Upon the outer walls, I bonded quartz in various colours—shades of pink for the skin of the king, and shades of blue-green for the sheets. All the exterior surfaces were then covered in a type of permanent sheet binding known as a Blind Veneer, which armoured the walls very effectively.
The Grief emerged slowly from the ground like some huge plant. Thus I had heeded the words of the great stonemage Henry Eagles, who wrote, “As a tree from the earth does the great tower grow forth.”
The work proceeded in this manner for nine months or so, and we fused hundreds of walls and placed countless thousands of cross-bindings—although the design was so sturdy in itself that I believe it would have stood firm even without these enchantments. At last the winter came once more. The statue was now complete up to the centre of the chest, and yet I still did not know how to solve the building’s two great problems, these being its property of speech, and the difficult angle of the right arm.
During the winter I turned my attention once more to the duties of my various posts, while simultaneously pondering the construction problems.
The speech was a secret feature, and so nobody knew of it, save only for the bishopa, whom I told in an intimate moment. The arm, however, was clearly detailed in the plans, though without the binding scheme, and, throughout the winter, my two assistants would frequently ask me how I planned to set the arm at such a pitch. When I told them I was still working on the plans, they shook their heads, telling me the angle was too steep, and no binding would reliably support the great weight of the arm. This, you see, reflected the inflexibility of their minds and their training. On hearing these objections, I assured them that, yes indeed, the arm would be constructed and in exactly the way I had drawn it.
Towards the end of the winter, my assistants saw my mind was still set upon building the arm in the way I had first planned, so they changed their tack, suggesting I could build the arm from some very light substance, such as paper over a wire frame, so it might be supported by the bindings over its full length,
I said, “No, I plan to make the bindings so powerful that the arm would remain in place even if it were made of solid lead.”
They said, “Then you must resort to a cantilever design?”
I said, “Perhaps that is the method where you are taught, but I am a stonemage, and I did not study my craft at the great school of Eopan in order to use cantilevers.”
At this they wondered greatly, knowing of no other way this task might be accomplished. And indeed, I knew of no way myself, but I had learned God cheerfully gives to His servants anything they might need, and since I was an archbishop, and therefore a servant of very considerable rank, I remained confident the answer would come to me, which it did, in the manner I will now describe.
I am in the habit of taking meditative walks from time to time, and one night I was walking around the streets of Quebec. I had just visited the newest floor of the statue, and I was contemplating the problem of the arm. I had not taken my myrmidons along, for the sound of their marching disturbed my thoughts. In place of their protection, I disguised myself, wearing my purple robes with the hood over my head. Yet my disguise must have been inadequate, for suddenly I heard a cry: “It is he! It is the Archbishop Yreth!” and before I knew it, twenty or thirty monks came running at me, and I was sure they meant me ill.
I was poorly prepared for a fight, carrying only my throwing-razor, but I noticed the leader of this mob was running some yards ahead of the rest, and he carried a great staff with a heavy gold top-piece such as senior monks carry in those regions. I quickly pulled my blade from my boot and flicked it towards him. It hit him square in the face, and he dropped the staff, screaming in pain. I instantly leaped forward, seized the staff and set to work on the rest of the monkish villains.
Now, they were confident, for they were many in number, but I had great faith in God and fought with a fury that astonished them, swinging left and right with the staff, and punching and kicking at their throats and groins. At last, those who remained took flight, calling me a demon in human form. Yet I knew it was God and not demons who gave me my strength and skill in combat. By contrast, they, who were weakened by Divine indifference, could barely fight, for instead of punching, they had only been able to slap at me with the palms of their hands or pull at my hair, such as children might do.
I then turned to the monks who lay upon the ground and examined their injuries closely. This was not because I am morbid, but because, like most people, I am both repelled yet fascinated by gruesome injuries, for they remind us how precious is the gift of life, and how close every one of us is to horrid death.
Some had received mortal wounds, and these I mercifully dispatched with my throwing-razor. As I went from monk to monk, I saw one lying on his back with his head tilted back into the gutter. I went over to look at him, but when I lifted up his head, I saw the back of his skull had been crushed and malformed. I had struck him several times around the head with the staff, you see, which had killed him instantly. Amazingly, there was no blood upon his bald head, which made the appearance of his wound even more horrible, for it made the skull appear like that of some hideous monster.
Of course, I shuddered to look at the sight, but it also made a strange impression on me, although I did not realize the meaning of it at first.
My myrmidons arrived soon after, and took the rest of the monks away. The treacherous monks were then given to the care of surgeons. When they were recovered, I committed them to the wire for their crimes.
A few days later, I once again returned to the problem of the Grief’s right arm. As I was working, the image of the monk’s head appeared before me once more, and suddenly I saw that, just as the monk’s skull had been crushed into a new shape, so might a certain type of binding, which is called the Lasser Sphere, be malformed to follow the contour of the right arm of my Grief.
