by Terry Carr
“I know,” said Jordan. “But I’ve met millipedes before, and I remember they were always having hunches about what was going to happen. I used to play Go with one of them, and it always beat me.’
Jordan stood by the boat, staring down at the millipede. Jordan was very tall, and the boat bobbed in the water at his feet. Nikki decided that she didn’t like looking up at him; she said to the attendant, “Will you cast us off, please?”
The attendant nodded and walked across the rough planks of the dock to the winch that anchored their boat. He pressed a metal plate, and the boat’s cable retracted into a slot in the bow. The gravity engines started up with a low hum.
As the boat moved away from the dock, Nikki said, “Jordan, I think you’re just mad at me. Don’t take it out on poor Robin.”
Jordan looked anxious. “No, I’m worried. The millipede said it knew things we don’t—”
The boat drifted out into the river current and began to move lazily downstream. Nikki called, “You’re just mad at me. Admit it, Jordan, admit it!”
The teacher stood helplessly as the boat moved farther out into the river. It was cool out here on the water; Nikki breathed a long sigh of pleasure. She saw Jordan waving goodbye, and she waved back.
Appeal to their better nature, she thought. Make them feel guilty.
Beside her, Robin leaned forward and said to the millipede, “Jordan really was wrong, wasn’t he? He thinks you can see the future or something, I bet.”
The millipede turned for a moment to look at Robin with its great dark eyes. It smiled briefly. Cool; the air at water level was cool.
“I do see the future,” said the millipede. “Do not be afraid.”
The boat began to rush headlong down the river, picking up speed as it entered the midstream current and raced toward the cataracts and the Abyss.
It was early afternoon when Gregorian arrived at the Cathedral of the Five Elements. He parked his cart under cool pine trees and walked to the Cathedral entrance, studying the massive chimney that dominated the building. Nearly ten meters high, he guessed; but he recognized the regulator at the chimney top as a type that drew air smoothly. Good, he thought; the fire will have enough height.
He went inside and found himself in a foyer built of ancient woods. There was a young couple waiting there, neither of them yet twenty years old, both dressed in outlander styles. They sat on a bench in the corner, obviously awed by their surroundings. Gregorian noticed them casting covert glances his way.
He decided to be polite to them. “Love to you,” he said. “I have to see the priestess, Salamander—do you know if she’s around?”
The young woman said eagerly, “Oh yes—we saw her. Right, Salvator? Just a few minutes ago.”
“Yes,” said the young man. “She went past the doorway there, and she nodded to us.” He was shorter than Gregorian, with a stocky body and a round face. Blond hair.
“We have an audience with her today,” said the woman. “But she’s busy getting ready for the service tonight. Did you know that they broadcasted her meditation this morning? She saw that thing that’s coming up out of the Abyss, and she recognized it. It’s the Beast! Really scary, but she’ll know how to deal with it.”
Gregorian decided that the woman’s mouth was too wide. “Is she in there?” he asked, nodding toward the chapel.
“Yes, but she can’t be interrupted. There’s an apprentice around somewhere.”
“I’ll wait for her,” Gregorian said. He began to wander around the foyer, looking at icons of water and fire gods that dated back centuries. He recognized one of the fire gods as Sathana, the Devouring Mother; he’d been interested in her when he was in art school because she was a patron saint of fire sculptors. The terra-cotta statuette of her that sat on a shelf here was crude; its face was hardly distinguishable in the flames. But it was old, Gregorian thought—molecular glazing had been abandoned over two hundred years ago.
I’ll give them points for purity, he thought, but none for art.
A young boy was standing in the doorway to the chapel, gazing at him with large eyes. The apprentice, Gregorian decided. He’d seen the boy when he was here before.
He went to him, looking into hazel eyes. “My name is Gregorian,” he said. “The priestess will want to see me right away.”
The boy continued to stare at him. Such naked awe in his eyes, Gregorian thought; the green in his eyes shone even in the dim light of the foyer.
“You’re the man who creates Fire tonight,” said the boy at last. “Yes, come with me.” He turned and led the way through the doorway into the chapel, and Gregorian followed.
The young outlander woman called after the boy, “You won’t forget that we have an audience, will you?” She’s so anxious, Gregorian thought. A gaunt, nervous woman. Of course she’s devoutly religious.
The apprentice didn’t answer her; casting occasional glances over his shoulder at Gregorian, the boy led him through the packed-dirt chapel and around to the side, where a thick wooden door stood ajar. The boy stopped beside the door, rapped twice and motioned him inside.
Gregorian went in. The room was tiny, barely three meters on a side; there were no windows, but a candle danced in one corner. Part of a personal shrine, Gregorian noticed. Devotion and utility combined in a candle; he liked that.
The priestess came forward, flame-red hair and a dramatic white cape. Very sexy, except that she was so thin, so small. Nikki would make two of her.
The priestess held out her hand, and after a moment’s hesitation Gregorian knelt to kiss her bracelet. Even on his knees, Gregorian came up to her breasts.
“I hope your Fire will be a large one,” said the priestess. “We will have an important ceremony tonight.”
Gregorian frowned as he stood up again. “You didn’t tell me that yesterday. How large is large?”
