check. A chance of entering the Walled City, no matter how remote, held enormous sway over desperate men and women.
The Sergeant of the Guard, an honest man of many yearsâ experience named Cristoforo, stood atop the gates, and called down to the assembled throng to make way for the morningâs draw. The plague people down below stepped back into something resembling orderly lines. When he was satisfied, the Sergeant of the Guard made them wait just a little longer and then ordered the guardsmen to form up outside. Levers were spun and cogs turned and a door within one of the main gates turned open, then a troop of a dozen armed guardsmen stepped out and formed a semicircle around the gates, holding shields and spears in front of them to warn the plague people back. These guardsmen were doing this duty as punishment for something, whoring or being drunk on duty, and they came into the closest contact with the sick. It was that or be thrown out of the city, and so they reluctantly accepted the task.
When Sergeant Cristoforo was satisfied, he ordered the gates open and one huge gate creaked slowly inwards until there was space for the ox cart to emerge. The huge beasts waddled out slowly and the sergeant wondered, as he did each day, what they would do when they had to eat the beasts. But as more plague victims arrived bringing tribute, of course the less need there was to do so.
Sergeant Cristoforo then called down to the sick and dying to bring forth their tribute. The crowd pushed forward then, calling out and holding up their offerings. Some had a chicken or two. Some had a pig and several had sacks of grain. The Sergeant had long observed that a family might arrive at the gates with several livestock and bags of grain, but they would be robbed of them before the next morning and others would stand there holding them up to the guardsmen. It didnât matter to him. His job was simply to take the largest offerings and give the person supplying them a pass into the city.
He noticed today a fat rogue with half his face eaten away with pustules, holding two pigs, three chickens and four sacks of grain. Yesterday the man had stood there with one pig only, and the day before that he had simply had a chicken. He wondered if he had slain the owners of the livestock and food or had traded them for their lives.
There was a decree that the gates would not be opened if the bodies of the dead were left around the walls of the city, so the sick and dying had to drag the corpses of their family, friends, or just strangers, to a ditch beyond a small rise and bury them there. Or at least make some pretence of burying them. The Sergeant pointed down to the fat rogue and the man beamed joyously, stepping forward while the guardsmen loaded his produce onto one of the carts.
He looked down for newcomers to the gates, bearing produce. They were easily discernible by the way they stared incredulously at the smooth unblemished skin of the guardsmen. It confirmed everything they had heard. There was a city that had withstood the plague where they had potions to cure it. Where, if you were rich enough or lucky enough, you could be admitted.
Sometimes a family might arrive, carrying a cart of their combined produce, which they would offer up just so that one of them, usually a sickly young boy or girl could be admitted to the city. At such times Sergeant Cristoforo tried not to imagine what he would do if he were outside the walls with his own wife and three children. He was, after all, a citizen of the Walled City and that was that. The plague victims were people from other lands. They had no given rights to entry to the Walled City, as the citizens of the city had no obligation to allow those not from the city to enter it.
But when his youngest daughter had been taken ill with a temperature two moons past he had woken from a nightmare in which the Council decreed that all sick children had to be put out of the city. He was trying to
The Sergeant of the Guard, an honest man of many yearsâ experience named Cristoforo, stood atop the gates, and called down to the assembled throng to make way for the morningâs draw. The plague people down below stepped back into something resembling orderly lines. When he was satisfied, the Sergeant of the Guard made them wait just a little longer and then ordered the guardsmen to form up outside. Levers were spun and cogs turned and a door within one of the main gates turned open, then a troop of a dozen armed guardsmen stepped out and formed a semicircle around the gates, holding shields and spears in front of them to warn the plague people back. These guardsmen were doing this duty as punishment for something, whoring or being drunk on duty, and they came into the closest contact with the sick. It was that or be thrown out of the city, and so they reluctantly accepted the task.
When Sergeant Cristoforo was satisfied, he ordered the gates open and one huge gate creaked slowly inwards until there was space for the ox cart to emerge. The huge beasts waddled out slowly and the sergeant wondered, as he did each day, what they would do when they had to eat the beasts. But as more plague victims arrived bringing tribute, of course the less need there was to do so.
Sergeant Cristoforo then called down to the sick and dying to bring forth their tribute. The crowd pushed forward then, calling out and holding up their offerings. Some had a chicken or two. Some had a pig and several had sacks of grain. The Sergeant had long observed that a family might arrive at the gates with several livestock and bags of grain, but they would be robbed of them before the next morning and others would stand there holding them up to the guardsmen. It didnât matter to him. His job was simply to take the largest offerings and give the person supplying them a pass into the city.
He noticed today a fat rogue with half his face eaten away with pustules, holding two pigs, three chickens and four sacks of grain. Yesterday the man had stood there with one pig only, and the day before that he had simply had a chicken. He wondered if he had slain the owners of the livestock and food or had traded them for their lives.
There was a decree that the gates would not be opened if the bodies of the dead were left around the walls of the city, so the sick and dying had to drag the corpses of their family, friends, or just strangers, to a ditch beyond a small rise and bury them there. Or at least make some pretence of burying them. The Sergeant pointed down to the fat rogue and the man beamed joyously, stepping forward while the guardsmen loaded his produce onto one of the carts.
He looked down for newcomers to the gates, bearing produce. They were easily discernible by the way they stared incredulously at the smooth unblemished skin of the guardsmen. It confirmed everything they had heard. There was a city that had withstood the plague where they had potions to cure it. Where, if you were rich enough or lucky enough, you could be admitted.
Sometimes a family might arrive, carrying a cart of their combined produce, which they would offer up just so that one of them, usually a sickly young boy or girl could be admitted to the city. At such times Sergeant Cristoforo tried not to imagine what he would do if he were outside the walls with his own wife and three children. He was, after all, a citizen of the Walled City and that was that. The plague victims were people from other lands. They had no given rights to entry to the Walled City, as the citizens of the city had no obligation to allow those not from the city to enter it.
But when his youngest daughter had been taken ill with a temperature two moons past he had woken from a nightmare in which the Council decreed that all sick children had to be put out of the city. He was trying to
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