Act IV — The Sleeping Water

Page 27 — The First Law

No one is beyond being found again.

I said it at the hearth, in the plain voice, on the afternoon of the fourteenth day.

We had a name by noon, and a law by dusk, and the two things were said the same day. We took the law as we took the name — without arguing.

The fire was low, and the low was the fire's part in the law. The afternoon was the afternoon of the fourteenth day — the day the name came — and the name and the law went on the same day, as the two things that are ours go on the same day. I did not make the law for the hour; the hour was the only hour the fire was low enough, and the law was ours to make, and we made it in the hour that was ours.

The five of us were around the fire.

The sixth place was the sixth place — no chair, the kept, set a little back from the light. I did not look at the kept place when I said the law, and I did not look away. The kept place was in the law as the kept place is in everything on this coast.

The law is short. It is one sentence.

No one is beyond being found again.

I said it once. I did not say it twice, because twice would have made it a word you can take back.

The word was out of my mouth before I finished deciding it, and the finishing was the fire's part, not mine. The fire took the word as the fire takes every word that is given to it — without keeping it separate from the rest. And the word stayed in the fire, and the fire did not give it back, and the not giving back was the law's first keeping.

What the law is not, I had to put into words.

It is not a promise. A promise is what we promise the search, and the law is what the search keeps for us. We do not promise the search; the search keeps us.

It is not a ward. A ward is what costs, and the ward cost the one who is not here, and the law does not cost. The ward was what the world gave us and took back; the law is what we give ourselves and do not take back.

It is not a prayer. The gods are here and not answering, and the new world owes no one an answer, and a prayer in the new world is a word the new world throws back. We do not pray to the new world; we say the law to ourselves, and the word is our part in the search.

What the law is about, I did not have to put into words, and we heard it as we hear the thing that is right.

It is about the lost, who are down the coast.

Six went through, and five are here — and the law is about the one who is not here. The law does not say he is found; it says he is not beyond being found.

It is about the forgotten, who are in the water or under it.

The forgotten are not the lost. The lost are down the coast, in the world we can walk to. The forgotten are in the water, under the water, in the part of the world we cannot walk to. The law covers the forgotten as it covers the lost: the forgotten are not beyond being found, no more than the lost.

It is about the ones the world throws out.

The world threw us out, and the world keeps throwing out, and the world does not take it back. The law says the thrown-out are not beyond being found, the lost and the forgotten no less than the thrown-out.

Rumzuck said it first, after the law, and the word was our part in the law.

Then we keep looking.

The ogre's word was the whole of our answer, and we did not add to it. Smackage put his palm flat on the ground, and his answer was the ground's answer. Wreckreate was at the water, and his answer was the water's answer. Zahlia's hands were in her lap, and her answer was the air's answer.

Each answer was the answer of the place its keeper belongs to — the ground's answer for the ground, the water's answer for the water, the air's answer for the air. And the kept place had its answer, and its answer was the keeping, and the keeping was the answer no one gave, because the kept place does not give an answer; the kept place is the question, and the question is the law.

We who do not look for our lost are not what we are.

That is all of the law. The law is what we say to ourselves, and the search is ours, and the search is the looking, and the looking is the keeping.

It was the first law of The Forgotten, and I have kept it, and the keeping has not ended.