The Ends of the Circle
Paul O. Williams
BALLANTINE BOOKS • NEW YORK
1
From the west wall of the Rive Tower in the city of Pelbarigan on the Heart, a young guardsman leaned out and yawned in the glare of the winter sun, now toward the west and glancing off the snowfields beyond the river. Far out on the river, a party of Pelbar was cutting ice, leaving large squares of dark water in the gray and moving the blocks toward shore, where they would be brought to the caves under the city for storage against the coming summer heat.
“Ahroe, you don’t watch,” said the guardsman. “Your husband has fallen four times now. He is tired. The Dah-mens are too hard on him. He will never bend. I know him. He is a good man, but incredibly stubborn.”
Ahroe said nothing. She resolutely looked upriver toward where a thin haze of woodsmoke had climbed above the trees on the bluff and lay like gauze on the still air.
“Ahroe,” said Erasse. She didn’t turn. He shrugged and looked away.
Far out on the ice, Stel, Ahroe’s husband of twelve weeks, was talking softly with Ruudi, his cousin. “It’s not a new world for me, even though we have peace with the outside tribes,” he said. “It could scarcely be worse.” He hooked the iron clip on the last dripping ice block and, heaving against it, sent it gliding and spinning toward shore.
“Never mind that. We’re here to cut ice. Look. The thaw has already darkened the ice over the channel. You will survive.”
Stel laughed in his throat. “You get to sleep at night.
And in a bed. With a little sleep, I could cut ice beside the worst Tantal that ever grew horns.”
“You knew what would happen if you married a Dah-men. You made your own bed. Too bad you don’t get to lie in it.” Ruudi chuckled.
“Well, there’s no use talking about it, Ruudi. I will never be as subservient as they want. It isn’t in me. I have tried —speaking of the Dahmens, here comes one.” Both men looked up as Aparet, who was directing the ice-cutting, came closer. She was a short woman, with graying hair, the beginnings of creases by her eyes, and well-defined wrinkles by her mouth.
“Let’s bend to it,” she began. “The thaw has begun early this year. Stel, go out to the edge of the dark ice and start a new cut. We want to get this close ice before it melts away from underneath. Work it right back and it will be a shorter drag to the gate.”
Both men stopped. “It is already dangerous out there, Aparet Dahmen,” said Stel. “You can even see air moving under the ice. It is eating it from underneath. I am afraid I might go through.”
“Resisting again? This is a clear enough request, Stel. You aren’t as weighty as you suppose. In fact you are rather light. You will find—”
“True enough. I am light with my present diet. But not light-headed. I’d sooner work the light ice than swim the dark channel.”
“Go. That is more than a request. It is now a command. You are in a new family now, and—”
“Don’t remind me. That I remember. All right, I will go. You come, too, and show me the place you mean.”
“I am serious, Stel. I am about to recommend you for exclusion from Pelbarigan. All the Dahmens know discipline.”
Stel hesitated. The habit of obedience was strong in him, being something that all the Pelbar are raised to, especially the males, who traditionally and by law subserved the commands of the women. Aparet said nothing more. Stel picked up a spud and an ice saw and started out toward the dark ice, sliding his feet, holding the long spud crosswise.
“Aparet, wait . . Ruudi began, but she raised her hand and shot him a hard look.
Stel stopped and set the spud to the ice. “Here?” he called.
“You know not. About fifteen more spans.”
Stel stood still a moment. Then he turned and continued out, but as he neared the darker ice, it cracked and gave way with nearly no warning, plunging him into the water. The spud kept him from going under the ice. He scrambled quickly up, heaving his weight forward, but the ice gave way again. He had thrashed well out onto the dark band of ice, and the current in the channel welled and flowed up around him, spilling out across the ice as he struggled up, each time the ice breaking under him. Ruudi had gone for a rope, but running, shouting, and looking, he could find none where the ropes ought to have been. Stel kept heaving forward, plunging and struggling. Aparet stood watching. Finally he reached across to thicker ice, set the spud into it, and rolled himself up onto it, rolling again and again out toward the farther shore.
