The Wolf Age

by James Enge

  "Making more prisons?" Morlock asked in the same language.

  "Not today. What day is it?"

  "The first of Drums."

  "No it's not. What year?"

  "The year of the Ship."

  "Then I'm in Wuruyaaria."

  "Yes. Didn't you expect to be?"

  "I expected to be left alone so that I can finish a rather large job I have on hand."

  "Another prison?"

  "No, no, no, no, no, no. No. Definitely no. Well, it depends on how you look at it, I guess. Listen, if you cared about what I'm doing you obviously would have gone away by now and left me to do it. I'd rather not try to make you go away; you appear to be armed. Is there anything I can do to persuade you to go away?"

  "I wanted to meet you, lacomes."

  "Pleased to meet you. Really, it's been an honor. Good-bye!"

  "But I don't accept your apology."

  "I haven't apologized. I'm actually trying to be dismissive and insulting, and it wounds me deeply that you haven't even noticed."

  Morlock recited, "'I, lacomes Saxiponderis, made this prison. Sorry about that, prisoner."'

  "Oh." lacomes focused his cold blue eyes on Morlock at last. "I see. You were a prisoner at the Vargulleion. Did they let you out? They don't usually do that."

  "I escaped."

  "Good for you."

  "Doesn't it bother you that your prison failed?"

  "I'm sure it didn't. You didn't tunnel out, or break the bars, did you? There are silver cores in those iron bars. If you'd sawn into them you'd have had a sad surprise."

  "I'm not a werewolf."

  "Then what were you doing in the Vargulleion? It's a prison for werewolves, you know."

  "They didn't consult me about it."

  "Hm. I suppose not. They are pretty arbitrary. Still, I'd bet a nickel that the guards were inattentive. Am I right? You got out of there because the guards were napping or smoke-drunk or something."

  Morlock nodded reluctantly, then added, "The locks weren't all that they might be."

  The man threw up his hands; the pen flew out of his hand and bounced off the window behind him, leaving an inkblot on the frosted glass. "They didn't hire me to provide locks! They used their own people for the locks and bolts. Blacksmiths! Guys who usually made chains and manacles and stuff like that. I saw one of those locks. Key slots so big you could stick your little finger in them. Cell doors with simple crossbars. I said to them, `What happens when you have a prison riot?' They said, `There will be no riots. We have a way of breaking prisoners.' But broken things or people are pretty damned dangerous. I told them it was a mistake. What is the use of a prison for incorrigibles that has substandard locks? They said, `Perpetual vigilance shall be our lock.' And I said, `Look, in this kind of situation, you wear suspenders and a belt, just to be safe.' But most of them don't even wear pants, so I guess they didn't get it."

  "But you took their money."

  "Naturally, naturally. What's wrong with that?"

  "The Vargulleion was hell before death. And you built it."

  "The Vargulleion was, and is, a prison for criminals. I know it may seem odd to you, no doubt being a law-abiding sort of person, but society has to have a place to put its criminals if it's not going to kill them outright. This prison break you staged: anyone come out with you?"

  "Practically everyone."

  "Well, congratulations. Any idea how many murderers, rapists, extortionists, robbers, and all-around thugs walked out with you? Or were they all innocent? I understand everyone in prison is innocent."

  "I was innocent."

  "Then you were the victim of an injustice. To the extent I am responsible for that, I apologize. Are you prepared to apologize to all those who've suffered and died because you unleashed a wave of criminals on the world?"

  "Eh."

  "I'll take that as a no. I'm not laughing off what happened to you: really, I'm not. It bothers me more than I can easily tell you or you'd believe. But I don't think you can have a society without injustice. When people live together-and they have to live together-interests and rights clash and someone always loses."

  "And as long as you are paid, you are content with that."

  "In a word: no. I hate it. I think everyone should hate it, and I hate it that everyone doesn't hate it. Look, injustice operates in my favor sometimes, against me other times. I guess maybe I'm better off than many. It's one kind of fool who doesn't think there's injustice in his city or his state. It's another kind of fool who sees it and thinks it doesn't matter as long as it doesn't touch him. I'm neither kind of fool."

