by Gene Wolfe
Page 37
"Im afraid I dont understand. Was he selected for some kind of suicide mission?"
The patient beyond the man on my left sat up - a young woman with a thin but lovely face. "They all are," she said. "At least, they cant go home until the war is won, and they know, really, that it will never be won. "
"External battles are already won when internal struggles are conducted with Correct Thought. "
I said, "Hes an Ascian, then. Thats what you meant. Ive never seen one before. "
"Most of them die," the black-haired man told me. "Thats what I said. "
"I didnt know they spoke our language. "
"They dont. Some officers who came here to talk to him said they thought hed been an interpreter. Probably he questioned our soldiers when they were captured. Only he did something wrong and had to go back to the ranks. "
The young woman said, "I dont think hes really mad. Most of them are. Whats your name?"
"Im sorry, I should have introduced myself. Im Severian. " I almost added that I was a lictor, but I knew neither of them would talk to me if I told them that.
"Im Foila, and this is Melito. I was of the Blue Huzzars, he a hoplite. "
"You shouldnt talk nonsense," Melito growled. "I am a hoplite. You are a huzzar. "
I thought he appeared much nearer death than she.
"Im only hoping we will be discharged when were well enough to leave this place," Foila said.
"And what will we do then? Milk somebody elses cow and herd his pigs?" Melito turned to me. "Dont let her talk deceive you - we were volunteers, both of us. I was about to be promoted when I was wounded, and when Im promoted Ill be able to support a wife. " Foila called, "I havent promised to marry you!" Several beds away, someone said loudly, "Take her so shell shut up about it!"
At that, the patient in the bed beyond Foilas sat up. "She will marry me. " He was big, fair skinned, and pale haired, and he spoke with the deliberation characteristic of the icy isles of the south. "I am Hallvard. "
Surprising me, the Ascian prisoner announced, "United, men and women are stronger; but a brave woman desires children, and not husbands. "
Foila said, "They fight even when theyre pregnant - Ive seen them dead on the battlefield. "
"The roots of the tree are the populace. The leaves fall, but the tree remains. "
I asked Melito and Foila if the Ascian were composing his remarks or quoting some literary source with which I was unfamiliar.
"Just making it up, you mean?" Foila asked. "No. They never do that. Everything they say has to be taken from an approved text. Some of them dont talk at all. The rest have thousands - I suppose actually tens or hundreds of thousands - of those tags memorized. "
"Thats impossible," I said.
Melito shrugged. He had managed to prop himself up on one elbow.
"They do it, though. At least, thats what everybody says. Foila knows more about them than I do. "
Foila nodded. "In the light cavalry, we do a lot of scouting, and sometimes were sent out specifically to take prisoners. You dont learn anything from talking to most of them, but just the same the General Staff can tell a good deal from their equipment and physical condition. On the northern continent, where they come from, only the smallest children ever talk the way we do. " I thought of Master Gurloes conducting the business of our guild.
"How could they possibly say something like Take three apprentices and unload that wagon?"
"They wouldnt say that at all - just grab people by the shoulder, point to the wagon, and give them a push. If they went to work, fine. If they didnt, then the leader would quote something about the need for labor to ensure victory, with several witnesses present. If the person he was talking to still wouldnt work after that, then he would have him killed - probably just by pointing to him and quoting something about the need to eliminate the enemies of the populace. "
The Ascian said, "The cries of the children are the cries of victory. Still, victory must learn wisdom. "
Foila interpreted for him. "That means that although children are needed, what they say is meaningless. Most Ascians would consider us mute even if we learned their tongue, because groups of words that are not approved texts are without meaning for them. If they admitted - even to themselves - that such talk meant something, then it would be possible for them to hear disloyal remarks, and even to make them. That would be extremely dangerous. As long as they only understand and quote approved texts, no one can accuse them. "
I turned my head to look at the Ascian. It was clear that he had been listening attentively, but I could not be certain of what his expression meant beyond that. "Those who write the approved texts," I told him, "cannot themselves be quoting from approved texts as they write. Therefore even an approved text may contain elements of disloyalty. "
"Correct Thought is the thought of the populace. The populace cannot betray the populace or the Group of Seventeen. " Foila called, "Dont insult the populace or the Group of Seventeen. He might try to kill himself. Sometimes they do. "
"Will he ever be normal?"
