“I had thought,” she began with a brooding stare into the darkness of the Blot, “that we would take the shape of those two creatures you dispatched down there. I can manage the duplicate creature if you can manage the shape of the Fatman.”
I considered it. When we had destroyed Fatman, we had not much damaged the Fatwagon, and I thought I could figure out how to run it. I could not imagine taking the shape of the Dupies, however, and I asked Mavin how she would manage that.
“I will keep myself low, in the belly, I should think, with bony plates around my brain. The heads of the creature will have to be managed like puppets. With practice, I should be able to make both of them speak at once, though that may not be necessary.” Still she brooded, finally swearing a horrible oath and stepping from her perch. “I don’t like it. It is like taking a shape of shame. The Guild of Midwives has much to answer for.’’
“Not their fault,” I said. “The Dupies said they had been ‘saved from the horrible Midwives.’ I did not understand what they meant at the time.”
She shook her head. “It has to do with the oaths the Midwives take, Peter. With their religion, if you will. I find myself more in sympathy with it, the older I grow.” She saw my puzzled look and went on. “Do you think you have a—a soul?”
Windlow, Silkhands, Yarrel and I had discussed this at Windlow’s tower in the southlands, in a recent time which seemed very long ago. It was old Windlow who had pointed out that each of us was conscious of being two persons, one which did and one which observed the doing. He had told us it was this which made mankind different from the animals we knew. So, I considered Mavin’s question and said, “I have more, perhaps. than a fustigar. Or so Windlow thought.”
“The Midwives believe in the soul. However, they do not believe that it is inborn in mankind. They believe it comes partly with the learning of language (which mankind alone of the animals seems to have) and partly from our fellowmen, a gift of human society to each child. Do you think that sensible?”
“I’m not sure I follow,” I said. “You mean, if I had been born among fustigars, and reared by fustigars, learning no language, I would be more fustigar than human?”
“Something like that. But more. The Midwives believe that only those who perceive their own humanity and perceive that others have the same become ensouled. Some who look like men can never believe that others are like themselves. They do not believe that others are real. One such was Mandor.”
I nodded. I believed her. Mandor had seen the whole world as his fingernail, to be cut at will and the parings thrown away.
“Huld, too,” she went on. “Though he talks a mockery of manners. The soulless ones can be well-mannered, as a beast may be well-mannered. Or so say the midwives who have studied the matter.”
“What has this to do with Dupey?”
“Ah.” She came to herself with a start. “The Midwives take an oath, very solemn and binding, that they will look into the future of each child born, and if they do not see that one gaining a soul, then they do not let it live. It is the Talent of the Midwives to see the future in that way, more narrowly than do Seers, and more reliably. It is called the Mercy-gift, the gift the Midwife gives the child, to look into the future and find there that it will have gained a soul.”
“How explain Mandor, then, or Huld?”
“The great Houses want no Midwife at their childbeds. No. They care nothing for ‘souls.’ They care only for manners, and this they can train into any if they be but strict enough. However, I do not think the Dupey was the offshoot of any great House. More likely he was scavenged from the Midwives, or born in some House where Midwives did not go.” This last was said with a hesitating fall, as thought she knew where that might have been. The talk was depressing me, but it had raised a question I had to ask. “And did the Midwives deliver me, Mother?”