  "What kind of fool are you?"

  "I'm the kind of fool who leaves his door unlocked when he doesn't want to be disturbed!"

  "That's no answer."

  "I haven't got one. Not about society, anyway. I think we have to live in imperfect societies, because there are no perfect ones, and no perfect people. But we have to struggle against their imperfections, and our own. It's a struggle that never ends, but if we carry on with it, things may get better. Not perfect, maybe, but better."

  "That's a long war," Morlock said, thinking dark thoughts.

  "Right; right. The longest. It'll never be over. Anyway, I'm not temperamentally suited for perfection. If I woke up tomorrow in Utopia City, the first thing I'd do is hit the road and head out of town."

  "People get tired of struggling."

  "Well, everyone needs a break sometimes. I like to read books, personally. What do you do?"

  "Make things."

  "Oh?" Iacomes looked him over, noticing the wooden glove on his left hand. "That from a work injury or something? Excuse my mentioning it if it's too painful."

  "I seem to be changing into a ghost."

  "Really?" lacomes was fully engaged in the conversation for the first time. "Can I see?"

  Morlock undid the bolts that fastened the wooden sheath to his arm.

  "It looks like those anchors are driven into bone," lacomes observed, watching him. "Didn't that hurt?"

  "No. Unfortunately not."

  "Unfortunately?"

  "It's the illness. First the nerves ache, and then they seem to die and feel nothing, and then the flesh becomes ghostly. Now my arm has no feeling up to the shoulder."

  "Hm."

  Morlock pulled the sheath off and his hand lay exposed: vaporous, drifting, ghostlike.

  "Does it hurt?" lacomes asked. "After it becomes ghostly, I mean."

  "There is a kind of pain, but it's not physical. I can't explain."

  "Hm. I hope I never understand fully, to tell you the truth. Can you move things with it?"

  "Leaves. Feathers. Bits of paper. Nothing much heavier."

  "Can you reach through things with it?"

  "Not glass, or metal, or stone. If it was alive, or is alive, my fingers seem to be able to sink into it some distance. But there is pain for the other, I believe."

  "I'll take your word on that," lacomes said hastily. "Hm," he added more thoughtfully, as Morlock pulled the wooden glove back over his ghostly hand. "This all reminds me of something. But what, exactly?"

  "You know something about the ghost illness?" Morlock asked, pausing briefly as he rebolted the wooden glove onto his arm.

  "Well, I read something about it once, and that's not the same thing at all. Where is that thing? Hey, Rogerius."

  What appeared to be a brass head lifted itself up from among a tumble of gray stones. It was suspended in midair by nothing more obvious than its own intention.

  "I asked you not to call me that," the brass head said, looking at lacomes with discontented crystal eyes.

  "Did you notice when I ignored you? No? Oh, well. Rogerius, I want you to find something for me."

  "I am busy at my visualization. I remind you that if I do not finish my visualization, you will not finish your project."

  "I want you to find something for me," lacomes repeated patiently. "I read something once-"

  "I sense an indef
inite but fairly large number of documents-"

  11 -about illness. That should narrow it down."

  "Still indefinitely large."

  "Oh, come on. I'm not a hypochondriac."

  "Do you include emotional disturbances in your definition of illness?"

  "Depends. Doesn't it? Everyone who has emotions has them disturbed sometimes. But some people are more disturbed than others."

  "The number is still indefinitely large."

  "All right. The document I am thinking of described an illness that had something to do with ghosts."

  "If we include emotional disorders, the number of relevant documents is still very large. Would you like an estimate or a count?"

  "Neither," lacomes said hastily. "How many if emotional disorders are excluded?"

  "Is that wise? The intruder-whose name you have not asked but whom I have of course identified-is subject to a number of emotional disorders."

  "Who isn't?"

  "I am not."

  "Assuming that's true (which it's not), so what? Who wants to be a disembodied brass head?"

  "I do."

  "Very well, I grant your wish: you are a disembodied brass head. Don't say I never did anything for you. Now exclude emotional disorders and give me a count."

  "Seven thousand and forty-two."

  "Hm. That's a lot."

