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.At thismoment, Ann said, she had begun to think of a northward journey, but the oddswere darkly against it.The twins were still nursing and sickly; the demands of meredaily living are heavy on a goddess who must also supervise housekeeping.Therewas, for instance, the endless squabbling treachery of the household slaves.At thattime also, Ann hoped to soften or divert some changes that seemed to be takingplace in Spearman himself.("I wonder if they were really changes& ")Spearman detested slavery, he said.But in a primitive economy how else could you get the work done? Even in daylight, when the kaksmas were half helpless, onlythe bravest soldiers would go into those hills not to work, but only as guards forthe chained lines of laborers, guards who could run fast if the kaksmas came out fora day-blind attack and leave the slaves to be consumed.Bad: Spearman was sorrysuch things had to be.Still, the slaves were poor or sometimes dangerous materialat best; besides that, they hated responsibility and were therefore really happier inslavery and received better care than they could otherwise have had.So you had tosee it as almost a eugenic, even a humanitarian measure as well as an unavoidabletransitional phase, and in any case you can't make an omelette without breakingeggs.At the use of meat slaves for the palace household, Spearman had to draw theline, and he instituted laws against the custom for the rest of his little kingdom, butthey were difficult to enforce without compromising matters of greater politicalimportance."Transitional" became a somewhat sacred word for Spearman over theyears, a sustaining conception when things went badly and when his ingrainedsensitivities brought from Earth were violated by the brisk egg-breaking of aNeolithic culture.Even the first war against Vestoia, in the third year of Spearman's deification,was part of a transitional phase, although Spearman did not feel that his pygmieswere advanced enough to be troubled with fine distinctions.It is better for a god toresist pressures for explanation.That first war was well planned, with limited objective.Six hundredspearwomen and archers crossed the Argo below Vestoia and fell on the city fromthe east, so that there was no clue to their southern origin; they set afire a mile ofthe lake settlement, took three hundred captives, and vanished again eastward,leaving a few crippled defenders to convey the message that they would come again.It had the desired effect: the armies of Lantis foamed eastward like crazed hornets,while Spearman's force slipped home across the Argo without a trace.In thefollowing year they struck again, again from the east, but with a larger force, layingwaste nearly a third of that part of the city on the eastern shores of the Vestoianlakes.The palace of Lantis, nerve center of empire, was on the west shore.Probablythe queen knew nothing of what had happened until she saw the far shore buried insmoke, and by the time she crossed over, she would have learned only thatSpearman's army had promised to come a third time and take Lantis herself andassume command of the empire.They did, just six years after that lonely journey along the rocks.Ann's twin sonswere five years old, five Lucifer years.In the first two campaigns, Spearman had notshown himself in person to the Vestoians.In this third battle he was at the head ofhis army, massive and tall; with a cold, unhappy precision, he was using a longhardwood stick with a razor-edge semicircular blade.And this time his legion haddriven in out of the west, directly against the palace and the temples and sacredplaces of the Queen of the World.Lantis was aging then, and sick, and bewildered; she probably never understoodthat it was merely a question of her own methods being used against her.Evenwhen her city was in flames around her and her people were scattering into forestand swamp and lake, she could neither yield nor destroy herself; thus it was hermisfortune to be taken alive [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
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.At thismoment, Ann said, she had begun to think of a northward journey, but the oddswere darkly against it.The twins were still nursing and sickly; the demands of meredaily living are heavy on a goddess who must also supervise housekeeping.Therewas, for instance, the endless squabbling treachery of the household slaves.At thattime also, Ann hoped to soften or divert some changes that seemed to be takingplace in Spearman himself.("I wonder if they were really changes& ")Spearman detested slavery, he said.But in a primitive economy how else could you get the work done? Even in daylight, when the kaksmas were half helpless, onlythe bravest soldiers would go into those hills not to work, but only as guards forthe chained lines of laborers, guards who could run fast if the kaksmas came out fora day-blind attack and leave the slaves to be consumed.Bad: Spearman was sorrysuch things had to be.Still, the slaves were poor or sometimes dangerous materialat best; besides that, they hated responsibility and were therefore really happier inslavery and received better care than they could otherwise have had.So you had tosee it as almost a eugenic, even a humanitarian measure as well as an unavoidabletransitional phase, and in any case you can't make an omelette without breakingeggs.At the use of meat slaves for the palace household, Spearman had to draw theline, and he instituted laws against the custom for the rest of his little kingdom, butthey were difficult to enforce without compromising matters of greater politicalimportance."Transitional" became a somewhat sacred word for Spearman over theyears, a sustaining conception when things went badly and when his ingrainedsensitivities brought from Earth were violated by the brisk egg-breaking of aNeolithic culture.Even the first war against Vestoia, in the third year of Spearman's deification,was part of a transitional phase, although Spearman did not feel that his pygmieswere advanced enough to be troubled with fine distinctions.It is better for a god toresist pressures for explanation.That first war was well planned, with limited objective.Six hundredspearwomen and archers crossed the Argo below Vestoia and fell on the city fromthe east, so that there was no clue to their southern origin; they set afire a mile ofthe lake settlement, took three hundred captives, and vanished again eastward,leaving a few crippled defenders to convey the message that they would come again.It had the desired effect: the armies of Lantis foamed eastward like crazed hornets,while Spearman's force slipped home across the Argo without a trace.In thefollowing year they struck again, again from the east, but with a larger force, layingwaste nearly a third of that part of the city on the eastern shores of the Vestoianlakes.The palace of Lantis, nerve center of empire, was on the west shore.Probablythe queen knew nothing of what had happened until she saw the far shore buried insmoke, and by the time she crossed over, she would have learned only thatSpearman's army had promised to come a third time and take Lantis herself andassume command of the empire.They did, just six years after that lonely journey along the rocks.Ann's twin sonswere five years old, five Lucifer years.In the first two campaigns, Spearman had notshown himself in person to the Vestoians.In this third battle he was at the head ofhis army, massive and tall; with a cold, unhappy precision, he was using a longhardwood stick with a razor-edge semicircular blade.And this time his legion haddriven in out of the west, directly against the palace and the temples and sacredplaces of the Queen of the World.Lantis was aging then, and sick, and bewildered; she probably never understoodthat it was merely a question of her own methods being used against her.Evenwhen her city was in flames around her and her people were scattering into forestand swamp and lake, she could neither yield nor destroy herself; thus it was hermisfortune to be taken alive [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]