Epiphany of the Long Sun

by Gene Wolfe

  "The Ayuntamiento. They aren't divine, Captain."

  "I assure you, I have never imagined that they were, My General." He guided her down a crooked street whose name she had forgotten, if she had ever known it; around its shuttered store fronts, the wind whispered of snow.

  "Since they aren't," she continued, "they can't possibly resist the will of the gods for long. It is Echidna's will, certainly. I think we can be sure it's Scylla's too."

  "Also that of Kypris," he reminded her. "Kypris spoke to me, My General, saying that Patera Silk must be Caldé. I serve you because you serve him, him because he serves her."

  She had scarcely heard him. "Five old men. Four, if His Cognizance is right, and no doubt he is. What gives them the courage?"

  "I cannot guess, My General. Here is our first post. Do you see it?"

  She shook her head.

  "Corporal!" the captain called. Hands clapped, and lights kindled across the street; a gleaming gun barrel protruded from a second-floor window. The captain pointed. "We have a buzz gun for this post, as you see, My General. A buzz gun because the street offers the most direct route to the entrance. The angle affords us a longitudinal field of fire. Down there," he pointed again, "a step or two more, and we could be fired upon from an upper window of the Alambrera."

  "They could come down this street, straight across Cage, and go into the Alambrera?"

  "That is correct, My General. Therefore we will not go farther. This way, please. You do not object to the alley?"

  "Certainly not."

  How strange the service of the gods was! When she was only a girl, Maytera Mockorange had told her that the gods' service meant missing sleep and meals, and had made her give that response each time she was asked. Now here she was; she hadn't eaten since breakfast, but by Thelxiepeia's grace she was too tired to be hungry.

  "The boy you sent off to bed." The captain chuckled. "He will sleep all night. Did you foresee that, My General? The poor girl will have to remain at her post until morning."

  "Horn? No more than three hours, Captain, if that."

  The alley ended at a wider steet. Mill Street, Maytera Mint told herself, seeing the forlorn sign of a dark coffee shop called the Mill. Mill Street was where you could buy odd lengths of serge and tweed cheaply.

  "Here we are out of sight, though not hidden from sentries on the wall. Look." He pointed again. "Do you recognize it, My General?"

  "I recognize the wall of the Alambrera, certainly. And I can see a floater. Is it yours? No, it can't be, or they'd be shooting at it, and the turret's missing."

  "It is one of those you destroyed, My General. But it is mine now. I have two men in it." He halted. "Here I leave you for perhaps three minutes. It is too dangerous for us to proceed, but I must see that all is well with them."

  She let him trot away, waiting until he had almost reached the disabled floater before she began to run herself, running as she had so often pictured herself running in games with the children at the palaestra, her skirt hiked to her knees and her feet flying, the fear of impropriety gone who could say where.

  He jumped, caught the edge of the hole where the turret had been, pulled himself up and rolled over, vanishing into the disabled floater. Seeing him, she felt less confident that she could do it too.

  Fortunately she did not have to; when she was still half a dozen strides away, a door opened in its side. "I did not think you would remain behind, My General," the captain told her, "though I dared hope. You must not risk yourself in this fashion."

  She nodded, too breathless to speak, and ducked into the floater. It was cramped yet strangely roofless, the crouching Guardsmen clearly ill at ease, trained to snap to attention but compressed by circumstance. "Sit down," she ordered them, "all of you. We can't stand on formality in here."

  That word stand had been unwisely chosen, she reflected. They sat anyway, with muttered thanks.

  "This buzz gun, you see, My General," the captain patted it, "once it belonged to the commander of this floater. He missed you, so it is yours."

  She knew nothing about buzz guns and was curious despite her fatigue. "Does it still operate? And do you have," at a loss, she waved a vague hand, "whatever it shoots?"

  "Cartridges, My General. Yes, there are enough. It was the fuel that exploded in this floater, you see. They are not like soldiers, these floaters. They are like taluses and must have fish oil or palm-nut oil for their engines. Fish oil is not so nice, but we employ it because it is less costly. This floater carried sufficient ammunition for both guns, and there is sufficient still."

