Books In English "City Of Illusions" Ursula K. Le Guin | Page 32

black, whispering in very small voices very close to the ground, "It is
wrong to take Me it is wrong to take life hello heeellllooo don't kill us
don't kill."
"I will!" Falk roared and all the mice were still.
It was hard to go to sleep again; or perhaps what was hard was to be
sure whether he was asleep or awake. He lay and wondered whether it was
day or night; how long they would leave him here and if they meant to kill
him, or use that drug again until his mind was destroyed, not mere ly
violated; how long it took thirst to change from discomfort to torment;
how one might go about catching mice in the dark without trap or bait;
how long one could stay alive on a diet of raw mouse.
Several times, to get a vacation from his thoughts, he went exploring
again. He found a great up-ended vat or tun and his heart leaped with hope,
but it rang hollow: splintered boards near the bottom scratched his hands
as he groped around it. He could find no other stairs or doors in his blind
explorations of the endless unseen walls.
He lost his bearings finally and could not find the stairs again. He sat
on the ground in the darkness and imagined rain falling, out in the forest of
his lonely journeying, the gray light and the sound of rain. He spoke in his
mind all he could remember of the Old Canon, beginning at the beginning;
The way that can be gone
is not the eternal Way…
His mouth was so dry after a while that he tried to lick the damp dirt
floor for its coolness; but to the tongue it was dry dust. The mice scuttled
up quite close to him sometimes, whispering.
Far away down long corridors of darkness bolts clashed and metal
clanged, a bright piercing clangor of light. Light—Vague shapes and
shadows, vaultings, arches, vats, beams, openings, bulked and loomed into
dim reality about him. He struggled to his feet and made his way, unsteady
but running, towards the light.
It came from a low doorway, through which, when he got close, he
could see an upswell of ground, treetops, and the rosy sky of evening or
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