The Fifth Head of Cerberus

by Gene Wolfe

  “Why did you kill them?” Sandwalker said. “They weren’t even part of the ceremony.”

  Two grabbed him and bent his arms behind him. One said: “They’re not people. We can eat them anytime.” The other added, “Big feast tonight.”

  “Let him go.” It was Eastwind, who took his elbow. “No use fighting, Brother. They’ll just break your arms.”

  “All right.” Sandwalker’s shoulders had been close to breaking already. He swung his arms back and forth.

  Eastwind was saying: “We usually sacrifice only one at a time—that’s why the people are excited now. With the two men and the two others there will be enough for a large piece for everyone, so they’re happy.”

  “The stars were kind, then,” said Sandwalker.

  “When the stars are kind,” Eastwind answered in a flat voice that was yet like an echo of his own, “we don’t send the river any messengers at all.”

  They had reached the pit before Sandwalker realized it was near. He strode to the edge determined to climb down rather than be pushed. Someone, a small figure that seemed to hold a smaller one, was already there; he stopped in surprise, was straight-armed from behind, and tumbled ignominiously down.

  The newcomer was Seven Girls Waiting. That night the Old Wise One and the other remaining Shadow children sang the Tear Song for their dead friends. Sandwalker lay on his back and tried to read the stars to see if the message old Bloodyfinger and Leaves-you-can-eat had carried had had any effect, but he was not learned and they seemed only the familiar constellations. Seven Girls Waiting had spent the day telling all of them how she had followed him down the river and been caught, and the sorrow he had felt at first in seeing her had turned, as he listened, to a kind of weak anger at her foolishness. Seven Girls Waiting herself seemed more happy than frightened, having found in the pit substitutes for the companions who had deserted her. Sandwalker reminded himself that she had not seen the drownings.

  Who could read the stars? The night was clear, and sisterworld, now much waned, had not yet risen; they shone in glory. Perhaps old Bloodyfinger could have, but he had never asked. He reminded himself that this was why the pit was called The Other Eye. Somewhere across the river Eastwind and Lastvoice would be studying the stars as well. Fretfully he rolled from side to side: the next time he would dive into the river and try to escape. Free, he might be able to help the others. If there remained others after the next time. He thought of Cedar Branches Waving being pushed beneath the surface (her face seen in agony through the ripples), then tried to put the thought aside. He wished that Seven Girls Waiting or Sweetmouth would come and lie with him and distract him, but they lay side by side, hands outstretched and touching, both asleep. The Tear Song rose and fell, then faded and died; Sandwalker sat up. “Old Wise One! Can you read the stars?”

  The Old Wise One came acrass the sand to him. He seemed fainter than ever, but taller, as if his illusion had been stretched. “Yes,” he said. “Although I do not always read there what your kind do.”

  “Can you walk among them?”

  “I can do whatever I choose.”

  “Then what do they say? Will more die?”

  “Tomorrow? The answer is both no and yes.”

  “What does that mean? Who?”

  “Someone dies every day,” the Old Wise One answered. And then, “I am what you call a Shadow child, remember. If the stars speak to me it is of our own affairs they speak. But it is all foolish divination—the truth is what one believes.”

  “Will it be Cedar Branches Waving?”

  The Old Wise One shook his head. “Not she. Not tomorrow.”

  Sandwalker lay back, sighing with relief. “I won’t ask about the others. I don’t want to know.”

  “That is wise.”

  “Then why walk among stars?”

  “Why indeed? We have just sung the Tear Song for our dead. You were full of thoughts of the others who died, so we are not angry that you did not join—but the Tear Song is better than such thoughts.”

  “It won’t bring them back.”

  “Would we wish it?”

  “Wish what?” Sandwalker found, with a certain wrench of surprise, that he was angry, and angry at himself for being so. When the Old Wise One did not answer immediately he added, “What are you talking about?” The constellations flashed with icy contempt, ignoring them both.

