The Belly of the Bow

by K. J. Parker

  ‘In other words,’ someone said, ‘magic. Sure thing. And then Doctor Gannadius pulls a toad out of his ear and vanishes up his own pointy hat. Somehow I’m not convinced.’

  ‘It’s a leap of faith, I agree,’ Mogre intervened, ‘but not an insurmountable one.’

  ‘A hop of faith, you mean.’

  ‘Yes, I like that, a hop of faith. Let’s just suppose for argument’s sake that there is this thing called magic, and the likes of Gannadius and his toad-abusing cronies can sometimes bend the Principle at will. Dormand would say it’s still random, it’s just individuals making choices, only carrying them out through a different medium - doesn’t matter whether I exercise the choice by walking through the door myself or influencing you to walk through it, the door still gets walked through, the choice happens.’

  ‘Ah,’ said the thin man, ‘but Gannadius would say that the sort of event that attracts magical interference follows a pattern. Battles, the fate of cities, blood curses and family feuds, that’s when magic gets used; and that in itself creates a trend, which in turn corrupts the purely random development of choice. In other words, there is an obscure design. It may not be Destiny, Obscurist-style; it’s purely artificial. But it’s a trend nonetheless, and unlike Dormand’s law, it’s not natural. Then consider the knock-on effect, and you can see where it’s leading.’

  ‘Obscurist crap,’ someone replied. ‘All this talk about something being corrupted implies there’s something to corrupt, an Obscure Design. If there’s a trend, it’s just part of the ordinary trend of human nature, just like Sten said a moment ago.’

  ‘Ah, yes,’ someone else objected, ‘but a supervening trend, a trend that’s bigger and stronger than just ordinary motivation, because it pushes people around, makes them do what they otherwise wouldn’t have done.’

  ‘In other words,’ Mogre said, ‘further economising on the number of possible alternatives. Pure Dormand. The State rests.’

  ‘Talking of which,’ said one of the council, standing up and stifling a yawn, ‘what’s good enough for the State’s good enough for me. You lot may be able to stay up all night and fight a battle next day, but I need my eight hours. Oh, and a word of advice: make sure Sten wins the argument, unless you want to find yourself posted in the front rank tomorrow.’

  ‘Funny you should mention that,’ Mogre said.

  The departing councillor stared at him; there was a little twinkle of pure fear in his eyes. ‘You’re joking, aren’t you?’ said he. ‘Sten, that’s not funny.’

  There was a long moment of silence; then Mogre smiled and said, ‘Of course I’m joking, Hain. This time, at any rate. See you in the morning.’ The circle around the small brass brazier had gone rather quiet, but Mogre didn’t appear to have noticed any change in mood. ‘Right,’ he said, ‘where he’d got to? Ah, yes—’

  Revision. Ack.

  Machaera looked up at the guttering candle, then back at the page in front of her. Sometimes a momentary break in eye contact with the book helped jolt her out of drowsiness. This time it didn’t look like it had worked. She’d read the same twenty lines at least five times now, and still it didn’t mean anything to her.

  She tried again.

  Although, in refuting the foolish and frivolous claims of Maddianus and his fellow adherents to the so-called Doctrine of the Obscure Design, I have in part sought to disallow the notion that the number of such possible alternatives is restricted through the agency and at the whim of an unknown and imperceptible supervening external agency—

  Machaera’s head nodded forward onto her chest. She snored—

  —And was sitting in darkness, looking down into a circle of light. To be more precise, she was balanced on a rickety folding stool that wobbled as she shifted her weight slightly. The canvas top sagged at one corner, and as she tried to get away from the sag she felt the material tear a little more. She sat perfectly still, and tried to make out her surroundings.

  There seemed to be two circles; an inner circle of men sitting round a glowing brazier, whose light and heat scarcely leaked past them; and an outer circle, dim silhouettes of heads and shoulders at the back of the tent (I’m in a tent, she realised. I haven’t been in a tent since I was seven, and it wasn’t this kind of tent), of whom she was apparently one. Directly opposite her in the inner circle, just visible between the heads of two other men with their backs to her, was a face she recognised. Everybody who’d been to see the army off would recognise that face. General Mogre. Presumably she was eavesdropping on a council of war. Fascinated, she craned her neck as far forward as she could without further provoking her derelict stool, and tried to catch what the great man was saying.