Aparet called to him. “Stel. You went too far. Go upriver and come back across.”
Stel stood, shivering and dancing. “I can’t. It won’t hold. You know it. I’m going across to the fish shed and get dry.” He turned and trotted toward the west bank.
“Come back,” Aparet shouted.
“Hurry up, Stel,” Ruudi yelled from beside her. “We will rig up an ice spanner.” Aparet turned to him, but eight men were already there, looking at her.
“You’d better go, Aparet. Report to your precious family. We don’t want you here,” said Quid, an older man in a ragged tunic.
“What? Wait now,” she began, but he picked up an ice hook, and she saw clearly enough that Pelbar courtesy had given way to a surging anger in them all. She turned and started for shore. “I will get the guard,” she called back. “Make your ice spanner.” Four men ran for shore.
The river was nearly a thousand arms wide, and at Pel-barigan the channel ran near the eastern shore. Stel had a long run. He could feel his feet going numb, and his hands, as he worked with short, quick steps to keep going in the cutting wind. He thought he could make it to the shed, but that was a makeshift structure, and he hoped a chert-and-steel fire set that the Sentani had not used still lay tucked in some corner of it. The shed seemed to stay far and small as he ran, but eventually he drew close to it and burst in the door. In the oak chest, fire makings lay in their pouch. He took them quickly out, fumbling with his hands to undo the knot on the pouch. It didn’t work. He couldn’t feel, nor make his fingers move. He stood and stamped as he worked, finally setting his teeth to the knot and tearing at it.
The shed held no place for a fire. It was generally used in summer and fall, so he had to kick aside snow by the door, set down the opened pouch, gather what tinder he could, and kindling. It wasn’t going to work, he thought. He beat his hands on his thighs but couldn’t even feel pain. A glance toward the eastern shore showed at least a dozen Pelbar, including four guardsmen, standing on the far side of the dark ice. No one was assembling an ice spanner, a very large trellis of poles, with floats, used to cross thin ice in emergencies. They were shouting to him, but he was too far away to hear them.
A glance up under the eaves showed him a phoebe’s nest. He reached for it, and in his clumsiness, showered it down on the snow around him. Carefully, watching his hands, working them like two stumps, he gathered what he could, then stumbled around the shed looking for another nest. There were none. He ran inside and rummaged as well as he could in the chest. The cold seemed to be creeping up his legs. He knew to move continually. Under the chest he found a mouse nest, lifted it carefully, put it in his tinder, packed the charcoal flecks laboriously and slowly into it, and tried to strike a spark. He couldn’t grip the big chert lump. He put it between his knees, but then found it impossible to strike. Inching forward, he placed his knees right over the tinder, struck down with both hands, again and again, carefully, but a little frantically, and caught a spark. Not trusting his hands to pick it up, he bent down, curled tinder over the glowing charcoal, and blinked away tears, but kept blowing. The smoke increased. He k
new he would have to watch his hands because if they started to bum, he would not feel it. Finally a flame burst.
He added the phoebe’s nest, piece by piece, quickly, laid on the woven fire pouch itself, then ran for twigs from nearby brush. Finally he had a small fire, and by running and adding to it, built it up until he was sure he wouldn’t freeze. Rather than running for larger wood, he tore at pieces from the fishing shed, building the fire with the window hood, the door gutter, then the door itself, two stools inside, then part of the near wall he kicked out. I will fix it for them next summer, he thought.
Feeling began to come back into his hands, and with it needles of sharp pain. His body trembled violently, but he started to take off his clothes to dry them. Looking back across the river, he saw that the west-bank trees already laid their shadows all the way across the river to the eastern shore. He could see Ruudi still standing on the ice, stamping and beating his arms, and so he waved. Walking to the edge of the river, he told his cousin, with both arms, to go back to the city. Ruudi held both arms out, palms up, in resignation, then shouted something. Stel made the same gesture and ran back to the fire, busying himself with his clothes. He saw clearly enough that he would be out there all night, and so had work to do.
