Clifford D. Simak - The Fellowship of the Talisman

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Title : The Fellowship of the Talisman

Author : Clifford D. Simak

Original copyright year: 1978

Genre : science fiction

Comments : to my knowledge, this is the only available e-text of this book

Source : scanned and OCR-read from a paperback edition with Xerox TextBridge Pro 9.0,

proofread in MS Word 2000.

Date of e-text : February 20, 2000

Prepared by : Anada Sucka

======================================================================

The Fellowship of the Talisman

Clifford D. Simak

1

The manor house was the first undamaged structure they had seen in two days of travel through

an area that had been desolated with a thoroughness at once terrifying and unbelievable.

During those two days, furtive wolves had watched them from hilltops. Foxes, their brushes

dragging, had skulked through underbrush. Buzzards, perched on dead trees or on the blackened

timbers of burned homesteads, had looked upon them with speculative interest. They had met not a

soul, but occasionally, in thickets, they had glimpsed human skeletons.

The weather had been fine until noon of the second day, when the soft sky of early autumn

became overcast, and a chill wind sprang from the north. At times the sharp wind whipped icy rain

against their backs, the rain sometimes mixed with snow.

Late in the afternoon, topping a low ridge, Duncan Standish sighted the manor, a rude set of

buildings fortified by palisades and a narrow moat. Inside the palisades, fronting the drawbridge,

lay a courtyard, within which were penned horses, cattle, sheep, and hogs. A few men moved about

in the courtyard, and smoke streamed from several chimneys. A number of small buildings, some of

which bore the signs of burning, lay outside the palisades. The entire place had a down-at-heels

appearance.

Daniel, the great war-horse, who had been following Duncan like a dog, came up behind the man.

Clopping behind Daniel came the little gray burro, Beauty, with packs lashed upon her back. Daniel

lowered his head, nudged his master's back.

"It's all right, Daniel," Duncan told him. "We've found shelter for the night."

The horse blew softly through his nostrils.

Conrad came trudging up the slope and ranged himself alongside Duncan. Conrad was a massive

man. Towering close to seven feet, he was heavy even for his height. A garment made of sheep pelts

hung from his shoulders almost to his knees. In his right fist he carried a heavy club fashioned

from an oak branch. He stood silently, staring at the manor house.

"What do you make of it?" asked Duncan.

"They have seen us," Conrad said. "Heads peeking out above the palisades."

"Your eyes are shaper than mine," said Duncan. "Are you sure?"

"I'm sure, m'lord."

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"Quit calling me 'my lord.' I'm not a lord. My father is the lord."

"I think of you as such," said Conrad. "When your father dies, you will be a lord."

"No Harriers?"

"Only people," Conrad told him.

"It seems unlikely," said Duncan, "that the Harriers would have passed by such a place."

"Maybe fought them off. Maybe the Harriers were in a hurry."

"So far," said Duncan, "from our observations, they passed little by. The lowliest cottages,

even huts, were burned."

"Here comes Tiny," said Conrad. "He's been down to look them over."

The mastiff came loping up the slope and they waited for him. He went over to stand close to

Conrad. Conrad patted his head, and the great dog wagged his tail. Looking at them, Duncan noted

once again how similar were the man and dog. Tiny reached almost to Conrad's waist. He was a

splendid brute. He wore a wide leather collar in which were fastened metal studs. His ears tipped

forward as he looked down at the manor. A faint growl rumbled in his throat.

"Tiny doesn't like it, either," Conrad said.

"It's the only place we've seen," said Duncan. "It's shelter. The night will be wet and cold."

"Bedbugs there will be. Lice as well."

The little burro sidled close to Daniel to get out of the cutting wind.

Duncan shucked up his sword belt. "I don't like it, Conrad, any better than you and Tiny do.

But there is a bad night coming on."

"We'll stay close together," Conrad said. "We'll not let them separate us."

"That is right," said Duncan. "We might as well start down."

