The Rose Sea

by S. M. Stirling

  She stopped. "I could get lost out here," she said to Windrush—-but more so she could hear a voice than anything. Windrush snorted and his ears flicked back and forth. The bleakness and the lonely sound of the wind as it rattled through the thicket and the birds screaming overhead had all blended to make her afraid. It was a hellish place, this place where they'd come to ground.

  "Well enough," she said softly. "I'll not make any turns—I'll just keep going straight round this thicket and sooner or later I'll have to come back to the channel."

  She didn't, however. She worked her way along the thicket, keeping Windrush at a steady trot, until she realized another thicket grew down to meet the first, with only a narrow passage between the two thorny barricades, and that on spongy ground. She frowned and rode forward, not liking at all the way the darkness seemed to press in on her, though there was still daylight left. The thorns gleamed, rattles and creaks and cracks echoed from either side of her, as well as clickings and whistles and little soft coughs, so that she knew she was not alone—and wished she were.

  The barriers grew closer, and she realized the space had become too narrow for her to turn Windrush around. She pressed her lips together firmly. "Higher ground," she said out loud; but her voice, which she had hoped would sound fierce and so give her courage, trembled instead.

  Windrush flicked his ears from side to side and pranced. The two of them were slowed to a walk, with no hope of proceeding faster. The horse was clearly unhappy with the situation in which he found himself. Karah could think only that he was a sensible animal to be frightened. Godsall knew, she was.

  Please let there be higher ground on the other side of this, she prayed.

  The narrow path between the thickets turned to the left in a steady, sweeping curve. Suddenly, she was riding up a tiny hill. She whooped and clicked to Windrush. The path widened slightly, still in that left-sweeping curve—and the hill grew steeper.

  "Yes," she whispered. "Yes!"

  The hill grew steeper, the curve tighter. She looked up, caught a glimpse of something ahead over the tops of the thorns, and then lost sight of it. She kept up the hill, for the path was still too narrow to permit her to turn. This was it, she thought. This was her high ground.

  She was spiraling around the base of a hill, she realized—going steadily upward She considered the likelihood of wild thorns growing in a spiral path around a hill all of their own accord and decided there was no chance of that. Someone had made the path she rode. She hoped that someone was friendly. She drew her sword—just in case—and a moment later, broke out of the confines of the path, and onto the top of a hill.

  A stone structure, graceful white carved pillars and smooth white stone cupola, sat at the top of the hill.

  She studied the building for an instant. It was worn. Dust and debris littered the entryway, and birds' nests hung along the cornices and capitals. Some of the stonework was crumbling and showed no sign of having been disturbed in ages.

  "Temple, then—or shrine," she said. "Abandoned."

  It would do. She turned Windrush around and charged down the hill as fast as she dared, to go find the others.

  Amourgin had found that last bit of the trek too close to disaster for his liking. He was soaked to the knees from the water that had swirled around his boots. Still rising, he'd kept thinking. The fact that the regimental priest walked beside him most of the way, talking genially of books and scholarship, was nerve-wracking.

  Karah had urged them all on—"high ground," she'd said, "with shelter at the top." The three-moon tide, which had dried the lowlands at low tide, was racing them to the high ground as the darkness came on and two of the three moons crested the horizon and almost immediately disappeared behind the thick blanket of clouds. Then, shortly after, the third came up—the merest blink of white, before it too was gone—and the rise of the tide began to outstrip the company's forward progress. They were fighting not only distance but the pull of the surging water as well, and Amourgin thought they would be victims of the ultimate irony—to survive a shipwreck only to drown on land.

  They made the questionable safety of the thickets, and though water still tugged at them, still pulled at their feet and knees and dragged at them, they gained hope, and they marched fester, and fought harder. They made the spiraling path, and their feet rejoiced in those weary upward steps; they left the sea, at last, behind. Amourgin stepped foot into the open air at the top of the hill in time to see the last rays of the sun glimmer on the horizon, in the slit between the clouds and distant hills. Then true darkness fell.

  It was an odd place Karah had found, he thought. He knew of no religion that guarded its temples with mazes of thickets and bogs and tides. Plenty built on hills, but all in his knowledge built where people lived—for the religions were dependent on their worshipers… and on their worshipers' tithes.

