Gene Wolfe - The Wizard

“They think pretty well of you up there.”

“Sir Manasen and Sir Erac spoke kindly to me, at least.”

“It’s good to have friends when you’re down here.” This was said with heavy significance.

I nodded. “It’s good to have friends everywhere. I had many good friends in Jotunland and a good many more in Skai.”

He passed over Skai without a thought. “The ice lands? Was you really there?”

“This winter. Believe me, I was glad to get out.”

“Is everything big up there? Big cows and all?”

“No,” I said, “only the people, and not all of them, because the Angrborn have human slaves. There’s a dungeon under Utgard. I was never a prisoner there, but I went to look at it. I don’t know how big your dungeon is here, but I’d assume it was bigger, since the prisoners were Angrborn. It was certainly worse than this has been up ‘til now.”

He gulped my wine. “I’d like to see it.”

“Perhaps someday you will. It was a terrible place, as I said, but there were few prisoners in it. I was told that King Gilling had generally executed those who opposed him.”

The gaoler shook his head. “Not like that with us, only we’re not full up, neither.”

“Some of your cells have windows. I’d like one.”

His manner stiffened at once. “We can’t do that, sir. Just noble prisoners.”

“I’m a knight.”

“I know. It ain’t enough.”

“I would be willing to pay a modest rent.”

“We was goin’ to talk about that, soon as I’d finished this wine.” He did, emptying the tumbler.

I poured what remained in the jug into it.

“You see, some’s treated one way, some another. You take my meaning, I know. Now you, you got friends. When he come with straw and what you et, I never made no objection, you’ll notice. I let him in nice as could be, didn’t I?”

“Certainly, and I appreciate it.”

“I knew you would. You’re a knight and a gentleman, as anybody can see. Only I didn’t have to. I coulda kept him out. I coulda said you get a order from the Earl Marshal, and we’ll see. His master might have got such in a day or two, but if he’d told his lackey to, it’d been never.”

I nodded.

“I’m a kindly man, but a poor man too. A poor man, sir, can’t be kindly for free.”

His lantern, as I ought to have said earlier, shone out through my door, which stood open behind him, casting yellow light on the wall opposite. For an instant something large, dark, and very quiet obscured that wall and was gone.

I asked how much his kindness cost.

“Only one scield a month, sir. That’s not much, now is it, sir? For one scield—silver, mind—at the full of the moon, you’d find me kind, and helpful too, sir. Only I can’t give you one with a window. Not for that nor more, sir. It’s the Earl Marshal. He won’t allow it.”

“Yes he will. Does he come down here often?”

“Every fortnight, sir, and makes sure all’s right.”

“That should be sufficient. The moon is full now, isn’t it? I believe I noticed a full moon the other night.”

The gaoler licked his lips. “Yes, sir. It is.”

“Then my first month’s payment must be due.”

“Yes, sir. Always, sir. Or I count from the dark of it, sir, or the quarter-full, or whatever.”

“I understand.” I nodded. “There’s twenty-four scields in a scepter, I believe?”

“Course there are.” He licked his lips again.

“Are you a man of your word? A man of honor?”

“Yes, sir. I try to be, sir.”

“That’s all any of us can say. I’m Sir Able—you know that. May I ask your own name?”

“Fiach, sir. At your service.”

I got out one of the big gold coins of Jotunland. “This holds more gold than a scepter. Since I don’t know how much, I’m going to call it twenty-four scields. Will you agree?”

“Not ‘til I see it, sir.”

I handed it to him. He polished it on his sleeve, held it so his lantern made the gold glow, bit it, and gave it back. “Seems right enough, sir. I’ll try and get ’em.”

I shook my head. “I’m going to offer you a bargain. You sell kindness at a scield a month, so this would buy two years’ worth. More, but we’ve agreed on two years. I’ll give you this for your kindness as long as I’m in here. For three years or five. But if I’m released in a week, you’ll owe me nothing. The gold will be yours and we’ll part as friends.”

He shook his head.

“Why not?”

“We don’t do like that.”

I suppose I sighed. “You and the other gaolers?”

He rose, picking up his key and his lantern. “You don’t understand how it is. You give me a scield.”

“I haven’t got one. I left small payments to my squire. He’ll give you one if you’ll let him in to see me.”

He grunted, started to leave, and turned again. “Give me that, an’ I’ll fetch you the scields, like I said.”

I shook my head.

“You think your friends’ll stand by you. I know how that is. They’ll come awhile. Then they won’t come no more and we’ll have it all.” With his big iron key, he pointed to the burse at my belt.

I was tempted to say I would escape before any such thing happened. Perhaps I should have.

“You lick those dishes, sir, ’cause that’s the last good food you’re goin’ to see for years.”

I said nothing.

“You give me that, and I’ll take it to a moneymonger. If he says it’s good, you’ll get twenty back. And kindness.”

He paused, but I did not speak; and at length he said, “It’ll be ours before the year’s out, and I won’t waste any more breath on you.”

The door of bars crashed shut behind him, and I watched him twist his big key in the lock. I was of half a mind to call out to Org to spare him, and of half a mind to call out that he might have him; in the end, I did neither.

I heard Fiach walk away, six steps maybe, or seven; after those, the cracking of his bones.

When I judged Org’s meal over, I got him to unlock my door and hide the key and went out to explore my dungeon.

I slept in my cell that night, and wished (if the truth be told) that I had some means of locking it from inside. I was back on the Western Trader . (This was not the first time that dream had recurred since my return from Skai.) I saw the vicious, famished faces of the Osterlings and knew they meant to land on Glas and that my mother was there. I went to the captain and ordered him to put about; he did not hear or see me, and when I knocked the hourglass from his table, it returned of its own accord.

I woke shivering to find myself in the dungeon. Having no wish to sleep again until the dream lost its grip, I went looking for blankets.

At Sheerwall it was hard to get into the dungeon without going out into the bailey It was different at Thortower; earlier I had found a stair leading to a barred door of thick oak. Now I climbed that stair again, took down the bar, and stepped into the castle kitchen, where a score of cooks and scullions snored on pallets. Clearly, the prisoners’ rations were prepared here and carried down. I blew out my lantern, set it on a step, and shut the door as quietly as I could. A potboy woke and stared at me. I put a finger to my lips, and told him to go back to sleep; he nodded and slept, or at least pretended to. What he may have thought of a knight prowling the kitchen after midnight, I cannot imagine.

Beyond the kitchen was a hallway, by no means cramped, leading into the great banqueting hall in which I had sat with Arnthor, Gaynor, and Morcaine. It made me curious about the entrance they had used; I found it, and in it a mirror, the largest I saw in Mythgarthr. Here (I suppose) the king, the queen, and the princess checked their appearance before making their entrances.