by Anthology
She came to the river's edge and reviewed him from top to toe. "Now you are built more like a man," she said, in her lovely, lingering voice.
"You see, the experiment was successful," he answered, smiling gaily.
Oceaxe continued looking him over. "Did some woman give you that ridiculous robe?"
"A woman did give it to me"--dropping his smile--"but I saw nothing ridiculous in the gift at the time, and I don't now."
"I think I'd look better in it."
As she drawled the words, she began stripping off the skin, which suited her form so well, and motioned to him to exchange garments. He obeyed, rather shamefacedly, for he realised that the proposed exchange was in fact more appropriate to his sex. He found the skin a freer dress. Oceaxe in her drapery appeared more dangerously feminine to him.
"I don't want you to receive gifts at all from other women," she remarked slowly.
"Why not? What can I be to you?"
"I have been thinking about you during the night." Her voice was retarded, scornful, viola-like. She sat down on the trunk of a fallen tree, and looked away.
"In what way?"
She returned no answer to his question, but began to pull off pieces of the bark.
"Last night you were so contemptuous."
"Last night is not today. Do you always walk through the world with your head over your shoulder?"
It was now Maskull's turn to be silent.
"Still, if you have male instincts, as I suppose you have, you can't go on resisting me forever."
"But this is preposterous," said Maskull, opening his eyes wide. "Granted that you are a beautiful woman--we can't be quite so primeval."
Oceaxe sighed, and rose to her feet. "It doesn't matter. I can wait."
"From that I gather that you intend to make the journey in my society. I have no objection--in fact I shall be glad--but only on condition that you drop this language."
"Yet you do think me beautiful?"
"Why shouldn't I think so, if it is the fact? I fail to see what that has to do with my feelings. Bring it to an end, Oceaxe. You will find plenty of men to admire--and love you."
At that she blazed up. "Does love pick and choose, you fool? Do you imagine I am so hard put to it that I have to hunt for lovers? Is not Crimtyphon waiting for me at this very moment?"
"Very well. I am sorry to have hurt your feelings. Now carry the temptation no farther--for it is a temptation, where a lovely woman is concerned. I am not my own master."
"I'm not proposing anything so very hateful, am I? Why do you humiliate me so?"
Maskull put his hands behind his back. "I repeat, I am not my own master."
"Then who is your master?"
"Yesterday I saw Surtur, and from today I am serving him."
"Did you speak with him?" she asked curiously.
"I did."
"Tell me what he said."
"No, I can't--I won't. But whatever he said, his beauty was more tormenting than yours, Oceaxe, and that's why I can look at you in cold blood."
"Did Surtur forbid you to be a man?"
Maskull frowned. "Is love such a manly sport, then? I should have thought it effeminate."
"It doesn't matter. You won't always be so boyish. But don't try my patience too far."
"Let us talk about something else--and, above all, let us get on our road."
She suddenly broke into a laugh, so rich, sweet, and enchanting, that he grew half inflamed, and half wished to catch her body in his arms. "Oh, Maskull, Maskull--what a fool you are!"
"In what way am I a fool?" he demanded, scowling not at her words, but at his own weakness.
"Isn't the whole world the handiwork of innumerable pairs of lovers? And yet you think yourself above all that. You try to fly away from nature, but where will you find a hole to hide yourself in?"
"Besides beauty, I now credit you with a second quality: persistence."
"Read me well, and then it is natural law that you'll think twice and three times before throwing me away.... And now, before we go, we had better eat."
"Eat?" said Maskull thoughtfully.
"Don't you eat? Is food in the same category as love?"
"What food is it?"
"Fish from the river."
Maskull recollected his promise to Joiwind. At the same time, he felt hungry.
"Is there nothing milder?"
She pulled her mouth scornfully. "You came through Poolingdred, didn't you? All the people there are the same. They think life is to be looked at, and not lived. Now that you are visiting Ifdawn, you will have to change your notions."
"Go catch your fish," he returned, pulling down his brows.
The broad, clear waters flowed past them with swelling undulations, from the direction of the mountains. Oceaxe knelt down on the bank, and peered into the depths. Presently her look became tense and concentrated; she dipped her hand in and pulled out some sort of little monster. It was more like a reptile than a fish, with its scaly plates and teeth. She threw it on the ground, and it started crawling about. Suddenly she darted all her will into her sorb. The creature leaped into the air, and fell down dead.
She picked up a sharp-edged slate, and with it removed the scales and entrails. During this operation, her hands and garment became stained with the light scarlet blood.
"Find the drude, Maskull," she said, with a lazy smile. "You had it last night."
He searched for it. It was hard to locate, for its rays had grown dull and feeble in the sunlight, but at last he found it. Oceaxe placed it in the interior of the monster, and left the body lying on the ground.
"While it's cooking, I'll wash some of this blood away, which frightens you so much. Have you never seen blood before?"
Maskull gazed at her in perplexity. The old paradox came back--the contrasting sexual characteristics in her person. Her bold, masterful, masculine egotism of manner seemed quite incongruous with the fascinating and disturbing femininity of her voice. A startling idea flashed into his mind.
