Gate of the Gods: Book 5 of The Windows of Heaven

by K. G. Powderly Jr.

Lugalbanda replied to his son, “It is good that you made friends with these people quickly, once you saw your mistake.”

  One of the fish-men said to Lugalbanda, “I pray you, do not be hard on the lad. Many of the people with him were much older, and unable to speak intelligibly. Your son is to be commended for holding this city together as well as he did for so many weeks, before we arrived.”

  Lugalbanda’s voice was cordial. “Yes, of course. Have you heard from any of the other Sun Ships?”

  The two fish-men glanced at each other. “You know of us?”

  “Yes. I was fortunate enough to be unaffected by the brain fever, which struck Uruk while I was away north,” Lugalbanda said it so smoothly that even Suinne almost believed him.

  One of the fish-men said, “It’s just that you are the only other one we’ve met. We’d given up hope, until a message came in from a landing party that went up river to a town called Surupag. We heard from there yesterday that the Zhui’Sudra and one of his sons is safe. Nobody else seems to remember us at all. Rather discouraging after all we went through…”

  Lugalbanda said, “Yes, I’m sure it is.”

  The fish-man seemed quite talkative. “Captain Haviri went upriver early this morning to join the M’El-Ki at this Surupag place—got word that his wife and sons were there; some people have all the luck! Me, I’m from Clan Aram. They say my folks have moved to the upper Ufratsi. Figures…”

  Lugalbanda’s voice spoke inside Suinne’s mind like a volcano erupting in his skull: “Getting an earful, Old Monster?”

  Suinne almost answered aloud.

  “Stay silent!” said the inner voice. “Listen all you want, but report to me anything you hear from the others when I am not present. Nod if you understand.”

  Suinne nodded.

  “Good. Now you go back to Kush and Saeba, and say your farewells to them. Like the woman, there will soon be boatmen who speak Kush’s new language. Watch and learn, Old Monster, for there are monsters abroad, older and more cunning than you are.”

  The other fish-man—the not-so-talkative one—collapsed. His startled companion stopped yakking, and bent over his friend. When he spoke again, his voice sounded frightened.

  “He’s burning up with fever!”

  Suinne wanted to scream, but feared that if he let himself, he would never be able to stop.

  87

  The wurm packs at the last river mouth had left Psydon less than half of his remaining men. For that blood price, the remnant of the Sun Ship Paru’Ainu had gorged on raw meat, salted what they could not eat, and filled their water-skins with those taken from their fallen comrades. Now the skins were almost empty again. The only reason they had survived this far, since that last watering place, was that the abnormal darkness dumped its foul tasting, yet drinkable, rains on them a little more often. The skies had since cleared, and with the sun, came days of heat, dehydration, and phantasms.

  Night fell, and so did the men.

  Soon, the others slept in the silver sands, while Psydon watched the flat, greasy waters of another in a line of dead seas in the empty Sink-lands. The superstitious believed these fluid mirrors were the very Mouths of Under-world. Psydon decided that superstition must be the new truth. A full moon glistened like venom, a poisoned light on the waters. Curly firefly dots danced over the still-hot sands, between his resting place and the dark beach. Over the toxic waters, the sky suddenly flared to a garish red in the north.

  Seconds later, a thunderclap hit Psydon on his face like the slap of a hot hand made from air. The others did not stir, as doubtless the partition between exhaustion and death grew thinner each night. Somewhere beyond the oily sea, a volcano had erupted—perhaps a whole line of them. It might as well have been the cracking of Under-world’s doors, with a light left burning for Psydon. Nothing lived in the sink deserts, or in their acrid seas, yet a big, black something now wiggled through the water, toward Psydon’s sleepless eyes. What new delirium was this?

  The snakelike shape curled up from the slime onto the sand by Psydon’s head; a pulsing shadow made out of living darkness. A week ago, he would have been terrified. Now, he felt nothing but weak resignation, as if the thing had somehow drained his will, and future eternity in its loathsome grip seemed as inevitable as the coming sunrise in a few hours.

