FSF, January-February 2010 Page 2

With neat efficiency, He decides who rides in the remaining two boats, those not mentioned now forced to find other means to cross open water. Then lifting one of the maps, he says, “We'll rendezvous here,” and points at a circular island waiting twenty leagues offshore. “Called Marvel, by the looks of it. And what a rich, perfect name that is!”

  Loading the Emperor's boat is the first concern, and that honor is carried out with rushed efficiency. Those to be left behind work fastest. No doubt they want us gone so their self-centered hunt for suitable vessels can begin. I don't blame them. In their place, I might do the same. But when they begin tossing the sealed boxes into our skiff, I approach and stare until the captain in charge says, “Neater, men. Neater.”

  Field Marshall Zann has already claimed the seat behind the pilot, its empty partner reserved for Him.

  The Emperor will be last onboard. Despite our desperate circumstances, He lingers for a few moments, giving orders to one general and repeating those words to another. What matters is this final opportunity to be saluted and knelt before. What He relishes are these tiny gestures of affection from people who might be dead by nightfall, or wish they were.

  I sit beside Rake, noticing as he studies the helm a little too intently.

  “You say you can handle this machine?” I ask.

  He says, “Absolutely.” But then he glances at me—a liar's gesture to see if his audience believes what it just heard.

  At last the Emperor steps into the cold surf, grimacing as the water climbs to His knees. His shock betrays much; weakness rises from His core. Accepting one of General Hawthorne's hands, He fights just to climb over the low railing and then collapses on the deck. His skin is gray, every muscle limp. This deep lack of vigor perplexes Him. But worse, his sickness terrifies us. Zann and Hawthorne even trade glances, using their eyes to pose the same awful question:

  “What if He should die?”

  He won't die. He cannot. My certainty is sudden, reflexive and primal. Yet I struggle to find good reasons to hold onto these instinctive beliefs. A greater-than-mortal master, the Emperor is wise and powerful in a multitude of ways. During these awful years, He has survived ambushes and miserable luck. Worse abuse than illness has rained down on his body and soul, yet hasn't He always come away grinning? But remembering that grin, I try to recall how long it has been since that weary face lit up the world with its joy.

  The past is no guide for the future. Circumstances change, and while history is endless, someday this Emperor will pass. His health is lousy. But just as terrible is my own foolishness, unable to imagine an existence where this man does not stand astride our great nation.

  “Drive this damned boat,” Hawthorne yells.

  Rake turns and pushes at the throttle, the boat's twin engines shivering as they press against the lake water. We accelerate quickly—faster than our pilot intends, no doubt—and the beached skiff feels the yank of the rope and fights the pressure until it has no choice but to turn and follow.

  “Careful with the maps,” Zann snaps at the pilot.

  Rake says nothing. But the skiff almost capsized, and he shudders and shrinks down a little, considering the consequences of that nightmare.

  For some while, we say nothing. Spent and reflective, we are thrilled with our escape but too ashamed to admit it. I watch the land recede. Men are running, making ready in their mad fashions, but faces vanish quickly and then the uniformed bodies are soon lost as well. Nothing remains of the beach but a narrow gray line where water meets land, and moments later the beach too is swallowed.

  The Emperor remains sitting on the tiny deck. Joking, He claims that the heat and vibrations of the engines help the ailing body.

  Hawthorne looks at me, perhaps wondering if I'd like to take my turn caring for our leader.

  I surprise myself, allowing him that grave honor.

  What matters is watching Rake handle the boat's wheel and the long brass throttle, and how he reads the map and both compasses, and his method of aiming at the waves that continue to roll toward us. Boats are simpler than trucks, it seems. But I tell myself that I could master this job well enough, if design or an emergency placed me in his seat.

  Something moves behind me. The general suddenly throws a steel pail into the lake, clinging to the rope and bringing it up full. Half is poured back. The other half is given a shot of detergent—the harsh brand normally used to wash fish scales off raw hands. But his intention is to soak rags and wipe down the Emperor's face and arms and hands, sounding like the father of a very important boy, saying, “Now look up, Sire. Higher, please. I want that neck a little less grimy, Sire.”

