by Gene Wolfe
“If it’s too calm to sail, couldn’t they row here?”
“They could, and some do.”
I had been pretty mad at Garsecg because he had gone away and left Uri and Baki to take care of themselves. But I got to thinking about all the things he had done for me, and how I had left them just as much as he had. So I stopped and motioned for him to catch up to me, and we walked together a little. We were in the shade of the trees all that time.
Before long we came to where the shade was only spotty, sunshine coming through the leaves in bright patches, sort of dappled. Then it seemed like something a whole lot bigger than Garsecg was walking beside me. Only it was not.
It was not really like a snake, and it was not really like a bird either. But I have to write those because they are as close as I can get. It was beautiful, and terribly scary. I do not remember all the colors and they changed anyway, but the thing was that whatever colors there were, were the darkest those colors could ever be. The blue was darker than black usually is, and so was the gold, a sort of brown gold with a deep, deep luster you felt like you could fall into. And dark, like you had seen something gold in the middle of a storm, but nowhere near as real as smoke.
I could hardly see Garsecg at all right then, but he looked like he was about to laugh. I told him I liked him better when he was Garsecg.
“I know.”
“That’s what you really are, isn’t it? You’re Setr. Are you really from the world under Aelfrice?”
“I am. Will you turn aside for a step or two now, Sir Able? There is something to be seen here more important than any view of the sea, and if you will consent I will show it to you.”
I felt like I had already seen something important, but I said I would.
Chapter 27. Kulili
T here was not any path, just soft grass and ferns underneath the big trees, down, around , and down again until it brought us to a little toy valley that could not have been more than a hundred yards long and wide. It was so pretty down there it took your breath away. There were tiny little waterfalls coming out of the rocks, and a pool in the middle with white lilies growing all around it, and some other kind of white flower that was prettier than the lilies. More ferns, too. The ones I had seen before had been little, but there they were huge, like the ferns were in Aelfrice. They arched up over my head so high I could have ridden a horse under them and never taken my helm off. It was dark shade there and Garsecg looked completely real, so real I knew if I touched him I would not feel the thing he really was at all.
Where the shade was thickest there was a white statue. It was a naked woman, but where it was in that dark shade it sort of loomed out at me like a ghost. One hand looked like she wanted to cover up her breasts, and the other hand looked like she was begging for something.
I was naked myself, as I guess I have already said, and when I saw that statue something happened that had happened at school when I watched the girls play volleyball. I did not want Garsecg to see it, so what I did was to jump right into the pool. It worked, too, because the water was good and cold. When I came up I tossed my hair out of my eyes the way you do and tried to grin.
Garsecg bent over to look at me. “Why did you do that?”
“To cool off and wash away my sweat. Aren’t you hot after all that walking? I was.”
He gave me his hand, and I swam over and climbed out.
“Look. Wait until the ripples die, and look carefully.”
“You said you wanted to show me my reflection,” I said, “so I’d know why the Osterlings were scared of me. Only I don’t think they were. Is that all this is?”
“No. Look deeply into the pool, Sir Able.”
I did. It looked like that pool went down forever but kind of crooked and off to the side, and I said so.
“Like many such waters, it is a gate to Aelfrice,” Garsecg told me. “I am showing it to you so that you will know how such gates look. Could you not tell, when the Kelpies carried you to me, that you were entering Aelfrice?”
I shook my head.
“Does it not seem to you that you should be peering down into the topmost story of the Tower of Glas?”
It had not hit me before, but he was right. The dirt on the island could not have been more than ten or twelve feet deep. I really stared after that; and I remembered that even though I had sunk down quite a way when I jumped in, I had never touched bottom.
“Here one may stand in Mythgarthr and scrutinize the gate,” Garsecg said. “Remember what you are seeing. Fix it in your mind. In times to come, what you learn may be of value to you.”
I could not believe that pool went down to Aelfrice, and I said so. It did look funny, very funny, down there. But I had jumped in already, and the only thing that happened was what I had wanted to happen. (I still could not look at the statue. It made Uri and Baki look like boys.) I said, “Are you telling me I could get to Aelfrice like that, if you were with me so I wouldn’t drown?”
“You will never drown,” Garsecg told me. “You are one with the sea—more than you know.”
The way he said it, I knew he meant it. And all’I could think about then was that Disiri was in Aelfrice. I want her more than I have ever wanted anything in my life, and I dove right in. I would do it again.
It did not even feel very cold the second time, and as soon as I started to slow down I began swimming hard. I had been a pretty good swimmer even back in America, and while I had been with Garsecg I had gotten so good you would think I was putting you on if I told you how good I was. I went down and down.
It should have gotten darken and darker, only it did not. There was beautiful blue light, like I had seen under the sea before, and seeing it before did not make it any less beautiful now. After a while I decided I could use a little rest, and I just let myself float in it while I tried to figure out which way was up. It probably seems to you like that ought to be pretty easy, and the fish always know, but when there are no fish in sight and you cannot see anything but that beautiful blue haze, you have to think about it.
