The Half-Made World by Felix Gilman Read Free Book Online Page B

painfully clear and intense, each rustling reed knife-sharp. The night-sight: the vision of the Guns. For six years, Creedmoor had lived among crowds and lights, and he’d almost forgotten the world the way the Guns saw it.
    Toads and snakes! He slogged forward through the reeds and muck, and frogs trilled and black kingfishers fled from him, calling their shrill rattling call.
    —That way, Creedmoor.
    The voice hurt—it buzzed, it scraped, it burned—and the Gun that housed his master throbbed like a wound at his hip—but the pain was becoming familiar again.
    He clambered up the banks and over a green mound of earth, and when he turned around, the last sign of the riverboat was gone.

    There was no refusing his masters when they Called. Creedmoor knew that very well.
    When a man first entered the service of the Gun, his masters promised strength, freedom, glory—it was impossible at first to imagine ever wanting to saying no to them. For the first ten years or so, man and weapon would exist in a wild and exhilarating unity of purpose. That was how it had been for Creedmoor. He’d been lost and drifting when the Gun first took him—too old still to be a rootless boy—no honest job, no family, more creditors than friends. Every grand cause he’d taken up in his wanderings had failed him, one by one. Liberationism—the Church of the White City Virgins—the Knights of Labor—even the fucking Smilers . He’d been considering settling down somewhere and devoting himself to the serious study of alcoholism and despair. The Gun had raised him up and made him extraordinary. For ten years, he fought for them all across the many fronts of the Great War, he schemed and murdered and bribed and seduced and blackmailed for them, and he did it joyfully.
    But the Gun’s Agents were wild and unruly, and sooner or later, they all began to resent their servitude. And then their masters would give them the Goad. It always happened—sooner or later. They seemed to take a certain satisfaction in it. Sometimes it had to be done twice or three times, rarely more often.
    Creedmoor had spent all afternoon in the riverboat’s bar, drinking like a condemned man and flirting desperately with the waitresses. When night fell and his master said,
    —Go now.
    . . . he’d gone. He didn’t want the Goad.

    He marched north through the dark of a gum tree grove, through thin bone-white trunks. They put him in mind of Hillfolk. Mud sucked at his boots. The throb of bullfrogs got on his nerves. He’d taken off his necktie, and his jacket was already torn. The ground sloped up sharply and he broke through the trees and out over the marshy plains.
    —That way, Creedmoor.
    —What do you want from me? Just tell me.
    —You must hear it from all of us. We must visit our Lodge.
    —This is an important errand? I’m honored.
    —All our purposes are important. And you are honored.
    Marshland gave way to grassland. He walked alone under a stark moon, breathing deeply in the cold air and—it was ridiculous! But there was no denying it—he began to feel the old joy again. Already he felt younger and wilder than he had for years. His legs were tireless. The Gun banged rhythmically against his hip, and his master said,
    —That way. Why are you smiling?
    —I would rather not serve you. But if I must, I might as well try to do it gladly.
    —Good, Creedmoor. We like our servants joyful.
    He came to the crest of a low rise, and jumped a fence of wood and wire. Now he was on grazing land—he saw the tracks and droppings of goats. In the distance on the edge of a hill, he saw the sharp outline of a farmhouse.
    —There, Creedmoor.
    —A farm.
    —Yes.
    —Are we borrowing eggs?
    No answer. He jogged briskly uphill. A worn and stony trail led him up to the farmhouse. It was a ramshackle cabin of logs and mud and corrugated iron. Its roof raised up a weathervane in the shape of a bird, probably some local Baron’s crest. Its door was adorned with an