  “What are you?” Psydon managed to ask with his last resolve.

  A voice answered out of the snake-shaped void, dead as the sea it had risen from; “I am the suicide of civilization; the rot that remains. My name is Rahab and Lotan—whom your forebears called ‘Leviathan.’”

  “Are we dying, then?”

  “You have always been dying. The only question has been exactly when, and exactly how the process will complete itself.”

  “Are we dying now, then?”

  “That depends.”

  “On what?”

  “On what you are willing to do for me.”

  “What do you want me to do for you?”

  Psydon felt only the relief of a terror delayed when it told him.

  88

  Surupag was abuzz.

  Palqui only understood a fraction of the talk he heard around him, but from what he had learned over the weeks since his fever broke, that was more than most of the people convalescing with him could claim—or at least claim intelligibly. Poor Lomina picked up even less than he did, and his brother Yoktani, somewhat more. The chatter threatened to overload Palqui’s senses, but he forced himself to listen anyway. Sometimes too many sounds beat against his skin like it was a drum.

  Yokti appeared at his elbow, with Loma and Mother. Mother motioned for Palqui to follow them.

  “Happening is what?” Palqui fought to say.

  His brother said. “Father’s boat approaches from the south.”

  Mother ran on ahead to the strand, which shimmered like diamonds in the long absent sunshine. Her two sons, with Lomina, lingered at the mouth of the palace courtyard. Then Palqui started to follow.

  That was when the sentry’s ram horn sounded from the north, its screech penetrating Palqui’s skull like a howling asag.

  Everyone froze, except Mother, who continued around the brick palace for the riverbank. When the horn stopped, the lookout shouted several words unfamiliar to Palqui, but the young seer was certain that he caught the man’s meaning. The sounds of hooves and marching feet soon confirmed it.

  Armed riders approached the settlement from the north road.

  Palqui nudged his wife and brother toward the riverbank after their mother. At least they might escape over the water in one of the boats if the army to the north proved hostile. He glanced above his head and saw the ripple in the afternoon air caused by his “Glow,” which did nothing to reveal even the state of his own emotions. He had somehow lost the ability to tell whether the Glow ultimately made him more confident or more afraid. Right now, his guess leaned toward “afraid.” His heart thudded in his ears. Only the words of Melchi Shemi gave him any peace at all.

  The continued presence of the Glow, which only he could see, now, seemed one minute a sure confirmation of the Great God’s presence, and the next, certain evidence of his own insanity. He reckoned one thing good, as he and Loma scrambled down onto the riverbank; the Glow did not brighten, as it always had just before horrible things began to happen. Perhaps he would tell Father Shemi about the Glow next time they talked. Surely, a man who was older than the world, yet still in the prime of his strength, would have wisdom to help him, even if many of his sayings were far over Palqui’s head.

  Palqui and the others gathered around Mother, watching the poling boat approach shore. Standing in its bows, his father, Heberi, looked much the same as he had when Palqui had last seen him as a boy, a quarter century ago. Mother jumped up and down and waved, while Yokti’s hatchet-blade face stood impassive. Palqui found his brother difficult to read since the Change. Perhaps Yokti’s lack of emotion stemmed from him being so young when Father left. Perhaps Palqui misread his brother
’s expression—after all, sometimes Palqui could not even tell people apart by their faces, let alone their expressions. In many ways, his world had gone gray.

  For right now, however, he knew his own father’s face, and for Palqui, that was enough; even with a hostile army gathering on the north perimeter about to overrun Surupag.

  89

  U’Sumi and T’Qinna were about to join the greeters down on the strand, when the northern watch alarm sounded.

  U’Sumi pushed through the curtain of their room, into the courtyard, but could see nothing. He poked his head back inside, and said to his wife, “Get my father down to the landing, and if you hear the alarm that we are under attack, get into one of the boats with him, and escape across the river.”

  She moved to obey.

  Only then did U’Sumi race out into the yard, and around the northern wing of the tiny palace, toward the guard post. His brother Khumi joined him from the far side of the building.

