The Golden Age of Science Fiction Novels Vol 02

by Anthology

  "It was a fearful crime. What will come of it?"

  Leehallfae gave a curious, wrinkled smile. "In Matterplay he will stir inside you, for he smells the air. Already you have his eyes.... I knew him.... Take care of yourself, or something more startling may happen. Keep out of the water."

  "This seems to me a terrible valley, in which anything may happen."

  "Don't torment yourself about Digrung. The valleys belong by right to the phaens--the men here are interlopers. It is a good work to remove them."

  Maskull continued thoughtful. "I say no more, but I see I will have to be cautious. What did you mean about my helping you with my luck?"

  "Your luck is fast weakening, but it may still be strong enough to serve me. Together we will search for Threal."

  "Search for Threal--why, is it so hard to find?"

  "I have told you that my whole life has been spent in the quest."

  "You said Faceny, Leehallfae."

  The phaen gazed at him with queer, ancient eyes, and smiled again. "This stream, Maskull, like every other life stream in Matterplay, has its source in Faceny. But as all these streams issue out from Threal, it is in Threal that we must look for Faceny."

  "But what's to prevent your finding Threal? Surely it's a well-known country?"

  "It lies underground. Its communications with the upper world are few, and where they are, no one that I have ever spoken to knows. I have scoured the valleys and the hills. I have been to the very gates of Lichstorm. I am old, so that your aged men would appear newborn infants beside me, but I am as far from Threal as when I was a green youth, dwelling among a throng of fellow phaens."

  "Then, if my luck is good, yours is very bad.... But when you have found Faceny, what do you gain?"

  Leehallfae looked at him in silence. The smile faded from aer face, and its place was taken by such a look of unearthly pain and sorrow that Maskull had no need to press his question. Ae was consumed by the grief and yearning of a lover eternally separated from the loved one, the scents and traces of whose person were always present. This passion stamped her features at that moment with a wild, stern, spiritual beauty, far transcending any beauty of woman or man.

  But the expression vanished suddenly, and then the abrupt contrast showed Maskull the real Leehallfae. Aer sensuality was solitary, but vulgar--it was like the heroism of a lonely nature, pursuing animal aims with untiring persistence.

  He looked at the phaen askance, and drummed his fingers against his thigh. "Well, we will go together. We may find something, and in any case I shan't be sorry to converse with such a singular individual as yourself."

  "But I should warn you, Maskull. You and I are of different creations. A phaen's body contains the whole of life, a man's body contains only the half of life--the other half is in woman. Faceny may be too strong a draught for your body to endure.... Do you not feel this?"

  "I am dull with my different feelings. I must take what precautions I can, and chance the rest." He bent down, and, taking hold of the phaen's thin and ragged robe, tore off a broad strip, which he proceeded to swathe in folds around his forehead. "I'm not forgetting your advice, Leehallfae. I would not like to start the walk as Maskull and finish it as Digrung."

  The phaen gave a twisted grin, and they began to move upstream. The road was difficult. They had to stride from boulder to boulder, and found it warm work. Occasionally a worse obstacle presented itself, which they could surmount only by climbing. There was no more conversation for a long time. Maskull, as far as possible, adopted his companion's counsel to avoid the water, but here and there he was forced to set foot in it. The second or third time he did so, he felt a sudden agony in his arm, where it had been wounded by Krag. His eyes grew joyful; his fears vanished; and he began deliberately to tread the stream.

  Leehallfae stroked aer chin and watched him with screwed-up eyes, trying to comprehend what had happened. "Is your luck speaking to you, Maskull, or what is the matter?"

  "Listen. You are a being of antique experience, and ought to know, if anyone does. What is Muspel?"

  The phaen's face was blank. "I don't know the name."

  "It is another world of some sort."

  "That cannot be. There is only this one world--Faceny's."