  The building was nothing but a darker hulk against the black sky until several of the company found wood and tinder and one of the men brought out his salvaged slow-light and set them a merry blaze going. Then, as they sat around the fire and cheered their survival and their success, Amourgin sat back and watched the blaze dye the white stone to gold and send shadows flickering along the fluted columns.

  It was an astonishingly pretty temple… or shrine… or… Amourgin wasn't sure what to make of it. It had the feel of great age and of long abandonment. Someone had once cared a great deal about it—had carved stone in fanciful shapes and worked pictures into the walls. Had made it a place of beauty—and then had stuck it out of the reach of nearly every living thing. He wished he had a better idea of where in the world he was. If he knew that, he might have been able to make an educated guess about the builders.

  "Pretty, isn't it?" Bren asked.

  "Catches the imagination," Amourgin agreed. "I'd love the chance to look through it, maybe study the inscriptions. If I saw them, I might even be able to figure out where we were."

  Father Solmin heaved himself up and took a torch to look at the eaves. "Very old," he said "I think I recognized one or two of those glyphs—similar to something I saw in an Old Empire text once. A very old Old Empire text, from its early days; even the protective spells barely held it together."

  "What was the text about?" Amourgin asked, impressed He'd taken Solmin for a simple hedge-priest.

  The priest shrugged and smiled. "A survey of ancient history," he said. "Ancient to them, that is—and it was three thousand years old. Impossible to tell what in it was legendary. I hope most of it was legendary."

  "Maybe we should take a look inside," Amourgin said.

  "Tomorrow," Bren said. "No telling what serpents have made the place home. If you decide to stir them up, at least do it when you can see them as soon as they see you." He chuckled. "You'll have a more even chance that way."

  Amourgin said, "And that, sir, shall be my life's philosophy. Never seek fights with hidden snakes."

  All three laughed.

  The company was merry, in spite of the hardships of being shelterless, nearly without food or drink, and lost in unknown and possibly hostile countryside. Amourgin thought, Our needs are much simpler than we would think them. Air and solid ground, something to eat as opportunity presents, and a place to lay our heads at night. Like the rest of them, he made his bed on the ground and fell quickly to sleep.

  Amourgin woke again to find tendrils of mist curling around him, faint and luminous green in the starless dark. Their damp tips felt oddly solid and almost fleshy until they broke and drifted around him. He sat, shivering at their cold, damp touch.

  The wild white-eyed man sat at his side, crosslegged—perched through the middle of a sleeping soldier. The effect was awful, and Amourgin gave a strangled cry of shock.

  "Quiet," the spirit said, and pointed that gnarled, claw-tipped finger at him again. "Come with me. We will walk."

  "No," Amourgin said, but his body got up as if it had a will of its own and followed.

  "In there." The madman
pointed into the dark maw of the temple, which somehow didn't look as lovely and inviting as Amourgin had remembered. The delicate cornices and graceful pillars seemed twisted and malign to him, though they were unchanged in form. The carved forms in the friezes had come to life and watched him with glittering, malefic eyes.

  Magic in the temple! he thought. Idiot, idiot, you should have done a spell to bind the temple.

  Man and spirit walked under the arching doorway, into the first of a series of vaulted rooms. Amourgin could see their outlines running back, much further back, in fact, than he would have thought possible. The temple hadn't looked that large from outside.

  "What is this place?" he asked, so taken again by curiosity that he was willing to seek information even from the wild-eyed spirit who led him.

  "This is the House of the Gods."

  Amourgin looked around the first room, at several little wooden idols sitting on plain pillars. "Obviously. But which gods?"

  The spirit cackled. "These are the Youngest Gods. Mefitose is there—" he pointed to a statue of a crouching cat with an evil man's face, "—and there is Mother Hunger," and he pointed to a skeletal woman whose flat breasts sagged and whose needlelike teeth ripped to shreds the carved bodies of tiny, open-mouthed people. "Finally, that little toad is Patience."

  "I don't recognize any of those," Amourgin said, puzzled.

