Outsider, its sacrifice. Accept it, Great Pas and all lesser gods."
Lowering the loaf, he broke it in two, scattering dun-colored crumbs over the whi
te cloth, then tore away a fragment and ate it.
"This is my blood." He raised the bottle, lowered it, sipped from it, and sprinkled a few drops upon the cloth.
"Can you tell what's going to happen from that… Can you tell what's going to happen from that, Patera?"
"I can try." He bent over the cloth, his lips pursed.
"Will my father ever come back… Will my father ever come back, Patera?"
"The right side-" he tapped it, "concerns the presenter and the augur. Perhaps you were aware of that already."
Olivine nodded.
"Here are two travelers, a man and woman." He smiled as he indicated them. "Converging upon another woman, who can only be yourself. It seems likely that they represent your father and the woman he has gone to seek. Since they are shown coming from opposite directions it may be they will arrive separately. You must be prepared for that."
"I won't mind a… I won't mind a bit!" There was joy in her voice, and it almost seemed that there was joy in her eyes as well, although that was impossible.
"Patera, why are you looking at me like… Patera, why are you looking at me like that?"
"Because I heard your mother, Olivine. You don't sound like her-not usually, I mean. Just then, you did."
"I've been wanting to talk to you about… I've been wanting to talk to you about her." Olivine's hands were at her face; there was a momentary silence, punctuated by a sharp click. "Here… Here, Patera. Take it to… Take it to her." Her hand held an eye like the one he had left on Green, save that it was not dark; the sackcloth had fallen away from her face, so like her mother's with its empty socket.
He drew back in horror. "I cannot let you do this. You're young! I forbid it. I can't let you sacrifice yourself-"
The eye fell among the crumbs and wine stains. She sprang up, limping and lurching, and fled before he could stop her. For what seemed to him a very long time, he heard her uneven footfalls upon floors bare and carpeted and stairs of wood and marble-always farther from himself, the wine-stained cloth, and the eye she was giving to her mother.
"Thank you," he said. "Thank you very much, Hound. Good evening, Pig. I hope you found this place without too much difficulty." Seeing Oreb perched upon a bedpost in the room beyond, he added, "Man back."
"Mon come ter see yer," Pig rumbled. "Gane noo."
Hound nodded. "An augur from the Prolocutor's Palace. He left his card. Where did I put it?" Hound's belongings were scattered over an old rosewood dresser; he moved one, then another, as he searched for it.
"Fashed h'about yer, bucky, him an' me both."
"You had no need to be, though I realize I'm very late. What did this augur want with me? And come to think of it, how did he know I was here?"
"I registered you." Hound put down a striker and picked up a scrap of paper, first to look under it and then to look at the scrap itself. "I had to, it's the law. This is a copy of what I wrote. Do you want to see it?"
He had dropped into a chair. "Read it to me, please. I'm tired, much too tired to do anything except sleep."
"All right. I wrote, `Hound of Endroad, Pig of Nabeanntan, and Horn of Blue.' '
"Is that your town, Pig? That Nabeanntan? I don't believe you've mentioned it."
"From nae toon." Pig was taking off his tunic. "Has ter have a thing ter write, they says."
"Then it seems quite innocent. No doubt Ermine's had to report it to some authority in the Civil Guard-though that must be the Calde's Guard now-and it made its way to the Palace from there by some route or other. What did he want?"
"Ter warn yet, bucky."
"Against what?"
Loudly, Oreb croaked, "No cut!"
Momentarily, Hound abandoned his search. "That was what he said when we asked what he wanted, but I think he really wanted something else."
"What was it?"
"I don't know. I told him that he could leave a message for you with us. Or write a note and seal it, if he preferred, but he wouldn't."
"H'asked h'about yer, ter. What yer look like an' where yer been." Pig rose. "Goin' ter have a wash, bucky. Want ter gae first?"
"No, thank you. I've bathed already."
"Thought sae. Smelt yer scented soap. New kicks, ter?"
"Yes, an augur's robe, and an augur's tunic and trousers-though I'm not an augur, as I have assured you. An explanation would be complex, and I'd prefer to provide one in the morning. Hound, I'm surprised you left it to Oreb to comment on them; and unless Pig understood Oreb, I can't imagine how he knew."
"Wise man," Oreb remarked.
The wise man's smile twitched at his thick black beard and heavy mustache. " 'Twas ther moth flakes, bucky."
Hound held up a modest white calling card. "I thought it might be better to let you bring up the subject yourself, if you wanted to talk about it. But it was quite a shock to see you like that only a little while after the other one left. Here's his card, if you'd like to see it."
PATERA GULO COADJUTOR PROLOCUTOR'S PALACE
"Ken him, bucky?"