"In your country I'm told there is an act of will called 'absorbing.' What is that?"
She held her red, dripping hands away from her draperies, and uttered a delicious, clashing laugh. "You think I am half a man?"
"Answer my question."
"I'm a woman through and through, Maskull--to the marrowbone. But that's not to say I have never absorbed males."
"And that means..."
"New strings for my harp, Maskull. A wider range of passions, a stormier heart..."
"For you, yes--But for them?..."
"I don't know. The victims don't describe their experiences. Probably unhappiness of some sort--if they still know anything."
"This is a fearful business!" he exclaimed, regarding her gloomily. "One would think Ifdawn a land of devils."
Oceaxe gave a beautiful sneer as she took a step toward the river. "Better men than you--better in every sense of the word--are walking about with foreign wills inside them. You may be as moral as you like, Maskull, but the fact remains, animals were made to be eaten, and simple natures were made to be absorbed."
"And human rights count for nothing!"
She had bent over the river's edge, to wash her arms and hands, but glanced up over her shoulder to answer his remark. "They do count. But we only regard a man as human for just as long as he's able to hold his own with others."
The flesh was soon cooked, and they breakfasted in silence. Maskull cast heavy, doubtful glances from time to time toward his companion. Whether it was due to the strange quality of the food, or to his long abstention, he did not know, but the meal tasted nauseous, and even cannibalistic. He ate little, and the moment he got up he felt defiled.
"Let me bury this drude, where I can find it some other time," said Oceaxe. "On the next occasion, though, I shall have no Maskull with me, to shock.... Now we have to take to the river."
They stepped off the land onto the water. It flowed against them with a sluggish current, but the oppo
sition, instead of hindering them, had the contrary effect--it caused them to exert themselves, and they moved faster. They climbed the river in this way for several miles. The exercise gradually improved the circulation of Maskull's blood, and he began to look at things in a far more way. The hot sunshine, the diminished wind, the cheerful marvellous cloud scenery, the quiet, crystal forests--all was soothing and delightful. They approached nearer and nearer to the gaily painted heights of Ifdawn.
There was something enigmatic to him in those bright walls. He was attracted by them, yet felt a sort of awe. They looked real, but at the same time very supernatural. If one could see the portrait of a ghost, painted with a hard, firm outline, in substantial colors, the feelings produced by such a sight would be exactly similar to Maskull's impressions as he studied the Ifdawn precipices.
He broke the long silence. "Those mountains have most extraordinary shapes. All the lines are straight and perpendicular--no slopes or curves."
She walked backward on the water, in order to face him. "That's typical of Ifdawn. Nature is all hammer blows with us. Nothing soft and gradual."
"I hear you, but I don't understand you."
"All over the Marest you'll find patches of ground plunging down or rushing up. Trees grow fast. Women and men don't think twice before acting. One may call Ifdawn a place of quick decisions."
Maskull was impressed. "A fresh, wild, primitive land."
"How is it where you come from?" asked Oceaxe.
"Oh, mine is a decrepit world, where nature takes a hundred years to move a foot of solid land. Men and animals go about in flocks. Originality is a lost habit."
"Are there women there?"
"As with you, and not very differently formed."
"Do they love?"
He laughed. "So much so that it has changed the dress, speech, and thoughts of the whole sex."
"Probably they are more beautiful than I?"
"No, I think not," said Maskull.
There was another rather long silence, as they travelled unsteadily onward.
"What is your business in Ifdawn?" demanded Oceaxe suddenly.
He hesitated over his answer. "Can you grasp that it's possible to have an aim right in front of one, so big that one can't see it as a whole?"
She stole a long, inquisitive look at him, "What sort of aim?"
"A moral aim."
"Are you proposing to set the world right?"
"I propose nothing--I am waiting."
"Don't wait too long, for time doesn't wait--especially in Ifdawn."
"Something will happen," said Maskull.
Oceaxe threw a subtle smile. "So you have no special destination in the Marest?"
"No, and if you'll permit me, I will come home with you."
"Singular man!" she said, with a short, thrilling laugh. "That's what I have been offering all the time. Of course you will come home with me. As for Crimtyphon..."
"You mentioned that name before. Who is he?"
"Oh! My lover, or, as you would say, my husband."
"This doesn't improve matters," said Maskull.
"It leaves them exactly where they were. We merely have to remove him."
"We are certainly misunderstanding each other," said Maskull, quite startled. "Do you by any chance imagine that I am making a compact with you?"
"You will do nothing against your will. But you have promised to come home with me."
"Tell me, how do you remove husbands in Ifdawn?"
"Either you or I must kill him."
He eyed her for a full minute. "Now we are passing from folly to insanity."
"Not at all," replied Oceaxe. "It is the too-sad truth. And when you have seen Crimtyphon, you will realise it."
"I'm aware I am on a strange planet," said Maskull slowly, "where all sorts of unheard of things may happen, and where the very laws of morality may be different. Still as far as I am concerned, murder is murder, and I'll have no more to do with a woman who wants to make use of me, to get rid of her husband."
"You think me wicked?" demanded Oceaxe steadily.