  ‘It’s all in Dormand,’ said General Mogre. ‘Everything you ever need to know about anything; you look in Dormand long enough, you’ll find the answer.’

  (Rubbish, Machaera said; but here, the words only sounded inside her own head. And I should know; I’m reading the horrid thing, right now.)

  ‘Let’s hope Gorgas hasn’t got a copy,’ said one of the men with his back to her. ‘Assuming he can read, that is.’

  ‘I’ll bet you Niessa’s read it,’ someone she couldn’t quite see chimed in. ‘Though I see her more as a disciple of the sainted Maddianus. The complete witch, in fact.’

  Sten Mogre grinned. ‘Maybe that’s why she had Patriarch Alexius kidnapped,’ he said. ‘To explain the long words to her.’

  ‘It’s a nice picture,’ someone else said. ‘You can just see her, flicking through trying to find the recipes for love potions and raising-storms-at-sea-made-simple.’

  ‘Probably reckons it’s written in code,’ said another. ‘You know the sort of thing, pick out every sixth word and it’ll spell out the true message.’

  (I must try that, Machaera said.

  It’s been tried, replied the person next to her. Doesn’t work. At least, it makes as much sense as reading the whole thing, but that’s not saying much.

  Who are you? Machaera asked.

  Alexius. You’re that star pupil of Gannadius’, aren’t you?

  I - Machaera couldn’t think what to say. It’s an honour to meet you, she mumbled.

  You think so? Good gods. By the way, Gannadius is over there somewhere. Hello, Gannadius.

  Hello yourself. And hello, Machaera. Shouldn’t you be revising Dormand? Though I suppose this almost counts. Alexius, what in the gods’ names are we doing here? I don’t understand. This can’t be a crucial turning point, they’re just talking horse manure about abstract philosophy.)

  ‘To get back to what we were talking about,’ said a thin man. ‘You should read what this fellow Gannadius wrote. It really does make a lot of sense.’

  (Horse manure? Alexius said.

  Oh, be quiet. Actually, it was. Pure drivel, from start to finish. You wouldn’t want me to tell these lunatics the truth, would you?

  Hush, someone said.)

  ‘The heart of the problem as I see it,’ one of the inner circle said, ‘is identifying your crucial moment. Well, how do you recognise the things? All right, let’s suppose that Huic over there stays here another half hour, then goes back to his tent. On his way he trips over a guy-rope and pulls a muscle. In the battle tomorrow, that pulled muscle slows him up just a fraction at a crucial moment, his unit just fails to make its ground in time, and in consequence we lose a battle we’d have won if he’d gone to his tent five minutes earlier or five minutes later. Suppose one of us says something about the operation of the Principle that burrows its way into the back of Sten’s mind and influences him in some minor way when he’s making a decision tomorrow. Suppose if I leave here in two minutes’ time for a piss, I’ll be outside at precisely the moment Gorgas and his army try to sneak past us, and I’ll just catch the faint echo of someone coughing, or see the moonlight on a belt buckle. All right so far? Very good. Now, suppose I’m a wizard or a witch, trying to find the crucial moment so I can prise it open and make things happen differently. How’m I goi
ng to know that was the crucial moment? Chances are I’ll be snooping round Gorgas while he’s trying to figure out what he should do, or else I’ll be at the battle itself. And of course, I’ll find heaps and heaps of crucial moments there, because every damn moment’s a crucial moment, or it could be. At this precise moment, maybe there’s a crucial moment going on wherever Gorgas is, and there’s a whole mob of wizards and witches crowding round him playing tug-o’-war. Now they can’t be there and here; but if they change his critical moment, who’s to say my crucial moment’s still going to be crucial? Like, if they make Gorgas go a different way round the wood, then when I leave this tent he won’t be there for me to see.’