Dark came quickly, and with a return of his warmth, so did fatigue. He heard some shouting from the river and, once dressed, walked out onto the ice. It was Ruudi again. He had a large bag of food and a sleepsack. Swinging them round and round his head, he finally slung them across the thin ice to Stel. A guardsman stood with him, but it was not Ahroe. He could see the Dahmen patch on the man’s sleeve. It was Ight, middle-aged now, used usually only for inside work, meek and as pliant as a green reed.
Ruudi said nothing of significance, so Stel knew that he felt he couldn’t. He knew too that the incident had caused tensions. Trouble lay ahead. Stel took the bag, waved, and walked back to his fire. The sack was heavy.
As he surmised, it contained, among other things, a note, but he was surprised to find it was from his mother, Sagan. He took it out and read it in the firelight, the sleepsack across his shoulders for warmth:
Stel, my son, I will not trouble you with your mistake. You knew all along my feeling about the Dahmens, the archtraditionalists, but lovers are not listeners. However, it is our distinct feeling—not mine only but that of the Southcounsel and the family—that having been deprived of exclusion by the peace, the Dahmens have already given up on you and that Aparet’s actions were deliberate. I do not write this lightly. No ropes were available in the prescribed locations, and the materials of the ice spanner had been cut up recently for firewood. The gate guards were Dahmens. We found that the usual roster had been altered to make this so—six days ago. You will find in this sack enough provisions to get you going, should you choose to do so, to North-wall, to appeal there to the Protector. I know that is desperate, but I fear for you, and we have all agreed to bear the shame. Do not concern yourself about Ahroe. She is one of them, and it is our opinion that she has consented to your death, though we may be wrong. But we are going to leave that relationship to you. I am glad you made it across the thin ice, and we watched your fire grow with great relief. Rutch laughed to see you in the distance kicking the side of the shed out. He and I send you all our love. This will be resolved. You have much of the night to think it all out —all night should you choose to come back to the city. I do not want to lose seeing you, but I fear deeply that should you stay, I would lose you forever. We all send our support, but since you married a Dahmen, you are now a Dahmen yourself. The Ardena says she stands with us. But there will be shame.
Stel read the letter several times, pondering it as he chewed on dried meat and fruit and ate half a small loaf of tough bread from the sack. He looked now across the river at Pelbarigan, looming black and square, with Gagen and Rive towers jutting up like two blunt horns, a small light on each seeming to blot away too many stars. He sighed and rubbed his hands in the new fur mittens he had taken from the sack.
He was sure his mother was wrong about Ahroe. She could not have been party to any conspiracy against him.
He was sure that his exclusion from her bed, then her room, to sleep in the hall—when they let him sleep— was just the nature of the Dahmens. She would not be allowed to break their decisions regarding him, and he saw that she held strictly to them, but with a grim mouth. He was sure she was not happy. But then her whole conduct puzzled him.
He had been wrong. As he thought about her, the shape of her body seemed to fill his hands again. He felt her soft breath, and the wisps of hair that escaped their rolls and blew across her face. He felt her ardor for him and the rising and choking strength of their loving. That was enough reason to submit himself to her, but now he saw, to his sudden astonishment, that the submission he had felt in himself was a part of the act of loving Ahroe, and not at all a general attitude. He had no desire to give the other Dahmen women any more than the usual respect that Pelbar males by rule and habit showed to all women.
Now he saw that their strict rules calling for what seemed to him an abject personal surrender had revolted him because he had seen in it a sexual element that was not in their thought at all. He had entrapped himself. He pondered his own emotional nature with a startling new insight. Could he change it? He didn’t see how. He didn’t see himself kneeling and groveling, either actually or symbolically, to that gang of crones, stern-faced tyrants, and haughty girls. Ahroe, yes. For her, anything. And yet, why had she not been out on the ice? What part had she in this?
Stel’s thought in such matters was still largely shaped by his society, the thousand individuals in this one walled city in the middle of a vast wasteland and wilderness inhabited only by a few transients of the Sentani and Shumai, both roving groups which passed through, the Shumai with their families, the Sentani generally only in hunting and trading parties. Everything had changed after the fight at North-wall two falls ago—except that Pelbarigan had not accepted as much change as the northern Pelbar city, and the Dahmens, who had been conservatives before, now had not moved a span from their former position, in fact seemed to stiffen and grow more rigid than ever.