The procedures involved in this transformation are very complex, but the principle is simple enough. The Lasser Sphere is the strongest of the twelve essential gossamers, but it is also the most difficult to construct, because it will distort if other bindings are placed within the volume it encloses. In the normal way of things, it is an inviolable rule that no other binding should be placed within a Lasser Sphere, save only for another Lasser Sphere placed symmetrically around its centre. Yet my plan now was to defy the common wisdom, placing other types of binding through the centre of the Lasser Sphere, thereby pulling its surface inwards so it might assume, more or less, the shape of the arm.
Experimenting with this method, I soon found that, with a little effort, the Lasser Sphere could be distorted into a vast array of forms, and working on a small scale I distorted the gossamer to resemble a potato, a turnip, and a sort of cactus shape. Later I used this novel method, which I named Yreth’s Transformation, to create countless architectural marvels.
Hear this, though: on my eventual return to Cyprus I explained my method to Pycan of Inteda, who was the master thaumaturge at the great building school in Eopan, where I myself had studied. I said to him that, if he wished, he might teach the method to his students, providing only that he respect the name I had given to the new binding. You may be sure he was grateful for the technique, yet so jealous was he of my ability that he changed the name I had given to the method, calling it not Yreth’s Transformation, but “Spherical Synthesis,” and he later claimed it was a traditional technique and had been used for centuries. So, even to this day my divinely inspired method is known in most parts as “Spherical Synthesis” (may the name rot the mouths of all who speak it).
In any case, Yreth’s Transformation was the technique I used to bond the right arm to the statue. I carefully applied interior bindings of various sizes until the outer binding conformed precisely to the contour of the mighty sculpture. That arm stood firm at an angle of forty-five degrees, exactly as I had seen it in my wonderful vision. And, as I had stated to my disbelievi
ng assistants, the enchantment was indeed strong enough to support the weight of many tons.
As for the statue’s speech, I considered a number of ingenious solutions. One involved placing two slaves in the head of the statue, and having them speak the message through a great horn which led down to the mouth. While one slept, the other could repeat the message, and vice versa.
Another solution involved training large quantities of starlings to speak the words simultaneously, for these birds have a remarkable ability to mimic human speech. My idea was that breadcrumbs and lard should be left about the Grief at all times, providing food for a great flock of these trained starlings, and their natural chattering would sound as if the mighty king’s voice was coming from all directions. In addition, since these birds are quick learners, other flocks of starlings which might fly to the Grief seeking the food would learn the words from the native flock. This concept, however, carried one obvious flaw: at night the birds would fall asleep, and King Thyatus would then fall silent, whereas I wished him to speak always, through all hours of the day and night, providing an eternal statement on the dangers of the mouse.
In the end, I settled upon a third solution, and this was to imitate the works of nature. That is to say, I would give my statue vocal cords and a tongue of sorts.
Thus, within the throat of the statue, I placed great reeds which vibrated when air rushed through them from many holes I had hidden beneath folds in the stone. This deep sound was then carried to the mouth, where it was further modulated by a series of wooden tubes, each tuned and shaped in order to produce a certain syllable when a lever was depressed. So the first tube made the sound of “Oh,” the second made the sound of “Hhhh,” the third the sound of “Ooo” and so on, with the action of each tube tripping the mechanism of the next.
For the mouse, which I wanted to speak also, I used the same technique, but employing smaller reeds, so the voice of the mouse would be high and squeaky, while that of Thyatus would be low and majestic.
This then was how I solved the final problems of the Grief, and a few months later, the structure was complete, to the utmost wonder and admiration of all who beheld it. On that day, people ascended the central spiral ramp, and then the wide staircase leading into the head, and looked down in awe as they saw that even the great towers of the cathedral were far below them.
Then, when there were many people gathered in the head of the statue, including my dear bishopa, and as many more people watched from below, I opened a trapdoor and climbed down the stairs into the Wind Room, which housed the speech mechanism. There I set the apparatus in motion, and instantly the great king and the fearsome mouse began to speak.
The speech was an absolute success, and even though only a soft breeze was blowing, everyone could clearly hear the king as he said, over and over, “Oh, who will relieve me of this mouse?” and the mouse replied, “Ho ho. Thyatus—victor over men, but conquered by me.”
The bishopa, the dignitaries, and all those present marvelled at this mechanical speech, and agreed I was not only a great stonemage, but also an engineer without parallel.
For some reason I cannot explain, the voice of the mouse turned out to be very much deeper than the voice of the king, but this only served to make the creature appear more sinister, and I was delighted this accident came about, even though it was contrary to my original intentions.
Some people claimed the speech was unintelligible and sounded like the moaning of an agonized elk, and these cruel rumours have followed me back to Cyprus. But you may rest assured there is no truth to them. Any truly careful listener could easily hear the words, and the speech of the Grief was frighteningly natural, as if God Himself was speaking down from on high.
During the months which followed the completion of the Grief, there was more unrest among the monks. At the roots of this dissent were the events of a half-year before, when I had killed several monks in self-defence and killed a few others upon the wire. Well, the other monks of the New Carolingian Order took umbrage at these deaths, forgetting that the victims had first tried to kill me. The monks provoked riots among the townspeople and blocked roads, and they tried to set fire to the Grief, which they said had been a shameful waste of the church’s money.
