The Ultimate Stonemage: A Modest Autobiography (25 page)

The plants, though, posed more of a problem for me. You see, although I like to look at plants occasionally, I do not like to grow them. It is a slow and tedious process, and I am impatient by nature, for my mind is very alert. And anyway, plants are fickle, and often choose not to grow in my care. So I decided to find plants and trees that were already grown and to place them in my garden. In the meantime, I told the slaves to sprinkle some grass seed around, for grass grows very quickly, and it looks better than plain earth.

It was around this time a visitor came to see me. I was sitting at my table, working, when a voice said, “Are you Yreth?”

Well, I was used to being recognized by then, so I thought nothing of this and said, “Yes I am,” without even looking up.

Then the man said, “Honoured sir, I have been sent to bring you an offer of employment.”

I looked up then and saw a very strange fellow. He wore long white robes, and his hair was also long, and he wore a gold comb in his hair marked with a crest of some kind.

I said, “Who has sent you?”

He said, “I cannot say, but you will find out if you accept the offer.”

I said, “Ah, then it is some noble or other, for they often seek employees in this secretive way,” but the man neither agreed nor commented upon my speculation. Then I said, “What is the nature of the work?”

He said, “Again, I cannot say. However, you may rest assured it lies within your field of expertise.”

I said, “I have not seen you around the city. Is this work to be carried out here in Belpinian, or in some other place?”

He said, “In another place many days’ journey from here, but I cannot tell you where.”

“Very well, then, ” I said, “what is the pay?”

He said, “I cannot give precise details, but I am told to tell you it is more than you have ever received before for your work.”

Well, this pricked my curiosity, you may be sure. Still, it was all too secretive for my liking, and I feared the whole thing might be the work of my enemies, trying to trick me into an ambush. So I said, “I cannot possibly accept an offer of employment when the terms are so vague. Besides, I am busy with work at the moment. Come back to me in a month, and bring a sum of money with you representing one-tenth of my proposed fee. If the sum pleases me, I will leave with you and work for your mysterious master.”

The man agreed to my terms and left then.

Later, over dinner, I told Lophtha about my strange visitor and the offer that had been made to me. When I described what the man had been wearing, and particularly the gold comb in his hair, he gasped and said, “That is the costume of a courtier of the
emperor. It sounds to me as if the emperor himself wishes to employ you.”

Lophtha’s wife agreed with this, and said that, in her home town of
Pos Croythorn, which is not far from the Imperial City of
Saskatoon, she had often seen courtiers dressed as I had described going to and fro on official business. She was afraid for my safety then, and said, “You should not have declined the offer so, for the emperor will be offended and may try to have you killed.”

I laughed at this, and said to her, “It is clear the emperor is very desperate for my building skills. If he kills me, my skills will be of little use to him. Besides, it is I who should be offended, for such a vague offer of employment should have had a little gold behind it in the first place—and I mean gold coins, not gold combs.”

Then Lophtha said I was right, and I was a very brave fellow to look at it so, because most people would have been so choked up with fear they would not put the facts into perspective as I had done.

Then he said, “Let us drink a toast to our intrepid and successful guest.” And Lophtha, his wife, his daughters and his son raised their glasses to me and drank in my honour.

I, for my part, resolved I would accept the emperor’s offer if the money seemed reasonable, and prepared to leave Belpinian in a month.

I knew there would not be time for me to finish my ornamental garden, but I determined to do what I could before I left the city, for I did not know if I would ever return.

In the next few days, I purchased a quantity of colourful fish and octopuses from a merchant who imported such rare things, and I had them poured into the water. Most of the fish died, unfortunately, and although the octopuses looked very elegant when they were swimming around, they had a habit of crawling out of the water onto the land, so I was finally obliged to kill them by stamping on them. Still, those fish that did survive gave a charming, natural feel to the blue waters.

I made several trips into the countryside around Belpinian, looking for attractive bushes and plants. I had the slaves dig up some of the good ones, and we brought them back to the city on a cart, then placed them at certain positions around the garden. One of the bushes was a mulberry bush. Another was a bush with blue-green leaves. Another had yellow flowers. Another had broad leaves and rounded purple flowers and attracted the butterflies and bees.

As for ground-flowers, I found that those growing in the country were too leafy for my tastes, with not enough blooms on them, so we did not dig up too many of those. Instead, I went about the town by night with a handcart, looking in people’s gardens for flowers of the most alluring and exquisite varieties. Whenever I saw some attractive plants, I pulled up a third of them, leaving enough so no injury was done and the missing plants would not be missed in any way. The next day, I had the slaves put the flowers in the rich beds I had set for them. They were few and far between at first, of course, but after a few weeks, my garden began to look very colourful.

