Gene Wolfe - The Wizard

“Idnn. Her Majesty.”

I nodded.

“I’ve thought of that. I—She has no one, nothing, and I’ve land from her father. Swiftbrook. It’s not much, I’m sure, but I might win more.”

“You will.”

“Thank you. Thank you for everything. You taught me more than you realize.” He turned again, and was lost in the fog after a step or two. When I could no longer see him, I heard him say, “We’ll engage when we get home. You agreed. Perhaps she’ll accept me after that.” From the sound of his voice, he was still quite near.

An hour passed, or at least a time long enough to seem an hour; when the sun is invisible, it can be hard to judge. Mani joined me, saying, “Do you like this?”

“Our fire?” I knew it was not what he meant. “No, not much. The wood’s wet.”

“The fog.”

“No. It’s wet, too.”

“Neither do I.” He jumped into my lap and made himself comfortable. “You know, dear owner, I wish you’d taken me along when you and the queen went riding.”

“You were in one of my saddlebags, I suppose. I should have thought of that.”

“As if you didn’t! But if I’d heard you, I might be able to offer advice. Don’t tell me you’re Able, I know it.”

“I don’t make that sort of joke.”

“Oh, no! No, really you don’t. Yours are better, but often you think no one understands.”

“And you,” I said, and stroked his back.

“You haven’t told anyone about the... About that room. Lord Thiazi’s room.”

“About your experience there, you mean? No.”

“Thank you. I think about it. I think about it a lot. I’m not usually that way.”

“Introspective? No, you aren’t.”

“Will I really be free when the cat dies? You said something about that—or somebody did—and Huld says it, too. That I’ll be an elemental once more.”

I was not sure he wanted an answer, but he insisted he did. “No,” I told him. “No, you won’t.”

“She says elementals aren’t really alive but just think they are, so they can’t die.”

I told him she was correct.

“So I’ll be free. That’s what she says.”

“The elemental will be free, no longer having any share in life. You’re not the elemental or the cat. You’re both, and the cat will die like other cats.”

“I’d like to think that I’m just... The other thing. The thing that talks.”

“Then I’ll cut off your ear and we’ll see if it hurts.”

“You would, wouldn’t you?” Mani’s voice, always fairly close to the mews and purrs of a common house cat, had become more so, though I could still understand him.

“No.” I drew my dagger, and he vanished into the night.

Svon had promised to send Toug, and I waited some time for him, warming my hands and thinking of Disiri and the things I would have to do before I searched for her. I had promised to fight Svon—under the circumstances I could not do otherwise—and it was possible he might wound me badly, in which case my search would be further delayed. It was at least as possible I would kill him to prevent it.

At length it seemed clear that he had neglected to send Toug, or that Toug had been unavailable for some reason, and I remembered what I had said to Uns, that we would have to go to Toug if Toug would not come to us.

Motioning to Gylf, I rose. I knew which way Vil had gone, and made myself behave (as I picked my way through the fog) as a blind man would—walking in what I imagined to be the correct direction, groping the ground with my sheathed sword, and stopping every few steps to listen.

Soon I heard voices, followed by a deep grinding or grating that I could not at once identify. Someone (I was nearly certain it was Svon) spoke. Then someone else, who might perhaps have been Toug himself. The grinding came again, the sound one hears when one heavy stone slides on another, the sound that precedes an avalanche.

Another step; I heard the voice I now felt certain was Toug’s say, “If you said you killed him, that might do it.”

Never have I been so tempted to eavesdrop. I called, “Toug? Is that you?” and nearly choked on my own words.

“Master!” It was stone on stone; I knew then to whom it belonged. “Yes,” I said, “I’m here, Org.”

He was not the most terrifying creature I have seen, for I have seen dragons; but he was terrifying, and never more so than on that blind gray morning. It was all I could do to keep from drawing Eterne.

He knelt and bowed his head, repeating, “Master.”

I laid my hand on it, and it was hot as fever, like the stones that are heated to warm a bed.

“Sir Able?” (That voice was Svon’s.)

I called, “Yes.” Less loudly, I spoke to the crouching monster before me. “Have you been bad, Org?”

“Many.” He looked up as he spoke; there was unspeakable cruelty in his slitted eyes, but suffering, too.

“Did you kill King Gilling? Answer honestly. I will not blame or punish you.”

“No, Master.”

I nodded. “I never thought you did, Org.”

Svon emerged from the fog. “He might easily have done it. Wouldn’t you agree?”

“So might I,” I said. “So might you or several others. But it’s beside the point. He’s an evil creature. We know it and so does he. Confess to having betrayed Sir Ravd!”

Svon took a quick step back. “No! I didn’t!”

I shrugged. “You see?”

“You mean I’m an evil creature too.”

“So am I. Why do we fight, if not to purge our evil? We’re afraid to die and afraid to live—afraid of what we may do. So we shout and charge. If we were good—”

Wistan had come near enough for me to recognize him. “Where’s Toug?” I asked him.

Svon said, “With you, I thought.”

“You sent him to me?”

“Yes, with Etela, her mother, and Vil. She insisted.”

When I said nothing, he added, “I thought you’d send them away if you wanted to talk to Toug alone.”

Gylf whined, pressing his shoulder against my hip; I had not been aware that he had followed me. I said, “Let’s hope we find them when this clears. Has Org served you well?”

“You overheard us.”

“I heard your voices. Nothing of what you said.”

Wistan started to speak, but Svon silenced him with a wave of his hand. “Do you want him back?”

Org himself said, “Yes.”

“I should have thanked you for him. I mean, when...”

“When you shared your confidence.”

Svon nodded. “Yes. Then. But I’m so used to hiding the fact that I have guardianship of him...”

“You must find it a heavy responsibility.”

He nodded again. “I’ve done my best for him as well as for the rest of us. I’ve protected him from us, and us from him. Or tried to.”

“I’m sure you have.”

Wistan said, “This’s my fault, Sir Able.”

“What is?” I had guessed, but it seemed best to ask.

“Sir Svon was alone, except for the mad woman.”

“Lady Lynnet.”

“Her, and I didn’t think she mattered. Her daughter had told me. Had told me enough, anyway. I said—I’m a friend of Toug’s, and I think Etela thought Toug must have told me about Org. I saw him once or twice when we were in Utgard.”

Svon added, “I suppose most of us did.”

I nodded, feeling Gylf press my leg.

“So I thought it might help Toug if Org were to say—not to everyone, just to the ones that matter—that he’d killed the king.”

This was an entirely new idea. I said, “You think Toug did it, and he’s feeling guilty? I assure you, he didn’t.”

“No. Not at all.”

Svon cleared his throat. “He was with Wistan the first time King Gilling was stabbed. Isn’t that correct, Wistan?”