Even
the cub would turn peaceful, either tired out by the day's doings, or
engaged in some quiet pursuit of its own, chewing at a bone or piece of
leather, or simply working out in dream the wonders and perils of its
world.
For Sylviana it was both comforting and painful to recall herself
through books, and to reveal to Kalus for the first time, the beauty and
torment of Man's elevated walk upon the Earth. That it should now be
all but extinguished was to her an unspeakable and inexpressible
tragedy. Yet she had learned from Ursula LeGuin years before (though at
the time she had not understood it), that the only way to deal with the
horror of a shattered past was to face it, and call it by its true name.
And she told herself that in her heart, if nowhere else, lived the
memory of much that was noble and good.
For Kalus the various narratives, histories and philosophies, continued
to open a whole new world before him. And though it was at times a
pleasant and enlightening escape, on the whole his reactions to modern
society were not unlike the woman's first impressions of the violent
world outside their door. It held wonders, yes, and on occasion,
profound beauty and wisdom. But the accounts of civil war, totalitarian
regimes, torture, famine, real and effectual slavery, environmental
pollution and industrial greed, excited in him the same horror that the
imagined swarm of giant ants had once roused in Sylviana.
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