  Unnoticed by me, the land has vanished. Behind us is nothing but water and the enslaved skiff. I watch the latter for a little while, trying to anticipate its shifting, almost carefree motions. Then a thought suddenly strikes. Or rather, I remember its presence. More than once, this odd matter has brought me out of the deepest sleep, and for hours I have lain awake, helplessly trying to pick apart the conundrum.

  Zann is the perfect audience, and an occasion this ripe will probably never come again.

  Leaning over my seat, trying to speak just loud enough for one man to hear, I ask, “When does this change?”

  “Change?”

  “The war's nature,” I say. “Its plan, its course.”

  “Change how?” Zann is a brilliant, perceptive man. A good military mind with twice as many soldiers wouldn't have accomplished the miracles that he has. But what seems obvious to me is a mystery to him. Shaking his head, he admits, “I don't know what you mean, son. What about the war is going to change?”

  I lean closer. Through the throb of the engines, I shout, “When do we stop retreating?”

  He looks baffled.

  Hawthorne stares at both of us. Did he hear what he thinks he heard? He wants to know, but the Emperor has just unfastened His black dress jacket, exposing a rib-rich chest more suited to a plucked bird.

  “Stop retreating?” Zann repeats.

  Rake glances my way, implying that the same sorry problem has also occurred to him.

  “You think this is a retreat, Castor? Is that it?”

  We never use such an explicit term, no. “Except I can't remember the last battle won,” I say. “We lose divisions, entire armies. The enemy rolls deeper into our country, until the Emperor has to abandon His estate and flee.”

  “But there is a difference between retreat and a simple redeployment,” Zann warns. “Between losing ground and surrendering the war.”

  I say, “Yes, sir.”

  He fumes.

  “There are matters that I don't understand,” I admit. “I'm just one person, and certainly not half as smart as a field marshal—”

  “You're a small man,” Zann snaps.

  Not physically, no. But I accept his criticism without complaint.

  Yet I haven't understood him. With a firm tone, he explains, “Everybody is small, Castor. Even the Emperor is just a tiny creature compared to the enormity of our good nation.”

  “Of course, sir.”

  “Now I'm going to ask you one question.” He leans forward, gray eyes burning. “Do you know how large our nation is?”

  “Of course not, sir.”

  “And why not?”

  Embarrassed, I confess, “I'm only His assistant. And our nation's precise dimensions are the deepest, deepest of secrets.”

  “Who does know this?”

  I glance at the sickly man on the deck.

  “Not even Him,” Zann warns.

  My surprise is total. And, overhearing the conversation, Rake jerks his head and then the wheel, causing the boat to swerve sideways across the open water.

  The field marshal enjoys our mutual astonishment. “When the Emperor's grandfather was still a young man,” he explains, “brave explorers were assembled, then sent forth to map the full extent of our empire. Armies cost less than that expedition, and for the next twenty years those exceptional souls pushed out in eve
ry direction, out to the fringes of what was known, and then past. And do you know what they discovered?”

  “Not at all,” I mutter.

  “No end to the cities and villages, to the lakes and seas and continents beyond. Elaborate, inadequate maps were drawn. Each map was made secret and stored inside the heavy boxes behind us, waiting for the awful moment when we would need such tools. Yet even our best cartographers managed only a partial mapping of one corner of the nation. It is that vast, and we are that tiny.”

  “But the people,” I begin, trying to comprehend this logic. “Those distant souls in far-off cities and villages?”

  “Our people.” Zann gestures over his shoulder. “His people.”

  My mind refuses to understand.

  “Our nation isn't just endless, Castor. It's also ancient beyond measure. And there has always been an emperor at its heart—this man's ancestors, and before them, other family lines that are barely remembered. It is the Emperor and His court that maintain this culture of ours, a society that can endure the worst abuses imaginable.”