"Ive heard that some of them eventually come to talk more or less the way we do, if thats what you mean. "
I could think of nothing to say to that, and for some time we were quiet. There are long periods of silence, I found, in such a place, where almost everyone is ill. We knew that we had watch after watch to occupy; that if we did not say what we wished to say that afternoon there would be another opportunity that evening and another again the next morning. Indeed, anyone who talked as healthy people normally do-after a meal, for example - would have been intolerable.
But what had been said had set me thinking of the north, and I found I knew next to nothing about it. When I had been a boy, scrubbing floors and running errands in the Citadel, the war itself had seemed almost infinitely remote. I knew that most of the matrosses who manned the major batteries had taken part in it, but I knew it just as I knew that the sunlight that fell upon my hand had been to the sun. I would be a torturer, and as a torturer 1 would have no reason „ to enter the army and no reason to fear that I would be impressed into it. I never expected to see the war at the gates of Nessus (in fact, those gates themselves were hardly more than legends to me), and I never expected to leave the city, or even to leave that quarter of the city that held the Citadel. The north, Ascia, was then inconceivably remote, a place as distant as the most distant galaxy, since both were forever out of reach. Mentally, I confused it with the dying belt of tropical vegetation that lay between our own land and theirs, although I would have distinguished the two without difficulty if Master Palaemon had asked me to in the classroom.
But of Ascia itself I had no idea. I did not know if it had great cities or none. I did not know if it was mountainous like the northern and eastern parts of our Commonwealth or as level as our pampas. I did have the impression (though I could not be sure it was correct) that it was a single land mass, and not a chain of islands like our south; and most distinct of all, I had the impression of an innumerable people - our Ascians populace - an inexhaustible swarm that almost became a creature in itself, as a colony of ants does. To think of those millions upon millions without speech, or confined to parroting proverbial phrases that must surely have long ago lost most of their meaning, was nearly more than the mind could bear. Speaking almost to myself, I said, "It must surely be a trick, or a lie, or a mistake. Such a nation could not exist. " And the Ascian, his voice no louder than my own had been, and perhaps even softer, answered, "How shall the state be most vigorous? It shall be most vigorous when it is without conflict. How shall it be without conflict? When it is without disagreement. How shall disagreement be banished? By banishing the four causes of disagreement: lies, foolish talk, boastful talk, and talk which serves only to incite quarrels. How shall the four causes be banished? By speaking only Correct Thought. Then shall the state be without disagreement. Being without disagreement it shall be without conflict. Being witho
ut conflict it shall be vigorous, strong, and secure. "
I had been answered, and doubly.
CHAPTER SIX - MILES, FOILA, MELITO, AND HALLVARD
That evening I fell prey to a fear I had been trying to put from my mind for some time. Although I had seen nothing of the monsters Hethor had brought from beyond the stars since little Severian and I had escaped from the village of the sorcerers, I had not forgotten that he was searching for me. While I traveled in the wilderness or upon the waters of Lake Diuturna, I had not been much afraid he would overtake me. Now I was traveling no longer, and I could feel the weakness in my limbs, for despite the food I had eaten I was weaker than I had ever been while starving in the mountains. Then too, I feared Agia almost more than Hethors notules, his salamanders and slugs. I knew her courage, her cleverness, and her malice. Any one of the scarlet-clad priestesses of the Pelerines moving between the cots might easily be she, with a poisoned stiletto beneath her gown. I slept badly that night; but though I dreamed much, my dreams were indistinct, and I will not attempt to relate them here.