  "I want to sit there." She was looking at the officer's seat. "May I?"

  "Certainly, My General." The captain scrambled out of her way.

  The seat was astonishingly comfortable, deeper and softer than her bed in the cenoby, although its scorched upholstery smelled of smoke. Not astonishing, Maytera Mint told herself, not really. To be expected, because it had been an officer's seat, and the Ayuntamiento treated officers well, knowing that its power rested on them; that was something to keep in mind, one more thing she must not forget.

  "Do not touch the trigger, My General. The safety catch is disengaged." The captain reached over her shoulder to push a small lever. "Now it is engaged. The gun will not fire."

  "This spider web thing." She touched it instead. "Is it what you call the sight?"

  "Yes, the rear sight, My General. The little post you see at the end of the barrel, that is the front sight. The gunner aligns the two, so that he sees the top of the post in one or another of the small rectangles."

  "I see."

  "Higher rectangles, My General, if the target is distant. To left or right if there is a strong wind, or because the gun favors one side or another."

  She leaned back in the seat and allowed herself, for no more than a second or two, to close her eyes. The captain was saying something about night vision, short bursts hitting more than long ones, about fields of fire.

  Fire was eating up somebody's home while he talked, and Lime (if Teasel had found her quickly and she hadn't been far) was looking for her right now, going from sentry post to post to post to post. Looking for her and asking people at each post whether they had seen her, whether they knew where the next one was and whether they would take her there because of the fires, because Bison had known, had rightly known that the fires must be put out but had been afraid to say it because he had known his people couldn't do it, could not, men and women who had fought so long and hard already all day, fight fires tonight and fight again tomorrow. Bison who made her feel so strong and competent, whose thick and curling black beard was longer than her hair. Maytera Mockorange had warned her about going without her coif, which was not just against the rule but stimulating to a great many men who were aroused by the sight of women's hair, particularly if long. She had lost her coif somewhere, had gone without it though her hair was short, though it had been cropped short on the first day, all of it.

  She fled Maytera Mockorange's anger down dark cold halls full of sudden turnings until she found Auk, who reminded her that she was to bring him the gods.

  "I am Colonel Oosik, Caldé," Silk's visitor informed him. He was a big man, so tall and broad that Shell was hidden by his green-uniformed bulk.

  "The officer who directs this brigade," Silk offered his hand. "In command. Is that what you say? I'm Patera Silk."

  "You have familiarized yourself with our organization." Oosik sat down in the chair Shell had carried in earlier.

  "Not really. Are those my clothes you have?"

  "Yes." Oosik held them up, an untidy black bundle. "We will speak of them presently, Caldé. If you have made no study of our organization charts, how is it you know my position?"

  "I saw a poster." Silk paused, remembering. "I was going to the lake with a woman named Chenille. The poster announced the formation of a reserve brigade. It was signed by you, and it told anyone who wanted to join it to apply to Third Brigade Headquarters. Patera Shell was
kind enough to look in on me a few minutes ago, and he happened to mention that this was the Third Brigade. After he had gone, I recalled your poster."

  Shell said hurriedly, "The colonel was in the captain's room when I got there, Patera. I told them I'd wait, but he made me come in and asked what I wanted, so I told him."

  "Thank you," Silk said. "Please return to your manteion at once, Patera. You've done everything that you can do here tonight." Trying to freight the words with significance, he added, "It's already late. Very late."

  "I thought, Patera-"

  "Go," Oosik tugged his drooping mustache. "Your Caldé and I have delicate matters to discuss. He understands that. So should you."

  "I thought-"

  "Go!" Oosik had scarcely raised his voice, yet the word was like the crack of a whip. Shell hurried out.

  "Sentry! Shut the door."

  The mustache was tipped with white, Silk observed; Oosik wound it about his index finger as he spoke. "Since you have not studied our organization, Caldé, you will not know that a brigade is the command of a general, called a brigadier."

  "No." Silk admitted. "I've never given it any thought."

