Soldier of the Mist

by Gene Wolfe

Page 21

 

  "Yes, Huntress. "

  "Once it was Gaeas. I sent my people, and they took it for me, breaking her altars. "

  "Yes, Huntress. "

  "You must not seek to loose their grasp, and because you will forget, I desire to send a slave with you who will remind you. Happily, there is someone with you who has sworn to serve me without reservation, and thus is mine wholly to do with as I choose. "

  "And I, Huntress. "

  "Hardly, though I know you mean well. Look at this. " She held out her hand; in it writhed a little snake no longer than my finger. "Take her, and keep her safe. "

  I took it, but I had nowhere to put it. I held it in my hand, and in a moment it seemed to vanish; I held nothing.

  "Good. Down that road is a farmhouse. " The Huntress pointed with her bow. "It is not far, and you need not fear that the shieldman set to watch you will wake. You must go to that farm and make its people give you a wineskin and a cup. When you meet the one who has dedicated himself to me, you must make him drink, and you must put my serpent into the cup. Do you understand?"

  "Huntress," I said, "I have lost your serpent. "

  "You will find her again when the time comes. Now go. I send my dogs before you to rouse the house. "

  As she spoke, they flashed from her side. For an instant I saw them streaking down the road she had indicated; then they were gone.

  I turned and followed them, knowing that was what the virgin wished me to do. When I had taken fifty steps or so, the urge to see her once more overwhelmed me, and I looked over my shoulder.

  I wish I had not, because she was gone. The Dark Mother stood where she had stood, holding her torches; wisps of fog and dark, shapeless things had left the trees to be with her. Someone screamed and I began to run, though I could not have said whether I ran to give aid or to fly the Dark Mother. The farmhouse was like a hundred others, of rough brick with a thatched roof, its farmyard surrounded by a low wall of mud and sticks. The gate had been broken; I entered easily. Inside, the wooden figure of the three women had been thrown down, though the altars to either side of the door had not been touched.

  The door was whole, but as I approached it a man with staring eyes flung it open and ran out. He would have collided with me as one horseman rides down another, had I not caught him as he came. I asked,

  "Are you the father of this hearth?"

  "Yes," he said.

  "Then I can take away the curse, I think; but you must give me freely a skin of wine and a cup. "

  His mouth worked. I think it would have foamed had there been any moisture there. The screaming inside had stopped, though a child wept.

  "Give me the wine," I told him.

  Without another word he turned and went in again, and I followed him.

  His wife came to him, naked and weeping, her face twisted with fear and grief. She tried to speak, but only the noises of grief and fear could pass her lips. He pushed her to one side; when she saw me she clasped me for protection, and I put my arm about her.

  The man returned with a wineskin and a cup of unglazed clay. "This has waited two seasons," he said.

  I saw that he himself was no older than I, and perhaps younger.

  Telling him to comfort his wife, I went back outside. There I set up the image in its place again, poured a little wine into the cup, and sprinkled a few drops before each of the three figures, calling them Dark Mother, Huntress, and Moon. Before I had finished, silence settled on the house, and an owl hooted from the wood.

  The farmer and his wife came out to me, she now wearing a gown and leading a girl younger than Io by the hand. I told them I did not think they would be troubled again. They thanked me many times; and he brought a lamp, another skin of wine, and cups like the one he had given me. We all drank the unmixed wine, the child sipping from her mothers cup that she might sleep soundly, as her mother said. I asked them what they had seen.

  The child would say only that it had been a bad thing; I did not question her further, seeing that it made her afraid. The woman said that a hag with staring eyes had sat upon her and held her motionless by a spell; she had been unable to breathe. The man spoke of a winged creature, not a bird nor a bat, that had flapped after him from room to room.

  I asked whether any of them had seen a dog. They told me they owned a dog and had heard him bark. We went to look for him in his kennel behind the house and found him dead, though there was no mark upon him. He was old and white at the muzzle. The man asked whether I was an archimage; I told him only for this night.

