The Fifth Head of Cerberus (1972)

The Fifth Head of Cerberus is the title of both a novella and a single-volume collection of three novellas, written by American science fiction and fantasy author Gene Wolfe, both published in 1972. The novella was included in the anthology Nebula Award Stories Eight.

Title

The title is a play on words in reference to Cerberus, a three-headed dog from Greek mythology who guarded the entrance to the underworld, Hades. In the first novella the protagonist explains that Cerberus represents his own family, its three heads being his father, aunt and Mr. Million, adding that its "unseen" heads are his brother David as fourth and, by implication, the fifth and final the narrator's own. Following this logic, the title of the novella therefore refers to the narrator himself, whose story we read. Further parallels between the narrator's family and the mythology of Cerberus can be drawn in numerous other ways throughout this novella. For example, a statue of this mythological creature exists at the front, or "gates" of their family home, which is itself located at 666 Saltimbanque, this number having associations with the underworld dating back to the Greek manuscripts of the Book of Revelation. Also, their family home is later referred to at one point as the Maison du Chien, literally "House of the Dog"; in several other places it is called "Cave Canem", or "Beware of the Dog".

Single-volume collection

The collection is an expansion of the first novella, originally published in the Orbit 10 anthology edited by Damon Knight in 1972. The following novellas, "A Story" by John V. Marsch and V.R.T. expand on the plot and themes of the first.

These works are set on two colony worlds, 20 light-years from Earth, the double planets of Sainte Anne and Sainte Croix, originally settled by French-speaking colonists, but lost by them in a war with an unnamed enemy. Sainte Anne was (perhaps) once home to an indigenous aboriginal culture (at an apparently pre-paleolithic level of technology) of shapeshifters, who may – or may not – have been wiped out by the human incomers.

Wolfe presented the title novella at a Milford Writer's Workshop. Norbert Slepyan, an editor at Scribner's, was impressed by the story and proposed that Wolfe write two more, related novellas, to be published in a single book.

Novellas

The Fifth Head of Cerberus

The title story is in the form of a biographical study, the narrator of which looks back on his boyhood and youth on the planet of Sainte Croix, and the events which led to his long, harsh incarceration, and eventual freedom.

Brought up in relative comfort in a large house (a brothel run by his father and aunt, staffed by several genetically enhanced "demimondaines"), he and his younger brother David are privately tutored by a robotic servant and often go outside the house for short trips.

One evening his old life ends when he is called to attend to his father, a distant figure. He is told that his name is now "Number 5", and after a period of questioning he is given a barrage of psychological, visual, drug, and association tests, which endure for some time. Finally released, he feels very drained. He finds out that David has been treated similarly; both boys undergo this treatment regularly for years afterward, though Number 5 is treated more severely, and begins to experience painful headaches and memory lapses.

He meets his aunt for the first time, who seems to know about Veil's Hypothesis (the theory that the Sainte Anne aboriginals could mimic the human settlers so perfectly that they killed them and took their places) and is given light duties in the running of the family business. He also meets John Marsch, an anthropologist from Earth, when he visits the house. He is visiting Aubrey Veil, author of the hypothesis, who happens to be Number 5's aunt.

Befriending a girl, she, he, and David get involved in amateur dramatics; money being short, they decide to break into a slave trader's warehouse to steal some cash. There, they meet a surgically altered human slave who bears an uncanny resemblance to him, and his father. After it attacks them, they kill it and run away.

Finally sick of his father's ongoing experiments on him, Number 5 decides to kill him. His resolve is bolstered after another visit by Marsch, who casually informs him that he, Number 5, and his father are clones – only two of many. This conversation is ended when Number 5 identifies Marsch as being an aboriginal, based on evidence never specified explicitly in the book. He kills his father, but is discovered and incarcerated. After nine years of imprisonment, Number 5 takes his father's place as head of the family estate.

"A Story," by John V. Marsch

In this hallucinatory tale from pre-contact Sainte Anne, Sandwalker sets out on a dreamquest to find "the priest", in his lonely cave, to commune with him. Sleeping at the entrance to the cave, he and his twin, Eastwind, unaware of each other's existence, dream of each other. Waking, Sandwalker goes out to hunt, where he meets the Shadow Children, an ethereal, nocturnal race, and they make an alliance by sharing food and learning each other's songs.

Walking on, he meets a girl and a baby, whom he befriends. After sleeping with her, and hunting for more food, he decides to follow the river downstream to the marshes. He manages to rescue some Shadow children from enemy marshmen, whom he kills. Learning that his mother and friends have been captured by other marshmen and taken away, he decides to follow and rescue them as well.

Followed by the Shadow children, they are all, themselves, captured and thrown into a large pit, where he finds his mother and friends; they are all due to be sacrificed by the marshmen, so their souls will enter the river and carry messages from them to the stars. His twin, Eastwind, belongs to the tribe who captured him.