"I see--understand, I mean. No doubt you're right; it would be better if you had a new name among us."

"Aye."

"You asked whether Oreb, Horn, and Silk were common names. Oreb is very unusual--I've never known a man with that name. Silk is fairly unusual, too, although certainly not unheard-of. Horn is common enough."

"Huh!"

"Here in Viron, men are named after animals or parts of animals. Silk is a male name, just as Milk is, because Silk comes from an animal, the silkworm. Addax, Alpaca, and Antbear are all common names. Do you like any of those?"

"H'ox fer me, maybe. Might do. H'or Bull. What h'about 'em, bucky?"

He smiled. "People would think we were related, but I've no objection to that."

"Gie me some mair."

"Well, let me see. Silk had a friend named Auk. An auk is a kind of water bird, as you probably know."

"Me h'own could be H'owl, maybe. Blind h'as a h'owl by daylight, dinna they say?"

"Yes, it could, if you wish it; also there are the various kinds of owls--Hawkowl, for example. I was about to say that Auk had a friend named Gib. A gib is a tomcat, so that's a male name, too. Gib was a large and powerful man, as you are."

"Pig," the stranger rumbled.

"Good name!"

"I beg your pardon?"

"Said me name's Pig, bucky. H'oreb, he likes h'it. Dinna yer, H'oreb?"

"Like Pig!"

Pig laughed deep in his chest, clearly pleased. "Never heard a' nae blind pig, bucky?"

"I don't think so, but I suppose there must be some."

"Have ter have a new name when me een's found. H'eagle, h'it could be, h'or Hawk."

"Did you say something about finding eyes?" He was startled.

"Aye. Why Pig come, bucky, doon h'out a' ther light lands. Have een ter gie h'in this Viron, bucky? Een fer me? 'Tis ther muckle place hereabouts? Yer talk like h'it."

"Yes, Viron's the city. It owns, or at least it controls, this land, and all the farms and villages for fifty leagues and more. But as to whether there is any physician in Viron skillful enough to restore your sight, I really have no way of knowing. I doubt that there was when I was here last, but that was about twenty years ago."

Pig seemed not to have heard. "Dinna drink nae mair."

"I seldom do myself. A little wine, occasionally. But I wanted to say that this is an extraordinary coincidence. You're looking for eyes, as you put it. Because I'm looking for eyes also. For one at--"

Pig had caught his shoulder, causing Oreb to flee with a terrified squawk. "Had een, yer said." Questing thumbs found them and pressed gently. "Read, yer said."

"Yes, sometimes. Not lately."

"Gude een, yer got." Fingers and thumbs traversed his cheeks, found the corners of his mouth and the point of his chin under his beard. "Snog clock, bucky. Liked ther girls, dinna yer? When yer was younger?"

"Only one, actually."

The tapping of the leather-covered bra.s.s scabbard resumed. "Them that can winna, an' 'em that wad canna. 'Tis a hard grind fer ther h'axe, bucky."

"A hard life, you mean. Yes, it is."

"Een noo. Yer lookin' fer een, yer said."

"Eyes for a chem. I have a friend--a chem who was a co-worker when I was younger--who's gone blind."

"Like auld Pig."

"Yes, precisely, except that she's a chem. Her name is Maytera Marble, and before I left Blue I promised I would find new eyes for her if I could. She gave me one of her old ones to use as a pattern, but I no longer have it."

"Yer lost it?"

"Not exactly. I was forced to leave it behind. I remember how it looked, however, or at least I believe I do; and I'd like very much to find replacements, if I can. Maytera was my teacher when I was a child, you see. I mean--"

"No talk!"

"Dinna fash auld Pig, H'oreb. Bucky, would yer make mock a' me fer h'offerin' me fin'ers ter help yer look?"

"Certainly not."

"Dinna think h'it. Yer nae ther kind. Yer lookin' fer a mon, yer said. Silk's ther name?"

"Yes, Calde Silk. Or Patera Silk. I intend to find him, and to bring him to Blue. That's what I swore to accomplish, and I will not break my oath."

"Ho, aye. An' Silk's cauld?"

"Dead? Then I'll find new eyes for Maytera Marble and return home, if I can."

There was a silence.

"Pig? Is that what you want me to call you?"

"Aye."

"Pig, would you mind if I walked closer to you? If--if I touched you, sometimes, as I walked?"

"Shuttin' yer h'in, h'is h'it? Touch h'all yer want."

"The darkness. This dark. Yes. Yes it is."

"Like dark!"

"I know you do, Oreb. But I don't. Not this, particularly. At home--on Blue, I mean. May I talk about the way it feels, Pig? I certainly don't mean to be offensive, but I believe it might make me feel better."

"Blue's h'outside, bucky?"

"Yes. Yes, it is. It has a--the Short Sun. A round gold sun that walks across the sky during the course of the day, and vanishes into the sea at shadelow. At shadeup it reappears in the mountains and climbs up the sky like a man climbing a hill of blue gla.s.s. But before it begins to climb, there's a silent shout--"

Pig chuckled, the good-humored rumble of men rolling empty barrels.

"It's a silly phrase, I realize; but I don't know another way to express it. It's as though the whole whorl, the whorl that we call Blue and say we own, were welcoming the Short Sun with tumultuous joy. I'm making myself ridiculous, I know."

Pig's hand, twice the size of his own, found his shoulder. "Dinna naebody but yer hear what dinna make nae noise, bucky?"

He did not answer.

"Partners?"

"Surely. Partners, if you don't object to having a fool for a partner."

