“It is a lie! Sarkon owns me totally. I never would have done it but for my bargain. I traded him my soul for the statue I wish I never had begun.”

“Builder, would you even now be free of such a bargain, if you could be free?” asked Everyman.

“There is no hope. Earthmaker, if he is, must loathe my wretched soul, if I have one.”

“Both Earthmaker and his Singer are. And you may be unchained if you cry out your guilt. Accept the Star-Song and the Stigmon and join us in the Singer’s Meal.”

In the distance they could hear the muffled cheers of upper Urbis as their brothers died.

“Hear the throng. They perish without hope. Yet each believes the Singer will return and rescue him from death. I envy them even if he should never come. Dying for any god is better far than living without one.”

“Oh, Praxis, cry out hope and be unchained while there yet is hope,” Anthem pleaded.

But Praxis turned and walked away. He had been gone for just an hour when Black Knights came to the gateway of the grotto. Everyman and Anthem were arrested. Sarkon, who had noticed Praxis leave the stands, had sent some knights to follow him. Thus the grotto was discovered.

Sarkon was delighted at the capture of the pair and told the Poet King that the leaders of the Singerian revolt at last were clapped in irons.

The public execution of Everyman was scheduled immediately. Anthem was placed in the cages for the Games. But Everyman had been the special grudge of Sarkon. Since he had given up his science for the Singer, he would die a special death.

XXII

The son of a hangman will play with ropes and dream of the day he will have a scaffold of his own to tend. But let him drink too deep of love and he will only stroke the hemp and cry that he is man.

Praxis trembled when Sarkon told him he would be the executioner of honor. His job was to set the torch to the oiled faggots at the feet of Everyman.

“Plague and Singerians must be handled just alike or they will spread,” Sarkon said. “When he is bound upon the wood, you only have to take the torch and plunge it at his feet. Just think, dear Praxis, you are the doctor of the sick mentality that eats like cancer on the great traditions of our state.”

“I cannot do it!” cried Praxis.

“We have a bargain … I own the soul you don’t believe you have,” said Sarkon. “And you will burn the faithless flesh of Everyman—and the unicorn will guard your way.”

“There is no unicorn,” groaned Praxis.

But they had been through all that before. He suffered guilt until the evening of the execution came. The knights of Urbis delivered Everyman and laid him on the wood. The rough sticks cut into his abdomen and shoulders. A priest of temple twenty-three put the oil of mercy on his shoulders to make his dying easier. Then in the custom of his faith, he spat into the face of Everyman and spoke the liturgy of heresy. He rang three silver bells and walked away.