Interim Errantry 2: On Ordeal

by Diane Duane

  Once or twice during his early practice, a fragment of a strange legend was heard on Wellakh: the tale of a journeying wizard, some kind of exiled nobility, endlessly making his way from one star to another away out in space, always returning to the dark after brief sojourns in the light. Whether anyone in the Wellakhit royal family ever heard the story remains unknown, but even if they had, it seems likely no one would have had any public reaction. After all, all kinds of strange stories come to the settled worlds out of the dark.

  And if there was a day when the Prince met his royal mother and father for breakfast and said, softly and in pain, “There is just one of me again,” they never spoke of it in any other being’s hearing.

  The Prince’s mettle as a wizard, meanwhile, was tested often enough both on Wellakh and on other worlds, where he ran occasional consultative errands on his father’s behalf. So he was not overly alarmed when some sunrounds later he passed through the Crossings on such an errand and found the place in an uproar—security staff running in every possible direction, and the remains of some strange enth-like creatures being carried away, occasionally in very small pieces, but mostly in buckets.

  In the course of his gate-change he passed by the Stationmaster’s central supervision facility, and saw that entity himself not too far away, walking along and having an intent conversation with a couple of nervous-looking hominids of some kind or another—possibly a male and a female if their secondary sexual characteristics went anything like the way Wellakhit ones did, though of course you could never be quite sure without consulting the Aethyrs. “Trouble? Oh, no trouble,” the Master was saying, glancing about him at blaster scarring and various other signs of damage to the infrastructure. “Not really.”

  Roshaun ke Nelaid smiled slightly at the irony, saluted the single eye that was turned toward him as he passed, and went on by, heading for his gate. He gave the matter no more thought, for no mere civil disruption would ever be allowed to damage the Crossings in any serious way. His mind went back to the issue of the star he was meant to examine on his father’s behalf, the possibility never crossing his mind that some connection might some day be forged between himself and a being from the distant world of those worried-looking hominids.

  And what the Aethyrs might have known about this business, They never shared with Rho. For all is done for each, and—whether foiling the intentions of the Lost One, or fulfilling an agreement once made—sometimes surprise works best.

  Mamvish fsh Wimsih

  Prelude

  Many species from this side of creation to the other and back again have at one time or another had a saying that involves perceiving the conditions then obtaining around one, and then pointing at them and saying in ultimate acceptance: "It is what it is." (Often with an added, or at least implied, “And what can you do?”) And this attitude is often seen as very wise and the pinnacle of maturity.

  Except that maturity isn’t everything… as wizards will be the first to agree.

  ***

  Every now and then in the course of events in the physical universe, the time rolls around for something particularly special to happen. When speaking of such occurrences after the fact, folksongs and carols and epic poems often describe a typical response to the approach of one of these event-nexi as “heaven holding its breath,” waiting in high anticipation for the event to occur.

  In the more central realms of creation, this description is sometimes accurate. But routinely the response is also rather mixed. There may be anticipation, yes… but usually running in harness with it is significant terror, of a type and intensity that would shatter beings originating in less central regions. This is because even the Powers that Be, regardless of their positioning outside the physical universe’s timestreams, still cannot predict with perfect certainty what will happen.

  Into all their calculations inevitably enter two sets of imponderables that do not easily submit to assessment accurate enough to allow prediction. One is of course the influence of the Lone Power. Its own behavior, routinely (and sometimes just reflexively) set against the plans and wills of the other Powers, can range through a broad assortment of responses from spiteful, amused laissez-faire indolence to an all-out hostility that in the past has as easily snuffed out stars and shattered worlds as it has crushed lives or blasted hearts. While Its former associates may have a general sense of Its present attitudes, the Lone One’s rapid changes of mood have played havoc with such analyses many times throughout the aeons, and the Powers that Be have learned better than to depend on them.

  The other set of variables—in a universe where even the vibrational rates of molecules may occasionally shift without warning—includes everything normally describable as “mere chance.” The wizardly triusm holding that “There are no accidents” still doesn’t render the intervention of random factors impossible: it merely suggests looking closely at what might have caused them. And though one great thinker of our own planet felt sure that God does not play dice with reality, others (even on this planet) have asked whether this is not more a comforting assessment than necessarily a true one. Even the Powers freely admit that the mind of the One is utterly unknowable by beings less centrally positioned. Is it possible that even the One may not always know for sure how the dice will fall… or (if knowing) might sometimes pretend not to know? For even the concept of “having everything turn out according to plan” becomes meaningless unless one has first accepted the possibility that things might not go that way.

  In any case, when Heaven holds its breath, sometimes it’s because chance is operating—the chance that the right being will happen to be in the right place at the right time to make something previously unthinkable happen. And this is most especially the case when someone suddenly comes along, looks at what is (and was and seemingly always will be), opens their eyes (or other organs of perception) wide, and says, "Well, that's just wrong."