"Pig, you perpetually amaze me. How do you do it?"
"Listen's h'all. Yet took a bit a' wind."
Hound said, "I noticed it myself."
"Gasped? I suppose I did. Not because I recognized his namethough I do-but because he's coadjutor. He wanted to warn me, you said? It's a matter of some importance if His Cognizance sent his coadjutor with the warning."
"Good Silk! Fish heads?"
He shook his head. "No, no food. To tell the truth, I want nothing but rest. Rest and sleep; and if I can go to bed without a supper, you certainly can. Hound, if you'll show me where I can lie down, I'll try not to trouble you and Pig further."
Hound led him to a pallet in the next room; and when he had removed he shoes and stretched himself on it, said softly, "We fed your bird when we ate. Don't worry about him."
There was no response, and Hound, moved by the sight of that tragic face, added still more softly, "You don't have to worry about anything. Pig and I will take care of it," hoping that he spoke the truth.
"Somebody to see you, Horn." It was Mother's voice from the kitchen; but he was lost in flames and smoke, groping through the fire that had destroyed the quarter, groping backward through time to reach the two-headed man in the old wooden chair Father used at meals.
"Somebody to see you."
He woke sweating, and it was ten minutes at least before he fully accepted the fact that he was older and knew that there was no returning to the past save in dreams.
When he had placed himself in time, he sat up. Hound breathed heavily in the bed; Pig more heavily in the room beyond. The window was open; curtains fluttered in a night breeze, gentle ghosts whispering of the days of Ermine's prosperity. Oreb was silent, asleep if he were present at all; and in all likelihood winging his way over the city.
This was the moment, yet he felt a strange reluctance.
His shoes were half under the bed. He retrieved them and groped in a corner for the knobbed staff, then remembered that he had left it in the Calde's Palace-in the lavatory in which he had bathed, or possibly in the bedroom beyond it. If Hound woke, or Pig, he might say that he was going back for it. He might make the he true, in fact, to salve his conscience; although it seemed doubtful that anyone would come to his knock at the Calde's door at such an hour, even more doubtful that he would be admitted to fetch his staff or anything of the kind.
Neither Hound nor Pig awoke.
The key was in the lock. He turned it as quietly as he could, slipped through the door, and relocked it from outside, dropping the key into his pocket. The years had worn threadbare gray paths down the middle of the luxurious carpets he recalled. Ermine's banisters had lost a baluster here and there.
The cavernous sellaria had been stripped of much of its furniture and most of its lights. At the desk, a lofty young man with a beard as black as Pig's own stood arguing with the clerk. The clerk wore a blue tunic with crimson embroidery that seemed chosen to hold death and the n
ight at bay, the bearded youth a long, curved saber and a white headcloth in place of a cap; neither man so much as glanced at him.
The door to Ermine's Glasshouse was locked, but the lock was small and cheap, the door old and warped.
Where Thelx holds up a mirror.
Dampness and decay scented the air; the broad blossoms were gone, the trees dead or overgrown, the colored glass gems trodden into the mud; improbably, the pond remained-light from distant skylands flashed gold in its depths.
He knelt, and closed his eyes. "It's me, Patera. It's Horn, and I've come to get you, I want to bring you back to Blue with me. You're here-I know you're here."
There was no answering touch, no ghostly voice.
"What Nettle and I wrote about you-we didn't just make it up. You told us on the airship, remember? You said a part of you would always be here." When he opened his eyes, it seemed for a moment that he saw Silk in the water; but it was only his own reflection, a reflection so faint it vanished as he stared.
"You're here; I know you'll always be here and I can't take you away. But you could talk to me, Patera, just for a minute. You always liked me. You liked me better than almost anybody else in the whole palaestra."
Not all the blossoms were gone, it seemed; the cool night air bore a faint perfume.
"Please, Patera? Please? I want this more than I've ever wanted anything. Just for a minute-just for a minute let me see you."
"I loved only you, nobody but you. Not ever." Warm lips brushed his ear. In the pool, an older Silk knelt beside Hyacinth. Both smiled at him.
The yawning maidservant who answered the Calde's door gawked at him and jumped in her haste to get out of his way. When he found the right room at last and the husband's knobbed staff was in his hands, he heard distant shots and opened a window.
There had been three, from a slug gun. While he listened he heard two more, and saw a mounted guardsman gallop by.
The maid had waited in the foyer to let him out, still so sleepy that she called him "Calde" when warning him against the danger of the streets. "One shot means death," he told her, smiling. "Many simply means that someone's missing a lot." He had learned that in worse streets and in the tunnels long ago. He wished for some money to give her for admitting him and for her obvious concern for him; but he had only the two whole cards, and a card was far too much.