  "You'll meet them some day, I suspect. Though I don't suppose you'll like it when you do." The spirit cackled again and beckoned. "The young gods tend to be rabble. Come, come. We've far to go, and little time."

  Amourgin followed the radiant form. The two of them wandered deeper into the temple, and in every room, Amourgin noted, the trimmings became more lavish and the idols and images were of finer materials set in more elaborate shrines. The Youngest Gods in the front had gotten short shrift, he decided.

  "These are the Strong Gods," the old man said, answering his question before he asked it.

  Amourgin suddenly realized he recognized two of them. "That's Hoth-Hoth, the Shillraki god of prosperity," he said, startled "Right across from her are the Zesillan Furies." He stopped and frowned. "But—they aren't gods of the same religion. What sort of place is this?"

  The old man shook his head slowly. "This is the House of the Gods. I already told you that" His voice became shrill. "There is something you must see. Hurry."

  More rooms followed, one after another after another, deeper and deeper. Still there was no end of rooms in sight. "The Great Gods," the spirit muttered, and the two of them hurried past The Three, carved of gold and set in shrines of gold and silk and gemstones, and that Tarinese nightmare, It of the Thousand Faces, as richly formed and honored.

  "Blasphemy," Amourgin muttered He made to dash the idol of the Thousand-Faced Monstrosity to the ground, but the clawed hand of his ghostly guide clutched his back with surprising strength.

  "Touch nothing," the old man said.

  "Why are the true gods in the same room with that abortion?" the law-speaker demanded.

  "They are contemporaries." The old man shrugged and hurried onward. After a moment, he added, "Relatively speaking," and tittered, finding something about that tremendously funny.

  "Why me?" Amourgin said plaintively. "We've got a priest along."

  "He would be too narrowly partisan," the old man said. "Shut up."

  Still deeper they went, now almost running.

  Each room back became progressively darker and dustier, and the gaudy trappings that had been so sumptuous in the room of The Three, were moldering and tattered. The idols were dust-coated, the metals tarnished. The smell of rot and mildew, which had been faint initially, became overpowering.

  The spirit slowed, and began peering into the face of each idol they passed "The Forgotten Gods," he said as he walked.

  Amourgin thought he could have figured that out by himself. Gods gone to seed, he thought. Beggars and bums. He was awed by the sheer numbers of them. The temple still went back as far as his eye could see. There was no end of forgotten gods.

  "Ahah!" the madman shrieked, and Amourgin jumped. "Here, here, here!" he yelled again. He jumped and pointed at one dusty old idol, and when Amourgin didn't comment, turned to see why.

  Amourgin stared at the god the spirit had found, but he could find nothing about the idol that would logically explain his guides excitement. The idol was formed of some dull grey metal; the subject was a priapic, round-cheeked statue with a leering grin and vacant eyes that crouched over a mound of cogs and wires. This idol was no more attractive or appealing than any of the rest of the sorry lot of forgotten gods, and perhaps less so.

  "What about him?" the law-speaker asked.

  "He's Heinous."

  "Yes, he is—but what does that have to do with me?"

  "He's the god Heinous, you idiot."

  Amourgin put on an air of righteous indignation. "Since he's a forgotten god, I could hardly be expected to know that, could I? Wonderful name for a god, anyway."

  The old man wasn't mollified. "In his time, he was the greatest of all the gods, and heinous once meant the same thing as majestic. The language has changed since then. Back in his time, he was the Overgod, as well as being God of Lust and Invention."

  Amourgin grinned at the idol. "Lust and invention, eh? Certainly an obvious pairing in my mind."

  "Don't mock Heinous gifted his worshipers with wondrous devices; machines that flew across the sky and sailed under the sea, that created wondrous food out of the air and turned the basest of ingredients into rare gems and noble metals."

  "Probably gifted his worshipers with lots of little worshipers, too," Amourgin muttered.

  The spirit heard him and gave him a hard look. "They didn't complain."

  "I'm sure they didn't Old man—if that is what you are—why have you dragged me in here in the dark of night to stare at a dusty old idol of a forgotten god?"

  "Because one of his devices still exists, and you are going to have to wake him from his long slumber to ask him for the key."