  When I left the farmhouse, a figure moved at the crossroad, and I saw many tiny lights, though the Dark Mother and her torches were gone. It was the Milesian; he started up as though frightened when I approached him, though he relaxed when he saw my face. "Latro!" he exclaimed. "Theres someone else awake, at least. Do you know the Rope Makers didnt even post a guard? Theres confidence for you. "

  I asked what he was doing.

  "Just a little sacrifice to the Triple Goddess. Road crossings like this are sacred to her, provided theres no house in sight, and the dark of the moon is the best time. I hadnt thanked her properly yet for the great boon she gave me in the city - you were there and saw it, what a pity you dont remember!

  Anyway, this seemed a good chance to do it. Then this fellow" - he pointed to the sacrifice, a black puppy - "wandered up to me, and I knew it had to be propitious. "

  I said, "If you havent finished . . . "

  "Oh, no. I completed the last invocation just as I heard your step. " He bent and picked up the glowing things that formed a circle around the puppy, then looked significantly at the wineskin. "Youve been buying from the peasants, I see. "

  I nodded and asked whether he was dedicated to the Triple Goddess.

  "Yes indeed. Ever since I was a lad. She gives her worshipers all they ask - even old Hesiod says so in his verses, though none of his countrymen seemed to heed him. I admit she has some strange ways of doing it. "

  I knew then that he was the one of whom the Huntress had spoken, and I loosened the thongs of the wineskin and poured wine into the cup. "What is it you have asked of her?"

  "Power, of course. Gold is only a kind of power, and not the best kind. As for women, Ive had a good many, and I find I prefer boys. "

  To fill the time, I said, "Power will get you all you wish of those. Kings have no difficulty. "

  "Of course not. But real power is not of this world, but of the higher one - the ability to call back the dead and summon spirits; the knowledge of unseen things. "

  I sipped from the cup, and as I lowered it, felt the little snake stir in the hand that held the skin. When I poured more wine into the cup, I dropped the snake in with it.

  The Milesian drained it at a gulp. "Thanks. I owe you something for that, Latro. " He wiped his mouth on the back of his hand. "Id initiate you into the mystery of the goddess, but youd forget, and it cant be written down. "

  Side by side we walked back to the tents of the Rope Makers. My bed was in Basiass tent; I do not know with whom the Milesians was. He asked if we might share another cup before we slept. I told him I had drunk all the wine I wanted, but I would gladly give him another. He drank it and wished me a good night.

  I tried to wish him the same, but the words stayed in my throat.

  "Eurykles," he told me, thinking that I had forgotten his name.

  "Yes, Eurykles," I said. "Good luck, Eurykles. I know your goddess is pleased with you. "

  He smiled and waved before he went into one of the tents.

  I lay down, and after a long time I slept. Now the sky grows light, and though I would sooner forget what happened last night, I think it best to write it here.

  Chapter 23 In the Village

  I am writing this in the courtyard of the inn. Eutaktos had been so eager to leave Thought that he did not buy provisions for the return to Redface Island. I think perhaps he believed also that he could get them more cheapl
y away from the city, and in that I suppose he was right. Anyway, we have halted here, and Eutaktos and some others are bargaining for food in the market. I am writing because I have not yet forgotten what took place last night, though I do not remember how I came to be among these Rope Makers.

  The Milesian came to me when we halted here and said, "Lets find a wineshop. Ill repay you for what you gave me last night. " I pretended to have forgotten, but he pressed me to go anyway, saying,

  "Basias can come with us. Then they cant say we were trying to get away. "

  Soon the Milesian, Basias, Io, and I were sitting very comfortably at a table in the shade; there was a jar of old wine and one of cold well water in the center of the table, and each of us had a cup before him.

  "You will recall that we were discussing the Triple Goddess last evening," the Milesian said to me. "At least, I hope you will. That hasnt gone yet, has it?"

  I shook my head. "I can remember our camping outside this village late last night, and everything that came after that. "

  Io asked, "Where are we, anyway? Is this far from Advent?"

  "This is Acharnae," the Milesian told her. "Were about fifty stades from Advent, which will be our next stop. It would have been a little shorter along the Sacred Way, but I suppose Eutaktos felt there was too much danger of incurring a charge of impiety. " He looked at Basias for confirmation, but the Rope Maker only shrugged and put his cup to his lips.