Stel chewed the other half of the small loaf, dipping it into his cooling tea, sucking its tough crust, thinking over his problem again and again, seeing with alarm that the running man in the stars had begun to slide down westward. He stood up and dusted his hands, threw another board on the fire, then walked down to the river’s edge. He looked toward the black wall of Pelbarigan, yearning for Ahroe, but feeling tangled more and more in the net that he felt was pulling him under. Then, as if his yearning thought were a mallard, splashing off the river, wheeling, and flying out toward her, only to be brought down suddenly by a hunter’s arrow, he felt something inside him fail and drop. He felt the cold river surge up around him again. He could not go back. It would not work. But he could not well go to Northwall, either.
However, he would go. Somewhere. Tired as he was, he turned back to the shed, tore off further boards, and quickly, with his deft builder’s hands, began to shape the snow sliders Jestak had taught them of. He swept all the shavings into the fire. His muscles ached, but his fatigue focused him in on the methodical work of his preparations. He had been in no condition that evening at all to think clearly, but having made up his mind, he simply set about his flight from Pelbarigan.
High on Rive Tower, Ahroe leaned on the wall. She was crying with her eyes, but stifling sobs with a hard-set jaw. She saw Stel’s fire across the river, and occasionally she saw his shadow pass in front of it. She knew there was more trouble in the city than merely their personal trouble. Stel’s family was a small one, but Sagan was a well-respected designer and the family a well-ordered one, if somewhat too democratic. The Dahmens had trouble attracting men from other families, but Stel had seemed to her to fit in—at least into her arms and thought. They fit in every way. That is, they would have, she thought, were it not for her family. Her anger toward Stel rose fur
ther every time he declined courtesy to them. But they demanded so much. She came to hate the sight of him, even when she loved his jokes, his smile, the toss of his head. Even now she seemed to see his gray eyes, as they must have been, narrow and troubled, staring into the fire, smarting as hers were, wondering what would happen when he returned to the city the next day.
She tried not to believe that her family had planned his death. It had been an accident, a bit of stupidity. But then the ropes were not in place. The ice spanner was not leaning in its usual place. She knew the deep anger and resentment swelling up in her family toward Stel. She saw it grow. She even shared it, while hating sharing it. Initially she assented willingly enough to their disciplines on him, thinking he would bend, then finally accept them. He seemed so gentle. But as they grew more rigid, so did he. As they heaped more duties on him, he accepted them more grimly, performed them more meticulously, and would not yield, either to their scorn or their demands for courtesy and submission. She had almost rebelled herself when he was finally excluded from their room, but by that time he seemed so unreasonable that she also wanted to strike out at him. Yet she saw his fatigue and pain and yearned to comfort him.
Now that he sat huddled across the river, his small fire showing in the general blackness, and the deep purple of the snow, she was more confused. She had missed her last period, too. What if she was pregnant? She had said nothing, but her life would be unbearable if she had a child without Stel there. The whole Southcouncil would shun her. Perhaps the west would as well. Anger at his stubbornness rose and mingled with fear, pity, and general misery in her thought the way the smoke of several nearby fires will rise and mingle into one drifting gray vagueness. She saw Stel’s fire grow more bright. Finally she felt along the wall for the stairs.
2
Before morning the guardsmen on the towers could see Stel’s fire flicker down and die out. They watched it idly since it was the only object of much interest, speculating on Stel’s future. With early light they could see Ruudi, Oleg, and Rutch, with four guardsmen, putting together a large, stretching ice spanner and gliding it out onto the surface of the river. Ruudi lay on it and worked his way across the dark ribbon of the channel. They saw him stop on the far side, looking at tracks, then looking at the trough in the ice where Stel had gone through. They saw him stoop and pick something up, then race for the fishing shed without sliding the ice spanner back across the channel for the guardsmen.
Paul O Williams - [Pelbar Cycle 02] Page 1
