Gene Wolfe - The Wizard

Will you spare me?

I could not speak as men speak in air, but I formed my thought as I had so long ago when I was young. “I will spare you if you yield.”

We have not engaged. First you must follow me, and see the thing that I will show you.

I agreed, and in the dark abyss we men call the bottom of the sea, I saw that of which I will not speak—though I shall speak of it in time, I hope, to one mightier than even the Valfather.

Toug, young Etela, Lynnet, and Vil stood waiting for me on the beach at the foot of the Tower of Glas. Though Toug’s left arm was in the sling still, that sling was crimson with blood, and Sword Breaker bright with blood to the hilt. Whom he had fought when they descended the tower I never inquired; but Etela let drop a hint now and again, as women will. It matters little to this tale of mine—and yet I shall never forget Toug’s face, the eyes that started from their sockets, and the clenched teeth.

“They’re coming!” Etela called, pointing. “We better hide!” Seven dragons—black, gray, turquoise, blue, green, golden, and red—flew stark against the luminous sky.

I shook my head and called the ship nearest us to shore. When its keel ground upon the beach, I lifted her into it, and put Lynnet and Vil into it as well. Sir Hunbalt and I took Toug, who stood as if entranced, waiting to fight them all. When our words availed nothing, we lifted him bodily and carried him. The dragons flew low at times and high at others, swooping and diving, but never closed with us. They would have slain us all if they could, or so I believe; but something restrained them, and if it was no more than fear, then fear proved restraint enough.

“They wanted to kill us before,” Etela explained, “only the white one scared them. Are you scared of the white one?”

I shook my head.

“We were. I was terrible scared, and Toug, ‘n I think Vil would of been more scared, too, only he couldn’t see it, you know. But it got us ‘n it carried us way up where they couldn’t get us. I shut my eyes, only then it went away.”

“The claws shut ‘round me,” Vil muttered, and there was nothing of the showman about him then.

Sir Hunbalt shook his head. “He’s blind, isn’t he?”

“Yes, sir, I am,” Vil said, “and it was better, maybe, to be blind just then. Little Etela was so affrighted me an’ her ma thought she’d die. It was a hour I’d swear ‘fore she stopped cryin’.”

“Well, you were scared, too,” Etela said, and turned to me, holding on to me as the crew pushed our vessel free of the beach. “I’m still scared. They wanted to kill us, the bad dragons up there did, ‘n they ‘bout killed Toug. The white one chased them ‘n said don’t be scared...”

She hesitated, and I said, “You couldn’t really hear her, could you, Etela?”

“No, sir. Only she did. Then she grabbed me up, the first one. ‘N she flew way up with me ‘n I thought she’d drop me, ‘n when we got way up there she did, only not hard, ‘n then Toug said we had to go down where you was, and there was big snakes ‘n Vil couldn’t even see them, ‘n a thing—I don’t know—”

She had begun to sob again. Toug comforted her.

“‘N the nice one’s gone, ‘n the others are still here.” She clasped Toug, trembling.

Vil said, “You’re takin’ her someplace safe, ain’t you, Master?”

“I’m trying to,” I told him.

Our ship was going about, the rowers on one side pulling while those on the other backed water. Sir Hunbalt touched my arm and pointed. The dragons Etela feared so much were coming to earth, and three had resumed Aelf form. I nodded.

Toug said, “I’ll kill them.” I was the first time he had spoken, and I was happy to hear his voice. Gylf, still guarding my clothing on the beach, clearly felt the same, standing and wagging his tail.

I drew breath. “If I fight beside you? Sir Hunbalt and I, and the other knights?”

Toug shook his head. “I just wish I had my big sword.”

“Alone?”

“It doesn’t matter.”

Sir Hunbalt nodded approvingly, but I said, “They would kill you, Toug. Setr alone would kill you.”

Toug only gripped Sword Breaker the tighter, freed himself from Etela, and went to the prow, looking out past the figurehead.

“He’s a knight,” Sir Hunbalt whispered.

I said that Toug himself did not know it.

“A young one, but a knight.” Sir Hunbalt paused, and his voice, when it came again, seemed to issue from the grave. “What a man knows hardly matters. It is what he does.” He turned away, and did not speak again.

Vil whispered, “Sick, ain’t he?”

“Dead,” I told him. “So am I.”

“Not like him you ain’t, sir.”

Etela clung to Lynnet, no longer having Toug to cling to, and Lynnet stroked her and calmed her.

One of the crew brought a scrap of old sail, brown and having worked on it in white thread something that might once have been a feather. I tied it about my waist.

Ashore, two knights came riding out of the wood, one leading a mount I knew at once. Gylf barked greeting.

Garsecg called across the water. “Are these friends of yours?” Etela wiped her eyes. “That’s Sir Svon, isn’t it? ‘N Sir Garvaon.”

That was; and when we had come nearer the mainland, I jumped from the gunwale, greeted them, learned that they had been searching for me for hours, and reclaimed my clothes and armor.

Garsecg said, “You will wish to take your friends back to Mythgarthr. At a later time, Uri can bring you again. Then we shall discuss the crowns I plan to give you.”

I shook my head and spoke to Svon and Garvaon. “You come too late, both of you, for me to explain all that has happened here. Did you see dragons?”

“One,” Svon told me. “A blue dragon, very large. But it’s gone now. I don’t know what became of it.”

“It’s here!” Etela burst out as she, Lynnet, and Vil followed Toug and Gylf ashore. “That’s it!”

“It is,” I told Svon and Garvaon. “But certain other things—the ships and the knights you see—are not here.” I sheathed Eterne as I spoke; and it was seen at once that the Knights of the Sword and the vessels that had borne them had been illusions born of the light that flashed from wave to wave. “Sir Svon.”

He looked nervous and a little frightened, but he nodded to show I had his attention.

“You seek to prove yourself. Because you do, I promised to fight you not long ago. Queen Idnn is not here to watch. Do you want to prove yourself to her alone? Or to yourself as well?”

“The latter.” Svon stood very straight as he spoke, and I could see his hand itched for his sword.

Garsecg turned to his followers. “This has nothing to do with you. You may go.”

One dove into the sea; two flew; the rest sauntered away grumbling, still in Aelf form.

“You are courageous,” I told Garsecg.

“And hungry.” His eyes were an emptiness into which whole worlds might vanish.

I remarked to Svon that his wounds had not entirely healed; he said it did not matter.

“As you wish. Sir Garvaon, you looked for death when we fought the Angrborn outside Utgard. You need not confirm or deny that. You know what you did, and I know what I saw.”

Garvaon did not speak; but Etela said, “He was really brave. Toug said so.”

“So was Sir Toug. We’ll get to him in moment, Etela.” Addressing Garvaon again, I said, “In a way, we come to him now. He has told me that when you led your men-at-arms out to take part in the fight that began in the marketplace, they appeared badly frightened. He thought it was because they were leaving the protection of the walls to war upon Angrborn. Yet they are brave men, they were led by a great knight, and they had fought Angrborn before and beaten them. I think they looked frightened because of something they had seen only a moment before.”