Gene Wolfe - New Sun 2 - The Claw Of The Concilliator

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01 THE VILLAGE OF SALTUS

Morwenna's face floated in the single beam of light, lovely and framed in

hair

dark as my cloak; blood from her neck pattered to the stones. Her lips

moved

without speech. Instead I saw framed within them (as though I were the

Increate,

peeping through his rent in Eternity to behold the World of Time) the

farm,

Stachys her husband tossing in agony upon his bed, little Chad at the

pond,

bathing his fevered face.

Outside, Eusebia, Morwenna's accuser, howled like a witch. I tried to

reach the

bars to tell her to be quiet, and at once became lost in the darkness of

the

cell. When I found light at last, it was the green road stretching from the

growing since the founding of Urth, trees as high as cliffs, wrapped in

pure

green. Between them lay the road, grown up in fresh grass, and on it

were the

bodies of men and women. A burning cariole tainted the clean air with

smoke.

Five riders sat destriers whose hooked tushes were encrusted with

lazulite. The

men wore helmets and capes of indanthrene blue and carried lances

whose heads

ran with blue fire; their faces were more akin than the faces of brothers.

these riders, the tide of travelers broke as a wave on a rock, some

turning

left, some right. Dorcas was torn from my arms, and I drew Terminus

Est to cut

down those between us and found I was about to strike Master

Malrubius, who

stood calmly, my dog Triskele at his side, in the midst of the tumult.

Seeing

bursting,

savory, and nearly burned - from the grill. Time to wash, time to serve

the

journeymen, time to chant lessons to myself before Master Palaemon's

examination.

I woke in the apprentices' dormitory, but everything was in the wrong

place: a

blank wall where the round port should have been, a square window

that should

have been a bulkhead. The row of hard, narrow cots was gone, and the

ceiling too

low.

Then I was awake. Country smells - much like the pleasant odors of

flower and

tree that used to float across the ruined curtain wall from the necropolis,

but

mixed now with the hot reek of a stable - drifted through the window.

The bells

began again, ringing in some campanile not far away, calling the few

who

still

wanted water to splash on my face and smooth my hair. Before sleeping

I had

folded my cloak, with the Claw at the center, to use for a pillow. I spread

now, and remembering how Agia had once tried to slip her hand into the

sabretache on my belt, thrust the Claw into my boot top.

Jonas still slept. In my experience, people asleep look younger than

they do

awake, but Jonas seemed older - or perhaps onIy ancient; he had the

face, with

straight nose and straight forehead, that I have often noted in old

pictures. I

buried the smoldering fire in its own ashes and left without waking him.

By the time I had finished refreshing myself from the bucket of the

innyard

well, the street before the inn was no longer silent, but alive with hooves

that

splashed through the puddles left by the previous night's rain, and the

clacking

of scimitar horns. Each animal was taller than a man, black or piebald,

their hard,

watchful, low-bred dogs.

Inside the inn once more, I ordered breakfast and got bread warm from

the oven,

newly churned butter, pickled duck's eggs, and peppered chocolate

beaten to a

froth. (This last a sure sign, though I did not know it then, that I was

among

people who drew their customs from the north.) Our hairless gnome of a

host, who

had no doubt seen me in conversation with the alcalde the night before,

hovered

over my table wiping his nose on his sleeve, inquiring about the quality

of each

dish as it was served - though they were all, in truth, very good -

promising

better food at supper, and condemning the cook, who was his wife. He

called me

sieur, not because he thought as they sometimes had in Nessus that I

was an

comfortable together?"

I was about to say that I would prefer separate rooms (I thought Jonas

no thief,

but I was afraid the Claw might be too much of a temptation for any

man, and I

was unused, moreover, to sleeping double) when it occurred to me that

he might

have difficulty paying for a private accommodation.

"You will be there today, sieur? When they break through the wall? A

mason could

take down the ashlars, but Barnoch's been heard moving inside and

may have

strength left. Perhaps he's found a weapon. Why, he could bite the

masons'

fingers, if nothing else!"

"Not in an official capacity. I may watch if I can."

"Everyone's coming." The bald man rubbed his hands, which slithered

together as

if they had been oiled. "There's to be a fair, you know. The alcalde

announced

fair sprang up out of his head, colored tents and ribbons, roast meat and

spun

sugar, all together. Today? Why today we'll open the sealed house and

pull

Barnoch out like a badger. That will warm them up, that will draw them

for

leagues around. Then we'll watch you do for Morwenna and that country

fellow.

Tomorrow you'll begin on Barnoch - hot irons you start with usually,

don't you?

And everybody will want to be there. The day after, finish him off and

fold the

tents. It doesn't do to let them hang about too long after they've spent

their

money, or they begin to beg and fight and so on. All well planned, all

well

thought out! There's an alcalde for you!"

I went out again after breakfast and watched the alcalde's enchanted

thoughts

take shape. Countryfolk were stumping into the village with fruits and

animals

drilling

of the garrison in the Citadel, but which I had not heard since I had left

it.

The cattle I had watched earlier that morning had been going down to

the river,

there to be herded into barges for the remainder of their trip to the

abattoirs

of Nessus. These soldiers were coming the other way, up from the

water. Whether

that was because their officers felt the march would toughen them, or

because

the boats that had brought them were needed elsewhere, or because

they were

destined for some area remote from Gyoll, I had no way of knowing. I

heard the

shouted order to sing as they came into the thickening crowd, and

almost

together with it the thwacks of the vingtners' rods and the howls of the

unfortunates who had been hit.

The men were kelau, each armed with a sling with a two-cubit handle

and each

but a true slingers' song. Insofar as I heard it that day, it ran thus:

"When I was a lad, my mother said,

'You dry your tears and go to bed;

I know my son will travel far,

Born beneath a shooting star.'

"In after years, my father said,

As he pulled my hair and knocked my head,

'They mustn't whimper at a scar,

Who're born beneath a shooting star.'

"A mage I met, and the mage he said,

'I see for you a future red,

Fire and riot, raid and war,

O born beneath a shooting star.'

"A shepherd I met, and the shephad said,

'We sheep must go where we are led,

To Dawn-Gate where the angels are,

Following the shooting star.' "

"Southerners - notice how many have yellow hair and dotted hides?

They're used

to cold down there, and they'll need to be in the mountains. Still, the

singing

almost makes you want to join 'em. How many, would you say?"

The baggage mules were just coming into view, laden with rations and

prodded

forward with the points of swords. "Two thousand. Perhaps twenty-five

hundred."

"Thank you, sieur. I like to keep track of them. You wouldn't believe how

many

I've seen coming up our road here. But precious few going back. Well,

that's

what war is, I believe. I always try to tell myself they're still there - I

mean, wherever it was they went - but you know and I know there's a lot

that

have gone to stay. Still, the singing makes a man want to go with 'em."

I asked if he had news of the war.

"Oh, yes, sieur. I've followed it for years and years now, though the

battles

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摘要：

01THEVILLAGEOFSALTUSMorwenna'sfacefloatedinthesinglebeamoflight,lovelyandframedinhairdarkasmycloak;bloodfromherneckpatteredtothestones.Herlipsmovedwithoutspeech.InsteadIsawframedwithinthem(asthoughIweretheIncreate,peepingthroughhisrentinEternitytobeholdtheWorldofTime)thefarm,Stachysherhusbandtossing...

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Gene Wolfe - New Sun 2 - The Claw Of The Concilliator

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