The Carpet People Read Free

like ‘Take one of these when you go to bed at night and another one if you wake up in the morning.’
    And occasionally he offered advice on other matters.
    Grimm was chopping sticks outside his hut. ‘It’ll never work,’ said Pismire, appearing behind him in that silent way of his. ‘You can’t send Snibril off to Tregon again. He’s a Munrung. No wonder he keeps running away. He’ll never be a clerk. It’s notin the blood, man. Let him stay. I’ll see he learns to read.’
    ‘If you can learn him, you’re welcome,’ said Grimm, shaking his head. ‘He’s a mystery to me. Spends all his time moping around. His mother used to be like that. Of course, she got a bit of sense once she got married.’
    Grimm had never learned to read, but he had always been impressed by the clerks at Tregon Marus. They could make marks on bits of parchment that could remember things. That was power, of a sort. He was quite keen to see that an Orkson got some of it.
    So Snibril went to Pismire’s village school with the other children, and learnt numbers, letters, and the Dumii laws. He enjoyed it, sucking in knowledge as though his life depended on it. It often did, Pismire said.
    And, strangely, he also grew up to be a hunter almost as good as his brother. But in different ways. Glurk chased. Snibril watched. You don’t have to chase around after creatures, Pismire had said. You watch them for long enough, and then you’ll find the place to wait and they’ll come to you. There’s nearly always a better way of doing something.
    When old Grimm died he was laid in a barrow dug out of the dust of the Carpet, with his hunting spear by his side. Munrungs had no idea where youwent when you died, but there was no reason to go hungry once you got there.
    Glurk became chieftain, and would have to take the tribe to the next Counting. But the messenger to summon them to Tregon Marus was long overdue, and that worried Glurk. Not that he was in a hurry to pay taxes, and actually going to see why the messenger was late seemed a bit too, you know, keen , but usually the Dumii were very reliable, especially over tax-gathering.
    But as he and his brother wandered homeward that evening he kept his thoughts to himself. Snibril grunted, and heaved the pole on to his other shoulder. He was shorter than his brother, and he was going to get shorter still, he thought, if he couldn’t shed the load for a minute or two.
    ‘I feel as though my feet have worn right off and my legs have turned up at the ends,’ he said. ‘Can’t we stop for a rest? Five minutes won’t hurt. And . . . my head aches . . .’
    ‘Five minutes, then,’ said Glurk. ‘No more. It’s getting dark.’
    They had reached the Dumii road, and not far north of it lay the Woodwall, home and supper. They sat down.
    Glurk, who never wasted his time, started to sharpen the point of his spear on a piece of grit, but both brothers gazed down the road, shining in thedim evening air. The road stretched west, a glowing line in the darkness. The hairs around it were full of growing shadows. It had fascinated Snibril, ever since his father had told him that all roads led to Ware. So it was only the road that lay between the doorway of his hut and the threshold of the Emperor’s palace, he thought. And if you counted all the streets and passages that led off the road . . . Once you set foot on it you might end up anywhere and if you just sat by the road and waited, who might pass you by? Everywhere was connected to everywhere else, Pismire had said.
    He put his head in his hands. The ache was worse. It felt as though he was being squeezed.
    The Carpet had felt wrong too, today. The hunting had been hard. Most of the animals had vanished, and the dust between the hairs did not stir in the breathless air.
    Glurk said, ‘I don’t like this. There hasn’t been anyone on the road for days.’
    He stood up and reached out for the pole.
    Snibril groaned. He’d have to ask Pismire for a