I floated there a long time, or anyhow it seemed long to me. There was a little current that turned me slowly, around and around, and carried me along, and that felt great. I was thinking about Disiri and the statue, and they got mixed up in my mind, and I started wondering if I was really real at all. It seemed to me this might be what it was like when you were just a memory, and maybe Disiri was remembering me, and would always remember me, would always love me like I would always love her, and this was me in her mind.
I am Kulili. It was not really a sound in my ear at all. It was more like a sound in the bones of my skull.
Down. Come down.
I did, and I knew which way down was because that was where her voice was coming from. The blue light went purple, then everything went black. Fingers touched my face, only I knew they were not really fingers at all. It seemed sort of not fair, and I said, “I can’t see you.”
You shall, by my will.
“Who are you?” I said. All of a sudden it seemed to me I did not even know who I was. Was I really just a kid from America? A knight? Bold Berthold’s brother?
I am Kulili. You are the man who has sworn to fight Kulili.
“Able,” I told her. “My name’s ... Able.”
Will you fight me?
“I don’t know.” It did not seem to matter much either way. “I suppose I’ll have to try. I promised.”
So I judge. Your honor is sacred to you.
“You’re a monster. That’s what Garsecg said.” It had been really, really dark up until then, but when I said that there was a green light off in the distance. I thought, what the heck is that?
A luminous fish. They come here sometimes.
“It’s hard to think.” I don’t know why I said that, but it was true. “Why is it so hard to think here?”
My water is cold.
“Why did you bring me here?”
She did not answer.
“Is it oka
y if I swim back up? I’d like to get warm again.”
Before you kill me? She was laughing at me, but it did not make me mad at all. I kind of liked it.
“You could kill me real easy down here if you wanted to.”
I will not.
“You killed the Aelf when they came to kill you. That’s another thing Garsecg said.”
This world was mine. Mine in a time when there were no Aelf. They drove me from the land into the water, and from the water into these depths. I can be driven no farther. Would you see me?
Like somebody had just dropped it there, there was a clear picture in my mind. It was the statue, only alive.
You looked into the pool. What you saw was yourself, as you are to others. What you see now I am, in the eyes of others.
I could not imagine anybody hating anybody so beautiful. I asked why the Aelf hated her.
Ask them.
“Well, why do you hate them?”
I do not, but I must fear them as long as they fear me.
The beautiful woman was gone. Instead I saw a strange forest. There were trees like phone poles, with a few big leaves at the top. There were pools of water all over, and down where the roots were, something really big was getting bigger and sending out feelers everyplace. The trees talked to this woman under them, and the little plants did too; she answered all of them, one at a time, and was great. She saw them all, and she saw their souls, because each of them was wrapped in a soul like a man would wear a cloak. Their souls were beautiful colors, and no matter what color they were, they sort of glowed.
Insects ate the leaves and spilled their sap, and there were all sorts of animals that would eat the bark and kill the trees. So the woman underneath them made protectors for them, taking little bits of their souls and little pieces of herself, pale gray wisdom that gleamed like pearls. Sticks, leaves, and mud, too, and fire and smoke and water and moss. All sorts of stuff.
At first the protectors were sort of like animals too, but the big woman under the roots looked up into the sky and saw Mythgarthr, and people up there plowing, and planting flowers and tending orchards. So she made the protectors more like them. They were a lot like scarecrows, but they got better and better and got so they could change their shapes to make themselves better yet.
Some still protect, even from me. Do you know them?
I saw Disiri, and it choked me up. I felt like I was going to die if I could not touch her and talk to her, and I said, “Yes. I love her.”
Kulili said, So do I. Then Disiri was gone. Would you see me now? With your eyes of flesh?
I think I said yes.
We waited then. It was not like ten minutes or ten seconds. It was the time they had before somebody built the first clock. I hung there in the cold seawater, turning and waiting, and that was all I did. White, yellow, and green lights went around and around me, and hay-colored lights, and sky-colored.
Our lamp.
They came together, and I saw they were really fish. There were little orange fish that glowed like the flames of candles, black fish with huge heads and bad-dream teeth that hung red and blue bait in front of their own mouths, long silvery fish with gills and tails like light bulbs, and big blue fish with rows of blue lights down their sides, and a lot more kinds that I forget. All sorts of reds and yellows and pinks and every kind of color.
Only they were not important. What was important was down under them, and it was white thread, a big, big tangle of white thread, all of it alive and sort of groping. When I first saw it I thought it did not have any shape, but as soon as I thought that, it did. There was a mouth that could have swallowed the Western Trader, and a nose like a hill. Only it was a beautiful nose and a beautiful mouth, too. Pretty soon there were eyes, white eyes that looked blind. They blinked, and they had pupils I could have dived into, and they were blue eyes, and there was color in the cheeks just like roses were blooming there. It was the woman the statue had been made like. Only the statue is usually bigger than the person. Way down in the dark seawater was the real person, and she could have worn the statue around her neck on a chain.
Will you kill me? Still?
In the first place, I did not want to. In the second place, I did not think I could. I said, “I’ll have to try, Kulili. I’ll have to try my best, because I promised I would. But I hope you get away. I hope I won’t be able to do it.”
Now?