I left the trees until the end, because I could not think how to dig one up. We tried digging up an oak, but we soon found the roots of an oak go very deep, and it really seemed to be more trouble than it was worth, applying all that work just to preserve a few roots that nobody would see in any case, once the tree was planted again.

Finally, as the month was drawing to a close, I had a better idea. I set out into the forest with my slaves and some axes, then I picked out some good trees and the slaves chopped them down. We brought them back to the town, laying them along two big carts I had borrowed. It was quite a sight, and all the city came out to watch.

When the trees were back at the ornamental garden, we dug holes in the ground wide enough to accommodate the trunks, and about ten feet in depth. Then, using ropes, we placed the tree trunks in the holes, padded them around with earth, and I fastened the trunks in place with several cross-bindings and a sheet binding.

I then told the slaves to pull on the ropes attached to the trees, and to try to topple them. They pulled as hard as they could, but the trees did not budge, for the bindings I had placed anchored them as firmly as any roots, and I knew they would hold the trees in place for as long as it took for new roots to grow.

We placed eight trees in all. Three were oaks, and the rest were great tall pine trees. They had been difficult to transport, but the end result was worth it, and my ornamental garden looked magnificent.

Finally, I put up a stone sign which said, “This ornamental garden is a gift from Yreth the stonemage to the generous people of Belpinian, given to them on the sole condition that I, Yreth, shall be allowed to work at the garden’s table whenever I desire, and that those in the garden will not make loud noises when I am working.”

Once the sign was in place, I ordered the slaves to remove the fence which had surrounded the garden until now. Soon afterwards, a great crowd was gathered there, staring in wonder at the beautiful wild place I had created in the heart of their city.

The next day was precisely one month after the man in the white robes had visited me. In the morning, I gave my farewells to Lophtha and his family, and I told them I would return to visit them again if I was able.

Lophtha asked me where he should send any future profits I had earned from my book. I replied he should not worry about that, and he might keep all the future profits if he wished, which was exceedingly generous of me when you think about it.

He was a gentleman, though, and he declined my offer, preferring instead to give me a sum of thirty arrans then and there, and promising, if my future profits exceeded that sum, he would search the ends of the earth in order to find me and give me my money.

Then I made my way to the ornamental garden, together with my pack, and I waited there for some hours, until, as promised, the man in the white robes returned. He laid before me a bag which looked to be full of coins. When I poured it out, though, I saw it contained not coins but jewels, and of the most delicate and valuable types. I guessed the value of this purse to be more than a thousand arrans, which meant, since this was only a tenth of the full payment, the total would be ten thousand, give or take. (You may calculate this for yourself if you use mathematics.)

I accepted the job on the spot, and within an hour I was walking along the road leading north and west from Belpinian.

A Sixth Section Of The Eleventh Part

In Which I Describe My Journey To The Imperial City Of Saskatoon And The Strange Employment I Found There

I cannot say this man
in robes was good company. In fact, he was exceedingly tiresome. He did not speak as he walked, nor did he sing along with the many entertaining ditties I sang.

That evening, as we made a camp in a cave among some rocks, I grew a little tired of his silent ways. I said to him, “Talk to me, for frankly I find your hushed manner disturbing.”

He replied, “It is not my way to indulge in idle chatter.”

I said, “That may be so, but if you do not entertain me in some way, I swear I shall turn around and walk back to Belpinian, and you will then have to explain the matter to your master.”

He thought about this for a while, looking very displeased, and finally said, “Very well, then, what is it you wish me to talk about.”

I said, “If I am to tell you what to say, I might as well talk to myself. Talk about whatever you please.”

“May I tell stories?” he asked.

I said, “Yes, I like a good story.”

This man (he never told me his name and I did not ask it) started telling stories then and there. They were all stories about a holy man named
Boh, who did not eat, did not fight, did not enjoy the company of women, and did not value wealth in any form. Whenever Boh was threatened by any dangerous thing, he would turn into a kind of vapour, so nothing could hurt him, and when the danger was gone he would turn back into a man again and continue his travels until the next danger.

These stories soon bored me, and when I had listened for a few hours and grasped the tiresome pattern of them, I finally told the man in the white robes that, if he wished, he could remain silent once more. He stopped telling his stories, and we did not talk further for the remainder of the journey, except for such comments as “Beware of that snake,” and “Give me that food there.”

We travelled for several days across flat, arid desert plains, and in my head I spent much time trying to imagine what sort of work the
emperor wanted from me. I was certain it would be something very important, and supposed either a palace or a great tower, for this is usually what such powerful persons ask for. As you will see, though, I was far from the mark.

The desert gradually came to an end, and we entered a region of many small lakes. As we travelled over this flat terrain, the land became increasingly green and lush. In the distance, upon a low hill, I could now see a great walled city. I asked my companion if this city was our destination. He said it was.