  Sten Mogre nodded. ‘What you’re saying is,’ he said, ‘either magic can’t work, because there’s no real economy of alternatives and Dormand is a pack of nonsense, or every moment is crucial, in which case it doesn’t matter where your witches and wizards stop and peel off the skin, they’ll always find a point where they can change everything. Avert, you should have been a lawyer, not a soldier.’

  ‘I wasn’t saying either of those,’ the man called Avert replied. ‘I was just pointing out something you’ve got to address if you want to believe in magic.’

  ‘Which you don’t, presumably.’

  ‘I try and keep an open mind, actually.’

  (If he calls me a witch one more time, someone said, I’ll smack his head, even if I’m not really here.

  Niessa Loredan, Alexius whispered. Machaera shuddered a little. It’s all right, Alexius went on, for some reason we’re all very polite here, nobody tries to stab anybody else or bully them into betraying secrets. It’s quite the nicest, friendliest war you ever heard of. Isn’t that right, Gannadius? For instance, Gannadius and I are on opposite sides.

  Oh, Machaera said. Isn’t that awkward? I thought you were friends.

  We are, Gannadius said. But we aren’t really here, so it doesn’t matter.

  Speak for yourself, interrupted the voice that had said, ‘Hush!’ a while back. I’m Vetriz Auzeil, by the way. And I’m definitely here.

  Excuse me, Machaera said. But does any of you know, if we’re here, why we’re here?)

  Sten Mogre suddenly yawned and stretched. ‘That’s enough of that for tonight,’ he said. ‘We’ll finish this discussion tomorrow, in Scona Town. Everybody clear about what they’re doing?’

  ‘Actually—’ someone replied.

  (I think we just decided the result of the war. Gannadius said. Any idea who won?)

  —And found himself sitting upright in bed, with a pain in his temples that made him cry out loud. For some reason he felt cold and frightened, as if he’d just seen some horrible accident in the street. ‘Machaera?’ he said aloud, not really knowing why.

  He climbed slowly out of bed and looked out of the window; still pitch dark outside, and the night-light was only just over half gone. He flopped down into his chair and reached for the wine jug.

  Magic, he thought, someone’s been making me do magic. For some reason, he felt sick. He swallowed three mouthfuls of wine, stood up again and washed his face and hands thoroughly in the big stone bowl by his bed. He felt an urgent need for light; he had three candles and an oil-lamp in the room as well as the night-light, and he lit them all. It helped a little.

  There was a knock at the door. He opened it.

  ‘Machaera?’ he said. ‘What’s the matter?’

  She looked up at him with those terribly young, rather gormless eyes. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘I had a dream—’

  Gannadius stepped out into the passage and looked both ways. Middle-aged teachers weren’t encouraged to receive young female students in their quarters in the small hours of the morning. ‘I know,’ he said, drawing her inside and closing the door. ‘Can you remember what it was?’

  She nodded. ‘I think so,’ she added, picking at the edges of her fingernails. ‘I’m not sure.’

  ‘Oh, sit down, for pity’s sake.’ Gannadius found his slippers and eased his feet into them, then slouched down opposite her and poured himself another drink. He didn’t offer her one. ‘All I can remember is waking up hearing you asking a question,’ he said. ‘By the way, does your head hurt?’

  She nodded. ‘A bit,’ she said.

  ‘A bit. Fine. Tell me what you remember about your dream.’

  She told him. When she’d finished, she saw that he had his eyes shut, his face turned away. ‘Is something the matter?’ she said.

  ‘I think so,’ he replied. ‘I think we’ve just sent hundreds of men to their deaths, and I don’t even know who.’

  There was still an hour to go before the first cracks of light would appear in the sky. Gorgas Loredan, who’d always had exceptional night vision, couldn’t see his hand in front of his face. He’d estimated the distance once they’d passed the wood by counting his own footsteps. There was every chance he’d got it wrong. He knew where he wanted to be, but he hadn’t the faintest idea where he actually was.

  One hell of a way to choose the site for the most important battle of the war, he reflected. It would be a sad thing if Scona fell because he’d underestimated the length of his own stride.

  ‘All right,’ he said, hoping someone was close enough to hear him, ‘fan out and dress your ranks. And let’s all hope we’re facing in the right direction.’