  Amourgin looked from the dusty idol to the spirit of the mad old man and back. "Wake him? Now, wait. What is this device? Why do I want it? Why do I want the key—" He stopped and crossed his arms over his chest "No. There are a lot of things you're going to have to explain before I go waking up sleeping gods, old man."

  The spirit turned to Amourgin, eyes blazing. His voice, which had quavered with the frailty of great age, was suddenly huge and hollow and booming as he roared, "You will not ask questions, nor will you make demands, little mortal. The gods have brought you to this place, and you are alive only because they have something for you to do. Otherwise, you would be at the bottom of the sea feeding fishes with the rest of your comrades. You will wake Heinous, and you will win his favor."

  Amourgin looked at the spirit, who had stretched during that tirade to three times his size, and who filled the room, blazing with angry red light—and he decided cooperating would probably be a good idea.

  "Right I'll wake him." He sighed. "How do I wake him?"

  "You worship him."

  Amourgin arched an eyebrow and studied the leering grin and outthrust member of the forgotten god, and said, "Just what sort of worship does old Heinous prefer?"

  "Candles, hymns, dancing girls, sacrifices… the usual sort of thing."

  "No doubt. And here I am, not a candle or a dancing girl to my name—"

  "SING… TO… HIM!"

  "O Heinous, O Heinous," sang Amourgin, improvising fast,

  "How heinous is your name,

  And far will spread your fame,

  And this song sure is lame.

  Glory, glory, glori-i-i-ia-a-a-a-a-a…"

  He stopped singing and sort of hummed while he squinted at the idol. Old Heinous was looking brighter. His trappings weren't quite as shabby as they had been, either.

  "SING," the old man snarled.

  "Glory, glory, glori-i-i-i-a-a-a-a-a-a."

  Amourgin faked another couple o
f verses, fitting in everything he could think of about inventions and women, and hitting the Heinous motif as hard as he dared without raising the suspicions of the crotchety old ghost.

  There was no doubt the attention was paying off. Heinous positively gleamed, and Amourgin thought he recognized the metal in the statue as platinum. Worth a lot of money, platinum, he thought. Wonder if Heinous would like to come home with his worshiper—

  "WHO CALLETH MY NAME?" a voice bellowed out of the ether.

  Amourgin jumped.

  "Say something, you idiot," the old man hissed.

  "Ah!" To the best of his knowledge, Amourgin had never spoken directly to a god. "I do, your—your, ah, Heinousness."

  "WHAT IS THY NAME, O MAN WHO IS BORN TO DIE?"

  Ever cheerful, those gods. I certainly hope he doesn't mean right now. Amourgin cleared his throat "Amourgin Thurdhad, law-speaker of Olmya."

  "WHERE ARE MY OTHER WORSHIPERS, AMOURGIN THRUGHEAD?"

  Thrughead? Amourgin frowned. Heinous was one of those gods. "I'm it," he said, and realized when he did it that some of the snappishness he felt had come out in his intonation. He hoped Heinous didn't notice.

  Heinous didn't. Instead, he yelped, "ONE! I HAVE ONE WORSHIPER?! THIS IS PREPOSTEROUS!"

  Until a few minutes ago, you didn't have any, Amourgin thought.

  "IS THAT SO?" the godsvoice rumbled. "THOU SEEMS TO THINK, PUNY MORTAL, THAT I SHOULD BE GRATEFUL TO HAVE ONE ACOLYTE—I, WHO ONCE HELD THE WHOLE OF THE WORLD AT MY FEET AND BALANCED THE SUN AND THE MOONS ON MY SHOULDERS, AND SWALLOWED THE CONTINENTS FOR MY BREAKFAST AND DRANK THE OCEANS TO WASH THEM DOWN."

  Amourgin thought it patently unfair that the god could read his mind—but he tried not to think it too loudly. "I didn't mean anything by that, glorious Heinous."

  The gods volume dropped, finally, to a tolerable level. "No, probably not," he agreed. "And I suppose I should be grateful, since thy worship and praise have rescued me from complete obscurity." The god sighed windily. "Once, long ago, I blessed my faithful with wondrous blessings. Would thou like a blessing, Amigrin Thudded?"

  "You would like a blessing," the ghost prompted.