  "Ive been to Advent before," Io told the Milesian. "With Latro and Pindaros and Hilaeira. Latro slept in the temple. "

  "Really? And did he learn anything?"

  "That the goddess would soon restore him to his friends. "

  I asked Io to tell me about that.

  "I dont know much, because you didnt tell me much. I think you told Pindaros more than me, and you probably wrote more than you told Pindaros. All you said to me was that you saw the goddess, and she gave you a flower and promised youd see your friends soon. We were your friends, Hilaeira and Pindaros and me, but I dont think she meant us. I think she meant the friends you lost when you were hurt. "

  Basias was looking at me narrowly. "She gave you a flower in a dream?"

  I said, "I dont know. "

  Io told him. "He just said she gave him one. "

  The Milesian spun an owl on the table as if hoping for an omen. "You can never tell about goddesses.

  Or gods either. Possibly a dream with a goddess in it is more real than a day without one. The goddess makes it so. Thats what Id like to be. "

  I was surprised. "A goddess?"

  "Or a god. Whatever. Find some little place, impress the people with my powers, and make them build me a temple. "

  Basias told him, "Youd better put more water in that. "

  The Milesian smiled. "Perhaps youre right. "

  "Drinking unmixed wine will drive a man mad - everybody knows that. The Sons of Scoloti do it, and theyre all as mad as crabs. "

  "Yet Ive heard there are little villages along your coast where the people worship sea gods whove been forgotten everywhere else in the world. "

  Basias drank again. "Who cares what slaves do? Or who their slave gods are?"

  Io said, "We had four Sons of Scoloti on Hypereidess ship with us, Latro. But then one left the night the sailor died and never came back. "

  Basias nodded. "What did I tell you?"

  The Milesian spun his coin again. "Not all of them are Sons of Scoloti. Some are Neurians; there was a Neurian in the city. "

  "Who are they? I never heard of them. "

  "They live east of the Sons of Scoloti and have much the same manners and customs. At least, when we see them. "

  Basias poured himself more wine. "Then who cares?"

  "Except that they can change themselves into wolves. Or anyway they change into wolves. Some people say they cant control it. " The Milesian lowered his voice. "Latro, you dont remember how I raised a woman in the city, but one of them had opened her grave. I had planned, you see, just to produce a ghost; but when I saw that broken coffin - well, the opportunity was too good to miss. "

  The innkeeper, who had been lounging against the wall not far away, sauntered over to join the conversation. "I couldnt help but hear what you said about men who change to wolves. You know, we had somethin a bit odd happen just last night, right here in Acharnae. Family sleepin peacefully in their beds, when just like a thunderclap the place was full of I dont know what you call em. People talk about Sabaktes and Mormo and all that, kind of like they was a joke. These wasnt, though they didnt write their names on the walls. " The Milesian said, "They vanished at dawn, I assume. I wish I might stay here another day, so I might exorcise them for those good people; my fame in that line outreaches the known world, though I hesitate to say it. But I fear the noble Eutaktos means for us to march again after the first meal. "

  "Theyre gone already," the innkeeper said. "I havent talked to the family myself, but I know them that have, and they say a man come to the door just as they was runnin out. He said to give him a skin of wine and hed fix things. So they did, and he set up the figure of the three goddesses that had been knocked down and poured out a bit to each goddess. Soon as he did that, they was gone. " The innkeeper paused, looking from face to face. "He was a real tall man, they said, with a scar on his head. "

  The Milesian yawned. "What happened to the wine? I dont suppose he poured it all out. "

  "Oh, he kept that. Some people are say in he probably whistled up those whatever-they-weres just to get it. I say that for a man who could do that, he was satisfied awful cheap. "

  "And so would I," the Milesian drawled when the innkeeper had left. He spun the owl on the table as before. "But then, it all depends on just whom the wonders worked for, doesnt it? When I raised the dead woman in the city, I had sense enough to take her around to some wealthy patrons before cockcrow. Most of them werent my patrons before they saw her, to be sure. But they were afterward.