The priestess shrugged and waved a dismissive hand. “No matter. Fire will make its own space in the darkness, whatever its size or shape.” She smiled gravely. “There will be a message tonight, you see—a rather frightening one. We will need the warmth of Fire.”
“Oh, it’ll be warm enough,” Gregorian said. “I figured you’d want that, so I used chemicals that will—”
“I appreciate that,” said Salamander, turning away. She stood facing her shrine for a moment, her long hair catching the candlelight and spreading it into a halo of fire. “Were you tuned in this morning when my vision was broadcast?” she asked.
He shook his head. “I was working.”
“And you don’t pick up broadcasts when you work? Many artists do, I’ve heard.”
Gregorian felt impatient; he wanted to get the fire laid and go home, look for Nikki—“Not me,” he said. “Sometimes I get echoes, because fire sculpting is a preconscious process like any other art, but I concentrate too deeply on what I’m doing to pick up anything more.” He looked around and saw that the door still stood ajar; outside he saw the open space of the great Cathedral and the high chimney that dominated one wall. “Shall I start?”
Salamander turned back to him, nodding. “By all means.” She followed him as he went through the door into the Cathedral; he heard the soft rustle of her cape behind him. He went to the fireplace and stood looking up at the chimney, hands on his hips. Yes, it was as he’d remembered it: a wide hearth set above the level of the Cathedral floor, tapering into a conventional-sized chimney. All built of atom-pressed brick—good, it would take the heat he needed for his fire.
“I’ll bring in my materials,” he said, starting for the foyer. But the apprentice stepped through the door, one of Gregorian’s heavy chemical boxes in each hand. The boy paused as his eyes adjusted to the darkness, and Gregorian took the metal boxes from him.
The apprentice immediately turned and went outside again—going for the woods and plastics, obviously. He can’t be more than ten, Gregorian thought. Best to start them young, I guess.
“Erich is anxious today,’‘’ said the p
riestess, frowning after the boy. “He saw my vision this morning, you see.”
Gregorian nodded without interest and set about placing the chemical injectors high inside the Cathedral hearth. He used a timed bonding cement that would release the injectors when he came back for them tomorrow—an expensive cement, but Gregorian had designed these injectors himself and didn’t want to leave them behind. They would shoot precisely measured streams of chemical at the exact angles and times for which he preset them, feeding colors and fuel to shape his flames.
The priestess stood watching as he worked, her eyes grave. After a while she asked, “Did you also not tune to the broadcast from those people who were flying in the Abyss?”
He pressed one of the injectors against the hearth wall and waited for its cement to set. “I worked all morning,” he said. “Didn’t tune in to a thing.”
“Then you have no idea what’s happening to us,” said Salamander.
Gregorian released an injector, tested it and saw that it would hold. He turned to look at the priestess. She was staring at him as though he were dying before her eyes—a look of tragedy, melodrama. He drew his tape measure from a blouse pocket and began checking to make sure the injector angles were right. “I don’t have any idea about anything,” he said.
The apprentice returned, his arms loaded with wooden logs and blocks. Gregorian took them from the boy quickly, afraid he might drop and break one of the smaller pieces. The apprentice went back outside for more, while Gregorian separated the wood by type; redwood, eucalyptus, cedar, oak and more. Each would burn at its own rate and its own height; some had been treated with grain expansion or contraction techniques to emphasize their individual properties.
“Our city faces a terrible threat,” said Salamander. “Not only to our souls, but to our physical beings as well. All of Cirque could be destroyed in an hour. This is what you missed seeing in the broadcasts, because you were working.”
Gregorian began putting up the graph-paper charts he had drawn, spreading them against the face of the chimney and bonding them with temporary cement that would evaporate in half an hour. “Is that what your temple believes?” he asked politely. “A day of judgment is coming? My temple says that too—I’m with the Pragmatic Temple of the Apocalypse.”
He wasn’t; Gregorian had no temple. The Pragmatic Temple was Nikki’s faith, but sometimes he went with her to services.
The priestess stepped closer, her face growing stern. “This is no dogma that I tell you—I had a vision this morning as I meditated. I was in truth when I saw it.” She paused, then sat down on the step in front of the hearth. She studied Gregorian’s face as he spread charts against the great chimney. “You have never had a religious experience in your life, have you?” she said.
“Of course I have,” Gregorian said. He read numbers from the charts and pressed tiny buttons on the side of one of the chemical injectors. As he set each number he imagined a stream of chemical jetting outward into the fire, saw black flames spurt upward, tinged with silver, saw a deep red grow in the heart of the fire, spreading until it enveloped all the flames. Another number, and a single tongue of fire rose up, coiling sinuously. “Artists aren’t a breed apart, you know,” he told the priestess. “We’re human; we have our hopes and fears. We believe in things.”
Salamander smiled faintly. “Yes, but I know of the Pragmatic Temple of the Apocalypse. You are no member of that faith.”
Gregorian paused, looking over his shoulder at her. “Why not?”
“Because you are no cynic,” she said.
He laughed. “Oh, lady, you ought to see me at service. I bring my lunch.”