Our road joined another, which ran along a great river, and we took this lovely riverside path towards the city. The setting was so pretty it literally filled me with hunger, and even though it was mid-morning and I had eaten a few hours earlier, I was compelled to sit down by the riverbank and eat another meal. I ate two meaty buns and drank a cup of weak wine, as I took my fill of the scenery. Of course, my miserable companion did not appreciate the delay and he paced and tutted the whole time.

When I was done my feast, we followed the road through the green lands, towards the fortified city. I saw other travellers upon the route, and, although they were far away, I could see many of them were wearing white robes, just like my dull companion. We reached the city gates half a day later, in the early evening.

I was awestruck at the tremendous height and thickness of the city walls. They towered two hundred feet above the ground, with wall towers extending that height by another hundred feet again in places. Even the gates seemed to have been built more for giants than men, for the arch of the gateway was at least eighty feet from the ground. The walls were made of strong fused stone, cast in brown and yellow. Also, there were thousands of arrow slits in the sides of the walls, and I could see myrmidons behind them.

Many other courtiers, also wearing white robes, were milling around the gate, chatting and laughing with each other. I greeted one or two of them and was surprised to receive a friendly response.

One said, “Ah, a new face! Welcome to the Imperial City of
Saskatoon. You look as if you have had a tiring journey.”

I said, “It has been more dreary than tiring.”

Then he laughed and said, “Don’t worry, for you will find entertainment enough in the city.”

This greeting made me happy at first, but then it made me cross at the emperor, for I realized not all of these men were of the same gloomy disposition as my guide, and I suspected the emperor had sent a mindless and slow-witted servant to fetch me, while many of the others, who might have made better travelling companions, remained here, gossiping at the gates.

In any case, I was led through the first set of gates and past a large, armoured gate house. Then we went through a second set of gates which were no less impressive than the first, and were sheeted in iron. Beyond this was an open strip, with hundreds of myrmidons standing guard on either side.

We were stopped here, and the commander of the myrmidons came to see who we were. He recognized my companion, though, and let us pass with no questions.

We crossed this area and went through a third set of gates, a little lower than the first two, but very formidable nevertheless, for the gates were studded with sharp black spikes and were set into walls that were also covered in spikes.

“One thing is certain,” I said to myself, “I have not been brought here to build fortifications, for no army in all the world could penetrate these defences.”

Within the three sets of walls stood the city itself, which, apart from its fortifications, was much like any other city you might come across, with a market and houses and people coming and going. They were not all dressed in the white robes of courtiers. In fact, most people just wore the ordinary clothes of the region, which is to say a tunic and duffs, plus sandals or pigeon boots.

We made our way to the centre of the city, where a great domed palace stood. When we entered the palace building, a long entrance hallway stretched out before us, lined with tall columns, and pilasters upon the walls. There must have been a hundred myrmidons lining the route, and at the far end were two great red doors.

I began to go down the hallway, but my companion said, “No, not there. This way.” Then he led me up a flight of stairs and down a corridor. I thought at first this was some secret route to the emperor’s apartments, but then it struck me as unlikely, for there were no myrmidons here, and it seemed inconceivable to me that any route to the emperor, secret or otherwise, would go unguarded.

My suspicions were confirmed a few moments later when we entered a chamber which led off the corridor. Here I was brought before the person who had summoned me, and it was not the emperor at all, but a woman, sitting in a chair shaped like a giant seashell. Looking at her face, it seemed to me she was young, although there was a good deal of grey in her hair. She wore a dark green gown studded with gems, and had a tiara of emeralds about her head. Several slaves stood around her, and also two other women, wearing clothes that were also very fine, though not so fine as hers.

My companion stepped forward and said, “Here is the man Yreth.”

She said to the courtier, “Good. You may go now: your punishment is over. But the next time it is your turn to dine at my table, you will eat what is put before you.”

The courtier gave a grunt and left us, then the lady turned to me and said, matter-of-factly, “Thank you for accepting my invitation. Your help is sorely needed here. Do you wish to start work immediately?”

Well I was still in a foul mood about the company I had been forced to endure, and my mood was made worse when I realized it was not the emperor who had summoned me, but some other person, obviously of lesser rank.

I said to her, “I will not cast a single binding until I am told exactly who you are, what your relationship is to the emperor, and the exact nature of the work you wish me to do. Also, I want your guarantee, before these witnesses, that I will receive ten thousand arrans for my labours.”

She was startled by my brusque tone, and I think she was on the verge of becoming angry with me, for she said, “You would do well not to speak to me in that way.”

But I said, “Come come, none of that! I am a man of great wealth and power, and I will not be treated as a common servant. State your business with me and be quick about it!”

