The World Above The World

by Brian Stableford

  But the Red Queen smiled and said: “I’ve deceived you. There’s nothing. You saved Nyve’s life, but you would also have risked your life for me. You fear shame more than death. I’ve seen the terrible depths of your soul. Like a wall, you stand up between peril and others. I’m not surprised that you defeated the monster of the waves. You could break me I your embrace. You would stand firm against my rowers! And, your strength unleashed, with that unfamiliar weapon, could Manharvar resist you? But Nevea, I entrust myself to you!”

  Hertha was seized by an impulse. She took her weapon from its sheath and held it out to Drythea. “Take it,” she said. “I put myself in your hands. I want nothing from you but your word as a Queen.”

  The gesture was bold, but Hertha was learning to judge souls. The Red Queen exclaimed: “No one was ever able to flatter like you! Keep your weapon, Nevea.” A softness appeared in her ardent eyes, and she leaned on her companion’s shoulder.

  Sincerely, Hertha said: “Queen of flame, how beautiful you are thus! How many, on my Earth, would be at your knees!”

  “You accept!” cried Drythea, with real joy. “Yes, I merit that you should stay with me! Tomorrow I shall take you to the most beautiful of my charming cities, then to my palace under the sea, and my Azure Isle. I shall keep your white beauty at my leisure, and the golden dawn will rise for me in your eyes. You will rest your head in my warm hair and my tender arms will protect your…sleep.” She, who did not sleep, had to search for the final word.

  Hertha looked at her silently. The purity of the body and soul of the Queen with the ardent eyes was strange and perfect. In her passionate words, only Drymea spoke: the world that was ignorant of men and desire.

  “Permit me,” said Hertha, “to tell you a tale of my distant Orient. There was a wise Queen. One of her subjects was a commander on the borders. Thousands obeyed her. The Queen’s favorites aroused her suspicions against the one who governed. It is necessary, they said, to bring her to your court and put her in chains in a dungeon, for she has become too powerful. The wise Queen ascertained the truth. She knew that her subject was loyal, brought her to her and heaped her with wealth and praise; then she sent her back to her province. Then the Queen said to the favorites: I have followed your advice. I have put her in chains, but chains stronger for a generous soul than any bonds!’ Was that Queen not wise?”

  Drythea smiled. “That Queen of your world trusted her subject—but she did well if the latter’s soul was worth a high price. Invisible bonds!”

  “Queen,” said Hertha, “Look into your heart. Those invisible bonds, which you know to be powerful, the Princess with the soft eyes has woven around me.”

  Drythea laughed faintly. “How you have played me, Nevea—how you have caught me in the trap of my own words, of my royal word. I cannot reproach you, however, for being faithful. Why did you not come to Manharvar first!”

  “I shall come back here soon,” Hertha said, “to you—for grandeurs and the love of beauty are resident in you. I cannot display harshness to one who treats me gently You are deserving—you, not your crown!” She spoke gravely and calmly, her eyes on the ardent eyes, which softened.

  “I no longer know how to say no to you,” said the Queen, smiling.

  V. Anxiety

  The Dragonfly left Manharvar a few days later. Hertha reviewed the cities that she knew to be eternal, where generations of Drymeans were accumulating treasures of beauty and well-being without fear of devouring war and pitiless scourges that their efforts had tamed.

  Aided by her companions, she succeeded in translating the language of Nirvanir into facile signs. Even Hertha scarcely suspected the enormous revolution that she was bringing. Nyve, however, said: “Where do your ideas come from?”

  Communal life, a reef to some, puts the seal on the alliance of others. Hertha took care to educate herself in the manners and rites of Nirvanir. All her actions and all her words were beneficial for Nyve. When the later saw her clad and coiffed in the fashion of the virgins of the realm, she said to her, joyfully: “The more I see you resemble my race, the more I love you, for I forget then that you come from a sun so distant that I’m afraid to think about it. I shall end up forgetting completely, Nevea.”