The first chemical injector was completely set; Gregorian went to the one on the left of the hearth. Again he read numbers from his charts and pressed buttons. Salamander watched him silently, no longer smiling.
The apprentice returned with the rest of his materials: the plastics, the curved and flowing materials made of controlled atoms. They weren’t really controlled; that was only the name of the process, a boast by a manufacturer who’d gone out of business decades ago. The colors and shapes of their flames weren’t as reliable as those of wood, but they did enable Gregorian to create effects that wood could never provide. He helped Erich as the boy set down his load gently, and then Gregorian began to sort the pieces.
Erich backed away, but then hesitated. “The people from Springs Crossing are still waiting to see you,” he said to Salamander.
“They must be patient,” the priestess said. Erich bowed his head and left.
Gregorian wondered why the priestess chose to stay and watch him lay his fire. He found her presence a bit disturbing. For one thing, he was never at ease in a temple, whatever the faith, and priestesses, gurus, rabbis only added to his unease. He always felt they were judging him.
Besides, he was uncomfortably aware of Salamander as a woman. Her red hair was like the embers of a fire, ready to burst into renewed life whenever light touched it. Her mouth was full-lipped and sensual, the more so because of her quiet, contained manner.
Gregorian shook his head, still sorting the plastics. This woman was a priestess; she believed in forces beyond reason, deities who secretly controlled the world’s destiny. He didn’t like irrational people; he certainly never found them sexually attractive. In any case, Salamander was too slight, an abridged version of a woman.
“Those people outside are anxious to see you,” he said.
“They will calm as they wait,” she said with a slight shrug. “I have never seen Fire fashioned by a professional. Fire is the manifestation of one of our deities.”
Gregorian finished sorting his materials. He stepped to the chimney face and studied one of the charts there. The detonators first, yes. He selected a dozen egg-shaped plastics and laid them under the giant grate in a spiral trail.
“You must feel the Spirit within Fire,” Salamander said. “I imagine artists must always do their work through some sort of contact with Spirit.”
Gregorian liked her voice; it was soft and husky. He wondered what she would sound like leading a chant.
“The only spirit I deal with is an artistic one,” he said. “My own.” He glanced around at her; she still sat on the step before the hearth, legs drawn up under her rust-colored skirt. Her white cape made her seem ghostly in the dimness. “One reason I like the Pragmatic Temple,” he told her, “is that they recognize that everyone has the spark in them. At least they know that much.”
He realized that he was beginning to attack her faith, so he turned back abruptly to the hearth. He reached for the smaller wood and began to lay sticks and blocks in a careful geometric pattern.
Salamander said, “But if everyone contains Spirit, then each of us has the responsibility of using it properly. You see? And so many people do not. We betray the Spirit within us; we feed on hatred and selfishness, and then we go to a temple and say, ‘I regret this part of my life; I cast it into the Abyss.’ And we assume it is gone forever, but it is not.”
“Sure, it’s hypocrisy,” Gregorian said. He was surprised that she’d admit so much; her temple cast the sins of its followers into the Abyss just as all of them did. Or was she beginning to question her beliefs?
What had happened this morning, anyway?
The first level of the fire was finished. Gregorian looked again at his charts and placed several larger pieces of wood and plastic on top of his base arrangement. Then he began to lay in joists and buttresses: the next level would be a few decimeters higher, leaving air for the fire to breathe.
Behind him Salamander said, “I have never seen hypocrisy in anyone. But I do see ignorance—people who are not aware of truth or of themselves. So they act irrationally.”
Gregorian laughed suddenly, amused at her definition of rationality. He sat back on his haunches and looked at her; she smiled at his laughter. There was gold in her eyes.
He took a breath and asked, “What happened this morning? What did I miss?”
“You should not ask me,” Salamander said. “You would only believe that what I told you was hallucination.” She smiled slowly, still holding his eyes. “I have already told you that Cirque may be destroyed—physically, not in any spiritual sense. You did not believe me. And you do not believe me now.”
She dropped her eyes, and the warmth left him. He wanted to tell her that he believed her, that of course he believed her; he wanted the contact of their eyes to be possible again. But he knew better, so he turned back to his fire sculpture and began to cement the buttresses into place.
One on the right side of the construction, another on the left, and smaller joists in the center. They would burn too, of course; it was all part of the fire. So too were the wire-thin beams he screwed into place to help balance the materials to be piled above; they would burn in their time, at their rate.
He began the second level of the fire, carefully placing wood and plastic pieces atop joists and beams, balancing them against each other and cementing several together after they were in place. The construction began to resemble an apartment building for birds, each cubicle open to the air. But textures and colors were mismatched; and there was no coherent shape; as architecture it was preposterous.
You have to be able to see what it’ll produce, not what it looks like now, Gregorian thought. That’s the mystic part of fire sculpture, the part that transcends ordinary perception; you have to be able to see the possibilities inside things.
Then he thought: Maybe that’s what Salamander means by a religious experience. If so, then I have them all the time.
The priestess watched him studying his skeletal construction. She said, “Tell me about your Fire. Will it be grand, will it be awesome? I have seen several of your Fires, you know; they have grace.”