streaming behind her.
The blade again, and the foremost floater burst in a ball of orange
flame. Behind it, the buzz guns of the second were firing, the flashes
from their muzzle mere sparks, the rattle of their shots lost in
pandemonium. 'Form up,' she shouted, not knowing what she
meant by it. Then, '_Forward! Forward!_'
Thousands of armed men and women were pouring from the
buildings, crowding through doorways and leaping from windows.
Yapok was gone, Kingcup somehow in front of her by half a length.
Unseen hands snatched off her coif and plucked one flapping black sleeve.
The shimmering blade brought a gush of silver from the second
floater, and there were no more flashes from its guns, only an
explosion that blew off the turret--and a rain of stones upon the
second floater, the third, and the Guardsmen behind it, and lines of
slug guns booming from rooftops and high windows. But not
enough, she thought. Not nearly enough, we must have more.
The azoth was almost too hot to hold. She took her thumb off the
demon and was abruptly skyborn as the white stallion cleared a slab
of twisted, smoking metal at a bound. The guns of the third floater
were firing, the turret gun not at her but at the men and women
pouring out of the buildings, the floater rising with a roar and a
cloud of dust and sooty smoke that the wind snatched away, until
the blade of her azoth impaled it and the floater crashed on its side,
at once pathetic and comic.
To Silk's bewilderment, his captors had treated him with consideration,
bandaging his wound and letting him lie unbound in an
outsized bed with four towering posts which only that morning had
belonged to some blameless citizen.
He had not lost consciousness so much as will. With mild surprise,
he discovered that he no longer cared whether the Alambrera had
surrendered, whether the Ayuntamiento remained in power, or
whether the long sun would nourish Viron for ages to come or burn
it to cinders. Those things had mattered. They no longer did. He
was aware that he might die, but that did not matter either; he
would surely die, whatever happened. If eventually, why not now?
It would be over--over and done forever.
He imagined himself mingling with the gods, their humblest
servitor and worshipper, yet beholding them face-to-face; and found
that there was only one whom he desired to see, a god who was not
among them.
'Well, well, well!' the surgeon exclaimed in a brisk, professional
voice. 'So you're Silk!'
He rolled his head on the pillow. 'I don't think so.'
'That's what they tell me. Somebody shoot you in the arm, too?'
'No. Something else. It doesn't matter.' He spat blood.
'It does to me: that's an old dressing. It ought to be changed.' The
surgeon left, returning at once (it seemed) with a basin of water and
a sponge. 'I'm taking that ultrasonic diathermic wrapping on your
ankle. We've got men who need it a lot more than you do.'
'Then take it, please,' Silk told him.
The surgeon looked surprised.
'What I mean is that 'Silk' has become someone a great deal
bigger than I am--that I'm not what is meant when people say,
'Silk.''
'You ought to be dead,' the surgeon informed him somewhat
later. 'Your lung's collapsed. Probably better to enlarge the exit
wound instead of going in this way. I'm going to roll you over. Did
you hear that? I'm going to turn you over. Keep your nose and
mouth to the side so you can breathe.'
He did not, but the surgeon moved his head for him.
Abruptly he was sitting almost upright with a quilt around him,
while the surgeon stabbed him with another needle. 'It's not as bad
as I thought, but you need blood. You'll feel a lot better with more
blood in you.'
A dark flask dangled from the bedpost like a ripe fruit.
Someone he could not see was sitting beside his bed. He turned his
head and craned his neck to no avail. At last he extended a hand
toward the visitor; and the visitor took it between his own, which
were large and hard and warm. As soon as their hands touched, he
knew.
You said you weren't going to help, he told the visitor. You said I
wasn't to expect help from you, yet here you are
The visitor did not reply, but his hands were clean and gentle and
full of healing.
* * *
'Are you awake, Patera?'
Silk wiped his eyes. 'Yes.'
'I thought you were. Your eyes were closed, but you were crying.'
'Yes,' Silk said again.
'I brought a chair. I thought we might talk for a minute. You
don't mind?' The man with the chair was robed in black.
'No. You're an augur, like me.'
'We were at the schola together, Patera. I'm Shell--Patera Shell
now. You sat behind me in canonics. Remember?'
'Yes. Yes, I do. It's been a long time.'
Shell nodded. 'Nearly two years.' He was thin and pale, but his
small shy smile made his face shine.
'It was good of you to come and see me, Patera--very good.' Silk
paused for a moment to think. 'You're on the other side, the
Ayuntamiento's side. You must be. You're taking a risk by talking
to me. I'm afraid.'
'I was.' Shell coughed apologetically. 'Perhaps--I don't know,
Patera. I--I haven't been fighting, you know. Not at all.'
'Of course not.'
'I brought the Pardon of Pas to our dying. To your dying, too,
Patera, when I could. When that was done, I helped nurse a little.
