It is likely that his pain and grief had been communicated to her, but in that very second he suddenly sensed how, perceiving the horror and despair of her beloved, she searched for his gaze.
He was silent, unable to force out a sound.
Fagirra sneered. “All right. I will ask the questions and you will answer. Is it true that your name is Egert Soll?”
“Yes,” his lips spoke instinctively. A sigh passed through the crowd.
“Is it true that you came here from the town of Kavarren about a year ago?”
Egert saw the towers and weathervanes reflected in the water of the spring Kava; the pavement bathed by rain; a pony under an elegant, child’s saddle; shutters closing with a bang; and his laughing mother with her palm shading her eyes.
“Yes,” he replied distantly.
“Good. Is it true that all this time you lived at the university, keeping close company with the dean and his daughter, and that she almost became your wife?”
He finally succumbed to the silent entreaty of Toria and decided to look at her.
She sat, leaning forward and not taking her eyes off him. Egert felt how she relaxed slightly as soon as she caught his gaze. Her face warmed and her gnawed lips tried to form a smile. She was happy to see him, even now, on the brink of betrayal, and she rushed to pour into him all her frantic, almost maternal tenderness, unextinguished by torture, for surely they were also torturing him, they would continue to torture him, perhaps more roughly and painfully, in front of the whole city, in front of the woman he loved; she understood how it was with him, what ailed him now and what would happen later: she understood everything.
It would have been easier for him to survive disdain than compassion. He turned his troubled gaze, full of hate, to Fagirra.
“Yes!”
At that moment something shivered in Toria’s eyes. Egert returned her gaze, and his hair stood up on his head because he too understood.
His trembling hand lay on his scar. On one day only, and only one chance. Please do not let me err in answering.
“Is it true that on the eve of the Plague you were in the dean’s study, and that you saw what happened there?”
The path must reach its bitter end.
“Yes,” he said for the fourth time.
The executioner scratched his nose. He was bored.
Fagirra smiled victoriously. “Is it true that the magical acts of the dean and his daughter called forth the Plague upon the city?”
The steel blade had ripped through his cheek, and the curse had broken his life in two. He had been self-assured on that morning; the spring had broken out cold and lingering, and dewdrops had slithered down the tree trunks, as if weeping for someone. He had not shut his eyes when the Wanderer’s sword sank into his face; there was pain, but there was no fear even then.
He felt the scar on his cheek come to life; it throbbed, full of fire. Still pressing his palm to his cheek, he looked down into the hall and met the gaze of perfectly clear eyes without eyelashes.
The Wanderer stood by a wall in the crowd, but seperate from all. Among the crowd of curious, overwrought, scowling, and tense faces, his long face, notched with vertical wrinkles, seemed as detached as a lock hanging off a door. When that which is foremost in your soul becomes last. When five questions are asked and you answer yes.
My fate steers me along a precisely designed line.
He shivered. At that very moment Toria also recognized the Wanderer. Without turning around, Egert saw how her swollen lips at first tentatively, then more boldly and joyfully, slipped into a smile.
Smiling, she would go to a horrible death. For it appeared that pardon for Egert sounded the death knell for Toria. She knew this and still smiled because in her life there had been the eternally green tree over the tomb of the First Prophet and those nights spent by the light of the fireplace and his promise to shed the curse for her sake.
The foremost in his soul must become the last. For her sake, for the sake of fulfilling his promise, he had to denounce and betray her; he had to let her be judged. Who had woven this web?
Heaven, he had paused for too long: already the hall was agitated and Fagirra was frowning, and the executioner was looking on with interest, casually lowering his sack to the floor.
He squeezed his eyes shut, but his imagination could spit on him for all it cared whether his eyes were open or not; his imagination obligingly pushed on him a vivid, meticulously detailed picture of the torture chamber. Chains dig into his flesh, holding him down, the executioner methodically bends over him; he is unassuming and repulsive in his shapeless sack, and in his hands he holds the pliers. Egert’s clenched jaws are pried open with an enormous bar, the pliers come ever closer, the iron beak opens as if about to feast, Egert fitfully tries to turn his head away, somewhere in the darkness a placid voice utters the words “false witness,” and Egert feels the icy pinch of steel at the root of his tongue.…
A man should not fear so. Thus do animals fear who have fallen into a trap, thus do cattle fear who are being driven to the gates of the slaughterhouse. By some miracle, Egert’s legs did not fall out from under him.
Fagirra’s gaze lay on him like a gravestone; Fagirra’s gaze squeezed him, mastering his soul, disordering his thoughts. The fifth question had been asked.
He must answer now, while the pliers were still in the sack, while the Wanderer looked on, aware of everything in advance. He would answer, and the fear would cease tormenting him: for why else would the scar ache so? It throbbed and fretted as if it were a living creature, as if it were a leech that had sucked his blood for so many days and now, right now, it was fated to die.
“Egert.” The sound of the word barely carried from the prisoner’s dock. It is possible that Toria had not uttered it aloud, but he understood that she was giving her blessing to his fifth yes.
… Fire in the fireplace, dark hair on the pillow, childlike fear and faith, also childlike, trusting. The high window of the library, a wet bird on the path, and the sun, the sun beats at the window. A basket in his arms, green onions tickling his hand, a warm roll from her hand, and the sun again. The print of a heel in soft, warm earth, her palms over his eyes, and the sun shines in through her fingers. The scent of wet grass, snow melting on hair …
Toria quietly scraped her bench along the floor. “Egert.”
How afraid she was for him. She wanted for this all to end as quickly as possible, for him to finally say the word.
His hesitation would gain him nothing. His fear would speak on its own, and his lips would be unable to form any word other than the magical fifth yes. His vocal cords would refuse to work, should he wish to step away from the designated path.
“Enough, Egert!” Fagirra glanced eloquently at the executioner. “I’ll ask you one last time: Is it true that the magical acts of the dean and his daughter called forth the Plague?”
The Wanderer’s lipless mouth quivered slightly. It is quite easy to err, and a mistake will cost you much.… This moment will occur just once in your life, and if you let it slip away, all hope will be forever lost.
So much pain in this hall! So much pain has settled into Toria’s small body! Oh, how the scar aches.
Silence.
He raised his eyes. Two windows watched him from the indifferent eyes of the Wanderer.
“N…”
The fear bellowed at him. It roared and jerked about, lacerating his throat, paralyzing his tongue. All his vast, overwhelming, omnivorous fear, which had for so long been building its fetid lair in Egert’s soul, howled and whirled like a raging monster.
“… o.”