Re: The Art of the Possible
Posted: Tue Dec 17, 2013 10:37 am
The crowd parts before them - the sensible stepping aside, the slow or heedless finding themselves shoved - and the squire rides the shoulders of a titan, relentless, unstoppable, a power he might grasp but cannot possibly direct. It is frightening. It is exhilerating, even as he tugs at Catch's brow and beard and stares around for some way out, and it drags a hoarse and ragged laughter from his throat; a laughter echoed by black birds that flap and wheel above the market square.
The crowd's voices are the rush of blood in his ears; a voice raised up ahead, one among many, the Governor shovelling words at the madman as if he expects them to be heeded, as if he imagines they have worth. He watches from above as Catch lunges past the Constables who move to intervene; a strike, a shove, and they fall in quick succession, Governor and Wormwoman and - a pang of regret, for he remembers her as kind - Sera Genny of the red hair.
The boy laughs again in surprise and rebellion and surging pride in his friend, who has risen from what he was - from mockery and mistrust and beatings and betrayal - has risen to make these declarations, to claim his own nature, to claim his own truth in the face of lies and distractions. And though different and terrible and lunatik, though broken in body and addled in mind, in that moment a boy's heart blazes with devotion for a hero.
In the next moment the grey tunics of the Constabulary close in; the Marshall declares the matter done, and Cherny cradles the madman's cloven skull between reverent hands.
"S-ser Catch, we should go. It's f-finished, it's finished."
The crowd's voices are the rush of blood in his ears; a voice raised up ahead, one among many, the Governor shovelling words at the madman as if he expects them to be heeded, as if he imagines they have worth. He watches from above as Catch lunges past the Constables who move to intervene; a strike, a shove, and they fall in quick succession, Governor and Wormwoman and - a pang of regret, for he remembers her as kind - Sera Genny of the red hair.
The boy laughs again in surprise and rebellion and surging pride in his friend, who has risen from what he was - from mockery and mistrust and beatings and betrayal - has risen to make these declarations, to claim his own nature, to claim his own truth in the face of lies and distractions. And though different and terrible and lunatik, though broken in body and addled in mind, in that moment a boy's heart blazes with devotion for a hero.
In the next moment the grey tunics of the Constabulary close in; the Marshall declares the matter done, and Cherny cradles the madman's cloven skull between reverent hands.
"S-ser Catch, we should go. It's f-finished, it's finished."