As they walked down the slope, Duncan unconsciously put his hand beneath his cloak to find the

pouch dangling from his belt. His fingers located the bulk of the manuscript. He seemed to hear

the crinkle of the parchment as his fingers touched it. He found himself suddenly enraged at his

action. Time after time, during the last two days, he'd gone through the same silly procedure,

making sure the manuscript was there. Like a country boy going to a fair, he told himself, with a

penny tucked in his pocket, thrusting his hand again and again into the pocket to make sure he had

not lost the penny.

Having touched the parchment, again he seemed to hear His Grace saying, "Upon those few pages

may rest the future hope of mankind." Although, come to think of it, His Grace was given to

overstatement and not to be taken as seriously as he sometimes tried to make a person think he

should be. In this instance, however, Duncan told himself, the aged and portly churchman might

very well be right. But that would not be known until they got to Oxenford.

And because of this, because of the tightly written script on a few sheets of parchment, he

was here rather than back in the comfort and security of Standish House, trudging down a hill to

seek shelter in a place where, as Conrad had pointed out, there probably would be bedbugs.

"One thing bothers me," said Conrad as he strode along with Duncan.

"I didn't know that anything ever bothered you."

"It's the Little Folk," said Conrad. "We have seen none of them. If anyone, they should be the

ones to escape the Harriers. You can't tell me that goblins and gnomes and others of their kind

could not escape the Harriers."

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"Maybe they are frightened and hiding out," said Duncan. "If I am any judge of them, they'd

know where to hide."

Conrad brightened visibly. "Yes, that must be it," he said.

As they drew closer to the manor, they saw their estimation of the place had not been wrong.

It was far from prepossessing. Ramshackle was the word for it. Here and there heads appeared over

the palisades, watching their approach.

The drawbridge was still up when they reached the moat, which was a noisome thing. The stench

was overpowering, and in the greenish water floated hunks of corruption that could have been

decaying human bodies.

Conrad bellowed at the heads protruding over the palisades. "Open up," he shouted. "Travelers

claim shelter."

Nothing happened for a time, and Conrad bellowed once again. Finally, with much creaking of

wood and squealing of chains, the bridge began a slow, jerky descent. As they crossed the bridge

they saw that there stood inside a motley crowd with the look of vagabonds about them, but the

vagabonds were armed with spears, and some carried makeshift swords in hand.

Conrad waved his club at them. "Stand back," he growled. "Make way for m'lord."

They backed off, but the spears were not grounded; the blades stayed naked. A crippled little

man, one foot dragging, limped through the crowd and came up to them. "My master welcomes you," he

whined. "He would have you at table."

"First," said Conrad, "shelter for the beasts."

"There is a shed," said the whining lame man. "It is open to the weather, but it has a roof

and is placed against the wall. There'll be hay for the horse and burro. I'll bring the dog a

bone."

"No bone," said Conrad. "Meat. Big meat. Meat to fit his size."

"I'll find some meat," said the lame man.

"Give him a penny," Duncan said to Conrad.

Conrad inserted his fingers into the purse at his belt, brought out a coin, and flipped it to

the man, who caught it deftly and touched a finger to his forelock, but in a mocking manner.

The shed was shelter, barely, but at the worst it offered some protection from the wind and a

cover against rain. Duncan unsaddled Daniel and placed the saddle against the wall of the

palisade. Conrad unshipped the pack from the burro, piled it atop the saddle.

"Do you not wish to take the saddle and the pack inside with you?" the lame man asked. "They

might be safer there."

"Safe here," insisted Conrad. "Should anyone touch them, he will get smashed ribs, perhaps his

throat torn out."

The raffish crowd that had confronted them when they crossed the bridge had scattered now. The

drawbridge, with shrill sounds of protest, was being drawn up.

"Now," said the lame man, "if you two will follow me. The master sits at meat."

