James Enge: This Crooked Way

Morlock saw this was true: blood was dripping off Velox's neck and running down his left foreleg, staining the dirty snow. Morlock grabbed some snow from a clean patch and held it to the ragged wound on the horse's neck. It was already healing, but Morlock thought the cold might help counter the pain. If Velox felt pain: that was one of the things Morlock wasn't sure about.

Presently he turned away and grabbed a bagful of herbs from the pack strapped behind the saddle. He knelt down in the snow next to the fallen man and examined the wound on his head.

"The skull doesn't seem to be broken," Morlock said. "The man may wake up, or not. If he doesn't, he'll be dead in a few days; toss him in the river. If he does wake, give him tea made with this, once a day for a few days." He tossed the bag to the farmer. "It will help him heal."

"What is it?"

"Redleaf."

"Uh. All right. Wait a moment, I'm supposed to look after this tramp? I've got a farm to run."

Morlock reached into a pocket and tossed him a gold coin. "It's on me."

The farmer's eyes opened wide as he looked at the coin, weighed it in his hand. "All right," he said.

Morlock pointed at the red lion, faintly visible on the supine man's dirty surcoat. "You should get rid of this, in case an imperial patrol comes by. This man must be one of Lord Urdhven's soldiers, the dead-enders who wouldn't accept the new Emperor's amnesty."

"I didn't know."

"It's better if they don't know. Better for you. For him."

"I'll get rid of it. Let's carry this poor virp into the barn; it's a bit warmer there. And I don't want him in the house."

They bedded the fallen workman down in the loft, and then the farmer said, "It occurs to me that you came into my yard for some reason."

"I need some food for my horse, something I can carry with me. Oats or something."

"Not a horsey type, are you? That horse isn't going anywhere for a while. It's wounded pretty bad."

"He'll be fine by now."

The farmer shook his head and said, "You may be a murderous son-of-abitch, but you don't strike me as cruel. And I tell you it'd be cruel to expect him to carry you and your baggage for a while. Leave him with me; I'll take care of him. Or sell him to me, if you don't plan to be back this way. I'll give you a fair price."

"Just sell me some oats."

The farmer wanted to haggle over the price, but Morlock just handed him another gold coin and said, "As much as this will buy."

The farmer sputtered. "You and the horse couldn't carry that much."

"As much as he can carry, then."

"It shouldn't be carrying anything!"

Morlock went with the farmer down to look at Velox, who was quietly stealing some hay and hiding it inside himself. The wound had closed and a scar was forming.

"There's something weird about this," the farmer said.

"He's an unusual beast," Morlock conceded.

They bagged up some oats and strapped them across Velox's back. Morlock took the pack off, strapped it to his own back, and they threw more bags of oats onto Velox.

"That's thirsty work," the farmer remarked. "You want a mug of beer before you go?"

Morlock considered it and, when he realized he was considering it, said, "No."

"We've got a jar or two of wine from foreign parts-" the farmer continued, doubtful of his ground but willing to be sociable.

"If you offer me a drink again," Morlock said evenly, "I'll kill you."

The farmer did not offer him a drink again. He said nothing at all as Morlock led Velox out of the yard and away, northward up the road to Sarkunden.

More or less at the same time, young Dhyrvalona said,

I don't understand?"

"Why didn't he take the drink?"

"Was he afraid it was poisoned?"

"A harmony," her nurse sang to her. "A harmony of meanings, Dhyrvalona dear. You may have three mouths, but I don't have three minds. Harmonize your questions the way you harmonize your voices; let your wisdom vibrate in the listener's mind, and she may return the favor."

Little Dhyrvalona's three adorable mouths harmonized three different but related obscenities she had heard her armed guards use.

Gathenavalona, Dhyrvalona's nurse, snapped her mandibles and extended all three of her arms in angular gestures of rebuke.

After a tense moment, young Dhyrvalona covered each of her three eyes with a palp-cluster, an expression of grief or sorrow-in this context, an apology. She peered through her palps to see how her nurse was taking it.

Gathenavalona relaxed the tension in her mandibles, giving her pyramidal face a less forbidding appearance. Her arms changed from harsh angles to soothing curves, and she stroked the top of Dhyrvalona's pointed head with one gentle palp-cluster.

Humbly, Dhyrvalona sang,

"But I still don't understand."

"Learning is a lasting joy."

"Ignorance is an endable grief."

Gathenavalona gestured strong approval and replied, more prosaically, "You know how the one-faced fill their one-mouths with rotten grape juice and old barley water?"

"Ick."

"So nasty."

"A single mouth! How ugly and stupid!"

The remarks didn't harmonize in sound or sense, but the nurse was not inclined to be strict with her charge these days. Young Dhyrvalona was growing up; soon she would take the place of old Valona in the Vale of the Mother. That would be a proud and sad day for the nurse, and she wanted the days and nights until then to be less proud and less sad.

"The juice makes some one-faceds happy; it makes some sad; it makes some sick. For Morlock-"

"Maker!"

"Traveller! "

"Destroyer!"

"-for Morlock Ambrosius, it does all these things. The farmer did not intend to harm him. His kindness would have harmed him, though. Do you understand?"

"No."

"Neither do you."

"The Destroyer is beyond understanding."

Gathenavalona sang.

"Empty your mind of lies."

"Fill your mind with truth."

"Nothing is beyond understanding."

Young llhyrvalona opened her eyes and her ear-lids, indicating a willingness to be instructed.

The nurse sang.

"Kindness can kill."

"Enmity can heal."

"Surgeon and destroyer both wield sharp blades."

Young Dhyrvalona gestured acknowledgement, but incomplete understanding.

The nurse sang.

"We are nothing to Morlock."

"Morlock is nothing to us."

"Yet, on a day, we met and wounded each other."

The nurse paused and resumed.

"A mother was wounded."

"A mother was slain."

"A mother stood waiting in death's jaws."

The nurse paused and resumed.

"Morlock stole the hatred of the gods."

"The gods stole our hatred of Morlock."

"That end/beginning was our beginning/end."

The nurse paused and resumed.

"That is why, once a year, we wear the man-masks."

"That is why, once a year, we curse the gods-who-hate-us."

"That is why, once a year, we sing of who destroyed us."

Young Dhyrvalona cried out impatiently,

"All right, I'm trying to be good."

"Night is falling; the time for tales is ending."

"You haven't even told me about the horse!"

Gathenavalona blinked one eye in amusement and sang indulgently.

"A horse is almost like us."

"Horses have four legs, anyway, not two."

"For a man to lose a horse is a serious thing …'