Songmaster

Ansset pulled away from Riktors's slack arm and walked to the door. He touched it; it opened for him. But he had not left when Riktors cried out in agony, Won't you say anything to me?

Ansset turned around, hunting for something to break the silence with. Finally he thought of it.

Thank you, he said.

He meant thank you for caring for me, for still wanting me, for giving me something to do now that I can't sing anymore, now that my home is closed to me.

But Riktors heard it another way. He heard Ansset saying thank you for letting me leave you, thank you for not requiring me to be near you, thank you for letting me live and work in Babylon where I won't be required to sing for you anymore.

And so, to Ansset's surprise, when his voice croaked out the two words, utterly devoid of music, Riktors did not take them kindly. He only looked at Ansset with a look that the boy could only interpret as cold hatred. The look held for a few minutes, an unbearably long time, before Ansset finally could not stand to see Riktors's hatred any longer. He turned away and passed through the door. It closed behind him. When the door closed, Ansset realized that at last he was no longer a Songbird. The work he had now would require no songs.

To his surprise, he felt relieved. The music fell off him like a burden welcomely shed. It would be some time before he realized that not singing was an even heavier burden, and one far harder to be rid of.

5

Songmaster O

And so Esste, waiting patiently in the High Room, was the first to hear that Ansset would not come home.

I was not allowed to come to Earth. The other passengers were unloaded by shuttle, and I never set foot on the planet,

The message, Esste said. Was it sent in Ansset's own language?

It was a personal apology from Riktors Mikal, O

Esste and O

He is a liar, Esste finally said.

This much is true: Ansset does not sing.

What does he do?

O

Esste sucked in air quickly. She sat in silence, her eyes focused on nothing. O

He is so young, Esste sang.

He was never young, O

I was cruel to him.

You gave him nothing but kindness.

When Riktors begged me to let them stay together, I should have refused.

All the Songmasters agreed that he should stay.

And then a cry that was not a song, that came deeper from within Esste than all her music.

Ansset, my son! What Have I done to you, Ansset, my son, my son!

O

Esste could not, he feared. Not a week had passed since Ansset had left that Esste had not sung of him, either mentioning him by name or singing a melody that those who knew her recognized-a song of Ansset's, a fragment of voice that could only have been produced by the child's throat, or by Esste's, since she knew all his songs so well. His homecoming had been watched for as no other singer's return. There was no celebration pla

O

6

Ansset had only been in Babylon a week when he got lost.

He had been in the palace too long. It didn't occur to him that he didn't know his way around. And in fact he had learned almost immediately every corner of the manager's building, which he was sharing for two weeks with the outgoing manager, who was trying to acquaint him with his staff and the current problems and work. It was tedious, but Ansset thrived on tedium these days. It kept his mind off himself. It was much more comfortable to immerse himself in the work of government.

He had no training for it, formally. But informally, he had the best training in the world. Hours and hours spent listening to Mikal and Riktors pour their hearts out, discreetly, about the decisions that faced them. He had been the dumping ground for the problems of an empire; it was not strange to him to face the problems of a world.

Yet there were times when they left him alone. There were limits to what anyone could absorb, and though Ansset knew he had no reason to be ashamed of the way he had been learning, he was keenly aware of the fact that they all thought him to be a child. He was small, and his voice had not changed, thanks to the Songhouse drugs. And so they were solicitous, oversolicitous, he thought. I can do more, he said one day when they quit before sunset.

That's enough for a day, the minister of education said. They told me not to go past four and it's nearly five. You've done very well. Then the minister had realized that he was sounding patronizing, tried to correct himself, then gave it up and left.

Alone, Ansset went to the window and looked out. Other rooms had balconies, but this one faced west, and he saw the sun setting over the buildings to the west. Yet below, where the stilts of the building left undisturbed ground, thick grass grew, and Ansset saw a bird rise from the grass; saw a large mammal lumbering under the buildings, heading, he assumed, toward the river to the east.

And he wanted to go outside.

No one went outside, of course, not in this weather. Months from now, when the Ufrates rose and the plain was water from horizon to horizon, then there would be boating parties dodging hippopotamuses and singing from building to building, while work went on in the buildings rooted in bedrock, like herons ignoring the current because their feet had a firm grasp in the mud.

Now, however, the plain belonged to the animals.

But there was no door that did not open to Ansset's hand, no button that did not work when he pushed it. And so he took elevators to the lowest floor, and there wandered until he found the freight elevator. He entered, pushed the only control, and waited as the elevator sank.

The door opened and Ansset stepped out into the grass. It was a hot evening, but a breeze flowed under the buildings. The air smelled very different from the deciduous breezes of Susqueha