The great hall of the manor was ill lighted and evil smelling. Smoky torches were ranged along

the walls to provide illumination. The rushes on the floor had not been changed for months,

possibly for years; they were littered with bones thrown to dogs or simply tossed upon the floor

once the meat had been gnawed from them. Dog droppings lay underfoot, and the room stank of urine--

dog, and, more than likely, human. At the far end of the room stood a fireplace with burning logs.

The chimney did not draw well and poured smoke into the hall. A long trestle table ran down the

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center of the hail. Around it was seated an uncouth company. Half-grown boys ran about, serving

platters of food and jugs of ale.

When Duncan and Conrad came into the hail, the talk quieted and the bleary white of the

feasters' faces turned to stare at the new arrivals. Dogs rose from their bones and showed their

teeth at them.

At the far end of the table a man rose from his seat. He roared at them in a joyous tone,

"Welcome, travelers. Come and share the board of Harold, the Reaver."

He turned his head to a group of youths serving the table.

"Kick those mangy dogs out of the way to make way for our guests," he roared. "It would not be

seemly for them to be set upon and bitten."

The youths set upon their task with a will. Boots thudded into dogs; the dogs snapped back,

whimpering and snarling.

Duncan strode forward, followed by Conrad.

"I thank you, sir," said Duncan, "for your courtesy."

Harold, the Reaver, was raw-boned, hairy and unkempt. His hair and beard had the appearance of

having housed rats. He wore a cloak that at one time may have been purple, but was now so

besmirched by grease that it seemed more mud than purple. The fur that offset the collar and the

sleeves was moth-eaten.

The Reaver waved at a place next to him. "Please be seated, sir," he said.

"My name," said Duncan, "is Duncan Standish, and the man with me is Conrad."

"Conrad is your man?"

"Not my man. My companion."

The Reaver mulled the answer for a moment, then said, "In that case, he must sit with you." He

said to the man in the next place, "Einer, get the hell out of here. Find another place and take

your trencher with you."

With ill grace, Einer picked up his trencher and his mug and went stalking down the table to

find another place.

"Now since it all is settled," the Reaver said to Duncan, "will you not sit down. We have meat

and ale. The ale is excellent; for the meat I'll not say as much. There also is bread of an

indifferent sort, but we have a supply of the finest honey a bee has ever made. When the Harriers

came down upon us, Old Cedric, our bee master, risked his very life to bring in the hives, thus

saving it for us."

"How long ago was that?" asked Duncan. "When the Harriers came?"

"It was late in the spring. There were just a few of them at first, the forerunners of the

Horde. It gave us a chance to bring in the livestock and the bees. When the real Horde finally

came, we were ready for them. Have you, sir, ever seen any of the Harriers?"

"No. I've only heard of them."

"They are a vicious lot," the Reaver said. "All shapes and sizes of them. Imps, demons,

devils, and many others that twist your gut with fear and turn your bowels to water, all with

their own special kinds of nastiness. The worst of them are the hairless ones. Human, but they are

not human. Like shambling idiots, strong, massive idiots that have no fear and an undying urge to

kill. No hair upon them, not a single hair from top to toe. White--white like the slugs you find

when you overturn a rotting log. Fat and heavy like the slugs. But no fat. Or I think no fat, but

muscle. Muscle such as you have never seen. Strength such as no one has ever seen. Taken all

together, the hairless ones and the others that run with them sweep everything before them. They

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kill, they burn, there is no mercy in them. Ferocity and magic. That is their stock in trade. We

were hard put, I don't mind telling you, to hold them at arm's length. But we resisted the magic

and matched the ferocity, although the very sight of them could scare a man to death."

"I take it you did not scare."

"We did not scare," the Reaver said. "My men, they are a hard lot. We gave them blow for blow.

We were as mean as they were. We were not about to give up this place we had found."

"Found?"

"Yes, found. You can tell, of course, that we are not the sort of people you'd ordinarily find

in a place like this. The Reaver in my name is just a sort of joke, you see. A joke among

ourselves. We are a band of honest workmen, unable to find jobs. There are many such as we. So all

of us, facing the same problems and knowing there was no work for us, banded together to seek out

some quiet corner of the land where we might set up rude homesteads and wrest from the soil a

living for our families and ourselves. But we found no such place until we came upon this place,

abandoned."