  “I only meant,” the Old Wise One said slowly, “if our song could call back Hatcher and Hunter, would we sing? Returned from death, would we not kill them?” Sandwalker noticed that the Old Wise One seemed younger than he had previously. Ghosts were strange.

  And easily offended he remembered. “I’m sorry if I sounded discourteous,” he said as politely as he could. “Hatcher and Hunter were your friends’ names? They were my friends too if I am a shadowfriend, and Bloodyfinger, and Leaves-you-can-eat. We should do something for them too—sit around and tell stories about them until late—but this doesn’t seem like a place where you can do it. I don’t feel good.”

  “I understand. You yourself resemble the man you called Bloodyfinger to a marked degree.”

  “His mother’s mother and my mother’s were probably sisters or something.”

  “You are looking at my comrades, the other Shadow children. Why?”

  “Because I never thought of Shadow children having names. I only thought of them as the Shadow children.”

  “I know.” The Old Wise One was staring at the sky again, reminding Sandwalker that he had said he could walk there. After what seemed a long time (Sandwalker lay down again, turning on his belly and resting his head on his arms, where he could smell, faintly, the salt tang of his own flesh), he said, “Their names are Foxfire, Swan, and Whistler.”

  “Just like people.”

  “We had no names before men came out of the sky,” the Old Wise One said dreamily. “We were mostly long, and lived in holes between the roots of trees.”

  Sandwalker said, “I thought we were the ones.”

  “I am confused,” the Old Wise One admitted. “There are so many of you now and so few of us.”

  “You hear our songs?”

  “I am made of your songs. Once there was a people using their hands—when they had hands—only to take food; there came among them another who crossed from star to star. Then it was found that the first heard the songs of the second and sent them out again—greater, greater, greater than before. Then the second felt their songs more strongly in all their bones—but touched, perhaps, by the first. Once I was sure I knew who the first were, and the second; now I am no longer sure.”

  “And I am no longer sure of what it is you’re saying,” Sandwalker told him.

  “Like a spark from the echoless vault of emptiness,” the Old Wise One continued, “the shining shape slipped steaming into the sea…” But Sandwalker was no longer listening. He had gone to lie between Sweetmouth and Seven Girls Waiting, reaching out a hand to each.

  * * *

  The next morning, before dawn, the liana was flung down the side of the pit again. This time there was no need for the marsh men to come down into The Other Eye to drive the hill-people up. Someone shouted from the rim and they came, though slowly and unwillingly. At the top Eastwind stood waiting, and Sandwalker, who had climbed with the three remaining Shadow children, asked him, “How were the stars last night?”

  “Evil. Very evil. Lastvoice is disturbed.”

  Sandwalker said: “I thought they looked bad myself—Swift right in the hair of Burning Hair Woman. I don’t think Leaves you-can-eat and old Bloodyfinger delivered the message you gave them. Leaves-you-can-eat would always do about what anybody asked him, but old Bloodyfinger’s probably been telling everyone you deserve worse than you’ve been getting. That’s what I’m going to do myself if you send me.”

  Eastwind exclaimed, “Fool!” and tried to knock him down. When he could not, two of the marshmen did.

  It was misty, and because of the mist dark. Sandwalker (when he
got up) thought that the darkness and cold fog, which he knew would be thickest a few feet above the water of the river, would be excellent for escape; but apparently the marshmen thought so as well. One walked on either side of him, holding his arms. Today it seemed a long way to the river. He stumbled, and his guards hurried him along to catch up with the others. Ahead the small, dark backs of the Shadow children and the broad, pale ones of marshmen appeared and vanished again.

  “A good eating last night,” one of the marshmen said. “You weren’t invited, but you’ll be there tonight.”

  Sandwalker said bitterly, “But your stars are evil.”

  Fear and fury rushed into the man’s eyes, and he wrenched Sandwalker’s arm. Ahead, in the mist, there were not quite human screams, then silence.

  “Our stars may be evil,” the other marshman said, “but our bellies will be full tonight.” Two more came walking back the way they had come, each carrying the limp body of a Shadow child. Sandwalker could smell the river—and hear, in the uncanny silence of the fog, the sound its ripples made against the bank.