  “But our enemies—”

  “What about them?”

  I don't quite know what to ask.

  So he asks for me. “How can our nation be endless, yet find itself invaded by others? Is that what you want to know?”

  I nod, though I'm not sure that is my concern.

  “Now that is a very good story, Castor.” He laughs sourly, shaking his gray face. “One thread of His grandfather's expedition did manage to find an edge to the Emperor's realm. There is an invisible but utterly real line, a kind of boundary or border, where our people do not live and the others begin.”

  “Where?” I blurt.

  He gestures over his shoulder with one hand, while the other hand thoughtfully strokes his ragged beard. “The truest particulars of this story have been lost. We don't know who to blame or why. But what we believe happened is that our explorers met a similar team representing their realm, and standing at that border, somebody chose their words poorly, and that's how this war was born.”

  I have never heard this tale. Absorbing it will take time; I wish the field marshal would have pity and stop talking now.

  “Do you understand? When your territory is boundless, retreat is an impossibility.”

  I don't find his logic convincing, and perhaps my body says as much.

  Zann ignores all doubts. “Our most vital and secret maps show that critical border region. We know its length, Lieutenant Castor. We know how the land looks. Think of a flat, barren plain fifty leagues across, bracketed on both sides by mountains that cannot be climbed. That's the only route between their lair and our good nation, and yes, maybe they are winning the battles today, and maybe that will continue for the next thousand years. But we are a different people. You recognize that, surely. We are one soul, and even though they can slaughter millions and billions, some of us will endure inside the conquered lands. Even as slaves and wolf packs, we will persist. No matter how many they murder, more of us will join even newer armies, giving back the miseries in kind. And that's why their fight is hopeless. They throw their soldiers into punishing and securing what cannot be held. Their lines of communication grow precarious. The war front widens every season, demanding more and more from their armies. It is the invaders who are the fools, and even if we do nothing, this flood will eventually run out of blood.”

  At last, Zann draws silent, satisfied with his performance.

  An obvious question begs to be mentioned, but Rake says it first. He turns and offers a cursory, “Sir,” to gain his superior's attention. Then he asks, “But what if the enemy is as numerous as we are? And what if their damnable nation is boundless too?”

  “An infinite mouth, you mean? Large enough to consume any meal?” The field marshal grins, pretending to consider this thorny problem. But then he says, “Oh, that's an easy one, boy. Remember that distant valley, fifty leagues across? I have seen reports: Our enemies have put down ten thousand pairs of rails at the border, troop trains running endlessly as they move into what is ours. Yet even with that, what is possible? One turn of the clock and a million armed soldiers charge forward. But what do those armies matter, set against a multitude that will swallow every foe, forever?”

  * * * *

  For the sake of my sanity, I have concluded that Rake is not my enemy. At least for this moment, we are partners in a great endeavor, and that's why I ask about our engines and fuel loads, plus the tricks that he uses to calculate the distance covered and our current position.

  “Eight leagues,” is Rake's estimate of how far. Then, one associate to another, he admits, “If we weren't towing this heavy skiff, we'd be a lot closer to Marvel by now.”

  A grunt comes, and I glance over my shoulder. The general and field marshal flank the Emperor, each carefully holding an arm and elbow as He kneels, trousers at His ankles, concentrating His aim on the empty bucket.

  Nothing but gas and blood escape from His bottom.

  I turn away, ashamed by my prurient, little-boy curiosity.

  “Over there,” Rake says, pointing out into the heavy fog. “Can you make out that dark mass?”

  “Barely.”

  “The Isle of Blue,” he reports.

  The map in my hand began the day as a pristine relic from an earlier time. Since then it has been folded and written upon, flying steel has cut through it, and someone's filthy thumb has left an ugly brown print on the Isle of Blue. Yet if Rake is correct, the island's near shore isn't half a league from us. “We should see it better than this,” I mention.