"You mean it was empty. No one living here."

"Not a soul," the Reaver said sanctimoniously. "No one around. So we had a council and decided

to move in--unless, of course, the rightful owners should show up."

"In which case you'd give it back to them?"

"Oh, most certainly," said the Reaver. "Give it back to them and set out again to find for

ourselves that quiet corner we had sought."

"Most admirable of you," said Duncan.

"Why, thank you, sir. But enough of this. Tell me of yourselves. Travelers, you say. In these

parts not many travelers are seen. It's far too dangerous for travelers."

"We are heading south," said Duncan. "To Oxenford. Perhaps then to London Town."

"And you do not fear?"

"Naturally we fear. But we are well armed and we shall be watchful."

"Watchful you'll need to be," the Reaver said. "You'll be traveling through the heart of the

Desolated Land. You face many perils. Food will be hard to find. I tell you there's nothing left.

Were a raven to fly across that country he'd need to carry his provisions with him."

"You get along all right."

"We were able to save our livestock. We planted late crops after the Harriers passed on.

Because of the lateness of the planting, the harvest has been poor. Half a crop of wheat, less

than half a crop of rye and barley. Only a small oat crop. The buckwheat was a total failure. We

are much pushed for an adequate supply of hay. And that's not all. Our cattle suffer from the

murrain. The wolves prey upon the sheep."

Trenchers were set down in front of Duncan and Conrad, then a huge platter with a haunch of

beef on one end of it, a saddle of mutton on the other. Another youth brought a loaf of bread and

a plate of honey in the comb.

As he ate, Duncan looked around the table. No matter what the Reaver may have said, he told

himself, the men who sat there could not be honest workmen. They had the look of wolves. Perhaps a

raiding party that, in the midst of raiding, had been surprised by the Harriers. Having fought off

the Harriers and with nothing better to do, they had settled down, at least for the time. It would

be a good hiding place. No one, not even a lawman, would come riding here.

"The Harriers?" he asked. "Where are they now?"

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"No one knows," the Reaver told him. "They could be anywhere."

"But this is little more than the border of the Desolated Land. Word is that they struck deep

into northern Britain."

"Ah, yes, perhaps. We have had no word. There are none to carry word. You are the only ones

we've seen. You must have matters of great import to bring you to this place."

"We carry messages. Nothing more."

"You said Oxenford. And London Town."

"That is right."

"There is nothing at Oxenford."

"That may be," said Duncan. "I have never been there."

There were no women here, he noted. No ladies sitting at the table, as would have been the

case in any well-regulated manor. If there were women here, they were shut away.

One of the youths brought a pitcher of ale, filled cups for the travelers. The ale, when

Duncan tasted it, was of high quality. He said as much to the Reaver.

"The next batch will not be," the Reaver said. "The grain is poor this year and the hay! We've

had a hell's own time getting any hay, even of the poorest quality. Our poor beasts will have slim

pickings through the winter months."

Many of those at the table had finished with their eating. A number of them had fallen forward

on the table, their heads pillowed on their arms. Perhaps they slept in this manner, Duncan

thought. Little more than animals, with no proper beds. The Reaver had lolled back in his chair,

his eyes closed. The talk throughout the hall had quieted.

Duncan sliced two chunks of bread and handed one of them to Conrad. His own slice he spread

with honey from the comb. As the Reaver had said, it was excellent, clean and sweet, made from

summer flowers. Not the dark, harsh-tasting product so often found in northern climes.

A log in the fireplace, burning through, collapsed in a shower of sparks. Some of the torches

along the wall had gone out, but still trailed greasy smoke. A couple of dogs, disputing a bone,

snarled at one another. The stench of the hall, it seemed, was worse than when they had first

entered.

