Painter had come out of the shed, and Sweets, who curled his lip at the fox’s odor. Painter came across the yard to where the little figure awaited him.
“Good evening, Counselor,” he said.
“Hello, Painter.”
“You’re supposed to have died.”
“Well, so I did. It’s wrong, I know, for Judas to be the one to rise from the grave. But there it is.” He looked a long time up at the massive face he had so often heard described and seen in tapes, but had never confronted. Even in the first moments of encounter he saw his parent’s mistake, and wondered at it. “You shouldn’t feel cheated,” he said. “The one who betrayed you suffered death. But he wanted you to have his services still. My services. Forever.
“You see,” he said, including them all, but looking at Painter intently, and at Sten, “I am sterile. Sexless, in fact. Therefore, in order to go on, I must be recreated — cloned — from a cell of my own. My parent understood the impasse he had come to, and saw that the only way out of it was his own death. I had been prepared to succeed him. My education was to have been longer, but I was released when he died.” He looked up at the wide sky. “It was a long wait.”
Loren said: “He did that in secret? Matured a clone? And nobody knew?”
“He was — I am — rich enough. There are men I pay well. Skilled. All that. I am immortal, if I’m careful.” He smiled again. “A less delightful prospect than you might imagine.”
Sten said: “You know what he knows.”
“I am he.”
“You know his plans, then, Why we’re here.”
“He had no plan.” Reynard’s voice had grown thin and almost inaudible.
Small plumes of frost came from his nostrils. Evening — the longest of the year — had gathered by degrees around them.
“No plan?”
“No.” Slowly, as though crumpling, he sat. A tiny folded figure. “Men plan,” he said. “I’m not a man, The appearance is a deception. All lies. Talk.” He said the word like a tiny bark. “Talk.”
Mika shivered violently. When she spoke, she felt her throat constricted. “You said Sten was to be a king.”
“Yes? Well, so he is, I suppose.”
Sten said: “What am I supposed to do?”
“That’s up to you, isn’t it? If you are a king.”
Caddie said: “You said Painter was King of Beasts.”
“I did. How was I to know it was the truth? My parent died learning it.”
They had come close, to hear his delicate, rasping, exhausted voice. “I make no plans,” he said. “I discern what is, and act accordingly. You can never trust me. I must act; it’s my nature. I’ll never stop. You. You make the future. You know yourselves. I will act in the world you make. It’s all up to you.” One by one, they sat or squatted around him, all but Painter, who still stood, remote, unmoving as an idol with eyes of jewel. It was still not yet night, though it had been twilight most of the day. They could still see one another’s faces, strange, matte, like the faces of people asleep. Tomorrow, the day would be imperceptibly longer. The sun would stir in his long sleep.
“Whatever we are to do,” Reynard said, “we are at least all here. Everyone I know of. All but Meric. Well. He prepares the way. Some way.” He offered, with a tiny, long-wristed hand, a place in the circle to Painter, He waited while the leo sat. The dog crept in beside him.
“Shall we begin?” Reynard said.