  "In that case no explanation is necessary. I had planned to tell you, so that each of us would know where we stand, that though I am a mere colonel, an officer of field grade," Oosik released his mustache to touch the silver osprey on his collar, "I command my brigade exactly as a brigadier would. I have for four years. Do you want your clothes?"

  "Yes. I'd like to get dressed, if you'll let me."

  Oosik nodded, though it was not clear whether his nod was meant to express permission or understanding. "You are nearly dead, Caldé. A needle passed through your lung."

  "Nevertheless, I'd feel better if I were up and dressed." It was a lie, although he wished fervently that it were true. "I'd be sitting on this bed then, instead of lying in it; but I've got nothing on."

  Oosik chuckled. "You wish your shoes as well?"

  "My shoes and my stockings. My underwear, my trousers, my tunic, and my robe. Please, colonel."

  The corners of the mustache tilted upward. "Dressed, you might easily escape, Caldé. Isn't that so?"

  "You say I'm near death, Colonel. A man near death might escape, I suppose; but not easily."

  "We have handled you roughly here in the Third, Caldé. You have been beaten. Tortured."

  Silk shook his head. "You shot me. At least, I suppose that it was one of your officers who shot me. But I've been treated by a doctor and installed in this comfortable room. No one has beaten me."

  "With your leave." Oosik peered at him. "Your face is bruised. I assumed that we had beaten you."

  Silk shook his head, pushing back the memory of hours of interrogation by Councillor Potto and Sergeant Sand.

  "You do not wish to explain the source of your bruises. You have been fighting, Caldé, a shameful thing for an augur. Or boxing. Boxing would be permissible, I suppose."

  "Through my own carelessness and stupidity, I fell down a flight of stairs," Silk said.

  To his surprise, Oosik roared with laughter, slapping his knee. "That is what our troopers say, Caldé," he wiped his eyes, still chuckling, "when one has been beaten by the rest. He says he fell down the barracks stairs, almost always. They don't want to confess that they've cheated their comrades, you see, or stolen from them."

  "In my case it's the truth." Silk considered. "I had been trying to steal, though not to cheat, two days earlier. But I really did fall down steps and bruise my face."

  "I am happy to hear you haven't been beaten. Our men do it sometimes without orders. I have known them to do it when it was contrary to their orders, as well. I punish them for that severely, you may be sure. In your case, Caldé," Oosik shrugged. "I sent out an officer because I required better information concerning the progress of the battle before the Alambrera than my glass could give me. I had made provisions for wounded and for prisoners. I needed to learn whether they would be sufficient."

  "I understand."

  "He came back with you." Oosik sighed. "Now he expects a medal and a promotion for putting me in this very difficult position. You understand my problem, Caldé?"

  "I'm not sure I do."

  "We are fighting, you and I. Your followers, a hundred thousand or more, against the Civil Guard, of which I am a senior officer, and a few thousand soldiers. Either side may win. Do you agree?"

  "I suppose so," Silk said.

  "Let us say, for the moment, that it is mine. I do not intend to be unfair to you, Caldé. We will discuss the other possibility in a moment. Say that the victory is ours, and I report to the Ayuntamiento that you are my prisoner. I will be asked why I did not report it earlier, and I may be court-martialed for not having reported it. If I am fortunate, my career will be destroyed. If I am not, I may be shot."

  "Then report it," Silk told him, "by all means."

  Oosik shook his head again, his big face gloomier than ever. "There is no right course for me in this, Caldé. No right course at all. But there is one that is clearly wrong, that can lead only to disaster, and you have advised it. The Ayuntamiento has ordered that you be killed on sight. Do you know that?"

  "I had anticipated it." Silk discovered that his hands were clenched beneath the quilt. He made himself relax.

  "No doubt. Lieutenant Tiger should have killed you at once. He didn't. May I be frank? I don't think he had the stomach for it. He denies it, but I don't think he had the stomach. He shot you. There you lay, an augur in an augur's robe, gasping like a fish and bleeding from the mouth. One more shot would be the end." Oosik shrugged. "No doubt he thought you would die while he was bringing you in. Most men would have."