A muted scream brought Duncan to his feet. For a second he stood listening, and the scream

came again, a fighting scream, of anger rather than of pain. Conrad surged up. "That's Daniel," he

shouted.

Duncan, followed by Conrad, charged down the hall. A man, stumbling erect from a sodden sleep,

loomed in Duncan's path. Duncan shoved him to one side. Conrad sprang past him, using his club to

clear the way for them. Men who came in contact with the club howled in anger behind them. A dog

ran yipping. Duncan freed his sword and whipped it from the scabbard, metal whispering as he drew

the blade.

Ahead of him, Conrad tugged at the door, forced it open, and the two of them plunged out into

the courtyard. A large bonfire was burning and in its light they saw a group of men gathered about

the shed in which the animals had been housed. But even as they came out into the yard the group

was breaking up and fleeing.

Daniel, squealing with rage, stood on his hind legs, striking out with his forefeet at the men

in front of him. One man was stretched on the ground and another was crawling away. As Duncan and

Conrad ran across the yard, the horse lashed out and caught another man in the face with an iron-

shod hoof, bowling him over. A few feet from Daniel, a raging Tiny had another man by the throat

and was shaking him savagely. The little burro was a flurry of flailing hoofs.

At the sight of the two men racing across the courtyard, the few remaining in the group before

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the shed broke up and ran.

Duncan strode forward to stand beside the horse. "It's all right now," he said. "We're here."

Daniel snorted at him.

"Let loose," Conrad said to Tiny. "He's dead."

The dog gave way, contemptuously, and licked his bloody muzzle. The man he had loosed had no

throat. Two men stretched in front of Daniel did not move; both seemed dead. Another dragged

himself across the courtyard with a broken back. Still others were limping, bent over, as they

fled.

Men were spewing out of the great hall door. Once they came out, they clustered into groups,

stood, and stared. Pushing his way through them came the Reaver. He walked toward Duncan and

Conrad.

He blustered at them. "What is this?" he stormed. "I give you hospitality and here my men lie

dead!"

"They tried to steal our goods," said Duncan. "Perhaps they had in mind, as well, to steal the

animals. Our animals, as you can see, did not take kindly to it."

The Reaver pretended to be horrified. "This I can't believe. My men would not stoop to such a

shabby trick."

"Your men," said Duncan, "are a shabby lot."

"This is most embarrassing," the Reaver said. "I do not quarrel with guests."

"No need to quarrel," said Duncan sharply. "Lower the bridge and we'll leave. I insist on

that."

Hoisting his club, Conrad stepped close to the Reaver. "You understand," he said. "M'lord

insists on it."

The Reaver made as if to leave, but Conrad grabbed him by the arm and spun him around. "The

club is hungry," he said. "It has not cracked a skull in months."

"The drawbridge," Duncan said, far too gently.

"All right," the Reaver said. "All right." He shouted to his men. "Let down the bridge so our

guests can leave."

"The rest stand back," said Conrad. "Way back. Give us room. Otherwise your skull is cracked."

"The rest of you stand back," the Reaver yelled. "Do not interfere. Give them room. We want no

trouble."

"If there is trouble," Conrad told him, "you will be the first to get it." He said to Duncan,

"Get the saddle on Daniel, the packs on Beauty. I will handle this one."

The drawbridge already was beginning to come down. By the time its far end thumped beyond the

moat, they were ready to move out.

"I'll hang on to the Reaver," Conrad said, "till the bridge is crossed."

He jerked the Reaver along. The men in the courtyard stood well back. Tiny took the point.

Once on the bridge, Duncan saw that the overcast sky had cleared. A near-full moon rode in the

sky, and the stars were shining. There still were a few scudding clouds.

At the end of the bridge they stopped. Conrad loosed his grip upon the Reaver.

Duncan said to their erstwhile host, "As soon as you get back, pull up the bridge. Don't even

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think of sending your men out after us. If you do, we'll loose the horse and dog on them. They're

war animals, trained to fight, as you have seen. They'd cut your men to ribbons."

