Books In English "City Of Illusions" Ursula K. Le Guin | Page 102

horrible, but only like a dream. But then coming down into planetary space
again, you go through what the Lords call the Barrier, and that blacks out
the passengers, unless they're prepared for it. Our ship wasn't. None of us
had come to when we were attacked, and so I don't remember it, any—any
more than you, prech Ramarren. When I came to I was aboard a Shing
vessel."
"Why were you brought along as a boy?"
"My father was the captain of the expedition. My mother was on the
ship too. You know, otherwise, prech Ramarren—well, if one came back
one's people would all have been dead, long long ago. Not that it
mattered—my parents are dead, now, anyhow. Or maybe they were treated
like you, and…and wouldn't recognize me if we met…"
"What was my part in the expedition?"
"You were our navigator."
The irony of that made Falk wince, but Orry went on in his respectful,
naive fashion, "Of course, that means you set the ship's course, the
coordinates—you were the greatest prosteny, a mathematician-astronomer,
in all Kelshy. You were prechnowa to all of us aboard except my father,
Har Weden. You are of the Eighth Order, prech Ramarren! You—you
remember something of that—?"
Falk shook his head.
The boy subsided, saying at last, sadly, "I can't really believe that you
don't remember, except when you do that."
"Shake my head?"
"On Werel we shrug for no. This way."
Orry's simplicity was irresistible. Falk tried the shrug; and it seemed to
him that he found a certain Rightness in it, a propriety, that could persuade
him that it was indeed an old habit. He smiled, and Orry at once cheered
up. "You are so like yourself, prech Ramarren, and so different! Forgive
me. But what did they do, what did they do to make you forget so much?"
"They destroyed me. Surely I'm like myself. I am myself. I'm Falk…"
He put his head in his hands. Orry, abashed, was silent. The quiet, cool air
of the room glowed like a blue-green jewel around them; the western wall
was lambent with late sunlight.
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