Gene Wolfe - The Wizard

Baki paused, and Mani asked, “He would compel them?”

“Exactly. He set out to make himself ruler of all, and to that end built the Tower of Glas, so lofty that its summit is an isle of Mythgarthr. He built it, I said, because that is how we speak. But we built for him, and he drove us like slaves.” Baki held out her hands. “You would not credit me if I told you half what these have done.”

“I would,” Ulfa said.

“Our king was no more—crushed between the jaws of a monster of the deep, Setr said. He would not permit us to choose a new king, then said we had and that we had chosen him. When the Tower was complete he made us Khimairae to guard it. Have you ever seen a Khimaira, any of you?”

“I haven’t,” Mani told her, “and I’d like to.”

In a moment, the old gray gown was off and lying like dirty water on the floor, and Baki wreathed in smoke. Her flesh darkened as if in fire, hard and cracked; her ears spread, her mouth grew and her teeth with it, becoming hideous fangs. Her feet and hands turned to claws, and she spread leathern wings.

Mani stood on Toug’s shoulder with every hair erect and hissed like two score serpents.

The Khimaira hissed in reply; the sound was ice on ice, and held the chill of death. “Thuss I wass, and thuss I sstayed. I hated my form, yet did not wish to change. Such was Setr’s hold on me.”

Again smoke poured from her eyes. When it retreated, it left a long-limbed Aelfmaid with coppery skin. An Aelfmaid, she snatched up the gray gown. When it had passed over her, she was a human with flaming hair, fair to look upon.

“Sir Able made me renounce my oath to Setr,” she said, “and returned me to the lithesome shape you saw. Yet my oath bound me still. First, because my rejection had been forced. More signally, because I feared him. I served Sir Able, and called myself his slave. This I do even now.”

Toug nodded.

“And yours, for gratitude and love of you. Setr I fear, but I shall strike the thing I fear. You would be a knight. Learn from me.”

“I’ll try,” he said.

“And so my heart’s desire.”

The sound of horses’ hoofs drifted up from the bailey, and Mani sprang to the windowsill to look.

“It is simply said,” Baki continued, “but will not be simply done. Or I fear it will not. I would bring Sir Able to Aelfrice and have him lead us against Setr.” Mani turned to stare at her, his green eyes wide. “And you and your sister are sworn to aid me.”

Toug looked to Ulfa (for he felt his heart sink), and Ulfa to Toug; but neither spoke.

“Little cat, you wished to see a Khimaira. You have seen one. Are you satisfied?”

“The Khimaira,” Mani told her, “has seen me. That is what I wanted, and it has been accomplished. I knew you were no common girl. Now you know that I’m no common cat.”

Baki made him a mock bow.

“My good news has been taken from me,” Mani continued, “and my fate has supplied only bad news to replace it. Which would you hear first?”

Ulfa said, “I have no hold over Sir Able.”

“Then you must gain what hold you can,” Baki told her.

Toug said, “He doesn’t owe me anything.”

“He sees himself in you, and that may be enough. Cat, you have taken no oath, and I know cats too well to imagine you will submit to one. But will you help us?”

“I’ve strained every sinew at it already,” Mani told her sourly, “and there isn’t an Overcyn in Skai who could say why. Will you hear my news? I myself greatly like the good, but you’ll want to spit my ill news from your ears.”

“It said the good news wasn’t true anymore,” Ulfa muttered. Wearily, she rose from her stool.

“Not so,” Mani told her. “I said that it was no longer news. It was that King Gilling has graciously consented to Lord Beel’s embassy. He and my mistress and all the rest—your master, Toug, and so on—have entered this castle. You heard their horses, if any of you were paying attention. You can see them now by looking out this window.”

Toug went to window to look, and Ulfa joined him. “It’s very grand,” she whispered.

“You should have seen it before it was looted,” Mani told her complacently, “as I did.”

She stared at him, and then at Toug; and her expression said very plainly, Cats can’t talk.

He cleared his throat. “Some can. It varies. I mean, Mani’s the only one I know, but he can.”

“He’s going to use that power,” Mani said, “to remind you that we’ve gained your heart’s desire. Our mission was to get His Prodigious Majesty to admit our company, and we have done it.”

Slowly, Toug smiled.

“I include you because you accompanied me, and because I am large-hearted and generous to a fault. In my wanderings, I chanced upon the king and his great clumsy wizard.”

“Thiazi.”

“Exactly. I spoke, and they were amazed, the king particularly. Do you think you’ve heard me talk? You haven’t heard me talk as I talked then. I was eloquent, diplomatic, and persuasive. Most of all, I was forceful, concise, and succinct. Gylf used to say I had a thin voice. Used to upbraid me for it, in fact. You recall Gylf.”

Toug nodded.

“He should have heard me when I spoke to the king. I doubt there’s a courtier in Thortower who could hold a candle to me. I explained that King Arnthor had sent us not as enemies but friends, to help him govern—”

“Toug...” Ulfa gripped his arm. “I—the cat’s really talking, isn’t it? I haven’t gone crazy?”

“Sure he is, and he wouldn’t talk with you around unless he liked you. Don’t get all upset.”

She pointed. “I saw a—a thing. Just now. Just for a moment. All those grand people down there were getting off their horses and it was over by that wall, and it was almost as big as the giants, only it wasn’t one. It was horrible and the same color as the wall. It moved and disappeared.”

“His name’s Org.” It was the best Toug could think of.

“I’ll protect you from him,” Mani told Ulfa. “You need not fear Org while I’m around. He’s a simple sort of fellow, though I admit I don’t much care for him myself. Simple and good, once you set aside his appetite for human flesh.”

“You persuaded the king to let Lord Beel and his party into Utgard,” Baki prompted Mani. “That is your good news, good because it was the desire of Toug’s heart. You said you had ill news too. What is it?”

“Ill for you,” Mani told her. “Ill for Toug and his sister, and not only because they’ve promised to help you. With your consent, I will say something else first, something cheering. I think it will gladden their hearts.”

Baki nodded, and Mani spoke to Ulfa. “You’re the king’s slaves, you and your husband? You belong to him?”

She nodded wordlessly.

“One who’s already persuaded the king in a large matter might well persuade him in a small one too, don’t you think? When the opportunity is ripe, I shall suggest to King Gilling that you and your husband—with the horses and so forth—would make a trifling but entirely welcome gift to Sir Able. Wouldn’t that get you your heart’s desire?”

“You—you’d do that?”

“Mani.” His voice was firm. “My name is Mani.”

“You’d do that for us, Mani? For Pouk and me? We’d be in your debt forever.”

“I know. I would. I will, at the appropriate moment.” He surveyed the two human beings and the Aelfmaiden, his eyes half closed. “This brings us to my ill news, which you had better hear. King Gilling contemplates engaging an army of bold men—human beings as opposed to his Angrborn—who would serve the throne beyond the southern borders. Beyond the present borders, I should say. These men, these stalwart soldiers of fortune, if I may so characterize them, would not be slaves. Far from it! They’d be liberally rewarded, and heaped with honors when they were successful. In time their commanders, having proved their loyalty to His Prodigious Majesty, might even hold fiefs south of the mountains.” Mani waited for comments, but none were forthcoming.