  Across the grazing field along a row of palms, a large company of riders sat still, mounted on a form of giant onager that U’Sumi had never seen before. Certainly, it had to be the man he had trusted with far too much; the last man he would have suspected of treachery—the man who, even after hearing the testimony of his own wife and father, a part of him still could not quite believe had betrayed him. But Nimurta was not at the head of the host.

  Iyapeti dismounted from a beast almost as large as a small unicorn, and ran toward his brothers.

  U’Sumi yelled for the watch to sound the “all-clear, friend” note just before his older brother smothered him and his younger sibling in a bear hug more like a friendly wrestler’s hold.

  “How did you know I had returned?” U’Sumi asked, once ‘Peti let up on his embrace enough to let him breathe.

  Iyapeti laughed. “I had no idea. I only knew that Uruk was held by enemy forces, and that this new Surupag had been built along the main channel, north of it, as a hostage city holding Pahp and your wives. Last year, I met a young seer named Palqui…”

  U’Sumi blurted over him. “That boy gets around!”

  “You’ve met him already?”

  “He’s here. Got the sickness, but he’s recovering.”

  ‘Peti cocked his enormous head. “That’s crazy; why would E’Yahavah strike his own messenger?”

  Khumi said, “Maybe his message isn’t for us, but the stricken.”

  His younger brother’s words hit U’Sumi like an epiphany. “I think ‘Umi’s onto something, there. From what T’Qinna tells me, even the stricken who can still speak the Language can only do so as small children. Palqui’s name means division, but maybe he is also the Bridge that spans the Divide.”

  The brothers began to walk toward the palace as some of either Khumi’s or U’Sumi’s men saw to their mounts, and Iyapeti’s men began to organize their camp in the North Field. The women and their father approached from out of the tiny “palace” courtyard.

  Iyapeti asked, “What do you mean, ‘a bridge that spans the divide?’”

  “T’Qinna and I have been meeting with Palqui. He’s been through a lot, and he struggles like one of the stricken. Perhaps sometimes it takes a child to speak to other children.”

  90

  No large feast accompanied the Great Conference in Surupag’s modest palace library. Hunter-gathering parties raided granaries from the nearest abandoned tent towns to survive the Big Wave, just to feed the new army. Almost none of the old Council Saars remained, aside from the surviving Firstborn of the Boat of a Million Years, but ragtag new chieftains crowded the tiny study to standing room only. Palqui felt strange participating with the Great Ones, and understood only half of what he heard.

  He also felt guilty because he had forgotten to mention the continuing presence of the Glow to Father Shemi and Mother Pyrrha, as he knew he should have by now. The idea scared him a little, but it seemed that every time he had tried, something had always happened to distract either him or his ancestors.

  The Father of All, hoary No-Ach, sat on his couch, while Father Kham spread maps at his feet, and Fathers Shemi and Yapheth discussed the scribblings on the many scrolls. All Palqui knew was what Shemi and his father had told him, before the gathering started; that they were dividing the lands of the Earth to all the tribes of Man. What he did not understand was how the Three Patriarchs would convince the scattering tribes, none of which understood one another, to go along with the scribbling on their nice new maps. No doubt, Father Shemi would think of something.

  Palqui also recognized one of Yapheth’s descendants, Aeolis, as someone he had once known in the increasingly dream-like Before-Life, although now he could not understand a word the man said. It seemed that his face had somehow changed, too. A light of rudimentary mutual recognition sparked between him and Aeolis when they shook hands, but nothing more. It was hard enough that Loma was no longer really Loma. How do I find common memories with this stranger?

  Once the room became crowded, Palqui’s mind began playing tricks again. The Glow that only he could see began to flicker. The faces of all the men, except hoary No-Ach, shifted madly, until they all appeared identical. He could still tell that Yapheth was tall and muscular, and that Iovan the father of Aeolis stooped, had silver hair, and only one eye, but beyond gross distinctions of color, height, and girth, Palqui was lost in a tiny room packed with rumbling men, who all had the same face under the flickering Glow. Panic grabbed at his stomach; until he pushed past two of the clay-doll slot-faced figures, into the courtyard, folded over, and lost his breakfast.