  "I see," Silk said. "He'll be in trouble now if you tell the Ayuntamiento that you have me, alive."

  "I will be in trouble." Oosik tapped his chest with a thick forefinger. "I will be ordered to kill you, Caldé, and I will have to do it. If we lose after that, your woman Mint will have me shot, if she doesn't light upon something worse. If we win, I will be marked for life. I will be the man who killed Silk, the augur who was, as the city firmly believes, chosen by Pas to be Caldé. If it is wise, the Ayuntamiento will disavow my actions, court-martial me, and have me shot. No, Caldé, I will not report that I hold you. That is the last thing that I will do."

  "You said that the Guard and the Army-I've been told there are seven thousand soldiers-are fighting the people. What is the strength of the Guard, Colonel?" Silk strove to recall his conversation with Hammerstone. "Thirty thousand, approximately?"

  "Less."

  "Some Guardsmen have deserted the Ayuntamiento. I know that for a fact."

  Oosik nodded gloomily.

  "May I ask how many?"

  "A few hundred, perhaps, Caldé."

  "Would you say a thousand?"

  For half a minute or more, Oosik did not speak; at last he said, "I am told five hundred. If that is correct, almost all have come from my own brigade."

  "I have something to show you," Silk said, "but I have to ask you for a promise first. It's something that Patera Shell brought me, and I want you to give me your word that you won't harm him or the augur of his manteion, or any of their sibyls. Will you promise?"

  Oosik shook his head. "I cannot disobey if I am ordered to arrest them, Patera."

  "If you're not ordered to." It should give them ample time to leave, Silk thought. "Promise me that you won't do anything to them on your own initiative."

  Oosik studied him. "You are offering your information very cheaply, Caldé. We don't bother you religious, except under the most severe provocation."

  "Then I have your word as an officer?"

  Oosik nodded, and Silk took the Prolocutor's letter from under his quilt and handed it to him. He unbuttoned a shirt pocket and got out a pair of silver-rimmed glasses, shifting his position slightly so that the light fell upon the letter.

  In the silence that followed, Silk reviewed everything Oosik had said. Had he
made the right decision? Oosik was ambitious-had probably volunteered to take charge of the reserve brigade as well as his own in the hope of gaining the rank and pay to which his position entitled him. He might be, in fact he almost certainly was, underestimating the fighting capabilities of soldiers like Sand and Hammerstone; but he was sure to know a great deal about those of the Civil Guard, in which he had spent his adult life; and he was considering the possibility that the Ayuntamiento would lose. The Prolocutor's letter, with its implications of increased support for Maytera Mint, might tilt the balance.

  Or so Silk hoped.

  Oosik looked up. "This says Lemur's dead."

  Silk nodded.

  "There have been rumors all day. What if your Prolocutor is simply repeating them?"

  "He's dead." Silk made the statement as forceful as he could, fortified by the knowledge that for once there was no need to hedge the truth. "You've got a glass, Colonel. You must. Ask it to find Lemur for you."

  "You saw him die?"

  Silk shook his head, saying, "I saw his body, however," and Oosik returned to the letter.

  Too much boldness could ruin everything; it would be worse than useless to try to make Oosik say or do anything that could be brought up against him later.

  Oosik put down the letter. "The Chapter is behind you, Caldé. I suspected as much, and this makes it very plain."

  "It is now, apparently." Here was a chance for Oosik to declare himself. "If you suspected it before you read that letter, Colonel, it was doubly kind of you to let Patera Shell in to see me."

  "I didn't, Caldé. Captain Gecko did."

  "I see. But you'll keep your promise?"

  "I am a man of honor, Caldé." Oosik refolded the letter and put it in his pocket with his glasses. "I will also keep this. Neither of us would want anyone else to read it. One of my officers, particularly."

  Silk nodded. "You're welcome to."

  "You want your clothes back. No doubt you would like to have the contents of your pockets as well. Your beads are in there, I think. I imagine you would like to tell them as you lie here."