Fred Saberhagen - Berserker 0 - Sign of the Wolf
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2024-11-19
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SIGN OF THE WOLF
by Fred Saberhagen
The dark shape, big as a man, came between the two smallest of the three
watchfires, moving in silence like that of sleep. Out of habit, Duncan had
been watching that downwind direction, though his mind was heavy with
tiredness and with the thoughts of life that came with sixteen summers' age.
Duncan raised his spear and howled, and charged the wolf. For a moment the
fire-eyes looked steadily at him, appearing to be a full hand apart. Then the
wolf turned away; it made one deep questioning sound, and was gone into the
darkness out beyond the fires.
Duncan stopped, drawing a gasping breath of relief. His charge had not been
courage. The wolf would probably have killed him if it had faced his charge,
but it did not yet dare to face him in firelight.
The sheeps' eyes were on Duncan, a hundred glowing spots in the huddled mass
of the flock. One or two of the animals bleated softly.
He paced around the flock, sleepiness and introspection jarred from his mind.
Legends said that men in the old Earth-land had animals called dogs that
guarded sheep. If that were true, some might think that men were fools for
ever leaving Earth-land.
But such thoughts were irreverent, and Duncan's situation called for prayer.
Every night now the wolf came, and all too often it killed a sheep.
Duncan raised his eyes to the night sky. "Send me a sign, star-gods," he
prayed, routinely. But the heavens were quiet. Only the stately fireflies of
the dawn zone traced their steady random paths, vanishing halfway up the
eastern sky. The stars themselves agreed that three-fourths of the night was
gone. The legends said that Earth-land was among the stars, but the younger
priests admitted such a statement could only be taken symbolically.
The heavy thoughts came back, in spite of the nearby wolf. For two years now
Duncan had prayed and hoped for his mystical experience, the sign from a god
that came to mark the future life of every youth. From what other young men
whispered now and then, he knew that many faked their signs. That was all
right for lowly herdsmen, or even for hunters. But how could a man without a
genuine vision ever be much more than a tender of animals? To be a priest, to
study the things brought from old Earth-land and saved--Duncan hungered for
learning, for greatness, for things he could not name.
He looked up again, and gasped, for he saw a great sign in the sky, almost
directly overhead. A point of dazzling light, and then a bright little cloud
remaining among the stars. Duncan gripped his spear, watching, for a moment
even forgetting the sheep. The tiny cloud swelled and faded very slowly.
For centuries now the berserker machines had warred on Earth-descended man.
Automatons loosed in some forgotten war, the machines moved as raiders through
the galaxy, destroying whatever life they could find and overcome.
One such machine slid out of the interstellar intervals toward Duncan's
planet, drawn from afar by the Sol-type light of Duncan's sun. To turn life
into death was a berserker's function, and this sun and this planet promised
life.
The berserker machine was the size of a small planetoid, and its power was
immense, but it knew well that some planets were defended, and it bent and
slowed its hurtling approach into a long cautious curve.
There were no warships in nearby space, but the berserker's telescopes picked
out the bright dots of defensive satellites, vanishing into the planet's
shadow and reappearing. To probe for more data, the berserker computers loosed
a spy missile.
The missile looped the planet, and then shot in, testing the defensive net.
Low over nightside, it turned suddenly into bright little cloud.
Still, defensive satellites formed no real obstacle to a berserker. It could
gobble them up almost at leisure if it moved in close to them, though they
would stop long range missles fired at the planet. It was the other things the
planet might have, the buried things, that held the berserker back from a
killing rush.
Also it was strange that this defended planet had no cities to make light
sparks on its nightside, and that no radio signals came from it into space.
With mechanical caution the berserker moved in, toward the area scouted by the
spy missile.
In the morning, Duncan counted his flock--and then recounted, scowling. Then
he searched until he found the slaughtered lamb. The wolf had not gone hungry
after all. That made four sheep lost, now, in ten days.
Duncan tried to tell himself that dead sheep no longer mattered so much to
him, that with a sign such as he had been granted last night his life was
going to be filled with great deeds and noble causes. But the sheep still did
matter, and not only because their owners would be angry.
Looking up suddenly from the eaten lamb, he saw a brown-robed priest, alone,
mounted on a donkey, climbing the long grassy slope of the grazing valley from
the direction of the Temple Village. He would be going to pray in one of the
Caves in the foot of the mountain at the head of the valley.
At Duncan's beckoning wave--he could not leave the flock to walk far toward
the priest--the man on the donkey changed course. Duncan walked a little way
to meet him.
"Blessings of Earth-land," said the priest shortly, when he came close. He was
a stout man who seemed glad to dismount and stretch, arching his back and
grunting.
He smiled as he saw Duncan's hesitation. "Are you much alone here, my son?"
"Yes, Holy One. But--last night, I had a sign. For two years I've wanted one,
and just last night it came."
"Indeed? That is good news." The priest's eyes strayed to the mountain, and to
the sun, as if he calculated how much time he could spare. But he said, with
no sound of impatience, "Tell me about it, if you wish."
When he heard the flash in the sky was Duncan's sign, the priest frowned. Then
he seemed to keep himself from smiling. "My son, that light was seen by many.
Today the elders of a dozen villages, of most of the Tribe, have come to the
Temple Village. Everyone has seen something different in the sky-flash, and I
am now going to pray in a Cave, because of it."
The priest remounted, but when he had looked at Duncan again, he waited to
say, "Still, I was not one of those chosen to see the sky-gods' sign; and you
were. It may be a sign for you as well as for others, so do not be
disappointed if it is not only for you. Be faithful in your duties and signs
will come." He turned the donkey away.
Feeling small, Duncan walked slowly back to his flock. How could he have
thought that a light seen over half the world was meant for one shepherd? Now
his sign was gone, but his wolf remained.
In the afternoon, another figure came into sight, walking straight toward the
flock from the direction of Colleen's village. Duncan tightened the belt on
his woolen tunic, and combed grass from his hair with his fingers. He felt his
chin, and wished his beard would really begin to grow.
He was sure the visitor was Colleen when she was still half a mile away. He
kept his movements calm and made himself appear to first notice her when she
came in sight on a hilltop within hailing distance. The wind moved her brown
hair and her garments.
"Hello, Colleen."
"Hello, Duncan the Herdsman. My father sent me to ask about his sheep."
He ran an anxious eye over the flock, picking out individuals. Praise be to
gods of land and sky. "Your father's sheep are well."
She walked closer to him. "Here are some cakes. The other sheep are not well?"
Ah, she was beautiful. But no mere herdsman would ever have her.
"Last night the wolf killed again." Duncan gestured with empty hands. "I
watch, I light fires. I have a spear and a club, and I rush at him when he
comes, and I drive him away. But sooner or later he comes on the wrong side of
the flock, or a sheep strays."
"Another man should come from the village," she said. "Even a boy would help.
With a big clever wolf, any herdsman may need help."
He nodded, faintly pleased at her implying he was a man. But his troubles were
too big to be soothed away. "Did you see the sky-flash, last night?" he asked,
remembering with bitterness his joy when he had thought the sign was his.
"No, but all the village is talking about it. I will tell them about the wolf,
but probably no man will come to help you for a day or two. They are all
dancing and talking, thinking of nothing but the sky-flash."
She raised puzzled eyes beyond Duncan. "Look."
It was the priest, rushing past half a mile from them on his way down valley
from the Caves, doing his best to make his donkey gallop toward the Temple
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SIGNOFTHEWOLFbyFredSaberhagenThedarkshape,bigasaman,camebetweenthetwosmallestofthethreewatchfires,mo...
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时间：2024-11-19
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