Still, I am not easily moved to violence, and so I endured their insults for a time, for it is written in the Holy Code that, if you are struck upon the cheek, you should turn your other cheek to your attacker and let him strike it also, and only then should you let forth your fury.
Yet my restraint did not impress the monks by so much as one grain, and mindless hatred continued to swell within their ranks. Many priests and bishops joined their movement, and they often formed huge crowds and marched upon the cathedral or the Grief, chanting words of hatred for me.
They became so troublesome that I was forced at last to seek the bishopa’s advice. She told me—reluctantly, for she was a gentle woman—to let the myrmidons settle the matter. And so I did, taking twenty of the most troublesome monks, five priests, a bishop, and an abbot and hurling them from the cliffs at Quebec Peak.
So ended the revolt. But the other bishops, instead of being grateful peace was restored, complained to the bishopa that I had handled the affair too roughly and the rebels should have been arrested and not killed, and so on. They said justice must be observed and I should be tried for murder.
Once again, of course, the truth of the matter was simply that they hated me and wanted me gone, but I cared nothing for their views, since I commanded a strong army, and I also had the protection and support of the bishopa. We were still very much in love, she and I, and would spend, I estimate, one-third of our waking hours taking delight in the joys of the bed.
Then, one day, a terrible tragedy occurred. During a moment of the greatest intimacy, the bishopa gave a gasp, saying: “Oh! I cannot see!”
“Shall I bring you your magnifying glass, bishopa?” I asked, for she had very poor eyesight.
“No,” she replied. “I truly cannot see. Everything has become brown and my head feels dizzy.”
“I shall call a surgeon,” I said, and I jumped from the bed—I was very fit and virile—and dressed myself, instructing the bishopa to dress herself also. But she did not move, saying there was no sensation in her limbs.
Now at this I was alarmed, for, although the bishopa suffered from a swelling of the joints which often made movements difficult, I had never before seen her in such a state as this. Then I realized she was dying, and she needed not some surgeon to prod and cut at her body, but a divine who could administer to her spirit.
I knelt down and began to speak the special prayers which one of God’s representatives must speak when a person is dying. And the bishopa smiled sweetly and nodded as she heard me saying these words, for she knew she would soon be in heaven. A few minutes later she said: “May those I have killed forgive me.” And then her breathing became very shallow as I pronounced more of the magical prayers. Then she passed wind with a great sound—which was no common flatulence, but the passage of her soul from her body—and suddenly she was dead.
I quickly opened the window, so her soul might have egress from the room, then I dressed the bishopa’s body in her night-cloak and her robes and set her in her bed, covered by sheets and supported by cushions.
There were many treasures in the room, and I quickly set about gathering some of them together. I forgot to mention that, in her last moments, the bishopa had also said to me: “Yreth, I would like you to take all of my treasures and my myrmidons and keep them as your own, or sell them if you so desire, and leave this place as soon as possible.”
Contrary to her wishes, however—and may God forgive me for this—I did not take them all, but rather claimed only a few jewelled ornaments, some rings, a gold book stand, and a few other items which had sentimental value to me. I wrapped these things in a bed sheet, so they might be more easily carried. In addition, I
took the bishopa’s pendant, which was part of a tusk set in gold and which she wore always around her neck.
I knew I was in great danger, for, once my enemies discovered the bishopa was dead, they would try to have me killed. Therefore I locked the door to the bishopa’s chamber, and, dragging the bed sheet behind me, I made my way to my own quarters. I then summoned some myrmidons from the Northern Guard. I instructed one group to carry all my possessions and chests of money to my ship, which was still moored down at the shore. I gave them orders to stay with the ship and protect it, and I sent written instructions to the crew to sail south to the Passage of Zebedee, then north along the western coast of America to the port of Great Tasker, at which town I would eventually arrive by land. I picked this site, incidentally, because I had heard Great Tasker is a fine, rich town, and very far from Quebec.
I ordered the rest of the myrmidons to find their comrades, and to assemble on the road beyond the northwest side of the city, which was the area furthest from the river. I told them to go there in small groups in order to attract less attention.
Next, I sought out the bishopa’s bodyguards, who were known as the Behemoths. Huge and fearsome myrmidons they were, eight feet tall, and completely black in colour, with chests like bulls and hides as rough and hard as stone. They were formidable fighters and cunning in all martial affairs, yet simple-minded in their loyalty. They served the bishopa not for her rank but because she wore the tusk pendant around her neck. This, then, was why I had removed the item from her dead body, for the Behemoths held the pendant in great reverence and would serve any person who wore it.
I showed them the pendant, which I had placed around my neck, and commanded the bodyguards to follow me and protect me. Then I walked from the cathedral, through the outskirts of the city towards the northwest road.
The Ultimate Stonemage: A Modest Autobiography Page 9