"Yer misses yer Short Sun."

"I do. It would be a relief, a very great relief to me, to see a light of any kind. A lantern, say. Or a candle. But most of all, the sun. Daylight."

"Aye."

"You must feel the same way. I should have realized it sooner. And if we were to encounter someone with a lantern, I would see it and see him. Even now, even in this terrible darkness, I remain singularly blessed. I should pray, Pig, and I should have thought of that much sooner."

Far away, a wolf howled.

"Yer got 'em h'on yer whorl?" Pig inquired.

"Yes, we do. Ordinary wolves, such as you have here, and felwolves, too, which have eight legs and are much larger and more dangerous. But, Pig . . ."

"H'out wi' h'it."

"That whorl, Blue, had people living upon it long before we came--people who may still be there, some of them at least. One seldom sees them. Most of us never have, and we call them the Vanished People, or the Neighbors, and children are taught that they're wholly legendary; but I've seen them more than once, and even spoken with them. I don't believe I will again, because I've lost something--a silver ring with a white stone--that was left behind with Maytera Marble's eye."

"Huh!"

"But once when I did--when I spoke with the Neighbors--I asked what they had called the whorl we call Blue, what their name for it had been. And they said, 'Ours.' "

"No cry!"

"I'm sorry, Oreb." He tried to dry his eyes on the sleeve of his tunic, then clamped the k.n.o.bbed staff beneath his arm to search himself for a handkerchief. Pig's elbow brushed his ear, and he corrected his position slightly and began to tap the roadway before him as Pig was.

"When Pig had een," Pig rumbled, "Pig dinna never have nae thin' ter look fer. Dinna tell yer sae?"

"No. Tell me now." He had recalled the b.l.o.o.d.y tatters of the handkerchief that the woman had discarded in the farmhouse kitchen, and was dabbing at his own eyes with his sleeve once more. (Remora spoke in the recesses of his mind. "No, um, place of permanence for us, eh? For we mortals, no--ah--possessions. Own it, eh? But in time, hey? Another's, and another's. Do you take my meaning, Horn? We've nothing but the G.o.ds, in the, um, make a final reckoning.") "Muckle la.s.ses, prog an' grog." Pig mused not far away, less visible than Remora in the dark. "Nae thin' h'else ter look fer, an' thought h'it livin'."

"No talk."

"Ho, Pig can bake h'it, H'oreb, an' yer can take h'it."

"No talk. Thing hear."

"Somethin' ter hear? What's fashin' him, bucky?"

He had already stopped to listen, his head c.o.c.ked, both hands grasping the k.n.o.bbed staff. No wind had blown, or so it seemed to him, since he had been returned to the Long Sun Whorl; but a wind touched both his cheeks, warm and moist and fetid. Hoping Pig could hear him, he whispered, "Something's listening to us or for us, I believe."

"Huh!"

"Where is it, Oreb?"

From his shoulder, Oreb muttered, "Bird see."

"Yes, I know you see it. But where is it?"

"Bird see," Oreb repeated. " 'Bye, Silk."

Feathers brushed the side of his head as Oreb spread his wings. Clawed feet pushed against his shoulder, those wings beat loudly, and Oreb was gone.

Pig said, "Yer corbie's right, bucky. 'Tis a G.o.dlin'. Pig winds h'it. H'in ther road h'up h'ahead, most like."

Something hard tapped his shin, and Pig's hand clasped his shoulder, feeling as big as his father's when he himself had been a small child--a sudden, poignant memory. That big hand drew him to one side. At his ear, Pig's hoa.r.s.e voice muttered, " 'Ware ditch, bucky."

It was shallow and dry, although he might easily have been tripped by it if he had not been warned. A twig kissed his hand; he forced himself to close his eyes, although those eyes wanted very badly to stare out uselessly at the utter darkness that wrapped him and them. "Pig?" he breathed; then somewhat more loudly, "Pig?"

"Aye."

"What are they?"

There was no reply, only the big hand drawing him deeper among whispering leaves.

"Oreb wouldn't tell me. What is a G.o.dling?"

"Hush." Pig had halted. "Hark." The hand drew him forward again, and for an interval that seemed to him very long indeed, he heard nothing save the occasional snap of a twig. Trees or bushes surrounded them, he felt sure, and from time to time his questing staff encountered a limb or trunk, or some motion of Pig's evoked the soft speech of foliage.

A faint and liquid music succeeded it, waking his tongue and lips to thirst. He hurried forward through the blackness, drawing the towering Pig after him until gravel crunched beneath their feet and he sensed that the water he heard was before him. He knelt, and felt a gracious coolness seep through the knees of his trousers, bent and splashed his face, and tasted the water, finding it cool and sweet. He swallowed and swallowed again.

"It's good," he began. "I'd say--"

Pig's span-across hand tightened upon his arm, and he realized that Pig was drinking already, sucking and gulping the water noisily, in fact.

He drank more, then explored the stream with his fingers, trying to keep their movements gentle so as not to stir up mud. "It's not wide," he whispered. "We could step across it easily, I believe."

"Aye." There was a hint of fear in the deep, rough voice.

"But the G.o.dling--whatever that is--shouldn't be able to hear us as long as we remain here. Or so I think. The noise of the water should cover the sound of our voices."

He bent and drank again. "I pumped water for a woman who had bandaged my wrists not long ago. It was good, cold well water, I believe, and I almost asked her for a gla.s.s. But we were about to eat--so I thought, at least--and I told myself I wasn't really so thirsty as all that. I must learn to drink when I have the opportunity."