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ancient, strange, distorted skull, covered with carvings, which he had taken from the customs deputy at Camran Head and carried on his back a thousand miles, all the time that Cassia and Rael were growing up.
Now he picked it up in his thin hands. With the sleeve of his dressing gown he polished it behind the jaw, where the deputy’s carving was most exquisite. Then he held it up to stare at it, looking deep into its eyeholes. They were rimmed with silver, and there was silver too behind its grinning teeth.
After the master died his senior students had tried to burn the parchment, as he had commanded. But it was treated with some chemical that rendered it impervious to fire. And so they had buried it too, buried it and the skull together in the same hole, obeying the master as completely as they could. Mr. Sarnath had been with them. But at about the same time that he moved out of the village and up into his cabin on the hilltop, he went out to dig it up, carrying a lantern and a mattock in the black of night. That night too he had stood polishing it, wiping the dirt out of its face, surprised to see that it was no different, that the paper which surrounded it was still intact, for the earth was full of vermin. Vermin crept out of the hole that he had made.
Much later, after Mr. Sarnath’s death, scholars from the University of Charn would hold an inquest, and with the superstition of born atheists would suggest that he had trafficked at this period with Magdol Starbridge, a loathsome succubus with naked breasts. It was not true. Sarnath was simply curious. And if there was a sin involved, it was at most the sin of arrogance. Sitting by himself day after day, meditating on the master’s lessons, he felt that he had reached a wall he could not cross. The master was pragmatic in all things: his goal had been to found a village and then help the villagers to live in it, at peace with others and themselves. His maxims had been practical, his metaphors concrete, accessible to everyone.
But Mr. Sarnath, ever since the night when he had seen the moth drown in the bowl, had felt himself blessed with the potentiality of understanding. As he thought more and more about them, the simplicity of the master’s lessons became frustrating. He was no longer interested in what to do, how to behave. Especially as he saw the village go astray, and the power in the village gathered into hands he did not trust, he was no longer content to obey. He wanted to follow the master into a rarefied and better world, where all phenomena were understood.
Five months—five hundred days—after the master’s death, he disinterred the skull and took it to his house. He felt it was a clue, because he had seen the reaction of the master, how in the moment of his death he had been shocked out of his thoughts. At that instant he had found out something that had stunned him, opened his eyes, perhaps, the way Mr. Sarnath’s had been opened on that night at his desk in Caladon. It was as if the master had mounted on a ladder through the door of death, and if he had turned around at last and ordered that the ladder be torn down and burnt and buried in a hole, perhaps it was because he did not trust the villagers to use new knowledge wisely, when he was not there to guide them.
In the village Mr. Sarnath had kept his thinking to himself. But on the veranda of his cabin on the hilltop, he laid the skull out on his table, where he could see it every day. That evening as he sat watching, he held it up between his hands and rubbed it, moving his dry fingertips over the parietal bone, following with his fingertips the complicated sequence of small figures: the master gathering his scattered people and striking out into the wilderness to form a new community. He picked a cloth up from the table. Wrapping it around his thumb, he rubbed at an imagined blemish on the zygomatic.
In fact, long contemplation of the skull had told him nothing. But after ten months, his
Now he picked it up in his thin hands. With the sleeve of his dressing gown he polished it behind the jaw, where the deputy’s carving was most exquisite. Then he held it up to stare at it, looking deep into its eyeholes. They were rimmed with silver, and there was silver too behind its grinning teeth.
After the master died his senior students had tried to burn the parchment, as he had commanded. But it was treated with some chemical that rendered it impervious to fire. And so they had buried it too, buried it and the skull together in the same hole, obeying the master as completely as they could. Mr. Sarnath had been with them. But at about the same time that he moved out of the village and up into his cabin on the hilltop, he went out to dig it up, carrying a lantern and a mattock in the black of night. That night too he had stood polishing it, wiping the dirt out of its face, surprised to see that it was no different, that the paper which surrounded it was still intact, for the earth was full of vermin. Vermin crept out of the hole that he had made.
Much later, after Mr. Sarnath’s death, scholars from the University of Charn would hold an inquest, and with the superstition of born atheists would suggest that he had trafficked at this period with Magdol Starbridge, a loathsome succubus with naked breasts. It was not true. Sarnath was simply curious. And if there was a sin involved, it was at most the sin of arrogance. Sitting by himself day after day, meditating on the master’s lessons, he felt that he had reached a wall he could not cross. The master was pragmatic in all things: his goal had been to found a village and then help the villagers to live in it, at peace with others and themselves. His maxims had been practical, his metaphors concrete, accessible to everyone.
But Mr. Sarnath, ever since the night when he had seen the moth drown in the bowl, had felt himself blessed with the potentiality of understanding. As he thought more and more about them, the simplicity of the master’s lessons became frustrating. He was no longer interested in what to do, how to behave. Especially as he saw the village go astray, and the power in the village gathered into hands he did not trust, he was no longer content to obey. He wanted to follow the master into a rarefied and better world, where all phenomena were understood.
Five months—five hundred days—after the master’s death, he disinterred the skull and took it to his house. He felt it was a clue, because he had seen the reaction of the master, how in the moment of his death he had been shocked out of his thoughts. At that instant he had found out something that had stunned him, opened his eyes, perhaps, the way Mr. Sarnath’s had been opened on that night at his desk in Caladon. It was as if the master had mounted on a ladder through the door of death, and if he had turned around at last and ordered that the ladder be torn down and burnt and buried in a hole, perhaps it was because he did not trust the villagers to use new knowledge wisely, when he was not there to guide them.
In the village Mr. Sarnath had kept his thinking to himself. But on the veranda of his cabin on the hilltop, he laid the skull out on his table, where he could see it every day. That evening as he sat watching, he held it up between his hands and rubbed it, moving his dry fingertips over the parietal bone, following with his fingertips the complicated sequence of small figures: the master gathering his scattered people and striking out into the wilderness to form a new community. He picked a cloth up from the table. Wrapping it around his thumb, he rubbed at an imagined blemish on the zygomatic.
In fact, long contemplation of the skull had told him nothing. But after ten months, his
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