The Crystal City Page 0,117

like this."

"So let's see if it'll fit."

Alvin set down the poke and rolled back the top until it made a thick cloth circle around the top of the golden plow. Then he picked up the plow and knelt down before the handles that Verily had made.

"Gold is soft," said Verily. "It'll wear away quickly in hard ground, won't it?"

"A living plow don't fit into the world the way ordinary ones do, and I expect it'll be as hard as I need it to be." Alvin rotated the plow this way and that, trying to figure out how to do the job with only two hands. "So do I fit the plow to the handles, or the handles to the plow?" he asked.

Verily laughed. "I'll hold the handles in place, and you work it out from there."

Alvin laughed, too. Then he brought the plow closer to the end where it was supposed to fit. His intention was to see how close a fit it was, and how exactly to insert it into place. But this was a living plow, and the handles were made of living wood, and when they got near enough, it was as if they recognized each other the way magnets do, lining themselves up in exactly the right way and then leaping together.

Leaping together, joining, the plowshare sliding into exactly the right spot, the wood flexing a bit to let it in, then closing back down over it, so it looked as if the handles had been carved from a tree that had the golden plow already embedded inside it.

Neither of them had a chance to marvel and admire, though, for the moment the plow leapt into place, there came such a music as Alvin had never heard before. It was the greensong-the song of the living wood, the living world, he recognized it, and felt how the handles vibrated with it. And yet it was another music, too. The music of worked metal, of machinery, of tools made to fit human needs and to do human work. It was the beating throb of the engine in a steamboat, and hissing and spitting of a locomotive, the whine of spinning wheels, the clatter and clump of power looms. Only instead of the cacophony of the factory, it all blended together into a single powerful song, and to Alvin's joy it fitted perfectly with the greensong and became one music that filled the air all around them.

Even then, he scarcely had time to realize what the music was before the plow started bucking and bouncing. It was clear that it no longer intended to be still, and Verily, far from controlling it, was barely able to hang on as the plow lurched forward-no ox or horse pulling it, nothing at all but its own will. It skipped a few feet and then dug into the thatch of the meadowgrass, cut through it like a hot knife through butter, then raced forward, Verily hanging on for dear life, running and twisting to keep up with it.

Whatever else this plow might want, it had no respect for the idea that the best furrow is a straight one. It twisted and turned all around the meadow, as if it were a dowser's stick searching for water.

Which, when Alvin thought about it, it very well might be. Not searching for water, but a dowser's wand all the same. Hadn't Verily shaped it into a single piece of living wood? Wasn't it shaped like a dowser's wand, with the two handles joined at the base?

"I can't hold on any longer!" cried Verily, and he fell to the ground as the plow lurched forward another yard and then ... stopped.

The plow just stood there in the ground, unmoving.

Alvin ran over as Verily got up off the ground.

Gingerly, Verily reached a hand out to it. The moment his skin touched it, the plow bucked again and moved forward.

"I have an idea," said Alvin. "You take the right handle, I'll take the left."

"Both at once," said Verily.

"One," said Alvin. And Verily joined in on "two" and "three."

"Wait a minute," said Verily. "How high are we counting?"

"I was thinking of three, but looks like that won't be it after all."

"When we say three, or when we would have said four?"

"When we say three, we should be grabbing right then," said Alvin.

One.

Two.

And away they went.

Only this time there was no bucking. The plow moved, all right, cutting deep into the ground and turning up the soil just like