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. But Father thought he
was heirless and alone, and had written them all - every
poem and song and lay, from the edicts to the first shaking
of the city, down through the dark years unto this time. A
dozen lines or so of one verse he had worried over,
scratched out, revised, and replaced, only to go back to the
first version, to his first choice of wording.
I mouthed the lines, then read them aloud:
"DOWN IN THE ARM OF CAERGOTH HE RODE:
PYRRHUS ALECTO, THE KNIGHT ON THE NIGHT OF BETRAYALS.
WHEN A FIREBRAND OF BURNING HAD CLOUDED THE
STRAITS OF HYLO.
LIKE OIL ON WATER, HE SOOTHED THE IGNITED COUNTRY.
FOREVER AND EVER THE VILLAGES LEARN HIS PASSAGE
IN THE GRAIN OF THE PEASANTRY, LIFE OF THE RAGGED ARMIES.
THEY CARRIED HIM BACK TO THE KEEP OF THE CASTLE
WHERE PYRRHUS THE LIGHTBRINGER CANCELED THE WORLD
BENEATH THE DENIAL OF BATTLEMENTS,
WHERE HE DIED AMID STONE WITH HIS HOVERING ARMIES.
FOR SEVENTEEN YEARS THE COUNTRY OF CAERGOTH
HAS TURNED AND TURNED IN HIS EMBRACING HAND,
A GARDEN OF SHIRES AND HAMLETS,
AND Lightbringer HISTORY HANGS ON THE PATH OF HIS NAME."
It was as though Father had never been satisfied.
Something had drawn him to these lines again and again, as
if changing them would . . .
Would straighten the past, make it true.
" 'Tis here, Mother," I announced, so softly that at first
she did not hear, though she was staring directly at me as I
read
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