all the words of the Evil Ones. Great
mountains of flame stood in the squares of the Cities for three months.
Then came the Great Rebirth.

The words of the Evil Ones... The words of the Unmentionable Times...
What are the words which we have lost?

May the Council have mercy upon us! We had no wish to write such a
question, and we knew not what we were doing till we had written it. We
shall not ask this question and we shall not think it. We shall not call
death upon our head.

And yet... And yet...

There is some word, one single word which is not in the language of men,
but which has been. And this is the Unspeakable Word, which no men may
speak nor hear. But sometimes, and it is rare, sometimes, somewhere, one
among men find that word. They find it upon scraps of old manuscripts
or cut into the fragments of ancient stones. But when they speak it they
are put to death. There is no crime punished by death in this world,
save this one crime of speaking the Unspeakable Word.

We have seen one of such men burned alive in the square of the City. And
it was a sight which has stayed with us through the years, and it haunts
us, and follows us, and it gives us no rest. We were a child then, ten
years old. And we stood in the great square with all the children and
all the men of the City, sent to behold the burning. They brought the
Transgressor out into the square and they led him to the pyre. They had
torn out the tongue of the Transgressor, so that they could speak no
longer. The Transgressor were young and tall. They had hair of gold and
eyes blue as morning. They walked to the pyre, and their step did not
falter. And of all the faces on that square, of all the faces which
shrieked and screamed and spat curses upon them, theirs was the calmest
and happiest face.

As the chains were wound over their body at the stake, and a flame set
to the pyre, the Transgressor looked upon the City. There was a thin
thread of blood running from the corner of their mouth, but their lips
were smiling. And a monstrous thought came to us then, which has never
left us. We had heard of Saints. There are the Saints of Labor, and the
Saints of the Councils, and the Saints of the Great Rebirth. But we had
never seen a Saint nor what the likeness of a Saint should be. And we
thought then, standing in the square, that the likeness of a Saint was
the face we saw before us in the flames, the face of the Transgressor of
the Unspeakable Word.