Jack Whyte - The Sorcer part 1 - The Fort at River's Bend

"Arthur, there are some things ... some aspects of life ... that appear to change as boys grow into men. They did for me, and they do for all boys. I think you have just come face to face with one of them. In a boy's world, I think, colours are easy to identify—black is black and white is white." I saw his eyes cloud with incomprehension and hurried on to explain myself. "All that means is that, when you're a boy, good is good and bad is bad and there's no difficulty in telling the two apart and then behaving in accordance with your findings. For instance, I believe most boys see men in one of three ways. There are men they like and admire, and they try to stay close to such men, emulating them. Then there are the ruck—the unknown strangers, the common mass of men—to whom they are indifferent, and they go on about their lives as boys always have, ignoring them as insignificant. The third kind of men are those they dislike—the bullies, the misanthropes— unpleasant men. These men wise boys avoid and take great pains to stay away from them. Would you agree?"

Arthur nodded, slowly and deliberately, and I found myself speaking with much solemnity as I continued.

"Good. Well, that ability to avoid such men is one of the things that changes as a boy grows older. While he is still a boy, his avoidance of them is unimportant and unnoticed. He may run and hide from them and spend his days avoiding them and suffer nothing by his flight, because he is a mere boy and hence beneath the notice of grown men. That is his great good fortune, though he is ignorant of all of it.

"When he grows up to man's estate, however, all of that changes. He is still the same boy in his heart, but his body has become a man's body, and his cares a man's concerns. He may no longer run and hide when his old enemies and their kind approach. Flight without dishonour has become impossible with the arrival of manhood. Do you understand what I am saying?"

"I think so. You are saying a man must stand and fight such men, or forfeit his honour."

"No, Arthur, I am not saying that, not exactly. What I am saying is that a man must learn to live among such men, to make allowance for their imperfections, and to strive to live a decent, honourable life in spite of them. He need not—indeed he cannot—-always fight them."

"Why not?"

"Because ... because there are so many of them, if the truth be told."

"So many? D'you mean there are more of them than there are honourable men?"

Did I mean that? I had to think carefully before responding.

"No, Arthur, I did not mean to suggest that at all, but you are forcing me here to think carefully about what I do mean, and I find it difficult to be exact. Let me think about it for a little." He sat gazing at me until I was ready to speak again, and I resumed slowly.

"I suppose the reality is that men—the ruck, that common mass of men I spoke of earlier—are indolent when all ] boils down to honour and dishonour. They would prefer an easy life, free of complication and the need to think about things whose meaning will elude them. That is not to say they lack honour, you understand? It merely means they are ... "

"Weak." The single word startled me, encompassing, as it did, so great a revelation of the depths of this strange man-child. I blinked and coughed, attempting to hide my surprise, but I saw little point in disputing the correctness of his choice of word.

"Weak ... yes, I suppose that is the word that best describes them in this case. The mass of men are weak, content to leave their welfare in the hands of other, more resolute men."

"Stronger, both good and bad."

"Hmm. Yes, but remember where this discussion began, Arthur. You are still seeing things through your own eyes, a boy's eyes, in terms of black and white, while in the world of men—the world in which we must all live most of our lives—those colours are but seldom seen. Your pony, Primus, is beautiful, and his coat is pied—black patches and white patches. Tell me, is he a black horse with white markings, or a white horse with black?"

Arthur smiled. "I've wondered about that before now, many times, and I've never been able to decide which is correct. Which do you think he is?"

"I don't have to think, Arthur, I know. He is neither. He is a black-and-white horse, very rare and extremely valuable. Few instances of such colouring exist in nature. Only a few birds, one kind of cattle, certain swine and very few such ponies. Otherwise, the colours mix and blend, and that leads us back to where we were with boys and men. Black mixed with white produces grey, Arthur, and the world of men is filled with shades of grey. Black and white, in the sense of absolute goodness and badness, godliness and evil in men, are seldom encountered in this world by anyone. In all my life I have met only one man whom I consider to be truly good, and I can think of none but two whom I considered truly evil.

"I think most men must be stupid."

"What?"

"I said they must be stupid, men on the whole as you called them ... like sheep. It is stupidity to let others rule your life simply because you lack the will or the desire to think, or to make decisions. Are women the same way?"

"Women?" I laughed aloud. "Of course they are, why would you even ask such a question? Women are no different from men in such respects. They are fundamentally the same in matters that concern their lives and the way they lead them. Women can be as strong or as weak as any man, as benevolent or wicked, as gracious and kind, or as cruel, mean and vicious. But by and large, they wish only to lead a simple life, uncluttered by the need to make decisions about matters of which they know but little. As you grow older, you will learn much about women and will come to see that they are little different from men in some respects, and universally different in others. You may even find that there are some of them whose company and friendship you will prefer over that of men."

"Hmm." The boy plainly preferred to defer any judgment on that until a later date. He was frowning slightly, deep in thought, his eyes gazing somewhere into the space between us.

"So then, what you are saying is that most men prefer to be told what do. Is that correct?"

I shrugged. "That would be one way of putting it. Personally, I would carry it further: most men require to be told what to do, most of the time."

The boy's frown deepened. "Why?" He had made no attempt to deny or dispute what I had said, accepting the truth of it as uttered. I sighed, deeply.

"I don't know, Arthur, but that is the way of the world. There are always leaders and no lack of followers. Men build societies—empires, kingdoms, cities, towns—and in all of them, in every one, the ruck are followers and the few are leaders. Even in your own small group of friends, there is a leader."

"Me."

"Aye, but when you turn your ponies loose to graze, what happens? Do they drift apart?"

He sat up straighter. "No, they stay together ... "

"And?"

"They follow Primus. He is their leader."

I nodded. "And so it is with cattle. The herd follows the lead bull, the dominant stag leads the herd of deer, the prime ram leads the flock of sheep."

"Dominance. The strongest dominates, everywhere."

"Among the animals, yes, that is true, the strongest dominates by right of conquest, and holds his leadership purely by strength and fighting prowess. But men are different. Men are rational beings, with the ability to combine their strengths with their intellect and talents for the common good. And when they do that, they develop government, which is no more than a regulated system of behaviour based upon the formal rules that we call law." I waited now, observing the play of thoughts upon the boy's face and fighting my own temptation to say too much by forcing myself to count slowly and await his next words. When they came, they were more or less what I had expected.