The Wall | Page 5

Sartas there, marching back and forth, ramrod straight, and showing all the discipline that would have made him a favorite of the King's. Tavarius didn't know why, but it unsettled him to see this. He didn't want to admit that it was guilt, but there was a nagging sense in the back of his mind that it was.
Others quickly followed the first, and by the beginning of the third week there was but one lonely soul walking the Wall. One man to stand between the unknown, the unseen, and the unlikely. One man protecting all of Cysteria from whatever evils might await beyond that towering barrier.
"A fool," Tavarius sighed as he lowered his spyglass and sat back in the cool shade. But there wasn't as much conviction in his voice as usual; and in his dark eyes and sun-lined face there were signs of grudging respect.
Karn chuckled softly. "Reminds me of you, when you first came to the Wall. You were eager then, Tav. So full of enthusiasm, so determined that you'd serve your king well. You believed then."
"In many things," Tavarius agreed quietly. "But I was young and naive. And I wasn't long for the Wall."
"We're all the same," Karn observed. "Back home they make us believe it's such a great honor. They make us believe there's purpose in what's done out here in the eternal loneliness of this forsaken desert." He shook his head. "Had I known back then what I know now, I'd have never accepted the 'honor' of being one of the walkers."
Tavarius laughed. "You make it sound as though you were betrayed."
"And wasn't I?" Karn slapped a hand against the sand. "Didn't I hear the guardians of the Wall spin their tales of wonder as they sat drinking in the taverns? Didn't I listen at the door as my father regaled all with stories of great daring? And didn't he leave me in awe of him after relating some great adventure that took place here?" He grabbed a fistful of sand and flung it angrily into the air. "Here, Tav! Here, in this hell of dust and boredom."
"My father, too, told such tales," Tavarius confessed. "And no doubt his father before him did the same. And I, when I'm at home with wife and children, am given to some embellishment when relating the months spent whiling away the time in this desert. Perhaps I'm just ashamed to admit there's no threat. Perhaps, when I see the wonder in their eyes and the glowing admiration, I can't help myself. And though I tell myself time and time again that it's wrong and that I must end the lies, I can't. Because somehow I feel that I'd be betraying them. Betraying their belief in me as husband and father."
Karn nodded sympathetically. "It's the truth," he sighed. "For it's no different for me. It's too easy to accept the accolades, even as the guilt gnaws at my conscience and I find myself wishing desperately to tell them all the truth. But sometimes, when I see my son look to me with such admiration, I want to cry. I want so desperately to tell him the truth, because one day he'll know it for himself. And then, Tav, what will he think of me?"
"Perhaps as you think of your father."
"With anger at first. And then pity. And understanding. More so as the years pass. I am he, in ways that I could never have imagined."
"As are we all." Tavarius raised his spyglass to his eye and peered at the Wall.
"And him?" asked Karn.
"Sartas, too, wishes only to be like his father. And because he can't yet accept the truth of it, he stands up there, vigilant against the embroidered myths that have led a succession of kings to send good men north and south to waste in the heat of a merciless desert sun." Tavarius lowered the glass and was silent for a moment.
"It's difficult to accept the humanity of one's idols," he said at length. "In our early years as sons we look upon our fathers as gods. They can do no wrong; they're always right. Until we grow old enough to see their feet of clay."
"Ah," said Karn, nodding his head. "Sartas doesn't walk the Wall for the King, then."
"No. He walks the Wall because he doesn't wish to see his father's feet of the clay."
******
It had been a month, now. A month of searing heat and the ceaseless monotony of days spent camped out in the shade, with little to occupy the minds of the guard save the perpetual cycle of gaming and the downing of liberal quantities of libation. Occasionally a fight would break out and the men would gather about the two combatants and cheer them on. But such confrontations seldom required the intervention