The Wall | Page 7

against his face; and he wondered what he was doing sitting up here drinking hot cha in the sweltering heat of the desert when he should have been down there enjoying wine and the companionship of his fellow guards.
"They think me a fool," said Sartas abruptly. He didn't lift his gaze as he spoke.
"Yes," Tavarius agreed. He glanced at the younger man, an apologetic look in his eye. "They don't understand why you remain up here, when it's so obvious there's no threat."
"Is it so obvious, Tavarius?" Now Sartas turned and stared at the old guard. "Is what we do here really so empty of meaning?"
Tavarius considered this for a moment. "The Wall has stood for longer than recorded time," he said at length. "In all those centuries there has never been one reported case of attack."
"Then you believe the threat for which it was built no longer exists?"
"Perhaps there was never a threat to begin with, lad."
Sartas snorted dismissively. "You talk nonsense," he growled. "What king would order the construction of such a thing if it were to serve no purpose?"
"I never said it was built for no reason."
"Walls are meant to keep things out," Sartas pronounced with finality.
"Or keep things in."
"Cysteria is not a prison!"
"Perhaps not now--though there are many definitions of prison."
Sartas shook his head vigorously. "The Wall is here to protect, as are we."
"I agree the Wall is here to protect," said Tavarius soberly. "But to protect what? The people? The land? Or perhaps the King and his minions."
"Some would brand your words as treason," Sartas said with a frown of reproach.
"We've lived in fear for centuries," Tavarius observed. "Centuries of rule by kings, who have preyed on that fear to maintain control of the land and its people."
"I don't believe it," Sartas said, a dark scowl across his face. "The Wall was built to protect us from a great evil."
"Which never came. Which never has, lad. And we've walked this stone for centuries in anticipation. Perhaps the only evil was the evil of anarchy. Perhaps the Wall brought order where none had been before. Perhaps the Wall, merely in its existence, brought purpose. It made people believe in the need for kings and armies at a time when they needed to. And now they can't stop believing."
"What if you're wrong, Tavarius? What if there's an army awaiting beyond, even as we speak?"
"Then will a wall and a handful of guards really stop them, Sartas?" Tavarius chuckled softly and shook his head. "We're here to maintain the illusion. The King is strong so long as there is a perceived threat and he is seen to be doing something about it."
"And what of the voices?" Sartas grinned triumphantly, believing that he'd won a point.
"We've all heard them at one time or another," Tavarius admitted. "But they could as like be the wind as not. The conversations of other guardians carried from other outposts."
"They weren't the wind!" Sartas declared. "And they weren't the Sun," he added.
Tavarius stared at him pityingly.
"You're too cynical and distrusting," Sartas insisted, simmering with rage.
"Age will do that to a man," said Tavarius. "Age and the Wall. But I don't actively seek to be these things. I know only that I've walked these walls for years, as did my father, and his father, and his father's father, down through the centuries, to ancestors whose names I don't even know. I would wish my son a better fate than this." He threw the last of his cha into the fire with an angry motion of disdain.
"We must be vigilant," Sartas insisted.
"Yes, we must. But not here, lad. Not on this wall. We must be vigilant against those who would use us, who would play us like puppets on strings, manipulating us for their own ends."
"If you believe these things you say, then why do you come?"
"Because I have family, lad. A wife and children who must be cared for."
"For coin, then."
"For coin."
"You have no doubts."
Tavarius grinned wanly. "There are always doubts," he said. "As I said: I, too, have heard the voices."
Sartas blinked. "You hear the evidence," he said, "and yet still you claim there's no threat."
"They're only voices, lad." Tavarius sighed and shook his head. "But as like as not they're the imaginings of lonely men."
"Or armies massing to launch an assault."
"And waiting so long to do it?" Tavarius scoffed. He chuckled dryly, mocking this notion. "I first heard them more than twenty years ago, Sartas. And before that, my father had heard them. And his father. Men have stood on this stone and heard them for as long as I've known. No army would wait centuries to launch an assault."
"They're not the wind," Sartas insisted angrily. "And they're not the imaginings of a lonely man."
It was dark now, and Tavarius stared into the