  Maskull came up to aer, linked arms, and began to talk. "I'm glad I fell in with you, Leehallfae, for this valley and everything connected with it need a lot of explaining. For example, in this spot there are hardly any organic forms left--why have they all disappeared? You call this brook a 'life stream,' yet the nearer its source we get, the less life it produces. A mile or two lower down we had those spontaneous plant-animals appearing out of nowhere, while right down by the sea, plants and animals were tumbling over one another. Now, if all this is connected in some mysterious way or other with your Faceny, it seems to me he must have a most paradoxical nature. His essence doesn't start creating shapes until it has become thoroughly weakened and watered.... But perhaps both of us are talking nonsense."

  Leehallfae shook aer head. "Everything hangs together. The stream is life, and it is throwing off sparks of life all the time. When these sparks are caught and imprisoned by matter, they become living shapes. The nearer the stream is to its source, the more terrible and vigorous is its life. You'll see for yourself when we reach the head of the valley that there are no living shapes there at all. That means that there is no kind of matter tough enough to capture and hold the terrible sparks that are to be found there. Lower down the stream, most of the sparks are vigorous enough to escape to the upper air, but some are held when they are a little way up, and these burst suddenly into shapes. I myself am of this nature. Lower down still, toward the sea, the stream has lost a great part of its vital power and the sparks are lazy and sluggish. They spread out, rather than rise into the air. There is hardly any kind of matter, however delicate, that is incapable of capturing these feeble sparks, and they are captured in multitudes--that accounts for the innumerable living shapes you see there. But not only that--the sparks are passed from one body to another by way of generation, and can never hope to cease being so until they are worn out by decay. Lowest of all, you have the Sinking Sea itself. There the degenerate and enfeebled life of the Matterplay streams has for its body the whole sea. So weak is it's power that it can't succeed in creating any shapes at all but you can see its ceaseless, futile attempts to do so, in those spouts."

  "So the slow development of men and women is due to the feebleness of the life germ in their case?"

  "Exactly. It can't attain all its desires at once. And now you can see how immeasurably superior are the phaens, who spring spontaneously from the more electric and vigorous sparks."

  "But where does the matter come from that imprisons these sparks?"

  "When life dies, it becomes matter. Matter itself dies, but its place is constantly taken by new matter."

  "But if life comes from Faceny, how can it die at all?"

  "Life is the thoughts of Faceny, and once these thoughts have left his brain they are nothing--mere dying embers."

  "This is a cheerless philosophy," said Maskull. "But who is Faceny himself, then, and why does he think at all?"

  Leehallfae gave another wrinkled smile. "That I'll explain too. Faceny is of this nature. He faces Nothingness in all directions. He has no back and no sides, but is all face; and this face is his shape. It must necessarily be so, for nothing else can exist between him and Nothingness. His face is all eyes, for he eternally contemplates Nothingness. He draws his inspirations from it; in no other way could he feel himself. For the same reason, phaens and even men love to be in empty places and vast solitudes, for each one is a little Faceny."

  "That rings true," said Maskull.

  "Thoughts flow perpetually from Faceny's face backward. Since his face is on all sides, however, they flow into his interior. A draught of thought thus continuously flows from Nothingness to the inside of Faceny, which is the world. The thoughts become shapes, and people the world. This ou
ter world, therefore, which is lying all around us, is not outside at all, as it happens, but inside. The visible universe is like a gigantic stomach, and the real outside of the world we shall never see."

  Maskull pondered deeply for a while.

  "Leehallfae, I fail to see what you personally have to hope for, since you are nothing more than a discarded, dying thought."

  "Have you never loved a woman?" asked the phaen, regarding him fixedly.

  "Perhaps I have."

  "When you loved, did you have no high moments?"

  "That's asking the same question in other words."

  "In those moments you were approaching Faceny. If you could have drawn nearer still, would you not have done so?"

  "I would, regardless of the consequences."

  "Even if you personally had nothing to hope for?"

  "But I would have that to hope for."

  Leehallfae walked on in silence.