“No. These fish of yours could kill me pretty easy, and I haven’t even got a sword.”
May it be long before we meet again.
Chapter 28. Three Years
I t was a long swim to the surface. It is funny, but when you have been way deep down it always seems like you are closer to the top than you really are. It is black down where you are, darker than any real night ever gets. You swim up quite a way, and it gets light, you can see things and you think you are only ten or twelve feet down. So you keep swimming up, maybe twenty-five feet, maybe fifty or a hundred. And you do not get to the top and nothing much changes. I felt like I was almost there half a dozen times probably before I really got there.
When I did, it was sort of a shock. For one thing I had not been breathing, and I was used to it. My head came out in the trough between two waves. I breathed out hard, and water ran out of my nose and mouth, and down my chin. And then a big wave hit me in the face. I choked, and when I got my head into the air again, I was making noises like a coffeepot. When I could breathe, I started to laugh.
After that I swam in and out of the waves and had a big time. Probably I played like that for half an hour.
I could see the sun, so I knew I was back in Mythgarthr again, and not in Aelfrice. I also knew that when I had been way deep down with Kulili, that had been Aelfrice. I figured I was pretty close to the island, and whenever I wanted to I could swim over that way and see about the two Aelf girls and Garsecg, and tell Garsecg it was going to take a whole lot more than a spear or a battle-ax for me to kill Kulili, and I really did not want to anyway. When I thought about it, I started hoping that I could trade him another favor for that one. Maybe a couple of them, or three.
Pretty soon I decided that was enough fun, and anyway it might be a long swim to the island, so I had better get started. I jumped up out of the water the way that fish do sometimes and had a look around. After the first one, I did it again, and again after that. The island was nowhere in sight. In fact there was no land anywhere. The only thing I could see was a ship about a mile away. I decided to swim for that because it would at least get me up higher. There was quite a bit of wind then, but the ship was headed toward me on a slant, so all I had to do was cut across to where it would be and wait. I could swim faster than it was sailing anyhow, so catching it was bound to be pretty easy.
I did not recognize it until it was close. A lot of paint had flaked off the forecastle, and some of the gold was missing from the wooden woman with the basket in front. But it was the Western Trader just the same. I could not believe it, even when I climbed up the side.
The lookout yelled something (I do not know what) and slid down the forestay dropping off it in front of me. He sort of goggled at me, then he got down on his knees. “Sir Able! I didn’t know ’twas you, sir. I didn’t know what ’twas, sir. I’m sorry, sir. I never meant no offense, sir. By wind an’ water, I never done.”
“Nor gave any,” I told him. “No sweat. If—wait a minute! You’re Pouk!”
“Aye, sir.”
“You’ve changed. It’s the beard. How long have I been gone, Pouk?”
“Three year, sir. We—I thought you wasn’t never comin’ back, sir. Cap’n didn’t, neither. Nobody done.”
“The captain? I thought I killed him.”
“Cap’n Kerl, sir, what was Mate. I—I signed papers, sir, ’cause they wouldn’t feed me less’n I done it. An’—an’ I been here ever since, sir. Topman o’ the main now, sir, an’ I’ve had worse berths.”
I shook his hand and told him I was proud of him.
&nb
sp; “Only I won’t be no more, sir, if you’ll have Cap’n strike me off articles, sir. Your man again, Sir Able, same as before, if there’s no feelin’s about me doin’ somethin’ else while you was gone.” Pouk paused and gulped. “Or even if there is, sir, if you’ll have me just th’ same.”
I did not know what to think of him, and I said, “You’ve got a good job here. You just said so.”
“Aye, sir.”
“I can’t pay you or feed you. Look at me. I don’t even have a pair of pants.”
“I’ll lend you ’un o’ mine, sir. Only they’ll be too small, maybe.”
“Thanks. But you’re right, I’d be sure to split them. Probably I couldn’t even get them on. We’ll have to talk to the captain. Captain Kerl?”
“Aye, sir.” Pouk nodded.
“I know that you can’t take yourself off duty, and you shouldn’t even be talking to me. But before I go looking for Kerl I want to know why you’d quit your job to work for me, when you know I haven’t got any money.”
“Selfishness is all ’tis, sir.” Pouk would not look me in the face.
“What do you mean, selfishness?”
“Crew’s got to stick together, sir. You’re s’posed to stick to your shipmates, see? But—but it’s my big chance, sir. Likely th’ only ’un I’ll ever get. I’m goin’.” He turned away so I could not see his face.
I patted his shoulder and went to look for Kerl. There was a little runway of deck alongside the forecastle, and as I walked along that I wondered what the rest of the crew would make of me.
As soon as I rounded the corner, I found out. I had not taken two more steps before I was surrounded by cheering men. “Below there!” a new mate shouted from the sterncastle deck. “What’s that gabble? Stations, all of you! Stations!”
A sailor I did not remember yelled, “It’s Sir Able, sir! He’s back!”
Somebody else yelled, “Give a cheer, men!” They did it, and all the noise brought Kerl out of his cabin. He started asking questions, then he saw me in the middle of a bunch of sailors, and he just gaped.