rise.
Today, man's cartage to and fro was much; the sun, too, eager in its task. These combined with a trick of eye that only the rough domes of each mountain top could be seen. Grayish black overturned bowls hovering over house tops round, or peaked sharp in their lap of lime of curving bricks. Like white steeples of whey had dripped from vessels held upside down to drain all away. A creation of discarded surplus.
Other days, the tops lost, the hills leading of the mountains pressed together as toes. An image of large feet held from a final step to the hovels and dens carved from rocks and brick beams which filled most of the city; which were in turn filled with most of the city's dwellers.
Days when the whole image stood rigidly clear, yet even than gray and black had search interplay of rock and shadow that illusion shimmered and danced with harsh. The mountains breathed hot wind in and out their numerous caverns; vultures specked the air far from the city's smells rousing their appetites. Men turn and look beyond the passage ways, narrow alleys, wonder what dwells in dark climbs, what scratches a living in these folds of ripples. Shiver even in a choke of heat, when they would stir their superstitions of what doings may arise beyond the light walled enlightened cities. Memories of day's spectre linger into dark night. The jagged apparitions are not seen but cool winds sing from their icy breath. The towns people still believing the long ago legends of half things, wedded of grave and horrific life. Their rot and cling held together by daily emission to beds of ice believed forever lie deep inside the splits of the mountains. Like burrowing ticks in an old woman's wrinkle. They believed these half dead would then crawl to the night's embrace and there wail their laments. This the cool winds smelling of musk; of old rock; of things half decayed that would wander and whistle over the brick and refuge of town.
Its caress varied from grip to brush, but was never unfelt. Some nights its descend so unlike a day's warmth, even flies slept, huddled to cracks in great black mass barely squirming. Fires were lit by those who could. Those who couldn't begged (those that could or huddled too). A blue tinge adding rapture to child like eyes. A wonder of contemplation, as old shawls wrapped more than one pair of shoulders. And all men gave thanks, even those so hollow with need only small tatters of cloth were needed for their limbs. All gave this thanks for the walls, the great brick which allowed them status and safety as men. To be not scraping and cringing unholy as beasts, fearing any break of twig cascading through the night. To at least here succumb in one piece, not ripped and torn to bits by fanged mouths, the mountain's revenge or the savage clans that still stalked wild on ugly ponies fast as wind borne.
It was night then that brought truly the vision of hidden mountains to men's eyes. Round the fires, tales would come from forbidden rises. Tales of the origin of these half dead. Send to be those cursed from the sense of the Gods for their blasphemy, cowardly or murderous ways when they were full men. Their revenge and savagery was swift indeed should any man stumble upon them. Ripped to shreds with their icy bent hands and rotted teeth tearing fierce on their flesh. For sometimes, a man in the city, despairing of his family's desolation would journey out. Believing the mountains would provide both a large sustenance then the city and as much sanctuary from the wild plains.
None were ever heard of again. Neither man, wife or child. Those all of the city did not doubt their reasons of silence.
They had all given, rather than found, sustenance. Fed the bellies of beasts, or fed the delight of imagination from torturous hordes or satisfied the descending reprisals of the cursed lot leprous in the mountains.
So these night tales made men give continuous bless to their city, benevolent or not, as a harsh uncle is blessed at an orphan's meal. Better always this than that. Such do men find joy in empty pots. The pot needs only filling but without the pot anything gathered merely spills to the ground and all is lost! Truly only the men of this city could be called: lovers of life. For they have such a tenacious grip upon the handle and such a hopeful look above the yawing rim.
The Beggar's young son had not this grip of thought to hold rigid to one place. What he sought would never fall rattling into any upturned dish. He would journey to these mountains though he doubted an answer there; but he was certain no answer would be left behind. If he found an answer he may return to them laden heavy with crumbs, if he found none, none here would miss another empty pot hung limp in a kitchen's poverty.
He had walked a few streets, relatively clean and wide in their lay. The houses though small and close packed maintained a continuum of clean line and a cared for standing.