  The little Drymean sensed the abyss between them, however, without being able to identify it precisely: the intellectual maturity of Hertha, who had come from a harsh world, tended toward strength and not toward generosity. Hertha had never been able to talk about the sinister side of the Earth. She knew that certain ideas are as toxic as poisons. What good would it do to bring back the dead past? Only the future of Drymea existed. Her pride was sufficient to keep her honest and pure.

  One evening, under the stars, she talked about Drythea’s offer. When Hertha came to the cup, the mantle and the oath, Nyve cried: “She was sincere! She would have bound herself to you forever, for there’s an unknown secret in those ceremonies! And you would have forgotten Nyve! But what would that matter, if a royal crown circled your golden hair!”

  Then Hertha saw that the Princess loved her for herself, and not selfishly, for she added: “There’s still time to accept!”

  “Would you suffer?” asked Hertha.

  “Yes, a great deal,” Nyve admitted. “But you would reign!”

  The blonde virgin wondered whether she would have found a similar affection on Earth, for the love of a man is often that of a master. But she knew that Marre-le-Rouge had loved her for five years in silence and died some years after her disappearance from Earth, still faithful to her memory.

  All she said was: “I prefer to remain with you. But you haven’t spoken to me about these strange ceremonies. Why?”

  “Listen,” Nyve whispered. “Would you like…me, by the Veil, the Shadow and the Cup, to consecrate you as the mistress of my soul? It’s possible—I know it is. Spiritual Forces are active of which I know nothing. I would be in your hands like a flower in the hands of a little girl. But you are Nevea. Would you like that?”

  Hertha, rich in bitter experience, replied gently: “No. I only want you to be duty-bound to yourself, and I fear the Unknown. I’m right, believe me.”

  Astonished but docile, Nyve talked about Dythea then. The Red Queen had a sincere love of beautiful works, and fostered the arts. She had no lack of a generosity more physical than pensive. Her authority maintained justice among the various classes of her realm. Proud and enthusiastic, she was able to forgive, and sometimes bowed to wise advice. “Your world would have considered it beneficial,” said Nyve. “It had terrible lacunae, you told me?”

  What we call civilization, Hertha thought, is based on a fundamental error. Our humankind only wanted material progress, paying no heed to moral progress. And only the former counted, in truth! Atrocious weapons humiliated our science. The Earth gloried in power and wealth, not in wisdom and not at all in generosity. The sages said so, eloquently, but who listened to them? Drymea judges its destiny differently.

  At daybreak, Nyve gazed at the golden sun, the fields of Nirvanir where life was awakening, and her sleeping friend. What was she dreaming? Nyve could not follow her there, but what did it matter? Happy years would pass in her company.

  Hertha saw the capital again as a familiar place, but a heavy task awaited her there. By order of the Queen, she had to install herself in the Summer Land with Greena. The Princess would finish her journey alone. Scarcely arrived in the palace, Hertha found a house of science built on Nacrysa’s desires, already filled with models and drawings. There, the most intelligent of the virgins of Nirvanir were to receive a new culture from Hertha.

  The nights were decreasing then; every day, the silver sun rose earlier. In Nirvanir, there is only one stage of education for all girls, and then the most enthusiastic or most brilliant direct their studies into a preferred art or science. The group furnishes artists or specialists. There are inequalities of mind, but they are not abyssal. There is not an edifice-village through which new ideas and new faces do not pass every day, b
y road or water. War, oppression and the merciless struggle for existence do not force groups to isolate themselves from the world. The common hall always welcomes traveling guests. No Drymean has ever known isolation. Surrounded by her group, supporting her pain and joy in its stronger thought, her wealth in the more powerful fortune of the hive in which she lives, she will not experience illness without assistance, nor dark poverty. The group does not surpass human proportions. Its collective soul is invincible.

  The multitude of personal problems that oppress us here is swept away at a stroke by the strength of all; groups rally round quickly if necessary. Living brains, rather than dead regulations, decide.