The Reaver said nothing. He clumped back across the bridge. Once back in the courtyard, he

bellowed at his men. Wheel shrieked and chains clanked, wood moaned. The bridge began slowly

moving up.

"Let's go," said Duncan when it was halfway up.

Tiny leading, they went down a hill, following a faint path.

"Where do we go?" asked Conrad.

"I don't know," said Duncan. "Just away from here."

Ahead of them Tiny growled a warning. A man was standing in the path.

Duncan walked forward to where Tiny stood. Together the two walked toward the man. The man

spoke in a quavery voice, "No need to fear, sir. It's only Old Cedric, the bee master."

"What are you doing here?" asked Duncan.

"I came to guide you, sir. Besides, I bring you food."

He reached down and lifted a sack that had been standing, unnoticed, at his feet.

"A flitch of bacon," he said, "a ham, a cheese, a loaf of bread, and some honey. Besides, I

can show you the fastest and the farthest way. I've lived here all my life. I know the country."

"Why should you want to help us? You are the Reaver's man. He spoke of you. He said you saved

the bees when the Harriers came."

"Not the Reaver's man," said the bee master. "I was here for years before he came. It was a

good life, a good life for all of us--the master and his people. We were a peaceful folk. We had

no chance when the Reaver came. We knew not how to fight. The Reaver and his hellions came two

years ago, come Michaelmas, and...

"But you stayed with the Reaver."

"Not stayed. Was spared. He spared me because I was the one who knew the bees. Few people know

of bees, and the Reaver likes good honey."

"So I was right in my thinking," Duncan said. "The Reaver and his men took the manor house,

slaughtering the people who lived here."

"Aye," said Cedric. "This poor country has fallen on hard times. First the Reaver and his

like, then the Harriers."

"And you'll show us the quickest way to get out of the Reaver's reach?"

"That I will. I know all the swiftest paths. Even in the dark. When I saw what was happening,

I nipped into the kitchen to collect provisions, then went over the palisades and lay in wait for

you."

"But the Reaver will know you did this. He'll have vengeance on you."

Cedric shook his head. "I will not be missed. I'm always with the bees. I even spend the

nights with them. I came in tonight because of the cold and rain. If I am missed, which I will not

be, they'll think I'm with the bees. And if you don't mind, sir, it'll be an honor to be of

service to the man who faced the Reaver down."

"You do not like this Reaver."

"I loathe him. But what's a man to do? A small stroke here and there. Like this. One does what

he can."

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Conrad took the sack from the old man's hand. "I'll carry this," he said. "Later we can put it

with Beauty's pack."

"You think the Reaver and his men will follow?" Duncan asked.

"I don't know. Probably not, but one can't be sure."

"You say you hate him. Why don't you travel with us? Surely you do not want to stay with him."

"Not with him. Willingly I'd join you. But I cannot leave the bees."

"The bees?"

"Sir, do you know anything of bees?"

"Very little."

"They are," said Cedric, "the most amazing creatures. In one hive of them alone their numbers

cannot be counted. But they need a human to help them. Each year there must be a strong queen to

lay many eggs. One queen. One queen only, mind you, if the hive is to be kept up to strength. If

there are more than one, the bees will swarm, part of them going elsewhere, cutting down the

number in the hive. To keep them strong there must be a bee master who knows how to manage them.

You go through the comb, you see, seeking out the extra queen cells and these you destroy. You

might even destroy a queen who is growing old and see that a strong new queen is raised..."

"Because of this, you'll stay with the Reaver?"

The old man drew himself erect. "I love my bees," he said. "They need me."

Conrad growled. "A pox on bees. We'll die here, talking of your bees."

"I talk too much of bees," the old man said. "Follow me. Keep close upon my heels."

He flitted like a ghost ahead of them. At times he jogged, at other times he ran, then again

he'd go cautiously and slowly, feeling out his way.