  "A man is the half of Life," ae broke out suddenly. "A woman is the other half of life, but a phaen is the whole of life. Moreover, when life becomes split into halves, something else has dropped out of it--something that belongs only to the whole. Between your love and mine there is no comparison. If even your sluggish blood is drawn to Faceny, without stopping to ask what will come of it, how do you suppose it is with me?"

  "I don't question the genuineness of your passion," replied Maskull, "but it's a pity you can't see your way to carry it forward into the next world."

  Leehallfae gave a distorted grin, expressing heaven knows what emotion. "Men think what they like, but phaens are so made that they can see the world only as it really is."

  That ended the conversation.

  The sun was high in the sky, and they appeared to be approaching the head of the ravine. Its walls had still further closed in and, except at those moments when Branchspell was directly behind them, they strode along all the time in deep shade; but still it was disagreeably hot and relaxing. All life had ceased. A beautiful, fantastic spectacle was presented by the cliff faces, the rocky ground, and the boulders that choked the entire width of the gorge. They were a snow-white crystalline limestone, heavily scored by veins of bright, gleaming blue. The rivulet was no longer green, but a clear, transparent crystal. Its noise was musical, and altogether it looked most romantic and charming, but Leehallfae seemed to find something else in it--aer features grew more and more set and tortured.

  About half an hour after all the other life forms had vanished, another plant-animal was precipitated out of space, in front of their eyes. It was as tall as Maskull himself, and had a brilliant and vigorous appearance, as befitted a creature just out of Nature's mint. It started to walk about; but hardly had it done so when it burst silently asunder. Nothing remained of it--the whole body disappeared instantaneously into the same invisible mist from which it had sprung.

  "That bears out what you said," commented Maskull, turning rather pale.

  "Yes," answered Leehallfae, "we have now come to the region of terrible life."

  "Then, since you're right in this, I must believe all that you've been telling me."

  As he uttered the words, they were just turning a bend of the ravine. There now loomed up straight ahead a perpendicular cliff about three hundred feet in height, composed of white, marbled rock. It was the head of the valley, and beyond it they could not proceed.

  "In return for my wisdom," said the phaen, "you will now lend me your luck."

  They walked up to the base of the cliff, and Maskull looked at it reflectively. It was possible to climb it, but the ascent would be difficult. The now tiny brook issued from a hole in the rock only a few feet up. Apart from its musical running, not a sound was to be beard. The floor of the gorge was in shadow, but about halfway up the precipice the sun was shining.

  "What do you want me to do?" demanded Maskull. "Everything is now in your hands, and I have no suggestions to make. Now it's your luck that must help us."

  Maskull continued gazing up a little while longer. "We had better wait till the afternoon, Leehallfae. I'll probably have to climb to the top, but it's too hot at present--and besides, I'm tired. I'll snatch a few hours' sleep. After that, we'll see."

  Leehallfae seemed annoyed, but raised no opposition.

  Chapter 17.

  CORPANG

  Maskull did not awaken till long after Blodsombre. Leehallfae was standing by his side, looking down at him. It was doubtful whether ae had slept at all.

  "What time is it?" Maskull asked, rubbing his eyes and sitting up.

  "The day is passing," was the vague reply.

  Maskull got on to his feet, and gazed up at the cliff. "Now I'm going to climb that. No need for both of us to risk our necks, so you wait here, and if I find anything on top I'll call you."

  Ale phaen glanced at him strangely. "There's nothing up there except a bare hillside. I've been there often. Have you anything special in mind?"

  "Heights often bring me inspiration. Sit down, and wait."

  Refreshed by his sleep, Maskull immediately attacked the face of the cliff, and took the first twenty feet at a single rush. Then it grew precipitous, and the ascent demanded greater circumspection and intelligence. There were few hand- or footholds: he had to reflect before every step. On the other hand, it was sound rock, and he was no novice at the sport. Branchspell glared full on the wall, so that it half blinded him with its glittering whiteness.

