Gene Wolfe - Return to the Whorl

"Aye."

"What are they?"

There was no reply, only the big hand drawing him deeper among whispering leaves.

"Oreb wouldn't tell me. What is a godling?"

"Hush." Pig had halted. "Hark." The hand drew him forward again, and for an interval that seemed to him very long indeed, he heard nothing save the occasional snap of a twig. Trees or bushes surrounded them, he felt sure, and from time to time his questing staff encountered a limb or trunk, or some motion of Pig's evoked the soft speech of foliage.

A faint and liquid music succeeded it, waking his tongue and lips to thirst. He hurried forward through the blackness, drawing the towering Pig after him until gravel crunched beneath their feet and he sensed that the water he heard was before him. He knelt, and felt a gracious coolness seep through the knees of his trousers, bent and splashed his face, and tasted the water, finding it cool and sweet. He swallowed and swallowed again.

"It's good," he began. "I'd say-"

Pig's span-across hand tightened upon his arm, and he realized that Pig was drinking already, sucking and gulping the water noisily, in fact.

He drank more, then explored the stream with his fingers, trying to keep their movements gentle so as not to stir up mud. "It's not wide," he whispered. "We could step across it easily, I believe."

"Aye." There was a hint of fear in the deep, rough voice.

"But the godling-whatever that is-shouldn't be able to hear us as long as we remain here. Or so I think. The noise of the water should cover the sound of our voices."

He bent and drank again. "I pumped water for a woman who had bandaged my wrists not long ago. It was good, cold well water, I believe, and I almost asked her for a glass. But we were about to eat so I thought, at least-and I told myself I wasn't really so thirsty as all that. I must learn to drink when I have the opportunity."

He recalled Pig's chance remark about drinking, and added, "Drink water, I should say. I thought I had learned that on Green, where there was rarely any water that was safe to drink except for what certain leaves caught when it rained."

"Bird find," a harsher voice even than Pig's announced.

"Oreb, is that you? It must be. What have you found?"

"Find thing. Thing hear."

"Did you? Good. Where is it?"

"No show."

"I don't want you to show it to me, Oreb, and I couldn't see it if you did. I want you to tell me how to avoid it. We were going to Viron, or at least I certainly hope we were. Is this thing, this godling, standing in the road waiting for us?"

"No stand. Thing sit."

"But it's in the road? Or sitting beside it?"

"On bridge."

Pig broke in. "H'oreb, me an' Horn's partners. You an' me, H'oreb, why, we're partners ter, h'ain't we? Yer Wallow such?"

"Good man!"

"Not too loudly, please, Oreb." He drank again.

"So, H'oreb, Pig needs yer ter tell where we're h'at. Will yer? 'Tis h'another road, wi' this trickle across?"

"No road."

"A medder, H'oreb? Might find coos hereabouts, would yer say?"

"No cow."

"Huh!" Pig sounded impatient. "How can Pig get him ter tell, bucky? Yer know him."

Oreb answered for himself. "Say woods."

"'Tis where we h'are, H'oreb? H'in a wood? Canna be."

"In woods," Oreb insisted. "Silk say."

"My name is Horn, Oreb-I've told you so. I believe he's correct, Pig. We're in a wood, perhaps on the edge of a forest." He paused to search his memory. "There was an extensive forest north of Viron when I lived there. A man named Blood had a villa in it, as did various other rich men. This may well be the same forest."

"Felt yer trees h'all 'round, bucky. Could nae touch 'em, an' such could nae touch me, h'or would nae."

"No doubt they're large trees, widely separated."

"Ho, aye." Pig's rough voice contrived to pack an immense skepticism into the two words. "Big trees hereabouts, H'oreb?"

"No big."

"Not close, they be? Ane here an' h'other h'over yon?"

"All touch."

"H'oreb can tell where they're h'at an' where they hain't. Do yer h'object ter lendin' him h'out, bucky?"

He rose. "I suggest we follow this stream instead. Streams frequently go somewhere, in my experience. Are you coming?"

"Bird come. Go Silk." Oreb settled upon his shoulder.

"Pig ter, H'oreb. We'll gae h'along wi' Horn."

He heard the big man's knees crack, and said, "Then let us go in silence, if you won't tell me about the godlings."

"Dinna hae naethin' ter tell yer, bucky. 'Struth. Pas sends such ter make folk gae ter yer h'outside places."

For some time after that they walked on without speaking. Now and then the tip of the knobbed staff splashed water; now and then the end of the leather-covered brass scabbard rapped softly against a trunk or a limb; but for the most part there was silence, save for the rasp and rattle of gravel beneath their feet and an occasional warning uttered sotto voce by Oreb, who at length offered, "No see."

"The godling, Oreb? Are you saying you no longer see it?"

"No see," Oreb repeated. "Thing watch. No watch."

Oreb's voice had sounded strangely hollow. The tip of the knobbed staff, exploring left and right, rapped stone. "We're in a tunnel of some sort."

"Aye, bucky." Those words reverberated slightly as well.

He stared into the darkness, half convinced he could make out a lofty semicircle of lighter black before them. "There are tunnels everywhere, do you know about them, Pig? Tunnels of unimaginable length and complexity underlying the entire Long Sun Whorl."

"Huh." Nearby in the darkness, Pig's softly re-echoing voice sounded understandably doubtful.

"I was in them long ago. One must pass through them to reach the landers, which are just below the outside surface. The first Oreb was down there as well, with Auk and Chenille."

"Bad hole!"

"Exactly. But I certainly hope you're right when you say the godling can't see us in here."

"Dinna harm folk," Pig muttered, "h'or nae h'often."

"We may be in those tunnels. If so, we're approaching a cavern such as the sleepers were in. Look up ahead. I can see something there, I swear." Without waiting for Pig, he hurried forward-then halted, stunned with wonder and terror.

To the north and south, the skylands spread in splendor far greater than he recalled. Against their magnificent display, above the bridge under which he had passed, he saw silhouetted shoulders like two hills, a smooth, domed head that might have filled the farm woman's kitchen and sundered all four walls, and bestial, pointed ears.

Nat has sent troopers from Dorp, who have arrested us. Dorp it appears has a standing horde (as Soldo did) which it calls its leger. There are three legermen and the sergeant. I gave him two silver cards, and although he will not let us go, it has put us on a friendly basis. I am paying for our rooms at this inn as well, one in which the sergeant, a legerman, and I are to sleep tonight, and another in which Jahlee is supposed to sleep, with Hide and the other two legermen.

Dinner and a bath! The sergeant-his name is Azijin-has been given money with which to buy provisions; I told him he might keep it, at least for tonight. He and his men, I said, could join us at dinner. There was wine, and food that seemed very good to Hide and me.

Nat is a person of importance in Dorp, it seems. We are likely to be fined and whipped. I have tried to convey to my daughter that it might be well for her to leave us, but I am not sure she understood. If she did, she may not agree; and if she tries to escape now, she may be shot.