The Children of the Company Read Online Free PDF

the street, and got down and called for an axe; with it he cut the beef into pieces, and handed them out to the crowd. They blessed him and cried that he was their lord, they called on him to live a thousand years, they prostrated themselves and kissed his feet.
    And though Enna-aru smiled broadly, and was genial as a favorite uncle before them all, Atrahasis noted that his eyes remained a little distant.
    “Such generosity, o king!” he said slyly, when they had ridden on. “Truly my people love you.”
    “That was showmanship,” said Enna-aru. “And they don’t love me; they don’t know me. But they love a handout now and then, and the promise that things will be a little better. If you had understood that fairly basic fact, I might not have marched into your city uncontested.”
    “Ah! So my fault was simply ruling by the wrong kind of showmanship?” said Atrahasis.
    “No,” said Enna-aru the king. “Your fault was that you never gave a thought to what your people wanted.”
    They dined once again on the terrace. A cool wind brought the smell of the river, the sound of frogs, the murmuring of rushes in the twilight. A round moon rose slowly out of the purple east, looking as though it had been painted on the horizon.
    “See how she lifts free of the earth?” said Atrahasis. “Red with smoke and dust at first, and then yellow; but the higher she ascends, the purer her light becomes, and she outshines even the stars. You and I have lifted free of the mud ourselves, o king. You shine upon those peasants down there; but who are your own people?
    “The idiots in the street sang their love for you; but their love meant nothing to you. I saw that. Your eyes are clear, you have no fond illusions, you know the world for the shameful place it is, you know the truth. You are a unique mortal.
    “What is it you desire, o king?”
    Enna-aru looked at him curiously.
    “A better world,” he said. “Full of better men.”
    Atrahasis looked up at the first stars.
    “I am going to give you a gift,” he said.
    Atrahasis carried the frame out himself, set it up in the garden as Enna-aru watched, uncomprehending. He tested the fabric, the pads, the taut straps; and when all was ready he lifted it onto his shoulders and stepped out to the edge of the terrace.
    “Now,” he said, “o king, you will see how close a man may come to being a god.”
    He leaned into the night and swept down, down, until he caught the thermal rising over the massed cook-fires of the city. Up he floated then, turning as he soared, circling, and the white moonlight glittered on the distant river and on the irrigation channels, but shone full and steady on his high terrace
and the tiny figure of Enna-aru. The king stood motionless, face turned up to him; he did not cower or tremble, as a mortal might have done. In his steady regard Atrahasis flew high, and higher, up where the stars hung like lamps in the blue night; and Atrahasis had never been so happy in his life.
    At last he drifted down, mothlike, and landed with a light foot beside Enna-aru.
    “Magicians and acrobats you have seen, o king; but never the like of this,” he said triumphantly.
    “Never,” admitted Enna-aru the king. He stepped close and examined the glider, peering intently at its tight-stitched fabric.
    “It will bear two,” said Atrahasis, edging over within the frame. “Will you dare to fly, mortal man?”
    Without replying, Enna-aru stepped in under the frame. He worked out the harness buckles for himself, and drew them tight; took firm hold of the frame, and stepped toward the edge.
    He never cried out once, not during the initial plunge, not in the moment when they lifted on the thermal like a blown leaf. Atrahasis looked into his face and saw that it was shining.
    When he returned to his chamber that night, there was a figure standing just within, obscured by shadows.
    “You had better check your credenza,” said Security Technical Vidya.
    “What are you talking