  After many doubts and pauses he drew near the top. He was hot, sweating copiously, and rather dizzy. To reach a ledge he caught hold of two projecting rocks, one with each hand, at the same time scrambling upward, his legs between the rocks. The left-hand rock, which was the larger of the two, became dislodged by his weight, and, flying like a huge, dark shadow past his head, crashed down with a terrifying sound to the foot of the precipice, followed by an avalanche of smaller stones. Maskull steadied himself as well as he could, but it was some moments before he dared to look down behind him.

  At first he could not distinguish Leehallfae. Then he caught sight of legs and hindquarters a few feet up the cliff from the bottom. He perceived that the phaen had aer head in a cavity and was scrutinising something, and waited for aer to reappear.

  Ae emerged, looked up to Maskull, and called out in aer hornlike voice, "The entrance is here!"

  "I'm coming down!" roared Maskull. "Wait for me!"

  He descended swiftly--without taking too much care, for he thought he recognised his "luck" in this discovery--and within twenty minutes was standing beside the phaen.

  "What happened?"

  "The rock you dislodged struck this other rock just above the spring. It tore it out of its bed. See--now there's room for us to get in!"

  "Don't get excited!" said Maskull. "It's a remarkable accident, but we have plenty of time. Let me look."

  He peered into the hole, which was large enough to admit a big man without stooping. Contrasted with the daylight outside it was dark, yet a peculiar glow pervaded the place, and he could see well enough. A rock tunnel went straight forward into the bowels of the hill, out of sight. The valley brook did not flow along the floor of this tunnel, as he had expected, but came up as a spring just inside the entrance.

  "Well Leehallfae, not much need to deliberate, eh? Still, observe that your stream parts company with us here."

  As he turned around for an answer he noticed that his companion was trembling from head to foot.

  "Why, what's the matter?"

  Leehallfae pressed a hand to aer heart. "The stream leaves us, but what makes the stream what it is continues with us. Faceny is there."

  "But surely you don't expect to see him in person? Why are you shaking?"

  "Perhaps it will be too much for me after all."

  "Why? How is it affecting you?"

  The phaen took him by the shoulder and held him at arm's length, endeavouring to study him with aer unsteady eyes. "Faceny's thoughts are obscure. I am his lover, you are a lover of women, yet he grants to you wh
at he denies to me."

  "What does he grant to me?"

  "To see him, and go on living. I shall die. But it's immaterial. Tomorrow both of us will be dead."

  Maskull impatiently shook himself free. "Your sensations may be reliable in your own case, but how do you know I shall die?"

  "Life is flaming up inside you," replied Leehallfae, shaking aer head. "But after it has reached its climax--perhaps tonight--it will sink rapidly and you'll die tomorrow. As for me, if I enter Threal I shan't come out again. A smell of death is being wafted to me out of this hole."

  "You talk like a frightened man. I smell nothing."

  "I am not frightened," said Leehallfae quietly--ae had been gradually recovering aer tranquillity--"but when one has lived as long as I have, it is a serious matter to die. Every year one puts out new roots."

  "Decide what you're going to do," said Maskull with a touch of contempt, "for I'm going in at once."

  The phaen gave an odd, meditative stare down the ravine, and after that walked into the cavern without another word. Maskull, scratching his head, followed close at aer heels.

  The moment they stepped across the bubbling spring, the atmosphere altered. Without becoming stale or unpleasant, it grew cold, clear and refined, and somehow suggested austere and tomblike thoughts. The daylight disappeared at the first bend in the tunnel. After that, Maskull could not say where the light came from. The air itself must have been luminous, for though it was as light as full moon on Earth, neither he nor Leehallfae cast a shadow. Another peculiarity of the light was that both the walls of the tunnel and their own bodies appeared colourless. Everything was black and white, like a lunar landscape. This intensified the solemn, funereal feelings created by the atmosphere.

  After they had proceeded for about ten minutes, the tunnel began to widen out. The roof was high above their heads, and six men could have walked side by side. Leehallfae was visibly weakening. Ae dragged aerself along slowly and painfully, with sunken head.

  Maskull caught hold of aer. "You can't go on like that. Better let me take you back."

  The phaen smiled, and staggered. "I'm dying."