They went down into a little valley, climbed a ridge, plunged down into another larger valley,

left it to climb yet another ridge. Above them the stars wheeled slowly in the sky and the moon

inclined to the west. The chill wind still blew out of the north, but there was no rain.

Duncan was tired. With no sleep, his body cried out against the pace old Cedric set.

Occasionally he stumbled. Conrad said to him, "Get up on the horse," but Duncan shook his head.

"Daniel's tired as well," he said.

His mind detached itself from his feet. His feet kept on, moving him ahead, through the

darkness, the pale moonlight, the great surge of forest, the loom of hills, the gash of valleys.

His mind went otherwhere. It went back to the day this had all begun.

2

Duncan's first warning that he had been selected for the mission came when he tramped down the

winding, baronial staircase and went across the foyer, heading for the library, where Wells had

said his father would be waiting for him with His Grace.

It was not unusual for his father to want to see him, Duncan told himself. He was accustomed

to being summoned, but what business could have brought the archbishop to the castle? His Grace

was an elderly man, portly from good eating and not enough to do. He seldom ventured from the

abbey. It would take something of more than usual importance to bring him here on his elderly gray

mule, which was slow, but soft of foot, making travel easier for a man who disliked activity.

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Duncan came into the library with its floor-to-ceiling book-rolls, its stained-glass window,

the stag's head mounted above the flaming fireplace.

His father and the archbishop were sitting in chairs half facing the fire, and when he came

into the room both of them rose to greet him, the archbishop puffing with the effort of raising

himself from the chair.

"Duncan," said his father, "we have a visitor you should remember."

"Your Grace," said Duncan, hurrying forward to receive the blessing. "It is good to see you

once again. It has been months."

He went down on a knee and once the blessing had been done, the archbishop reached down a

symbolic hand to lift him to his feet.

"He should remember me," the archbishop told Duncan's father. "I had him in quite often to

reason gently with him. It seems it was quite a job for the good fathers to pound some simple

Latin and indifferent Greek and a number of other things into his reluctant skull."

"But, Your Grace," said Duncan, "it was all so dull. What does the parsing of a Latin verb..."

"Spoken like a gentleman," said His Grace. "When they come to the abbey and face the Latin

that is always their complaint. But you, despite some backsliding now and then, did better than

most."

"The lad's all right," growled Duncan's father. "I, myself, have but little Latin. Your people

at the abbey put too much weight on it."

"That may be so," the archbishop conceded, "but it's the one thing we can do. We cannot teach

the riding of a horse or the handling of a sword or the cozening of maidens."

"Let's forsake the banter and sit down," said Duncan's father. "We have matters to discuss."

He said to Duncan, "Pay close attention, son. This has to do with you."

"Yes, sir," said Duncan, sitting down.

The archbishop glanced at Duncan's father. "Shall I tell him, Douglas?"

"Yes," Duncan's father said. "You know more of it than I do. And you can tell it better. You

have the words for it."

The archbishop leaned back in his chair, laced pudgy fingers across a pudgy paunch. "Two years

or more ago," he said to Duncan, "your father brought me a manuscript that he had found while

sorting out the family papers."

"It was a job," said Duncan's father, "that should have been done centuries ago. Papers and

records all shuffled together, without rhyme or reason. Old letters, old records, old grants, old

deeds, ancient instruments, all shoved into a variety of boxes. The job's not entirely done as

yet. I work on it occasionally. It's difficult, at times, to make sense of what I find."

"He brought me the manuscript," said the archbishop, "because it was written in an unfamiliar

language. A language he had never seen and that few others ever have."

"It turned out to be Aramaic," said Duncan's father. "The tongue, I am told, in which Jesus

spoke."

Duncan looked from one to the other of them. What was going on? he asked himself. What was

this all about? What did it have to do with him?

"You're wondering," said the archbishop, "what this may have to do with you."

"Yes, I am," said Duncan.

"We'll get to it in time."

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Clifford D. Simak - The Fellowship of the Talisman

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