  A gentle hand touched his shoulder as Palqui began to weep.

  The hand pulled him tenderly to his feet. Through his tears, he saw that it was the kindly leopard woman; Mother Pyrrha, whose real name Palqui once knew, back when he was a man, and not the lesser being he had become since the Glow started tailing him.

  Her musically accented voice touched him, and his panic fled. “What happened, Palqui?”

  “All men have the same face!” It sounded crazy even to him. There was so little that did not anymore.

  “And do the faces sometimes change, as before?”

  “Yes. And my seeing is sometimes that each face matches the right person, too—just not inside there.” He jabbed his finger at the library, as if it had caused the madness at work in his own head. He wanted to blame it on the Glow, but that only made him feel guilty, because he had not mentioned the Glow to her before. So many needed mentionings are too much to recall!

  Mother Pyrrha gently tugged on his mantle, “Come along with me to a quiet place, Palqui, away from too much sight and sound.”

  She led him down by the river, where the waters quietly lapped past the reed boats. The slightly overcast sky muted colors and contrasts, so the sun did not harshly shimmer off the channel.

  “You are not going mad, Palqui. You have been given the spirit of a sound mind, not fear.” Her words, as well as her very voice, seemed to heal.

  “But men’s faces shift and change sometimes. Words are different. Voices speak jabber when no one is near. I cannot have the speaks with Mother and Father, even with my wife, at times too many! I can’t have the speaks with you too much. Too high! Too high! And then there’s the Glow!”

  Pyrrha sat him down on a log by the boats. She spoke as if she had not heard him mention the Glow; “The breath of spirit and mind is not the same as the brain you must use to express the thoughts and feelings of your mind with. The brain is material—made of earth-clay. The spirit and mind are non-material—information and will—coming from E’Yahavah’s breath.”

  Palqui could not make out what she said, though he sensed that in the dream-like Before-Time, he might have understood her easily. “Brain?”

  “Yes, Palqui, in your head. Your brain exputiosly ananimastical of your mind. E’Huwawah breathes topoblastcally eskab mind.”

  “Only know brain, breath, and mind. Other words not know I.”

  Her eyes grew large and sad. “You have
a good mind, Palqui, and a kind heart, but your brain needs time to heal. Does that make sense?”

  Palqui nodded.

  “The faces changing are just a trick of the brain, not a Divine curse.”

  Palqui said, “Brain makes my eyes see things wrong?”

  She smiled. “Yes. I think it will happen less and less, but it may happen sometimes for a long while yet.”

  “What about voices of watching demons? They chatter, and I hear! And the Glow! The Glow follows and burns!”

  “As it is with your eyes, so it is with your ears. Sounds and light will sometimes seem strange to you. Your brain needs time to heal. But you are still a seer of E’Yahavah. We all saw the Divine fire resting over you when you first arrived—that was not just your brain. He will give you wisdom to know when it is your brain, when he speaks to you, and when to fight in his Spirit against evil Watchers who speak perverse things that frighten you. You will overcome this because you are his seer.”

  He looked up from the sand, into her green eyes. “Seer?”

  “Yes. But first you need a season of rest and healing.”

  91

  The conference had gone on for nearly two weeks, but today let out early by mutual agreement. Everyone noticed that Pahpi Nu seemed to tire more quickly each day it dragged on.

  T’Qinna looked forward to an evening with her Deukal’Uinne—New-Wine Sailor—a pet name she had called her husband since the World-that-Was. It amused her ironically that the silly bit of sentimental sonnetry was not her own, but part of a final message she had received from her old priestess mentor from sunken Aztlan, of all people. Mnemosynae the daughter of Prometu had always been a romantic, despite living in a place designed to destroy any positive expression of romance.

  T’Qinna’s old teacher had sent her a private imaging orb on a day of terror that had turned into one of bittersweet joy, not long before the Deluge had swept away the old woman’s world. A handwritten note accompanied the device. It had read: