by John Norman
“Have they?” I asked.
“‘We are here,’ they say. ‘Come seek us, Fools, if you dare!’”
“Perhaps,” I said. “Perhaps.”
“Do you doubt the message?” asked Samos.
“I do not know,” I said. “I simply do not know.”
“They taunt us,” said Samos. “War is a sport for them.”
“Perhaps,” I said.
“We must act,” he said.
“In what way?” I asked.
“You must sail immediately to the world’s end.” Samos looked at me, grimly. “There you must seek out Half-Ear, and destroy him.”
“None have returned from the world’s end,” I said.
“You are afraid?” asked Samos.
“Why,” I asked, “should the message be addressed to me?”
“The Kurii know you,” said he. “They respect you.”
I, too, respected them. I was a warrior. I enjoyed sharing with them the cruel, mortal games of war. They were cunning, and fierce, and terrible. I was a warrior. I found them precious foes.
“Does not the fate of worlds weigh upon you?” asked Samos.
I smiled.
“I know you,” he said, bitterly, “you are a warrior, a soldier, a mercenary, an adventurer. You fight for the exhilaration. You are frivolous. In your way you are as despicable as the Kur.”
“Perhaps I am an adventurer,” I said. “I do not truly know. I have stood against the Kur. I have met men with steel. I have had the women of enemies naked at my feet, suing to be my slaves.”
“You are a mercenary,” he said.
“Perhaps,” I said. “but I choose my wars with care.”
“It is strange,” said Samos.
“What?” I asked.
“We fight for civilization,” said Samos, “against the barbarism of the Kur.”
I smiled that Samos should see himself so.
“And yet,” said he, “in the world for which we strive we would have no place.”
I looked at him.
“In a civilized world, Captain,” said he, “there would be no place for such as you.”
“That is true,” I said.
“Is it not a paradox?” asked Samos. “Men need us in order to bring about a world in which we may be scorned and disregarded.”
I said nothing.
“Men seldom recall who it was who brought them the fruits of victory.”
“It is true,” I conceded.
“Civilized men,” said Samos, “the small and pale, the righteous, the learned, the smug, the supercilious, the weak-stomached and contemptuous, stand upon the shoulders of forgotten, bloody giants.”
I shrugged.
“You are such a bloody giant,” he said.
“No,” I said. “I am only a tarnsman, a nomad in unusual conflicts, a friend of the sword.”
“Sometimes,” said Samos, “I weep.” He looked at me. I bad never before seen him in such a mood.
“Is our struggle, if successful,” he asked, “to issue only in the victory of defeat, the triumph of the trivial and placid, the glorification of mediocrity?”
“Perhaps,” I said.
“Will our blood have been shed,” he asked, “to bring about so miniscule an achievement, the contentment of the herd browsing among the dunes of boredom?”
“They will have their petty concerns,” I said, “which will seem important to them.”
He looked down, angrily.
“And they will have their entertainments and their stimulations. There will be industries which will attempt to assuage their boredom.”
“But will nothing truly matter?” he asked.
“Perhaps men must sleep before they wake,” I said.
“I do not understand,” he said.
“There are the stars,” I said.
“The Kurii stand between us and the stars,” said Samos.
“Perhaps we labor,” said I, “to open the gates to the stars.”
“Men will never seek them,” said Samos.
“Some men will,” I said.
“But the others will not help them, and the adventure will fall,” said Samos.
“Perhaps,” I said. “I do not know.” I looked at him. “Much depends on what men are,” I said.
“His measure has not yet been taken,” said Samos.
“And perhaps it will never be taken,” I said, “and cannot he taken. Every bound you set him will show him a place beyond which he can place his foot or hand.”
“Perhaps,” smiled Samos.
“I have hunted, and I have been hunted,” I said.
“Why do you say this?” he asked.
“And in hunting, and in being hunted,” I said, “I have been alive.”
“Yes,” said Samos. “But why are you saying this?”
“Do you not see?” I asked him. ‘The conflict, the struggle, even if it should issue in the triumph of the leveled herd, each smiling and trying to be the same as the other, will yet have been ours, and cannot be taken from us.”
“Yes,” said Samos.
“Ours will have been the war,” I said.
“Yes,” he said.
“It is our hand that will have grasped the hilt of the sword. It is we, not they, who will have met the enemy. Let them weep that they were not there.”
“Yes,” said Samos, “I would not be other than I am, and I would not be other than where I am.”
“The meaning of history,” I said, “lies not in the future. It is like a range of mountains with many summits. Great deeds are the meaning of history. There are many meanings and many summits. One may climb different mountains at different times, but each mountain glows in the same sun.”
“The Kurii must be met!” said Samos.
“Perhaps we will choose to do so,” I said.
“You are a monster, Captain,” he laughed.
“I am of the warriors,” I said.
“I know your sort,” he said. “It is the fight you relish. What a wicked sort you are, and yet how useful!”
I shrugged.
“You see a fight you want, you take it,” he said. “You see a woman you like, you take her.”
“Perhaps if she pleased me,” I said.
“You would do as you wished,” he said.
“Of course,” I said.
“Warrior!” said he.
“Yes, Warrior,” I said.
“The eyes will be painted, and the ship will be launched at dawn,” he said.
I rose to my feet. “Let us not be precipitate,” I said.
He looked at me, startled.
“Supplies must be laid in,” I said. “Too, a crew must be recruited. Too, there must be an acceptable preliminary voyage, to test the handling of the ship, and its seaworthiness.”
“Time is crucial!” he said. “I can give you supplies, men.”
“I must think of these things,” I said. “And if I am to sail with men I must pick them myself, for our lives would depend upon one another.”
“Half-Ear waits at the world’s end!” cried Samos.
“Let him wait,” I said.
Samos looked at me, irritated.
“If he is truly waiting,” I said, “there is no great hurry.” I looked at Samos. “Besides,” said I, “it may take months to reach the world’s end, if it can be reached at all.”
“That is true,” said Samos.
“Besides,” I said, “it is En’Kara.”
“So?” asked Samos.
“It is time for the Kaissa matches at the Fair of En’Kara, at the Sardar,” I said. I found it hard to think that this was not on the mind of Samos. “Centius of Cos,” I said, “is defending his title against Scormus of Ar.”
“How can you be concerned with Kaissa at a time like this?” he asked.
“The match is important,” I pointed out. Anyone who knew anything of Kaissa knew this. It was the talk of Gor.
“I should have you whipped, and chained to an
oar,” said Samos.
“I have been whipped,” I said, “at various times, and, too, I have been chained to an oar.” I had felt the leather. I had drawn the oar.
“Apparently it taught you little,” he said.
“I am difficult to teach,” I admitted.
“Kaissa!” grumbled Samos.
“The planet has waited years for this match,” I said.
“I have not,” said Samos.
It had been delayed because of the war between Ar and Cos, having to do with piracy and competitive commercial claims on the Vosk. The war persisted but now both players had been brought to the Sardar by armed men from their respective cities, under a special flag of truce, agreed upon by Lurius of Jad, Ubar of Cos, and Marlenus of Ar, called the Ubar of Ubars, who ruled in Ar. Hostilities between the two cities were suspended for the duration of the match. Kaissa is a serious matter for most Goreans. That Samos did not seem sufficiently impressed with the monumentality of the confrontation irritated me somewhat. It is hard to understand one who is not concerned with Kaissa.
“We all have our limitations,” I said.
“That is true,” he said.
“What did you say?” I asked. He muttered something.
“I said,” said Samos, “that Kaissa is a disease.”
“Oh,” I said. If it was a disease, and that seemed not unlikely, it was at least one which afflicted perhaps a majority of Goreans. I expected to have to pay a golden tarn disk for standing room in the amphitheater in which the match would take place. A golden tarn disk would purchase a trained war tarn, or several women.
“If there was a crucial act to be done at a given time,” said Samos, “and the fate of two worlds hung upon that act, and it interfered with a Kaissa match, what would you do?”
I grinned. “I would have to think about it,” I told him. “Who would be playing?”
Samos rose to his feet. exasperated, but grinning. “Come with me,” he said.
He conducted me to a place in the hail, where he pointed down to that portion of the intricate map mosaic which lay there.
“Cos and Tyros,” I said.
He pointed beyond them. For most practical purposes, except for a few small, close islands, of little or no importance, the mosaic ended there. No one knew what lay beyond Cos and Tyros to the west, once the small islands were passed.
“You should have your mind not on Kaissa,” said Samos, “my dear Captain, but on the world’s end.” He pointed to a place on the floor. It contained only small, smooth white tiles.
“Perhaps the world’s end,” I said, “is on the other side of the wall.”
We did not know where it might be, in the scale of the map mosaic.
“Perhaps,” laughed Samos. “Perhaps.”
He glanced about at the mosaic. For an instant his eye stopped, near its top.
“What is it?” I asked. I had noticed a bit of hesitation in him, a small movement in his shoulder, the sort of thing which suggests that a casual thought. unimportantly troubling, has occurred to someone.
“Nothing,” he said. He had dismissed the thought.
“No,” I said, curious. “What is it?”
He gestured to a guardsman to bring a lamp, for we were far from the light of the bowl of coals now, and of various torches set in the walls.
We walked slowly toward the back of the hall. The guardsman brought him the lamp there.
“As you know,” said Samos, “this house is an intelligence center, in which we receive many reports. Much of what we hear is trivial and unimportant, simply meaningless. Yet we try to remain informed.”
“Naturally,” I said. Who knew when, or if, a pattern might emerge.
“Two items of information we have received seem to us peculiar. We have received them at different times. They are in their nature, unrelated. Yet each is provocative.”
“What are they?” I asked.
“See,” said Samos, crouching down, holding the lamp about a foot above the floor, “here is Kassau, and the Skerry of Vars.”
“Yes,” I said.
“And Torvaldsland, northwards,” he said, “and Ax Glacier.”
“Yes,” I said.
“Have you heard,” he asked, “of the herd of Tancred?”
“No,” I said.
“It is a herd of northern tabuk,” said Samos, “a gigantic herd, one of several. The herd of Tancred winters in the rims of the northern forests south and east of Torvaldsland. In the spring, short-haired and hungry, they emerge from the forests hind migrate northward.” He indicated the map. “They follow this route,” he said, “emerging from the forest here, skirting Torvaldsland here, to the east, and then moving west above Torvaldsland, to the sea. They follow the shore of Thassa north, cross Ax Glacier here, like dark clouds on the ice, then continue to follow the shore north here, until they then turn eastward into the tundra of the polar basin, for their summer grazing. With the coming of winter, long-haired and fat, they return by the same route to the forests. This migration, like others of its kind, occurs annually.”
“Yes?” I said.
“It seems not to have occurred this year,” he said.
I looked at him, puzzled.
“Red hunters of the polar basin, trading for tea and sugar, have reported the failure of the herd to appear.”
“That is puzzling,” I said.
“It is more serious than that,” he said. “It means the perishing of the men of the polar basin, or their near starvation. They depend on the tabuk in the summer for food.”
“Is there anything that can he done?” I asked.
“I think not,” said Samos. “Their winter stores of food, from the ice hunting. will last them for a time. Then they must hunt elsewhere. Perhaps some can live by fishing until the fall, and the return of the black sea sleen.”
The red hunters lived as nomads, dependent on the migrations of various types of animals, in particular the northern tabuk and four varieties of sea sleen. Their fishing and hunting were seasonal, and depended on the animals. Sometimes they managed to secure the northern shark, sometimes even the toothed Hunjer whale or the less common Karl whale, which was a four-fluked, baleen whale. But their life, at best, was a precarious one. Little was known of them. Like many simple, primitive peoples, isolated and remote, they could live or die without being noticed.
“Send a ship north,” I said, “with supplies.”
“The waters north of Ax Glacier are ruthless,” said Samos.
“Send it,” I said.
“Very well,” he said.
“There was something else,” I said.
“It is nothing,” he said.
“Tell me,” I said.
“Here,” he said, moving a bit, “here.” He crouched over the mosaic where it delineated the sea, an arm of Thassa, crescentlike, extending northward and eastward, tangent upon the polar shores. The sea in this area was frozen for more than half the year. Winds and tides broke the ice, crushing and piling it in fantastic shapes, wild, trackless conformations, the sport of a terrible nature at play, the dreaded pack ice of the north.
Samos put the lamp down on the floor. “Here,” he said, pointing. “It lies somewhere here.”
“What?” I asked. Nothing was indicated on the map.
“The mountain that does not move,” he said.
“Most mountains do not move,” I smiled.
“The ice mountains of the polar sea,” he said, “drift eastward.”
“I see,” I said.
Samos referred to an iceberg. Some of these are gigantic, pasangs in width, hundreds of feet high. They break from glaciers, usually in the spring and summer, and drift in Thassa, moving with the currents. The currents generally moved eastward above the polar basin. Gorean has no expression specifically for an iceberg. The same expression is used for both mountain and iceberg. If a reference should he unclear the expression is qualified, as by saying, “ice mountain.” A mountain is a mountain to Goreans, regardle
ss of whether it be formed of soil and stone, or ice. We tend to think of mountains as being land formations. The Gorean tends to think more of them as being objects of a certain sort, rather than objects of a certain sort with a particular location. In a sense, English does, too, for the expression ‘berg’ is simple German for ‘mountain’, and the expression ‘iceberg’, then is a composite word which, literally translated would yield ‘ice mountain’ or ‘mountain of ice’. ‘Berg’, of course, in actual German, would be capitalized, for it is a noun. Interestingly, Goreans, although they do not capitalize all nouns do capitalize many more of them than would be capitalized in, say, English or French. Sometimes context determines capitalization. Languages are diverse and interesting, idiosyncratic and fascinating.
I will generally use the expression ‘iceberg’ for it is easier for me to do so.
“There is here an iceberg,” said Samos, pointing to the map, “which is not following the parsit current.” Samos had said, literally, of course, ‘ice mountain’. The parsit current is the main eastward current above the polar basin. It is called the parsit current for it is followed by several varieties of migrating parsit, a small, narrow, usually striped fish. Sleen, interestingly, come northward with the parsit. their own migrations synchronized with those of the parsit, which forms for them their principal prey. The four main types of sea sleen found in the polar seas are the black sleen, the brown sleen, the tusked sleen and the flat-nosed sleen. There is a time of year for the arrival of each, depending on the waves of the parsit migrations. Not all members of a species of sleen migrate. Also, some winter under the ice, remaining generally dormant, rising every quarter of an Ahn or so to breathe. This is done at breaks in the ice or at gnawed breathing holes.
“An iceberg which does not drift with the current, which does not move with its brothers,” I said.
“Yes,” said Samos.
“It is a thing of myth,” I said.
“I suppose so,” said Samos.
“You grow too tense with your responsibilities, Samos,” I told him. “Obviously such a thing cannot be.”
Samos nodded. He grinned. “You are right,” he said.
“Where did you hear of this?” I asked.
“It was told by a man of the polar basin who had come south to sell skins at the Sardar.”