My male bodies looked uneasy and shifted back and forth on their feet, as if ready to run. But the two neuters remained calm. My poet thanked the lord a second time, sounding confident. Then I split up and went in all directions through the hall, seeking information.
The drinking went on till dawn, and the lord’s retainers were happy to tell me stories about the Straightener. She had a female love of comfort and fondness for children, but could not be called tender in any other way. Rather, she was a fierce leader in battle and a strict ruler, as exact as a balance or a straight-edge.
"She’ll lead us against Bent Foot," one drunk soldier said. "We’ll kill him and bring the children here. The stolen children, at least. I don’t know about Bent Foot’s spawn. It might be better for them to die. Not my problem. I let the lord make all the decisions, except whether or not I’m going to fart."
Finally, I went up to my room. My scout lay asleep, the baby in her arms. My male parts began to pace nervously. The rest of me settled to compose a poem.
As the sky brightened, the world outside began to wake and make noise. Most of the noise could be ignored, but there was a wishikunder the eaves directly outside my room’s window. Its shrill, repeating cry drove my poet to distraction. I could not concentrate on the poem.
Desperate, I threw things at the animaclass="underline" buttons from my sewing kit, spare pens, an antique paperweight I found in the room. Nothing worked. The wishikfluttered away briefly, then returned and resumed its irritating cry.
At last my scout woke. I explained the problem. She nodded and listened to the wishikfor a while. Then she fastened a string to an arrow and shot the arrow out the window. It hit the wishik. The animal gave a final cry. Grabbing the string, my scout pulled the beast inside.
"Why did I do that?" I asked.
"Because I didn’t want the body to fall in the courtyard."
"Why not?"
Before she could answer, the body at her feet expanded and changed its shape. Instead of the body of a dead wishik,I saw a grey goxhat body, pierced by the scout’s arrow, dead.
My males swore. The rest of me exclaimed in surprise.
My scout said, "This is part of a wizard, no doubt employed by the keep’s lord, who must really want to unroll my testicles, since she is willing to be unfair and play tricks. The wishikcry was magical, designed to bother me so much than I could not concentrate on my composition. If this body had fallen to the ground, the rest of the wizard would have seen it and known the trick had failed. As things are, I may have time to finish the poem." The scout looked at the rest of me severely. "Get to work."
My poet went back to composing, my scribe to writing. The poem went smoothly now. As the stanzas grew in number, I grew increasingly happy and pleased. Soon I noticed the pleasure was sexual. This sometimes happened, though usually when a poem was erotic. The god of poetry and the god of sex are siblings, though they share only one parent, who is called the All-Mother-Father.
Even though the poem was not erotic, my male and female parts became increasingly excited. Ah! I was rubbing against myself. Ah! I was making soft noises! The poet and scribe could not feel this sexual pleasure, of course, but the sight of the rest of me tumbling on the rug was distracting. Yes, neuters are clear-eyed and rational, but they are also curious; and nothing arouses their curiosity more than sex. They stopped working on the poem and watched as I fondled myself. 5
Only the scout remained detached from sensuality and went into the defecating closet. Coming out with a bucket of cold water, the scout poured it over my amorous bodies.
I sprang apart, yelling with shock.
"This is more magic," the scout said. "I did not know a spell inciting lust could be worked at such a distance, but evidently it can. Every part of me that is male or female, go in the bathroom! Wash in cold water till the idea of sex becomes uninteresting! As for my neuter parts–" The scout glared. "Get back to the poem!"
"Why has one part of me escaped the spell?" I asked the scout.
"I did not think I could lactate without laying an egg first, but the child’s attempts to nurse have caused my body to produce milk. As a rule, nursing mothers are not interested in sex, and this has proved true of me. Because of this, and the child’s stubborn nursing, there is a chance of finishing the poem. I owe this child a debt of gratitude."
"Maybe," grumbled my male parts. The poet and scribe said, "I shall see."
The poem was done by sunset. That evening I recited it in the lord’s hall. If I do say so myself, it was a splendid achievement. The wishik’scry was in it, as was the rocking up-and-down rhythm of a sexually excited goxhat. The second gave the poem energy and an emphatic beat. As for the first, every line ended with one of the two sounds in the wishik’sever-repeating, irritating cry. Nowadays, we call this repetition of sound "rhyming." But it had no name when I invented it.
5
The goxhat believe masturbation is natural and ordinary. But reproduction within a person–inbreeding, as they call it–is unnatural and a horrible disgrace. It rarely happens. Most goxhat are not intrafertile, for reasons too complicated to explain here.
When I was done, the lord ordered several retainers to memorize the poem. "I want to hear it over and over," she said. "What a splendid idea it is to make words ring against each other in this fashion! How striking the sound! How memorable! Between you and the traveling plumber, I will certainly be famous."
That night was spent like the first one, everyone except me feasting. I feigned indigestion and poured my drinks on the floor under the feasting table. The lord was tricky and liked winning. Who could say what she might order put in my cup or bowl, now that she had my poem?
When the last retainer fell over and began to snore, I got up and walked to the hall’s main door. Sometime in the next day or so, the lord would discover that her wizard had lost a part to death and that one of her paperweights was missing. I did not want to be around when these discoveries were made.
Standing in the doorway, I considered looking for the treadmill. Maybe I could free the prisoners. They might be travelers like me, innocent victims of the lord’s malice and envy and her desire for hot water on every floor. But there were likely to be guards around the treadmill, and the guards might be sober. I was only one goxhat. I could not save everyone. And the servant had said they were criminals.
I climbed the stairs quietly, gathered my belongings and the baby, and left through a window down a rope made of knotted sheets.
The sky was clear; the brilliant star we call Beacon stood above the high peaks, shedding so much light I had no trouble seeing my way. I set a rapid pace eastward. Toward morning, clouds moved in. The Beacon vanished. Snow began to fall, concealing my trail. The baby, nursing on the scout, made happy noises.