I woke feeling less than rested. My fever, of which I had hardly been conscious when I came to the lazaret, and which had seemed to subside on the day previous, returned. I felt its heat in every limb
- it seemed to me that I must glow, that the very glaciers of the south would melt if I came among them. I took out the Claw and clasped it to me, and for a time even held it in my mouth. My fever sank again, but left me weak and dizzied.
That morning the soldier came to see me. He wore a white gown the Pelerines had given him in place of his armor, but he appeared wholly recovered, and told me he hoped to leave the next day. I said I would like to introduce him to the acquaintances I had made in this part of the lazaret and asked if he now recalled his name. He shook his head. "I can remember very little. I am hoping that when I go among the units of the army I will find someone there who knows me. "
I introduced him anyway, calling him Miles since I could think of nothing better. I did not know the Ascians name either and discovered that no one did, not even Foila. When we asked him what it was, he only said, "I am Loyal to the Group of Seventeen. " For a time Foila, Melito, the soldier, and I chatted among ourselves. Melito seemed to like him very well, though perhaps only because of the similarity of the name I had given him to his own. Then the soldier helped me into a sitting posture, lowered his voice, and said,
"Now I have to talk to you privately. As I said, I think I will leave here in the morning. From what I have seen of you, you wont be getting out for several days - maybe not for a couple of weeks. I may never see you again. "
"Let us hope that isnt so. "
"I hope not either. But if I can find my legion, I may be killed by the time youre well. And if I cant find it, Ill probably go into another to keep from being arrested as a deserter. " He paused. I smiled. "And I may die here, of the fever. You didnt want to say that. Do I look as bad as poor Melito?"
He shook his head. "Not as bad, no. I think youll make it - "
"Thats what the thrush sang while the lynx chased the hare around the bay tree. "
Now it was his turn to smile. "Youre right; I was about to say that. "
"Is it a common expression in that part of the Commonwealth where you were brought up?"
The smile vanished. "I dont know. I cant remember where my home is, and thats part of the reason I have to talk to you now. I remember walking down a road with you at night - thats the only thing I do remember, before I came here. Where did you find me?"
"In a wood, I suppose about five or ten leagues south of here. Do you recall what I told you about the Claw as we walked?" He shook his head. "I think I remember you mentioning such a thing, but not what you said. "
"What do you remember? Tell me all of it, and Ill tell you what I know, and what I can guess. "
"Walking with you. A lot of darkness. . . I fell, or maybe flew through it. Seeing my own face, multiplied again and again. A girl with hair like red gold and enormous eyes. "
"A beautiful woman?"
He nodded. "The most beautiful in the world. " Raising my voice, I asked if anyone had a mirror he would lend us for a moment. Foila produced one from the possessions beneath her cot, and I held it up for the soldier. "Is this the face?" He hesitated. "I think so. "
"Blue eyes?"
". . . I cant be sure. "
I returned the mirror to Foila. "I will tell you again what I told you on the road, and I wish we had a more private place in which to do it. Some time ago a talisman came into my hands. It came innocently, but it does not belong to me, and it is very valuable -
sometimes, not always, but sometimes - it has the power to heal the sick, and even to revive the dead. Two days ago, as I was traveling north, I came across the body of a dead soldier. It was in a forest, away from the road. He had been dead less than a day; I would say its likely he had died sometime during the preceding night. I was very hungry then, and I cut his pack straps and ate most of the food he had been carrying with him. Then I felt guilty about doing that and got out the talisman and tried to restore him to life. It has failed often before, and this time I thought for a while it was going to fail again. It didnt, although he returned to life slowly and for a long time did not seem to know where he was or what was happening to him. "
"And I was that soldier?"
I nodded, looking into his honest blue eyes.
"May I see the talisman?"
I took it out and held it in the palm of my hand. He took it from me, examined both sides carefully, and tested the point against the ball of his finger. "It doesnt look magical," he said.
"Im not sure magical is the right term for it. Ive met magicians, and nothing they did reminded me of this or the way it acts. Sometimes it glows with light - its very faint now, and I doubt if you can see it. "