  "Ghosts cause illness. It's a scientific fact."

  "Aha. Exclude ghost as cause. What then?"

  "There is a much smaller number of relevant documents."

  "How many?"

  "Five."

  "How many are in this room? I seem to remember reading it in here. Or in the third-floor tower. Or in the kitchen. How many are in the house, here?"

  "Three."

  "Bring them to me, eh?"

  The brass head floated about the dim room, gathering dusty pieces of parchment in its teeth. It dropped them on the desk near lacomes and floated back to its nest among the tumble of stones.

  "Thanks, Rogerius," said lacomes absently. "Well, this one is no good. It's Vespasian's dying joke-you know, `I think I'm becoming a god.' I can't think why he brought it to me. Though there is some overlap between `god' and `ghost,' I suppose, especially in Latin. And this is just a recipe for giving the morally ill the ability to see ghosts. I have no idea what use that would be, though I suppose in the right hands some use could be made of it. No, it's this that I was thinking of. see?"

  He offered the parchment fragment to Morlock, who took it with his right hand. It was a set of instructions for making a mirror out of a unicorn's horn. The page was torn, probably from a scroll, but the mirror clearly had something to do with ghost illness (morbus lemuralis)-whether as cure or cause was not clear. There was a fragmentary notation along one torn edge of the page. It seemed to say lumina umbrosa. He pointed it out to lacomes.

  "Yes, I couldn't make anything of that. `Lights full of shadow.' Makes no sense."

  "But lumina can also mean `eyes' and an umbra can also be a ghost."

  "Hm. `Eyes full of ghosts,' then. `Ghosts-in-the-eyes.' Ulugarriu!"

  "Yes." Morlock nodded. "This will be useful to me. What do you want for it?"

  "I don't have time to haggle right now. Why don't you just take it, and if I think of any little thing I can use-"

  "You will not trick me into accepting an open-ended bargain."

  "Well, it was worth a try. What have you got?"

  They bargained keenly for a time, and in the end lacomes accepted three gold coins and a glass dagger for the parchment. "Though I don't know what I can do with a glass dagger," he said in the end.

  "Take it, leave it, or bargain some more."

  "No, I have this big job due and I've wasted too much time here already. We're even. Have a good day, and please don't call again."

  "You're the worst salesman in the world, Iacomes," Morlock said, with a grudging admiration.

  "Thank you, thank you. Praise from a master is indeed gratifying. Please pull the door completely shut as you go. Thanks. Thanks. Good luck, Morlock.

  Morlock was back on the dim street, wending back toward the Shadow Market, before he realized something. He had never given his name to lacomes.

  He turned back and tried to find lacomes' shop, but he lost his way in the twisting streets and finally had to give up. Hrutnefdhu met him as he was coming back to the border of the Shadow Market.

  "What in ghost's name were you doing in there?" the pale werewolf gasped, who seemed especially pale for some reason.

  "That's my business," Morlock replied curtly. He liked Hrutnefdhu, but he didn't like it when anyone tried to limit his movements.

  "It's dangerous, that's all," Hrutnefdhu said apologetically. "The streets shift. They say nothing is ever in the same place twice. All sorts of weird entities come and go."

  "Hm." There was something in this, but Morlock didn't want to talk about it. He was feeling a little odd, as if he was on the verge of the trembling madness that comes with a long bout of drinking.

  "My friend Liuunurriu doesn't know anything about ghost sickness," Hrutnefdhu continued, "but he does know someone who might. He'll be back at twilight."

  By now they were in the Shadow Market. The sun was high enough that misty golden light was falling on some of the black-and-white paving blocks. The place was almost empty of vendors: bright light and their shady callings did not mix, it seemed.

  "I can come back, then," Hrutnefdhu said, when Morlock didn't answer.

  "Thank you," said Morlock, whose body and soul were aching for a drink. "I may not be able to join you."

  t was another dark night. The sky above was stormy, split sometimes by lightning, but even above the clouds there was no moon tonight. Horseman had set just after sunset, and it would be seven days before Trumpeter rose.

