The Ancient Enemy Read Online Free Page B

fine young mot. That they did. The ancient men they raised you up."
    "And before then there are no memories, and we did not know anything."
    "Before then you were animals and had no need of long memories. The High Men remade you in their image. Just as they made us to watch over you."
    "And we live in the Garden of Eden."
    "That is one way to describe it."
    "And we have always lived in it."
    "No, young Salish. You have not been listening to Master Acmonides. For a long time the world was frozen. There was ice a mile deep over the northland. The ice ground the mountains down. The ice filled the Valley of the Moon, and Highnoth was walled in by ice that towered over these walls."
    "Did you live then, Utnapishtim?"
    They were at it again, distracting old Utnapishtim and getting him off onto tales from the past. Which was much more fun than writing down the names of the local stars and also helped to prolong the class in a pleasant way, listening to the old Assenzi speak about the ancient world, gone forever beneath the ice.
    "Oh yes, young Salish, old Utnapishtim lived then. Utnapishtim first came to life more than one hundred thousand years ago. The ice came four times and retreated each time. Now we think the period of the ice is over for a while."
    But young Salish was still pondering something beyond the numbers.
    "And when we were animals, we kept no memories. So we can never really know that time."
    "Ah, you would not want to, young Salish. That was not a good time for animals. That was the time of Man the Cruel."
    When the Assenzi spoke like this Thru always felt the familiar chill run down his spine.
    "I am the broken pig." The words came unbidden to his mind, from the prayer for salvation. Several of them were mouthing them, just as they did on Spirit days.
The hanging cow that was torn and ripped.
The dying lamb that was born again.
    In years to come, the dark days of deep winter would always bring up memories for Thru of wielding a hammer in the forge while the bellows roared and the coals put out so much heat it felt as if your fur might catch fire.
    And on the anvil the bar of iron slowly became a sword blade, two and a half feet in length, an inch and a half across. Thru felt the force of the magic there, where metal changed its nature and in time became a shimmering piece of steel.
    Then it was sharpened and polished to a mirrorlike glow.
    On graduation night, Graedon presented each of them with a handle and a hilt. At last they wore the swords on their belts, sheathed in newly minted scabbards made of stiffened bush-withe bearing seven layers of lacquer.
    "Thank you, Master Graedon, I will always treasure this moment."
    Another time that winter, while it was snowing outside, the class sat in rows on the long, green carpet. The room was cold enough that their breath was clearly visible each time they exhaled. Yet they wore little in the way of clothing, with bare sandals on their feet.
    "Open your hearts to the sky," said Cutshamakim, sitting on a pad of stone in front of them.
    The wind soughed through the ruined latticework of the building above them. The snow was falling again. It was a dry powdery snow, and traces of it were already showing on the floor of the meditation chamber.
    "When we breathe we put aside preconditions, we allow ourselves simply to be here. Feel the moment. Breathe in!"
    The soft susurration of their breath echoed off the high ceiling.
    They repeated the ancient syllables, ending on the great universal hum. Their eyes closed, their fingers forming the circle of wisdom.
    In time and perfect accord they drew seven breaths through the left nostril and expelled them from the right. Then they reversed the procedure for the next seven breaths.
    The regular soft sound, like a velvet-covered piston broke against the high ceiling, and mingled with the skitter of the falling snow.

CHAPTER FOUR
    Winter passed and left Thru hardened against the cold. He had learned to enjoy the icy dip in the morning