by K. J. Parker
She looked at the page in front of her and considered the next line in the main text. But that same foolish and opinionated clerk, in averring that the same essence could be at one and the same time corporeal and non-corporeal, commits a grave error; indeed, his ignorance and folly are such that no scholar would pay any heed to them. In consequence—
Machaera yawned and lifted her head until she could see out of the window. Outside it was a clear, crisp day, and the menacing silhouette of Scona Island was painfully sharp against the hard blue sky. Over there, apparently, lurked the Enemy, the latest incarnation of the dark and malevolent force that waited eternally for the weak, the helpless, and bad girls who didn’t eat up their dinners. She found it extremely unsettling to think that the Enemy was so close, only the width of a narrow channel away; if she wasn’t careful, she could easily spend hours staring at the water, imagining shadowy coracles flitting over the dark water, spear-points and helmet-ridges gleaming in the thin light of a watchful star - and then she’d never get any work done, and she’d fail Mods completely and have to go home. Oh, damn Scona, for being at war and distracting her from her revision!
She didn’t look up, because she knew that the man standing beside her wasn’t real, and that she was in another of those involuntary and unfortunately extra-curricular visions (if only they counted towards the year-end continuous assessment grades - but they didn’t, and a headache right now would be so inconvenient . . .)
‘Machaera,’ Alexius said. ‘I’m sorry, am I disturbing you?’
‘A bit,’ she replied, trying not to let her resentment show; after all, Patriarch Alexius was one of the greatest scholars ever, she should be proud—
‘You work too hard, you know,’ he said. ‘You aren’t getting enough sleep. Fine thing it’d be if you’re so exhausted you fall asleep in the exam. Don’t laugh; it happened to a friend of mine. He’d spent a whole year cramming for that one subject, got as far as writing his name, and the next thing he knew was the invigilator shaking him by the shoulder and taking his paper. He gave up philosophy after that and went into the wine trade, where he made a great deal of money and would have done very well for himself if he hadn’t been killed when the City fell. At least, I assume that’s what happened to him; it’s a fairly safe assumption. What’s that you’re reading?’
‘Veutses, On Obscurity,’ Machaera replied. ‘Doctor Gannadius says it’s the key to understanding the whole of neo-Tractarianism. ’
‘He’s right,’ Alexius said, ‘surprisingly enough, since I happen to know for a fact he’s never read it. Oh, he’s read the Epitome and the Digest, which contain everything you need to know; but as for sitting down and actually ploughing through the wretched thing, he told me himself, life’s too short. I did read it, once - a long time ago now, of course - and frankly I couldn’t make head or tail of it. So I went back and read the Digest entry and for the life of me I couldn’t remember any of the important points listed in the Digest article being in the original text. So I went back and read Veutses again, from beginning to end, and blow me down if I wasn’t right. All the important ground-breaking stuff was made up by whichever poor little clerk it was who did the Digest entry, not Veutses at all.’
‘Oh,’ said Machaera, visibly shaken. ‘But it says in the Commentary—’
‘Ah.’ Alexius smiled. ‘The purpose of the Commentary, which was written two hundred years later, was to take the conclusions reached in the Digest and then go back into the original text and find obscure and badly written bits which could be interpreted to seem as if they were the bits the writer of the Digest got his ideas from. It’s a wonderfully imaginative and inventive piece of academic writing, and just shows what you can achieve if you really set your mind to something.’
‘Oh.’
‘But for pity’s sake don’t go pointing that out in the exam,’ Alexius went on, ‘or they’ll fail you on the spot.’
‘Oh . . .’
‘As is quite right and proper,’ Alexius continued. ‘Because what you’ve been taught is that Veutses discovered Veutses’ Law of Obscurity, and the exam’s to test what you’ve learnt, not some theory or other you may have dreamt up for yourself. After all,’ he went on, ‘the conclusions drawn by the Digest writer are still just as valid and important, so why does it matter who wrote them?’
‘I suppose not,’ Machaera replied, frowning. ‘But it still doesn’t seem fair, really.’
‘Doesn’t it?’ Alexius shrugged his shoulders. ‘I don’t think it was ever supposed to be. If I were you, though, I’d skip the rest of the book and just read the Digest. After all, you can’t go far wrong if you emulate someone as distinguished as Doctor Gannadius.’
Machaera looked at him, then nodded obediently. ‘If you say so,’ she said. ‘But I still think—’
‘Give it thirty years and it’ll wear off,’ Alexius interrupted. ‘Thinking, I mean. It’s something you grow out of, like greasy skin and spots. And, all due respect, I didn’t come here to discuss Veutses and intellectual dishonesty. Do you mind if I sit down, by the way? I know this isn’t my real body, but even notional cramp in imaginary legs can be quite painful.’
‘Oh. I mean, sorry. Yes, please sit down.’
Alexius perched on the edge of the desk. ‘That’s better,’ he said. ‘Now then, let’s get to the point. You and I are deadly enemies.’
