'Thanks.' Lost in thought, Auk reflected on his own life and
character, the limp stocking still in his hand. At length he said, 'It's
never done me a lot of good, Terrible Tartaros, only I guess I never
really had much.'
'If an augur sees the face and hears the words of a god, Auk, he
sees and hears because he has never known Woman. A sibyl, also,
may see and hear a god, provided that she has not known Man.
Children who have never known either may see us as well. That is
the law fixed by my mother, the price that she demanded for
accepting the gift my father offered. And though her law does not
function as she intended in every instance, for the most part it
functions well enough.'
'All right,' Auk said.
'The faces we had as mortals have rotted to dust, and the voices
we once possessed have been still for a thousand years. No augur,
no sibyl in the _Whorl_, has ever seen or heard them. What your
augurs and sibyls see, if they see anything, is the self-image of the
god who chooses to be seen. You say that you could nearly make
out the face of my father's concubine. The face you nearly saw was
her own image of herself, her self as she imagines that self to
appear. I feel confident that it was a beautiful face. I have never met
any woman more secure in her own vanity. In the same fashion, we
sound to them as we conceive our voices to sound. Have I made
myself clear to you, Auk?'
'No, Terrible Tartaros, 'cause I can't see you.'
'What you see, Auk, is that part of me which can be seen. That is
to say, nothing. I came blind from the womb, Auk, and because of it
I am incapable of formulating a visual image for you. Nor can I show
you the Holy Hues, which are my brother's and my sisters' thoughts
before they have coalesced. Nor can I exhibit to you any face at all,
whether lovely or terrible. You see the face I envision when I think
upon my own. That is to say, nothing. When I depart, you will
behold once more the luminous gray you mention.'
'I'd rather you stayed around awhile, Terrible Tartaros. If
Bustard ain't going to come back, I like having you with me.' Auk
licked his lips. 'Probably I oughtn't to say this, but I don't mean any
harm by it.'
'Speak, Auk, my noctolater.'
'Well, if I could scheme out some way to help you, I'd do it.'
There was silence again, a silence that endured so long that Auk
feared that the god had returned to Mainframe; even the distant
woman's voice was silent.
'You asked by what power you hear my words as words, Auk, my noctolater.'
He breathed a sigh of relief. 'Yeah, I guess I did.'
'It is not uncommon. My mother's law has lost its hold on you,
because there is something amiss with your mind.'
Auk nodded. 'Yeah, I know. I fell off our tall ass when he got hit
with a rocket, and I guess I must've landed on my head. Like, it
don't bother me that Bustard's dead, only he's down here talking to
me. Only I know it would've in the old days. I don't worry about
Jugs, either, like I ought to. I love her, and maybe that cull Urus's
trying to jump her right now, but she's a whore anyhow.' Auk
shrugged. 'I just hope he don't hurt her.'
'You cannot live in these tunnels, Auk, my noctolater. There is
no food for you here.'
'Me and Bustard'll try to get out, soon as I find him,' Auk promised.
'If I were to possess you, I might be able to heal you, Auk.'
'Go ahead, then.'
'We would be blind, Auk. As blind as I. Because I have never had
eyes of my own, I could not look out through yours. But I shall go
with you, and guide you, and use your body to heal you, if I can.
Look upon me, Auk.'
'There's nothing to see,' Auk protested.
But there was: a stammering light so filled with hope and pleasure
and wonder that Auk would willingly have seen nothing else, if only
he could have watched it forever.
'If you're actually Patera Silk,' the young woman at the barricade
told him, 'they'll kill you the minute you step out there.'
'No step,' Oreb muttered. And again, 'No step.'
'Very possibly they would,' Silk conceded. 'As in fact they almost
certainly will--unless you're willing to help.'
'If you're Silk you wouldn't have to ask me or my people for
anything.' Uneasily she studied the thin, ascetic face revealed by the
bright skylight. 'If you're Silk, you are our commander and even
General Mint must answer to you. You could just tell us, and we'd
have to do whatever you said.'
Silk shook his head. 'I am Silk, but I can't prove that here. You
would have to find someone you trust who knows me and can
identify me, and that would consume more time than I have; so I'm
begging you instead. Assume--though I swear to you that this is
contrary to fact--that I am not Silk. That I am--this, of course, is
entirely factual--a poor young augur in urgent need of your
assistance. If you won't help me for my sake, or for that of the god I
serve, do so for your own, I implore you.'
'I can't launch an attack without an order from Brigadier Bison.'
'You shouldn't,' Silk told her, 'with one. There's an armored
floater behind those sandbags. I can see the turret above them. If
your people attacked, they would be advancing into its fire, and I've
seen what a buzz gun can do.'
The young woman drew herself up to her full height, which was a
span and a half less than his own. 'We will attack if we are ordered
to do so, Calde.'
Oreb bobbed his approbation. 'Good girl!'
Looking at the sleeping figures behind the barricade, children
of fifteen and fourteen, thirteen and even twelve, Silk shook his head.
'They're pretty young.' (The young woman could not have been
more than twenty herself.) 'But they'll fight if they're led, and I'll
lead them.' When Silk said nothing, she added 'That's not all. I've