  Beginnings

  Wimst is one of those star systems that most people primarily interested in interstellar tourism would normally pass by without a second thought. The response of any of them who’d ever heard of the place—at least early on in its relationship with the greater galactic civilizations then extant in the Milky Way Galaxy—would've been “Wimst? There’s nothing on Wimst.”

  And at that point, generally they’d have appeared to be right. At least from the point of view of other species along the same matter-substrate spectrum, the single planet that gives the system its name was not an appealing place. Judged as a home for carbon-based life, Wimst was (and largely remains) unusually bleak, unwelcoming, and hostile: extremely dry and barren, subject to both long droughts and bouts of violent wet weather that seemed to do the ecosystem little good except in the very long run. There would probably be some who’d say that it was a miracle that life had managed to burgeon there at all… except that life, as we know, usually finds a way without waiting around for miracles

  Additionally, the system’s location is not promising in terms of the longer-term development of a given species arising there, as normally in the long term most species go to space. Wimst and its star are buried deep in the middle of what astronomers from our part of space sometimes colloquially refer to as a coal sack. All this phrase normally indicates is a region with unusually high concentrations of interstellar dust, high enough when viewed from a distance to block out everything beyond it, and (from the inside) block out almost everything outside it. But the words do give a little sense of the dark, forbidding quality of such spaces.

  As if this positioning wasn’t already infelicitous enough, the space around Wimst is also something of a star desert due to its position in a backwater region between two great galactic arms. Between the already-sparse scatter of even distant stellar bodies and the obscuring qualities of the dark nebula saturating the region of the Wimsih star, the result is one of those skies which at nighttime tends to cause the beings living there either to believe that they are alone in the universe, or to wish despera
tely that they weren't.

  In any case members of the dominant Wimsih species from earliest times generally paid little mind to the tiny faint lights that were occasionally visible in the night sky (and occasionally were not, as the interstellar dust changed its configuration from century to century and blotted out stars that might have been dimly perceptible before). Early commentators might have suggested that this blase attitude arose because noticing the stars conferred no particular survival advantage. More sardonic commentators later on sometimes observed that from a Tauwff’s point of view the stars would not have been worth paying attention to because nobody could eat them. But that joke could not acquire its bite until after one very important occurrence befell the Wimsih planet and its dominant species.

  That species, the Tauwff, were endothermic, warm-blooded saurians of a type familiar across the galaxy in many carbon-based environments where climates are challenging. There are nearly as many beings of this type as there are of hominids—which says something about the inherent variability and adaptability of both sorts.

  Initially, though, the adaptability of the Tauwff was not so much of an issue—as both their legends and their planet’s crustal history make plain. But in understanding who and what the Tauwff became, possibly the legends tell a fuller or at least a more nuanced story.

  ***

  It should be said (as a sort of prologue) that in the most central regions of existence the line between prophecy and game plan can be very thin.

  Prophecy is at best a statement of intent on the part of some one, or even many, of the Powers that Be. At worst, at its most simplistic and easily derailed, or easily misunderstood, it’s no more than a statement about the contents and appearance of a snapshot of a given moment in time. What that event or appearance actually means—whether it portrays a situation planned to be of long standing or of a duration counted merely in moments—is rarely clear simply from examining that single frozen image.

  The Wimsih tell a story of one such prophecy, and how it came to bear on their whole world; how the prophecy failed, or (as some say) succeeded, and what finally came to pass.

  Here, then, the tale in condensed form—as the most popular version, the Canticles of the Great Subversion, can take as long as three years to recite and might be a bit much for the tastes of a species whose lifespan doesn’t routinely run to a decade of millennia.

  ***

  There was in the ancient day a star new-formed—the star that would be Wimst’s primary—and not long after its formation, the star heard a rumor in the heavens about the largest planet about to form from its accretion disk. The star heard how it was being whispered among the Powers that on this world to come would be born a species great in mind and powerful in their works, one that in its Choice would choose for the Powers that Be and not for the Lone Power, their old antagonist. It was murmured as well, as the tale of times and years rolled by, that one would be born in this world who would change many things, even to the fates of other worlds and of other species far away. So that star—a thoughtful and secretive being who would not then and does not now tell its name—having heard these rumors, set all its intention toward making of the new world to come a place that would be fit home for such a species and would fill all their needs.

  Even when acting merely through the laws of physics, stars acting with such intent can produce great things. The vast disk of dust and slowly gathering elemental stuff around it came together and formed itself over long millions of years into a single mighty planet, one of the largest ever known to sentient beings. And the star, its kindling then well finished, shone mindfully on that world as it gathered itself into shape and settled in its new orbit, as its rotation slowed and its crust cooled and tightened, as its atmosphere stabilized and its first weather systems manifested and the very first rains began. Slowly the new planet’s oceans spread themselves wide into the beds laid down for them, slowly the world’s air grew deep and sweet, and the long, leisurely business of Life's manifestation there began.