  Lastvoice stood as he had before, tendrils of white vapor twining about his tall figure. The marshmen wore necklaces and anklets and bracelets and coronets of bright green grass today, and danced a slow dance on the bank; women, children, and men all winding like a serpent, mumbling as they danced. Eastwind relieved one of the guards and muttered in Sandwalker’s ear, “This may! be the last muster of the marsh. The stars are very evil.” Sandwalker answered contemptuously, “Are you so afraid of them?” Then Eastwind was gone, and the guards were thrusting him, with the last Shadow child, his mother, and the two girls into a shivering group. Pink Butterflies was crying, and Seven Girls Waiting rocked her back and forth, comforting her with some nonsense and asking things of God. Sandwalker put his arm around her and she buried her face in his shoulder.

  The last Shadow child stood next to Sandwalker, and Sandwalker, looking down, saw that he trembled. The Old Wise One stood beside him, so thin in the mist that it seemed no one except Sandwalker could possible see him. Unexpectedly the last Shadow child touched Sandwalker’s arm and said, “We will die together. We loved you.”

  “Chew harder,” Sandwalker told him, “and you won’t believe that.” And then, because he was sorry to have hurt a friend at such a time he added more kindly, “Which one are you—aren’t you the one who showed me what it is you chew?”

  “Wolf.”

  Lastvoice had begun his chant. Sandwalker said, “Your Old Wise One told me last night your names were Foxfire, Whistler, and something else I forget—but there was none of that name.”

  “We have names for seven,” the Shadow child said, “and names for five. The names for three you have heard. My name now is the name for one. Only his name, the Old Wise One’s name, never changes.”

  “Except,” the Old Wise One whispered, “when I am called—as occasionally I once was—the Group Norm.” The Old Wise One was only a sort of emptiness in the mist now, a man-shaped hole.

  Sandwalker had been watching the guards, and he saw, as he thought, an opening—a moment of relaxation of vigilance as they listened to Lastvoice. The mist hung everywhere and the river was wide and hidden. If God so willed, he might reach the deep water…

  God, dear God, good Master…

  He bolted, feet splashing, then slipping as he tried to dive his supple body between two marshmen. They caught him by the hair and smashed his face with fists and knees before pushing him back among the others. Seven Girls Waiting, Sweetmouth, and his mother tried to help him, but he cursed them and drove them away, bathing his face in the bitter river water.

  “Why did you do that?” the last Shadow child asked.

  “Because I want to live. Don’t you know that in a few minutes they’re going to drown us all?”

  “I hear your song,” the Shadow child said, “and I wish to live too. I am not, perhaps, of your blood, but I wish to live.”

  “But we must die,” the voice of the Old Wise One whispered.

  “We must die,” Sandwalker said harshly, “not you. They won’t pick your bones.”

  “When this one dies, I die,” the Old Wise One said, indicating the last Shadow child. “Half I am of your making and half of his, but without him to echo, your mind will not shape me.”

  Softly the last Shadow child said again, “I, too, wish to live. It may be that there is a way.”

  “What?” Sandwalker looked at him.

  “Men cross the stars, bending the sky to make the way short. Since first we came here—”

  “Since first they came here,” the Old Wise One corrected him gently. “Now I am half a man, and know that we were always here listening to thought that did not come; listening without thought of our own to be men. Or it may be that all are one stock, half-remembering and dwindling, half-forgetting and flourishing.”

  “The song of the girl with the little child is in my mind,” said the last Shadow child, “and the one they call Lastvoice is chanting. And I do not care if we are two or one. We have sung to hold the starcrossers back. We desired to live as we wished, unreminded of what was and is; and though they have bent the sky, we have bent their thought. Suppose I now sing them in, and they come? The marshmen will take them, and there will be many to choose from. Perhaps we will not be chosen.”

  “Can one do so much?” Sandwalker asked.

