Shardik (92 page)

He turned back towards the river and for a long time remained leaning on the half-wall, watching the slow clouds and their mirrored images. The water was so smooth that when two duck flew across a white cloud, wheeled in the sky and disappeared upstream,
their
reflections were plain as themselves. This he saw with
a
sense of having seen the like before, yet could not remember where.

He stood up to pray, but could not raise his wounded arm and after
a
short time, his weakness overcoming him, was forced once more to support himself against the half-wall. For a long time his thoughts formed no words, dwelling only upon his own past ignorance and self-will. Yet strangely, these thoughts were kind to him, bringing with them no shame or distress, and turning finally to
a
flood of humility and gratitude. The mysterious gift of Shardik’s death, he now knew, transcended all personal shame and guilt and must be accepted without dwelling on his own unworthiness, just as a prince mourning his father’s death must contain his grief and be strong to assume, as a sacred trust, the responsibilities and cares of state which have fallen upon him. In spite of mankind and of all folly, Shardik had completed his work and returned to God. For his one-time priest to be absorbed in his own sorrow and penitence would be only to fail him yet again, the nature of the sacred truth immanent in
that work being a mystery still to be grasped through prayer and meditation. And
then
? he thought. What then?

Below him the stones lay clean on the empty shore. The world, he reflected, was very old. ‘Do with me what You intend,’ he whispered aloud. ‘I am waiting, at last.’

The fishermen had left the river. There appeared to be no one below in the village. So much quiet seemed strange in the early afternoon. When he heard the soldiers approaching he did not at first recognize
the
sound. Then, as they drew nearer, what had been one sound resolved into many - the tramping of feet, the clink of accoutrements, voices, a cough, a shouted order, a tryzatt’s sharp admonition. There must be many soldiers - more than a hundred, he guessed; and by the sounds, armed and equipped. Melathys still slept as they passed by, unseen by him, on the landward side of the hut

As their tramping died away he suddenly heard Yeldasha
y voices talking below. Then th
ere was a knock: Dirion opened the door and spoke a few words, but too
quietly
for him to make out what she had said. Supposing that the soldiers must be leaving the village and wondering whether Melathys knew of it, he waited and after a
little
Dirion came clambering up the ladder into the further end of the gallery. When she was half-way across the room she suddenly saw him, started and began scolding him back to bed. Smiling, he asked, ‘What is it? What’s happening?’

‘Why, the young officer, to be sure,’ she answered. ‘He’s here for the saiyett - to take her down to the shore. They’re ready for the burning, and I must wake her. Now you go back to bed, my dear.’

At this moment Melathys woke as sil
ently
and swiftl
y as the moon emerges from behind clouds, her eyes opening and looking towards them with no remaining trace of sleep. To his surprise she ignored him, saying quickly to Dirion, ‘Is it afternoon? Has the officer come?’ Dirion nodded and went across to her.
Kelderek
followed more slowly, came up to the bed and took her hand.

‘What’s happening?’ he repeated. ‘What do they want?’

She gazed gravely up into his eyes.

‘It is Lord Shardik,’ she answered. ‘I have to do - what is appointed.’

Understanding, he drew in his breath. ‘The body?’

She nodded. ‘The appointed way is very old - as old as Quiso. The Tuginda herself c
ould not recall all the ceremony
, but what has to be done is plain enough, and God will not refuse to accept the best that we are able to offer. At least Lord Shardik will have
a
fitting and honourable passing.’

‘How doe
s he pass?’

‘The Tuginda never told you ? ‘

‘No,’ replied
Kelderek
sadly. ‘No; that, too, I neglected to learn.’

‘He drifts down th
e river on a burning raft
‘ The
n, standing up, she took both h
is hands in her own and said, ‘
Kelderek
, my dear love, I should have told you of this, but it could not have been delayed later
than
today, and even this morning you still seemed too tired and weak.’

‘I’m well enough,’ he answered firmly. ‘I am coming with you. Don’t say otherwise.’ She seemed about to reply, but he added, ‘At all costs I shall come.’

He turned to Dirion. ‘If the
Yeldashay
officer is still below, greet him from me and ask him to come and help me down the ladder.’ She shook her head, but went without argument, and he said to
Melathys
, ‘I won’t delay you, but somehow or other I must be dressed dec
ently
. What clothes do you mean to wear?’

She nodded towards a rough-hewn, unpolished chest standing on the other side of the bare room, and he saw lying across it a plain, clean robe, loose-sleeved and high-necked, dyed, somewhat unevenly, a dark red - a peasant girl’s’ one good dress’.

‘They’re kind people,’ she said. ‘The elder’s wife gave me the cloth - her own - and her women made it yesterday.’ She smiled. ‘That’s two new dresses I’ve been given in five days.’

‘People like you.’

‘It can be useful. But come, my dearest, since I’m not going to try to cross you in your resolve, we have to be busy. What will you do for clothes?’

‘The
Yeldashay
will help me.’ He limped to the head of the ladder as Dirion came struggling up it for the second time, lugging with her a wooden pail of cold water.
Melathys
said in Beklan, ‘The washing’s like the
cloth
es. But she’s the soul of kindness. Tell
the
officer I shan’t be long.’

The Yeldashay officer had followed Dirion half-way up the ladder and now, looking down, Kelderek recognized Tan-Rion.

‘Please give me your hand,’ he said. ‘I’m recovered suffici
ently
to come with you and the priestess today.’