Machaera looked shocked. ‘But we can’t be,’ she said. ‘Really, I would never—’
Alexius raised a hand, palm towards her. ‘I know, I know,’ he said. ‘But it isn’t up to us. It’s because of the war, you see. And it seems that you and I are like - oh, I don’t know - we’re two siege engines mounted high on towers, facing each other across the straits, ready to bombard each other and turn each other’s cities into rubble. Believe me, it’s true. I was brought here - to Scona, I mean - and you’ve been carefully encouraged when under normal circumstances you’d either have been scared into never using your latent abilities or strangled or something, just so we can be part of the war.’
Machaera looked at him gravely. ‘I’m not sure I want that,’ she said. ‘But you can’t be right about me,’ she went on. ‘Why me, when we’ve got people like Doctor Gannadius?’
Alexius chuckled. ‘Gannadius is a nice enough man, and quite bright too, in his own way, but he’s got about as much ability to use the Principle as I have wings to fly through the air. Anything he can do in the Principle he has to do through a natural. It’s the same with Niessa Loredan, and she’s the one using me.’
‘Oh.’
‘So I thought,’ Alexius went on, ‘why don’t you and I come to an agreement? Call it a private peace treaty all of our own. Because one of these days, quite soon, you’ll find yourself in one of these visions, and you’ll be at some critical point in the future of the war, and you’ll be standing there looking at a single moment in time where either of two things can happen. I haven’t the faintest idea what it’ll be; it could be a soldier standing in a doorway, or an engineer aiming a trebuchet, or a general putting his head up above a slit-trench to see what’s happening, whatever. That’s when you’ll find yourself making a decision about what should happen next - let’s say you decide that the soldier in the doorway sees the enemy approaching and runs away, instead of holding his ground and keeping them back until reinforcements arrive, or the engineer decides to add an extra two degrees to allow for windage, or the general thinks better of it and isn’t shot down by a sniper. When that happens, I’d like you to make a conscious effort not to make a decision. Switch off your mind, say out loud, “I don’t know what’s going to happen next.” And if we both do that—’
‘Excuse me,’ Machaera said.
‘Sorry?’
‘Excuse me,’ she repeated, ‘and please don’t take this the wrong way; but if we’re really on opposite sides, and I don’t make the decision, how will I know that you won’t make the decision either? I know this sounds awful,’ she went on wretchedly, ‘but if I do
as you’re saying, won’t I be hurting my side and helping yours? And besides, I do want Shastel to win the war. It can’t be wrong to want that, can it? I mean, shouldn’t people do everything they can to help their side win, if there’s a war?’
Alexius narrowed his eyes. ‘But they’re using you,’ he said. ‘Just like Niessa’s using me. Surely you can see that’s not right.’
‘It’s all right if I don’t mind,’ Machaera replied. ‘And yes, the war’s a dreadful thing, and I wish ever so much there didn’t have to be one, because lots of my friends will have to go and fight and some of them may get killed or badly hurt, which is probably worse in a way, because then they’ll have to live their lives without an arm or an eye or something. But if I don’t do something to help, that won’t mean there won’t be a war, it just means we’re less likely to win; and what if I keep my side and you don’t? Then I’d really be hurting my side—’
Alexius scowled at her for a moment, and stood up; he raised his hand, drew it back and slapped her hard across the side of her head, at which point he wasn’t Alexius any more but a short, stout middle-aged woman she’d never seen before but somehow knew as Niessa Loredan. Machaera tried to scramble out of the way, but Niessa was coming after her; now she had a knife in her hand, and behind her shoulder Machaera could see Patriarch Alexius, looking horrified but not moving. She got as far as the doorway when Niessa managed to reach out and grab her by the hair. Machaera screamed, and as Niessa slashed at her with the knife she tried to fend the blade off with her hands. She could feel the knife cutting her fingers and palms, slicing through the knuckles of her right hand just below the first joint; but the sensation wasn’t pain, it was more like a kind of fear she could feel with her body as well as her mind. She screamed again, and then Niessa got past her flailing hands and stuck the knife into her, just below her ribs, in the place her father used to stick in the knife when he was skinning rabbits he’d snared up in the mountains orchard. She could feel the knife inside her, an intrusion, something that shouldn’t be there—
And she was sitting looking out of the window at a distant prospect of Scona, with her hands clasped in front of her, as if she was trying to keep her intestines from falling out. She’d scattered her bits of parchment and knocked over the inkwell.
‘What the hell do you think you’re playing at?’ someone said behind her; and the librarian stepped smartly forward and rescued the copy of Veutses’ On Obscurity just before the spreading pool of ink reached it. ‘For gods’ sakes, be careful, this book’s irreplaceable.’ He scowled down at her, just as someone had done a moment or so ago (but she couldn’t remember who, and she had a headache) and then sighed. ‘You fell asleep,’ he said, not quite so ferociously, ‘and knocked over the ink. Second year, I take it?’
Machaera nodded.
‘Swotting for Mods and not getting enough sleep,’ the librarian went on. ‘Well, you wouldn’t be the first. Go on, get out of my sight while I clear this up. Go to bed. You aren’t safe to be around innocent books.’
Alexius woke up with a start and opened his eyes.
‘You nodded off,’ said Niessa Loredan, smiling indulgently like a fond daughter. ‘In the middle of a sentence. You were just about to explain to me about Parazygus’ theory of simultaneous displacement, and suddenly you went out like a snuffed candle.’