Here at the edge, however, the street suddenly twisted and narrowed. A darker smell hovered amazingly at the edge of this physical change, as if foulness knows the limits of its trespass. He stopped and looked. The houses did not follow the angle of the sloping road but rather began to lean and crook in their own manner of unlikeness. In fact, down in the view, he saw many had gave into a lower need and half construction than of the houses he had just passed by.
The alley road did indeed slope downward, hence the chosen name of this quarter of the city: Valley of the dogs. Called so by notice of its depression in land and by the stomach that poverty has for large collections of scrawny curs. Though no one family owns a particular dog; rather they are a collective herd for use and abuse. That use had at times reached a sustenance level and hence the address, ‘Are you of the Valley of the dogs?’ grew to be a slanderous term similar to: 'You are what you eat'. It was more commonly slurred outside the valley than in it, the other quarters more enjoying a downward cast by the possession of their ,so-called by self, fuller innocence.
Before the Beggar could begin his descending probe into this place of unshouldered struggle, he heard a noise as if the angered shout of a child. It came from a side street the opening of which he had just passed. He turned, strode back, then walked up the side street.
There at the end, in a larger construction than the houses, was a building square and squatter with a large wooden door and very small windows, shuttered tight. A very bland square lime box but for one beautiful statue on top. A chiselled form of three boys in tunics; one knelt on one knee reading a scroll; one stood aiming a bow and arrow towards the sky, its tip above the kneeling boy's head. The last boy faced away from the two; he had a dove cupped in his hand and looked intently to its face.
A shout again. Or perhaps more now like a yell of pain. Below this elevated scene, one man held a young boy of about ten years age. Another man had just given the boy's back a solid hit from a club he held. Another boy stood to the side, his eyes in the squint of rage or tears, his fists clenched tight.
The man was about to swing down upon the boy again when the Beggar yelled out: "Pray what is the name of the crime here? And who I beg is fiend and who is angel? Though tis usual to grant in the ways of men, and in the smaller ways of boys, that the one with the stick is deemed judge and jury and the one without, ready to sing of his sentence. For might has its right to question and the lesser to offer humble answer."
The two men turned towards the beggar. The man with the stick unnoticeable except for his rather wide bulbous nose, marked with scars from battle, disease or wine, it was not known; though likely a failing war with spirits.
The other man was doubly unnoticeable since he had no large nose or no large stick. Such being his state he rarely spoke except when noticed and thereby rarely spoke.
This being the arrangement, Big Nose pointed his stick at the Beggar and with menace replied: "You've a subtle tongue to thus trap an answer that the reply bring a re-align of stature. Civility can bring too its compensation but such the look of you should beware you trod the rug threadbare and get cut amongst the stones! I am the Master of this School you see risen before us, this other is a teacher. These boys are pupils. These doings none of your haphazard concern. Trod along fellow, lest the stings have time to callous these youthful backs before I add another."
The Beggar, giving no inclination of moving on, simply
replied: “Pardon I continue the crime of these prying eyes and add accomplice tongue. But I would ask, what teachings are so rare, so delicate that eyes and ears have no heed? Only the brush of a wooden word can whisper beneath the skin. For I have heard of old blind priests who read the roughed ink of scrolls through their fingertips. Seen deaf men sway their hands to music with their bodies pressed to a wall. What school do you call your particular technique? The Flailology of Minors Philosophy? Do they thus learn well the names of plants and vegetable life? That either boy could lie in forest or field and easily name ten species below his back. Or in each to do a test upon the other's back. A test of angles and lengths of line. Calculate new theories of squared dignity upon stripped shoulders. Plot that against swelling volumes of oppression. Pray, sir, instruct me in what of so deep a teaching carves boys into men; by a means that makes grown men shudder?
Big Nose: "I've half a mind to instruct your insolence and prying with such a means: Lucky for you and unlucky for us, the law allows the means on a boy's back but not a more deserving beckon as yours. If you must know, the whipping is punishment, not teaching. Though we are
The Seven Days of Wander Page 28