‘I didn’t know of this,’ replied Tan-Rion, evid
ently
taken aback. ‘I was told you would not be equal to it.’

‘With your help I shall be,’ said
Kelderek
. ‘I beg you not to refuse. To me this duty is more sacred
than
birth and death.’

For answer Tan-Rion stretched out his hand. As
Kelderek
came gropingly down the ladder, he said, ‘You followed your bear on foot from Bekla to this place?’

Kelderek
hesitated. ‘In some sort - yes, I suppose so.’ ‘And the bear saved Lord Elleroth’s son.’

Kelderek, in pain, gave way to a touch of impatience. ‘I was there.’ Feeling faint, he leaned against the wall of the dark, lower room into which he had climbed down. ‘Can you - could your men, perhaps - find me some clothes? Anything clean and decent will do.’

Tan-Rion turned to the two soldiers waiting by the door and spoke in his own tongue. One answered him, frowning and evid
ently
in some perplexity. He spoke again, more sharply, and they hurried away.

Kelderek
fumbled his way out of the hut to the fore-shore, pulled off the rough, sack-like shift he had been wearing in the bed and knelt down to wash, one-handed, in the shallows. The cold water pulled him together and he sat, clear-headed enough, on a bench, while Tan-Rion dried him with the shift for want of anything better. The soldiers returned, one carrying a bundle wrapped in a cloak.
Kelderek
tried to make out what they said.

- ‘whole village empty, sir,’ he heard - ‘decent people - can’t just help ourselves - done the best we can -‘

Tan-Rion nodded and turned back to him. ‘They’ve brought some clothes of their own. They suggest you put them on and wear a sentry’s night-cloak over the top. I think
that
‘s the best we can do at this short notice. It will look well enough.’

‘I’m grateful,’ said Kelderek. ‘C
ould they - could someone - sup
port me, do you think? I’m afraid I’m weaker than I thought.’

One of the soldiers, perceiving his clumsiness and evident fear of hurting his heavily-bound left arm, had already, with natural kindliness, stepped forward to help
him
into the unfamiliar clothes. They were the regulation garments of a Yeldashay infantryman. The man fastened the cloak at his neck and then drew his sound arm over his own shoulders. At this moment
Melathys
came down the ladder, bowed gravely to Tan-Rion, touched
Kelderek
‘s hand for an instant and then led the way out into the village street.

She was wearing the plaited wooden rings of a priestess of Quiso. Were they her own, he wondered, hidden and kept safe throughout her wanderings, or had the Tuginda given them to her pardoned priestess when she left Zeray? Her long, black hair was gathered round her head and fastened with two heavy wooden pins - no doubt the very best that Dirion could borrow. The dark-red robe, which wo
uld oth
erwise have fallen straight from
the
shoulder like a shift, was gathered at the waist by a belt of soft, grey leather with a crisscross pattern of bronze studs, and from below this the skirt flared sli
ghtly
, falling to her ankles. Even at this moment Kelderek found himself wondering how she had come by
the
belt. Had she brought it with her from
Zeray
, or was it the gift of Tan-Rion or some other Yeldashay officer?

Outside, between
the
huts, a double file of Sarkid soldiers, in full panoply, stood waiting. Each wore the corn-sheaves on his left shoulder. They were spearmen, and at the approach of the priestess of Quiso, followed by
their
own officer and the limping, pallid Ortelgan priest-king who had suffered in comradeship with the Ban’s son,
they
saluted by beati
ng
the
bronze-shod butts of their spears in succession
with
a dull, rolling sound on the hard-trodden earth.
Melathys
bowed to the tryzatt and took up her place at the head of and between the two files. Kelderek, still leaning on the soldier’s shoulder, stationed himself a few paces behind her. After a moment she turned and came back to him.

‘You are still of
the
same mind, my love?’ she whispered.

‘If we go slowly -
I
can manage it.’

Giving his soldier a nod and smile of thanks, she returned to her place, looked quickly about her and then, leaving it to
the
tryzatt and his men to follow her lead, set off with the same solemn, gliding step. Kelderek came limping, breathing hard and leaning heavily on the soldier’s shoulder. The
Telthearna
lay on their left and he realized that they were going southward out of the village, towards the place where Shardik had died. They passed patches of cultivated ground, a shed for oxen with a great pile of manure outside it, a frame on which nets hung drying and an up-ended canoe, patched and repaired, its new caulking shining black in the sun. Hobbling between the files of soldiers, he recalled how he had once paced the streets of Bekla with his scarlet-cloaked priestesses, the train of his panelled robe carried behind him. He could feel again the weight of the curved, silver claws hangin
g from the fingers of his gauntle
ts, hear the stroke of the gong and see about him the finery of his attendants. He felt no regret. That great city he would never, he knew, see again; and gone, too, was the false i
llusion which had carried him th
ither in bloodshed and drawn him thence, alone and friendless, to suffering and self-knowledge. But the secret - the great secret of life on earth - the secret
that
Shardik might perhaps have been able to impart to a humble, selfless, listening heart - must that, too, be lost for ever? ‘Ah, Lord Shardik,’ he prayed sil
ently
, ‘the empire was pride and folly. I am sorry for my blindness, and sorry, too, for all
that
you suffered at my hands. Yet for others’ sake, not mine, I entreat you not to leave us for ever without the truth that you came to reveal. Not for our deserving, but of your own grace and pity for Man’s helplessness.’