  Rake nods, explaining, “The farther out you go on this lake, the worse the mist is. It has to do with the chilled water. At least that's what the fishermen claim. Though I have my doubts.”

  I wait, thinking he will explain.

  But he won't. Instead, he says, “That patch of rough ground is famous for its ladies. Very pretty, very mean. They will play the most amazing games with a willing man, but if the objects of their affections disappoint, they will cut them off and throw them in the drink.”

  “Delightful,” I offer.

  We laugh grimly, quietly.

  Then, for an instant, if that, one engine loses power. It is a sudden event that passes so quickly I'm not certain it actually happened. But Rake heard enough to frown now, admitting, “I don't trust our fuel. It's old and possibly wet, and water in the lines might present problems.”

  Another concern on top of a mountain made of worries.

  He dips his head now, and with a conspirator's tone whispers, “I listened to what the Zann was telling you.”

  I ignore him, examining the map, trying to find a nearby island to serve us if our boat loses all power. Not the Isle of Blue, please.

  “About our nation's size...it was fascinating, wasn't it?”

  “We shouldn't discuss this,” I remind him. Then I repeat the old saying, “'Keep secrets off your tongue, and nothing can be told.'”

  Yet Rake won't let the subject die. “I know I haven't been in His court as long as you. A few weeks compared to how many years? But ever since I was big enough to understand what people were saying, I've heard stories about our Emperor. How He is good and wise. How no other soul could direct the war against our sworn foes. Maybe His face was a mystery, and His given name too. But He builds passion among people everywhere. For instance, I can't count the times that I've heard grown men argue about the size of His boots, or the size of His prick.”

  I nod, appreciating that reasonable confusion.

  “I had never seen the Emperor. But when I spotted your group—at a distance and through the smoke—I understood that this was His court. And with a second glance, I understood which soggy, sorry fellow was Him.”

  The Emperor moans now.

  I bite my lip, making my own tiny pain.

  “The nation must have its leader,” Rake admits. “It always has. Those fortunate enough to see His face describe Him to others, and those others do the sam
e when they wander far, and that must be how these stories flow. This empire. This wonderland. It seems incredible, but that's how it is. Which makes me wonder how such a thing can occur so easily...so perfectly—”

  “What else could happen?” I ask.

  “I don't know,” he concedes. “But doesn't it make you curious, thinking about the mechanism that holds our nation together?”

  “And why does the sun rise, and where does it go in the night?” I reply. “Yes, your question is reasonable. But in these times, it is a fancy, unimportant question. Maybe later, once this war is finished....”

  My voice trails off.

  Both of us laugh quietly at what seems impossible.

  Then the Emperor groans again, consumed by misery while His most loyal officers help pull up His dirty trousers. A few sorry blankets provide the simplest mattress for His suffering, fever-ravaged body. Zann and Hawthorne are focused only on their patient. And this is the moment when Rake leans even closer, speaking into my ear. “I am different from most people,” he promises.

  I start to say, “You are not.”

  But he proves himself with the words that follow. “What if this man that we are escorting...what if he is not the true emperor? What if He, and I mean the real He, created a fictional court and sent off this imposter to play the role?”

  “But why?” I blurt.

  “To mislead our enemies for these last awful years, of course.” Nothing can be more obvious. “They chase what has no value, and meanwhile the heart of our people is free to move and act as He wishes.”

  In the same morning, I have heard two impossibilities. And if anything, this vision is more incredible than the infinite world.

  I sit back in my seat, offering no reply.

  “The Emperor is a story,” my companion maintains. “A great and probably eternal story, yes. But why should we believe—where is the compelling reason—for us to believe that the ill old fellow shitting out his guts behind us is really that great man?”

  The engines remain strong, carrying our boat across the next fold on the map. I turn it over in my hand, and Rake asks the name of the next island that will pass to our left. What I see is a dot, nameless and almost invisible. I don't know why, but I invent the name, “Larner's Rock,” and his response is immediate.