Rewards and Fairies - Penn State University

Rudyard Kipling
cause any man can lie to a God, but no man can lie to a woman. me to be a God, like the God Tyr, who gave his right hand to
And I am not angry with you. I am only very sorrowful for conquer a Great Beast.’
you. Wait a little, and you will see out of your one eye why I ‘By the Fire in the Belly of the Flint was that so?’ Puck
am sorry. So she hid herself.
rapped out.
‘I went back with my people, each one carrying his Knife, ‘By my Knife and the Naked Chalk, so it was! They made
and making it sing in the air—tssee-sssse. The Flint never way for my shadow as though it had been a Priestess walking
sings. It mutters—ump-ump. The Beast heard. The Beast saw. to the Barrows of the Dead. I was afraid. I said to myself, “My
He knew! Everywhere he ran away from us. We all laughed. Mother and my Maiden will know I am not Tyr.” But still I
As we walked over the grass my Mother’s brother—the Chief was afraid, with the fear of a man who falls into a steep flint-pit
on the Men’s Side—he took off his Chief’s necklace of yel- while he runs, and feels that it will be hard to climb out.
low sea-stones.’
‘When we came to the Dew-ponds all our people were there.
‘How? Eh? Oh, I remember! Amber,’ said Puck.
The men showed their knives and told their tale. The sheep
‘And would have put them on my neck. I said, “No, I am guards also had seen The Beast flying from us. The Beast
content. What does my one eye matter if my other eye sees fat went west across the river in packs—howling! He knew the
sheep and fat children running about safely?” My Mother’s brother Knife had come to the Naked Chalk at last—at last! He knew!
said to them, “I told you he would never take such things.” Then So my work was done. I looked for my Maiden among the
they began to sing a song in the Old Tongue—The Song of Tyr. Priestesses. She looked at me, but she did not smile. She made
I sang with them, but my Mother’s brother said, “This is your the sign to me that our Priestesses must make when they sac-
song, O Buyer of the Knife. Let us sing it, Tyr.”
rifice to the Old Dead in the Barrows. I would have spoken,
‘Even then I did not understand, till I saw that—that no but my Mother’s brother made himself my Mouth, as though
man stepped on my shadow; and I knew that they thought I had been one of the Old Dead in the Barrows for whom
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