  Rokhlenu had grown up hating moonless nights, but now he loved them. It was pleasantly perverse to be entangled with his beloved, both of them wearing the day shape, deep in the darkness of night. Wuinlendhono, too, relished it. The air was warm as summer, despite the storm, and they lay on the day couch without a blanket.

  The windows stood open to admit the cool rainy air. Had they turned their heads to look, they would have seen the approach of the airships standing in toward the outlier settlement, the eyes of the gondolas already angry-red with fire. But they were absorbed in a marital conversation and did not notice.

  It was the warning calls that roused their attention at last: shouting, howling, horns; all rising from the watchtowers on the settlement's verge. They had been watching the plank roads and the waters for the approach of the enemy. They had been vigilant. But they had not been watching the sky, and so they noticed the airships almost too late.

  Wuinlendhono and her mate rolled from the wedding couch and looked out the northern windows. One glance told them both all they needed to know. The Sardhluun had surrendered their long-boasted solitary stance and had allied with the Neyuwuleiuun Pack-the Neyuwuleiuun, who controlled the airships. Now airships were being sent against the outliers as if they were stray never-wolves fleeing bands of raiders.

  "I'll go to the watchtowers," Rokhlenu said as they frantically pulled on clothing. "The airships may come within the range of our crossbows and catapults-"

  "I'll go to the watchtowers," Wuinlendhono said. "I'm the First Wolf of this settlement, and it's for me to take charge of the defenses. You have to go to that crazy never-wolf friend of yours and see if he's got something to help us. Otherwise, we're done."

  Rokhlenu stuttered a moment or two, but then bit down his protestations unspoken. She was right. And what bothered him was the thought of her going into danger, but no place was safe while the airships were attacking.

  He seized her, kissed her, ran from her down the winding stairs to ground level.

  He ran all the way to Hrutnefdhu and Liudhleeo's den in the rickety slum-tower on the east side of town. There was a new lock on the door of the den; it had a coppery face and glass eyes. It gr
inned in recognition and let him in as soon as he knocked.

  Hrutnefdhu was alone in the den; he was sitting up in the sleeping couch, blinking.

  "Where's Morlock?" asked Rokhlenu, and then nearly struck himself. Morlock was absent; Liudhleeo was gone. Wasn't it possible they were coupling at this moment, Hrutnefdhu's mate and his old friend?

  If the pale werewolf was thinking anything along those lines, he gave no sign of it. "Morlock's drunk, I expect," Hrutnefdhu said sleepily. "He usually is, by this time of night. What time is it?"

  "Where is he?"

  "Cave. Wait a moment."

  "I don't have a moment. The airships of the Neyuwuleiuun are attacking us.

  Hrutnefdhu jumped naked from the couch, grabbed the coverlet, and wrapped it around himself as he ran after Rokhlenu.

  The wickerwork boat with the glass eye was waiting on their side of the water-otherwise Rokhlenu would have leapt into the water and floundered across. Both werewolves took oars and drove the boat across the rain-lashed water. Shoulder to shoulder they ran up the long slope to Morlock's cave.

  Morlock was sprawled in a pile of blankets by the cave's entrance. A halfempty jar of wine was still in his right hand. Deeper in the cave, Hlupnafenglu was sitting by the nexus of living flames, playing solitaire with Morlock's cards. He looked up in surprise at the entrance of the other two werewolves.

  "What is it?" he asked.

  "The Neyuwuleiuun are attacking."

  "Who are the Neyuwuleiuun?" asked the red werewolf with an oddly unconcerned smile.

  Rokhlenu goggled at him for a moment, but then remembered that Hlupnafenglu had lost his memories. "They have airships. We need Morlock. Wasn't he working on wings, or something?"

  "Morlock is drunk."

  "I see that. Wasn't he working on wings or something?"

  "We were all working on them," Hrutnefdhu said. "But I don't know where they are, or if they're done."

  Hlupnafenglu's smile became even broader. He pointed at the roof of the cave.

  Five sets of wings in various stages of completion were hanging there. Or, more precisely, they were lying against the roof of the cave as if it were the floor.

  Three were obviously unready, but the mechanisms of two seemed complete, and the skinlike surfaces of both were covered with the weight-defying metallic rings.