  “We are so few that among us even one is no mean number. And the others sing so the starcrossers will not see what they wish to see. For a heartbeat my song will clear their sight, and the bent sky is near here at many points. They will be swift.”

  “It is evil,” the Old Wise One said. “For very long we have walked carefree in the only paradise. It would be better if all here were to die.”

  The last Shadow child said firmly, “Nothing is worse than that I should die,” and something that had wrapped the world was gone. It went in an instant and left the river and the mist, the shaking, dancing marshmen and chanting Lastvoice and themselves all unchanged, but it had been bigger than everything and Sandwalker had never seen it because it had been there always, but now he could not remember what it had been. The sky was open now, with nothing at all between the birds and the sun; the mist swirling around Lastvoice might reach to Burning Hair Woman. Sandwalker looked at the last Shadow child and saw that he was weeping and that his eyes held nothing at all. He felt that way himself, and turning to Cedar Branches Waving asked, “Mother, what color are my eyes now?”

  “Green,” Cedar Branches Waving answered. “They look gray in this light, but they are green. That is the color of eyes.” Behind her Seven Girls Waiting and Sweetmouth murmured, “Green.” And Seven Girls Waiting added, “Pink Butterflies’s eyes are green too.”

  Then, glowing red as old blood through the fog, a spark appeared—high overhead to the north, where Ocean moved like an eel under the grayness. Sandwalker saw it before anyone else. It grew larger, more angry, and a whistling and humming came over the water; on the bank one of the dancing women screamed and pointed as the gout of red fire came hissing down. It made the noise heard when lightning kills a tree. There were two more red stars falling with it already, and the shrieking of all the people followed them down, and when they struck, the marshmen fled. Sweetmouth and Seven Girls Waiting threw their arms around Sandwalker and buried their faces in his chest. The marshmen who had guarded them were running, tearing away their grass bracelets and crowns.

  Only Lastvoice stood. His chant had stopped, but he did not flee. Sandwalker thought he saw in his eyes a despair like that of the exhausted beast that at last turns and bares its throat to the jaws of the tire-tiger. “Come,” Sandwalker said, pushing aside the girls and taking his mother’s arm; but in his ear the Old Wise One said, “No.”

  Behind them feet were splashing in the river water. It was Eastwind, and when Lastvoice saw him said, “You ran.”

  Eastwind answered: “Only for a moment. Then I remembered.” He sounded shamed. Last
voice said, “I shall speak no more,” and turned his back on them all, looking out to Ocean.

  Sandwalker said: “We’re going. Don’t try to stop us.”

  “Wait.” Eastwind looked at Cedar Branches Waving. “Tell him to wait.”

  She said to Sandwalker, “He, too, is my son. Wait.”

  Sandwalker shrugged and asked bitterly, “Brother, what do you want of us?”

  “It is a matter for men, not women; and not,” Eastwind looked at the last Shadow child, “for such as he. Tell them to go to the bank and upriver. No marshman, I swear, will hinder them.”

  The women went, but the last Shadow child only said, “I will wait on the bank,” and Eastwind, defeated, nodded.

  “Now, Brother,” said Sandwalker, “what walks here?”

  “While the stars remain in their places,” Eastwind answered slowly, “the starwalker judges the people; but when a star falls the river must be clouded with his blood, that it may forget. His disciple does this, aided by all nearby.”

  Sandwalker looked a question.

  “I can strike,” Eastwind said, “and I will strike. But I love him, and I may not strike hard enough. You must help me. Come.”

  Together they swam the river, and on the farther bank found a tree of that white-barked kind Sandwalker had once dreamed grew in a great circle about Eastwind. The roots trailed in the bitter water, and selecting a branching one less thick than a finger, Eastwind bit it through, pulled it up dripping to give to Sandwalker. It was as long as his arm, the lower part heavy with small shellfish and smelling of ooze. While Sandwalker examined it, Eastwind took another for himself, and with them they flogged Lastvoice until no further blood ran as he floated, though the sharp little shells sliced the white flesh of his back. “He was a hill-man,” Eastwind said. “All starwalkers must be born in the high country.”