"Or mad."
"Then you had better leave me, Maskull--only--"
"Only what?"
"You wish to be consistent, don't you? Leave all other mad and wicked people as well. Then you'll find it easier to reform the rest."
Maskull frowned, but said nothing.
"Well?" demanded Oceaxe, with a half smile.
"I'll come with you, and I'll see Crimtyphon--if only to warn him."
Oceaxe broke into a cascade of rich, feminine laughter, but whether at the image conjured up by Maskull's last words, or from some other cause, he did not know. The conversation dropped.
At a distance of a couple of miles from the now towering cliffs, the river made a sharp, right-angled turn to the west, and was no longer of use to them on their journey. Maskull stared up doubtfully.
"It's a stiff climb for a hot morning."
"Let's rest here a little," said she, indicating a smooth flat island of black rock, standing up just out of the water in the middle of the river.
They accordingly went to it, and Maskull sat down. Oceaxe, however, standing graceful and erect, turned her face toward the cliffs opposite, and uttered a piercing and peculiar call.
"What is that for?" She did not answer. After waiting a minute, she repeated the call. Maskull now saw a large bird detach itself from the top of one of the precipices, and sail slowly down toward them. It was followed by two others. The flight of these birds was exceedingly slow and clumsy.
"What are they?" he asked.
She still returned no answer, but smiled rather peculiarly and sat down beside him. Before many minutes he was able to distinguish the shapes and colors of the flying monsters. They were not birds, but creatures with long, snakelike bodies, and ten reptilian legs apiece, terminating in fins which acted as wings. The bodies were of bright blue, the legs and fins were yellow. They were flying, without haste, but in a somewhat ominous fashion, straight toward them. He could make out a long, thin spike projecting from each of the heads.
"They are shrowks," explained Oceaxe at last. "If you want to know their intention, I'll tell you. To make a meal of us. First of all their spikes will pierce us, and then their mouths, which are really suckers, will drain us dry of blood--pretty thoroughly too; there are no half measures with shrowks. They are toothless beasts, so don't eat flesh."
"As you show such admirable sangfroid," said Maskull dryly, "I take it there's no particular danger."
Nevertheless he instinctively tried to get on to his feet and failed. A new form of paralysis was chaining him to the ground.
"Are you trying to get up?" asked Oceaxe smoothly.
"Well, yes, but those cursed reptiles seem to be nailing me down to the rock with their wills. May I ask if you had any special object in view in waking them up?"
"I assure you the danger is quite real, Maskull. Instead of talking and asking questions, you had much better see what you can do with your will."
"I seem to have no will, unfortunately."
Oceaxe was seized with a paroxysm of laughter, but it was still rich and beautiful. "It's obvious you aren't a very heroic protector, Maskull. It seems I must play the man, and you the woman. I expected better things of your big body. Why, my husband would send those creatures dancing all around the sky, by way of a joke, before disposing of them. Now watch me.. Two of the three I'll kill; the third we will ride home on. Which one shall we keep?"
The shrowks continued their slow, wobbling flight toward them. Their bodies were of huge size. They produced in Maskull the same sensation of loathing as insects did. He instinctively understood that as they hunted with their wills, there was no necessity for them to possess a swift motion.
"Choose which you please," he said shortly. "They are equally objectionable to me."
"Then I'll choose the leader, as it is presumably the most energetic animal. Watch now."
She stood upright, and her
sorb suddenly blazed with fire. Maskull felt something snap inside his brain. His limbs were free once more. The two monsters in the rear staggered and darted head foremost toward the earth, one after the other. He watched them crash on the ground, and then lie motionless. The leader still came toward them, but he fancied that its flight was altered in character; it was no longer menacing, but tame and unwilling.
Oceaxe guided it with her will to the mainland shore opposite their island rock. Its vast bulk lay there extended, awaiting her pleasure. They immediately crossed the water.
Maskull viewed the shrowk at close quarters. It was about thirty feet long. Its bright-coloured skin was shining, slippery, and leathery; a mane of black hair covered its long neck. Its face was awesome and unnatural, with its carnivorous eyes, frightful stiletto, and blood-sucking cavity. There were true fins on its back and tail.
"Have you a good seat?" asked Oceaxe, patting the creature's flank. "As I have to steer, let me jump on first."
She pulled up her gown, then climbed up and sat astride the animal's back, just behind the mane, which she clutched. Between her and the fin there was just room for Maskull. He grasped the two flanks with his outer hands; his third, new arm pressed against Oceaxe's back, and for additional security he was compelled to encircle her waist with it.
Directly he did so, he realised that he had been tricked, and that this ride had been planned for one purpose only--to inflame his desires.
The third arm possessed a function of its own, of which hitherto he had been ignorant. It was a developed magn. But the stream of love which was communicated to it was no longer pure and noble--it was boiling, passionate, and torturing. He gritted his teeth, and kept quiet, but Oceaxe had not plotted the adventure to remain unconscious of his feelings. She looked around, with a golden, triumphant smile. "The ride will last some time, so hold on well!" Her voice was soft like a flute, but rather malicious.