She was even more taken aback then, and did not seem to know what to say. Her eyes flashed fury, but her lip trembled as if she would weep. For a moment, I regretted my angry words.

But then she seemed to gain control of herself, and she said, in a less arrogant way, “Yes, of course. You have a right to know these things. I am the Imperial Aunt
Diaphrone, the daughter of the eighth youngest sister of the emperor’s paternal grandfather.”

I said, “Eighth youngest?” for I wondered how many sisters the emperor’s grandfather had.

She smiled and said, “Yes, indeed! The eighth. We have long felt this a fortuitous placement within the family structure and I am glad to see you are similarly impressed by it.” Then she leaned towards me and said, “I have asked you here, Yreth, in order to entrust you with the care of my child, for he is badly behaved and I cannot control him. Moreover, I fear that his conduct may impair his future advancement in the eyes of the emperor. I have tried to follow the excellent advice in your book, but with little effect, and I suspect your own masterly touch is required. As to your fees, I will gladly pay your ten thousand arrans, if you can successfully train my dear child.”

Now it was my turn to be surprised, for I had blindly assumed I was being summoned about some matter of building, forgetting how, in this part of the world, I was now much better known as a philosopher on the education of children. Still, I did not let my surprise show too much, and although my mouth was agape, I covered for this by quickly picking at my teeth.

Finally, I said, “I will accept the offer. Moreover, I will begin my work immediately, just as soon as I have bathed and eaten. Note, however, the prompt commencement of my work is not because you have asked it—for, as must now be clear, I will not be given orders—but because I am an enthusiastic worker in everything I tackle, and I am keen to make a start.”

Now, you might wonder whether it was wise to take such a strong stand against this woman who, after all, was possessed of considerable rank. However, I quickly perceived that my angry outburst, which might have been a disaster for me, had instead been a stroke of good fortune. It had come purely from the mood of the moment, but I had gained the high ground over the Imperial Aunt and it set us off on the right foot.

One of the women who had been standing by the Imperial Aunt led me out of the bower and showed me my quarters, which included a large pool for bathing. As I inspected it, the woman said to me, “You certainly have a way about you! I have never seen the Imperial Aunt so meek and agreeable.”

It was clear the foul mood I had felt, and the firm hand I took as a result, had been the influence of Heaven upon me, helping me to make my way around these powerful people, so I might be raised to new heights.

Later, in a large hall, I was introduced to Diaphrone’s son. His name was
Pandrick, and he was the vilest little toad I have ever met. He was about nine years old, I should say, with a sour, disagreeable expression upon his face, and an upturned nose which reminded me of a bat. He did not nod or take my hand when I came up to greet him, but instead gave a scowl.

I turned to all those present then, for there were dozens of them turned out to see me at work, and I said, “Well, it seems he knows
his
place in the world, and mine too.”

This got a good laugh, and I could see they thought me an excellent fellow for being so pleasant about the boy’s rudeness.

Then I said to the observers, “Let us see if we may win his love by satisfying his natural appetites.” I took a tray of cakes, which I had requested for the occasion, and held it before the child, saying softly, “There you are, dear Pandrick. Take one of these for yourself.”

The child did not take one of the cakes though. Instead, he kicked up at the tray, sending all the cakes flying. All those present gasped in horror at his rude behaviour. Then the Imperial Aunt said, “He is fond of cheese. Try the plate of cheese.”

It was clear to me, however, I would have no more luck with the cheese than I had had with the cakes, for I now perceived exactly what kind of child I was faced with. Although he was the son of an Imperial Aunt, I had seen his like often enough, playing in rat-infested alleys and splashing in gutters. I knew, too, how to deal with such a child, so I turned to the Imperial Aunt and said, “It is very difficult to work, with so many people around, for the child can see he has an audience, and it makes his behaviour worse. Is there a place, somewhere very quiet, where I might be alone with the child for a time and reason with him?”

She said yes, indeed, there was such a place, and I was taken to a fencing room on one of the lower floors of the palace. I asked then that I might be left quite alone with the boy, with no people around, and no slaves, and no myrmidons. Nothing, in fact, that might distract him. I also asked for another tray of cakes, and some of his favourite cheeses. These, however, were a deception, and I had not the slightest intention of using them.

When we were alone, I looked out of the doorway to make sure there was nobody in the corridor beyond. Then I gave a great shout, crying “Help!” in as loud a voice as I could muster.

I waited for a short time, then I called help again. When no help came, I turned to the boy and said, “You see? Nobody can hear you here.”

He said, “I don’t care.” Then he ran at me, and butted me with his head. Well, almost without thinking, I seized him by the hair and pulled him over backwards, then pulled my throwing-razor from my boot and held its point at his throat.

I said, “Don’t trifle with me child, or I will have your life!” And I meant it, too, for he had made me angry.