  My decision, he kept telling himself, mine and mine alone. Niessa doesn’t want me here. I assume the people I’m doing this for are relying on me, but I don’t know that; for all I really know, they’re welcoming the halberdiers as liberators. The only thing I’ve relied on in making my decision is my sense of what’s right. My sense, for gods’ sakes. That’s comedy.

  He closed his eyes. For Bardas; for Niessa; for Luha and little Niessa; for Iseutz and Heris; for them, whether they wanted his help or not. For us and what’s ours, right or wrong. Never, not once, have I ever regretted anything I’ve done, I stand by it all, and I suppose this is where it all gets put to the test. Victory will be vindication of what I once did and all I’ve done since. Well. We shall see.

  And then the sun rose on Sten Mogre’s army.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  At first light, Bardas Loredan embarked on the next stage of the project.

  All through the night before, he’d drawn down the sun-dried tendons and pounded them on an oak board with a hide mallet until the sinew began to disintegrate into its component fibres; these he’d slowly and painstakingly drawn off with a purpose-made ivory comb, sorting the coarse, translucent yellow fibres into bundles of roughly matching length and laying them out on the bench in order of size so that they’d be handy when he came to use them. Now all that remained by way of preparation was to clean the ribs and make up the glue.

  The bone was slippery with its own grease, so he scoured each section with lye and boiling water, paying particular attention to the insides of the splices, and set them aside to cool down while he made the different sorts of glue that would be needed for what was to follow.

  He made the sizing glue by mixing congealed blood with sawdust, and the main fixing glue by boiling scrapings of rawhide and the waste sinew in water vigorously for an hour, skimming off the chaff as it rose to the surface and stirring from time to time. He separated off the first pouring, which would make the strongest join, and put the residue back to simmer for the rest of the day. The smell was disgusting, but he scarcely noticed it.

  With the blood glue he carefully sized both the bone and the wood to seal them, and put them to one side, delicately balanced on wooden blocks where the sunlight poured in through the window. While the size hardened, he pounded more sinew into fibre and made a wooden jig for winding gut into a bowstring. Finally he stretched pieces of soaked rawhide to make the outside wrapping.

  (‘Of course I’d like to help,’ young Luha had said, ‘if it’s for the war. What do you want me to do?’

  ‘Oh, fairly basic things, nothing difficult. I wouldn’t bother you, only I’ve got so used
to having an apprentice, and I don’t know anybody else who’d be able to help.’

  Luha had smiled. ‘I’ve always wanted to learn a trade,’ he’d said. ‘Something with my hands, that is, not just bookwork or fighting. Making things. I’ve always wanted to make things.’

  ‘It must run in the family,’ he’d replied encouragingly. ‘Well, you and I, we’ll make the best bow ever seen outside the Mesoge, you can bet your life on it.’

  Luha’s smiled had widened; like so many apparently sullen and withdrawn children, he had a nice smile. ‘Father will be so pleased,’ he’d said.

  ‘Let’s hope so,’ he’d replied.)

  At roughly the same time as the battle of Lox Wood reached its climax, he finished the preparation of materials and was ready to start building the bow itself.

  ‘Subtlety,’ said Sten Mogre, ‘is for losers. On the other hand, we really don’t want to mess up this battle, so let’s take it nice and steady.’

  It was a blindingly hot, bright morning, with no trace of a breeze. The sun blazed and sparkled off the sea to the east so fiercely that it was painful to look at, and flashed on the copper-washed roof of the Bank as if it was already on fire. Between Lox Wood, to his rear, and Scona Town itself there was nothing but the open downs, gently sweeping towards the cliffs that flanked the bay. Perfect country for an infantry charge; enough of a gradient to add worthwhile impetus, but not steep enough to make the going treacherous. Below him, he could see Gorgas’ little army lying across the line of the road, like a thin billet of steel on an anvil ready to be beaten into shape. ‘Thirty gold quarters for Gorgas’ head,’ Mogre called out, ‘twenty more if he’s still attached to it and capable of breathing. Apart from him, we don’t need any of them for anything, so feel free to indulge yourselves. Keep in line and don’t dawdle, and it ought to be easy as treading on beetles.’