‘Did I?’ Alexius put a hand to the side of his head, where something was banging away like a trip-hammer in a foundry. ‘How terribly rude of me,’ he said, ‘I do apologise. It must be old age.’
‘That’s all right,’ Niessa said. ‘And it’s rather warm in here, and you did eat four slices of cinnamon cake.’ She stood and picked up the knife. ‘Let me cut you another,’ she said.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
It could have been any village in the mountains of Scona; the same red sandstone houses, the same grey mossy thatch, rutted muddy street, open doors, ubiquitous chickens and children. But this village was barely twelve miles from Shastel, and its people were downtrodden serfs of the Foundation rather than satisfied clients of the Loredan Bank. And although they weren’t showing a tremendous amount of enthusiasm for the idea, they were on the point of throwing off their chains and joining the great war for freedom. Assuming, of course, that they knew what was good for them.
The harbinger of liberty in this instance was Sergeant Mohan Bar, a thirty-year man who’d served in a wide variety of armies, official and unofficial, before drifting into the Scona archers as a sergeant instructor. Organising successful revolutions was largely uncharted territory as far as he was concerned, and he wasn’t sure he was temperamentally suited to it. There was far too much diplomacy involved, and not enough giving and obeying orders; in fact, he had the uneasy feeling that what these downtrodden serfs on the verge of throwing off their chains wanted him to do was go away. That, however, wasn’t an option.
The villagers were holding yet another meeting, which Sergeant Bar was watching from the comfort of a bench outside the village’s anonymous and extremely scruffy inn. The mug of cider in his hand had been on the house (or at least he’d assumed so; as far as he could recall, the issue of payment hadn’t been addressed in his short conversation with the innkeeper), it was a pleasantly warm day for the time of year and there was nothing else he was supposed to be doing; a soldier on active service learns to recognise such quiet interludes and make the most of them while they last.
‘It’s very simple,’ one of the village worthies was saying. ‘They’re here, for sure the Foundation knows they’re here, whether we like it or not we’ll already have been convicted of treason just because they’re here; so what the hell, why don’t we do as he says? We haven’t got anything to lose by it. More to the point, we don’t exactly have a choice.’
The rest of the meeting grumbled, the way people do when facing an unpopular truth.
‘We can still explain,’ someone at the back replied. ‘Grab hold of these jokers, tie them up, send a message to the Foundation telling them what’s happened and asking for an escort to take them on as soon as possible. If we do that, then how can they possibly say we’ve acted treasonably?’
The first speaker shook his head. ‘Don’t you believe it,’ he said. ‘It’s like it’s some sort of contagious disease; if you come in contact with the enemy, you’re assumed to be infected. As far as the Foundation’s concerned, we’re dead men. So, we fight or we go quietly and end up in a labour gang or dangling from a tree beside the road somewhere. Oh, yes, and just one thing you may have missed: you’re talking ever so bravely about arresting these men and tying them up. If you try it, I’ll be interested to see how far you get. In case you hadn’t noticed, they’re heavily armed soldiers, not a few kids you’ve caught scrumping apples.’
‘This is wonderful,’ someone else said. ‘Whatever we do, we’re going to get killed. Why don’t we all just get out of here up into the hills till all these lunatics have wiped each other out. Then we can come back down and steal their boots.’
Sergeant Bar smiled, finished his cider and went for a walk to stretch his legs. He couldn’t help thinking that he wasn’t getting the most out of what should have been a thoroughly desirable assignment - out of the camp, left to his own devices, no officers and no fighting, in a village where they had booze and (presumably, though he hadn’t seen any) women. Somehow, unfortunately, he couldn’t see it in that light.
He walked to the top of the hill that overlooked the village and stared out in the direction of Shastel. There was a taller hill between him and the Citadel, which was probably just as well for his peace of mind, but he had a good view of the only road in these parts, along which any intercepting force would have to come if it didn’t want to scramble through bogs and rocky outcrops. From sheer force of habit he planned a defence; his twelve archers, six on either side of the road in among those trees directly below where he was standing, the local levy (big joke!) blocking the road behind a barricade of carts and barrels, with a reserve force hal
fway up the slope behind those rocks, where they’d be out of sight and nicely placed for a quick uninterrupted sprint down onto the enemy’s rear to conclude the engagement. If he’d been fabricating a battlefield on the barrack-room floor, with rolled-up blankets for the hills, water bottles for the trees and a stretched-out sword-belt for the road, he couldn’t have designed anything much more favourable for a defence against superior numbers.
He frowned, and shuddered; bad luck, wishing a fight on himself and his men. If he had the sense he was born with, he’d be more concerned with his lines of retreat, the fastest way back to the inlet where their ship was waiting. Fortunately, that was pretty straightforward, too. Provided they had enough advance notice, they could double back round the edge of the far hill and down the path they’d come up in the first place long before the enemy even reached the village. Sergeant Bar shook his head. It’d be as well to post a sentry up here, and place another man in the village to watch for a signal. If he did that, there was nothing to worry about. Safe as houses.