  As the world that would be Wimst came into its own, the whispers about it in the depths of creation became ever more frequent, and there was great anticipation of the species that would rise there and the world that would be their home. The planet would be a garden nearly from pole to pole, a place of great beauty and wondrous variation in its species. And of the species that would rise there to dominate that world, rumor whispered how it would be wise and long-lived and gentle-souled, patient and intelligent in nature, mighty benefactors and friends to all. This would be a species destined to leave its mark in the merely physical realms, an ornament to the galaxy that could claim it as its child; a world worth waiting for, which in the fullness of time would be filled with great works of joy.

  But the innermost realms of creation are full of echoes. There far beyond those regions where the little local laws of time and space hold sway, a whisper may travel far. And at last that whispering came to the notice of the Power called Lone. In Its contrary heart, the Lone One thought, "So this new world a-borning will become a wonder for all the worlds around to see, will it—a place of peace and excellence and kindness as might be taken for a model for others far and wide? We shall see about that."

  Many a long age went by while Wimst grew complex and beautiful, while life proliferated in its seas and across its continents. The Lone One, meanwhile, went off about what It had made Its business: corrupting and destroying and blighting and maiming, and otherwise deranging the One’s creation in all the ways It might. In the fullness of time It came back to Wimst and, sure enough, found the most senior and highly developed of its species, the Tauwff, on the brink of establishing their first true civilization there.

  The Lone One took bodily shape for a season and walked among the Tauwff, and was delighted to find them as quickwitted and kindly and wise as had been foretold… as well as innocent and not particularly perceptive of Its presence. And It waved Its Tauwff-ish tail in secret merriment as it went among them; for far from annoying the Lone One, this outcome filled It with glee. It could tell that the time of the Tauwff’s Choice was close upon them… and therefrom It would get much entertainment.

  It would, as was Its wont, enter into their Choice along with that world’s people. And should the Tauwff somehow manage to stay true to the other Powers’ designs, then It would punish them in so terrible a manner as to make them a byword and a cautionary tale through all that part of the galaxy. Whereas should It induce them to willingly accept Its gift, which is Death and the works of death, then for long ages they would be tools in Its claws to wreak much wickedness on all the species round about and on one another. And from that too, the Lone One would derive great satisfaction.

  So on the day when it was destined to occur, to the place of the Choice of the Tauwff the Lone One came. Seeming at first to be merely one more of the many wise ones and elders and wizards gathered in the garden-like vale where they were met, sweetly the Lone One put forward its case to them, gesturing with graceful claws and wreathing its tail into sensible shapes.

  Their greatness, It said to those gathered there, was yet but a weak thing without power to make itself safe and enforce it—and the Lone One’s gift to them, along with the mastery of it, would make them mighty. Using death and the threat of it judiciously and for the good of all, the Tauwff would come to wield great power over every species they met, imposing their way of life and the culture and wisdom of Wimstkind upon them even in the face of fierce resistance.

  "For the only true power lies in likeness," the Lone Power said to them. “Only with those who are like us are we safe. Once safely made like us, they may be guided out of their destructive and benighted ways into the true paths of wisdom and action. And as for all who are not like you, you may either force them to become so, or else blot them from the universe as if they were a mere stain or spill of error. Thus you will make the worlds safe for yourselves and your hatchlings, and spread the wisdom and order of Wimst’s people far and wide—an o
rnament to the galaxy that clutched it, and a people fit to teach unruly younger races the right way."

  But the Tauwff, gathered together as they were for the purpose of Choice, were by virtue of that intention rendered far more aware of the Lone Power’s presence than It had come to believe they would be during previous meetings with them singly or in smaller groups. Together they now understood whom it was that spoke, and roundly they rejected It.

  "All your sweet-sounding proffers and blandishments, we do renounce them," the Tauwff said; "for we can clearly scent their source. Of your ‘gift’ of oppression and subjugation we will have none. We have no desire for empire, nor any wish but to manage our own world in our own way. What other worlds may do or not about their likeness to us is theirs to determine, as their worlds are theirs to rule. And of your desires we have long been warned by prophecy. With them, and you, we will have naught to do. Take yourself away therefore to some other world less well prepared for your meddling; we will have none of it.”

  The Lone One grew wroth at such bluntness. "I have heard overmuch of prophecy of late," It said to the Tauwff there gathered. “Therefore beware how you quote it to me! Your own ingratitude shall set the pattern for your destruction. Other worlds will yet tell in song and story of what Wimst had, and might yet have had, and what its people threw away. Not that you will hear firsthand of their pity, for what you have brought upon yourselves will follow soon enough."

  With that the Lone Power departed from among them. But instead of visiting Its wrath upon them straightway, It made another plan. Into the distant cloud of leftover rubble and detritus that had never been included into Wimst’s structure, It dropped a small gravitic anomaly that did no more than dislodge a few of those small distant bodies from their orbits.