  Hertha could not help thinking: What an astonishing mixture: a monarchy superimposed on a semi-communist society, with an absolute spiritual belief—for there are no atheists on Drymea! Beneath that calm ocean of human beings, does the pain of life reign or not? No. That propensity of their collective mind yielded centuries ago. Heredity is invincible. The collective sensibility is in play. All for one and one for all! Generous beings, on Earth, have dreamed such dreams—but men with strong arms, the sons of past conflicts, do not feel that they need other men. Women have been prey for a hundred thousand years. Everyone has a life, even at the expense of others. Everything breaks those dreams: the couple ambitious for themselves and their children; amorous rivalry; bloodthirsty governments. I’ve named amour: that alone, the law of Earth, is sufficient to disturb it. These Drymeans do not know it, and their world is peaceful.

  Meanwhile, Hertha found her pupils. They were between 16 and 20 years old. At first, the strange distance between Hertha and themselves intimidated them—but the blonde virgin found them docile and trusting; she quickly made them love her. Teaching seemed to her to be have a humorous aspect. Queen Nacrysa did not want to heave the exceptional messenger from another world idle. Then she got a taste for it. From the dawn on the golden sun onwards, she gave lessons. In the hottest part of the day, people rest on Drymea. At sunset, she went out on to the shore, followed by those who wished. She was better than fair to all. The soul of the group formed around her. The stranger did not sense that, but she knew that the happiness of the others was aiding her own.

  The Queen had made the new alphabet known throughout Nirvanir. All of Hertha’s lessons were distributed throughout Drymea, in the old and new script. It was necessary to equip workers with versatile characters rather than unique symbols. Once the idea was born, it did not go to sleep again.

  On Drymea, no Pasteur or Jenner had ever appeared, but the healthy life and preventive methods had let nothing persist but accidents, pain and sudden illnesses. Solely by her knowledge of anesthetics and the microscope, Hertha justified her advent. Instruments familiar to Hertha brought out the contrast between the double suns.

  During the hot hours, she wrote brief treatises, in which she tried to condense in clear language the intellectual flower of our Earth. Then, in the golden evening, she read them to those who wanted to follow her. In the white dawn, she went to bed, the only person on Drymea who slept. Alone in her room, whose walls were painted with smiling faces, she examined her conscience, asking herself whether she had done well that day. There was none above her thought but God. It was up to her to separate the wheat from the tares. The responsibility seemed heavy. “You have made me, Lord, powerful and solitary…” Her influence over the gentle daughters of Nirvanir frightened her a little. Hertha alone knew the depth of the abyss that separated them. All the terrestrial demons were dormant within her; they might awaken, those which were not even suspected on Drymea.

  While preparing the next day’s tasks, Hertha told herself that she had not acted in vain. Raising a little higher the light that would no longer perish, she had spread the best of what we have through another world.

  By the sea, on golden evenings, she thought about that strange life. She was the torch for these virgins in flower; she was opening to them a vast spiritual and material universe, hitherto unknown. She reigned by her own value. Her proud and honest soul was slightly flattered.

  The daughters of Nirvanir conceived an exalted admiration for her. They believed, easily, that Hertha alone had discovered everything, done everything, invented everything, and refused to recognize her as the messenger of another humankind, heavy with pain and experience. Smiling, Helgar’s daughter rectified their error. She talked to them about the best of our world, who alleviated suffering, saved others from death, soothed pain or enlightened minds—but of that truth, her pupils took no more than they wished: the messenger was a pure jewel of Earth; and Nyve, on her return was able to confirm that.

  The Princess brought news. Queen Nacrysa judged it appropriate to give Hertha a share in the produce of new inventions derived from her knowledge. Neither the Queen nor Nyve calculated the terrible leverage that sudden wealth would put in Nevea’s hands, for Drymea had no large-scale industry, the maker of power and manipulation.

  Hertha knew it. In response to her desire, a magnificent jewel was sent to Drythea, as a memento. Then she ordered the best of ships from the yards of Nirvanir. The old call of the sea had awakened in her soul.

  One golden evening, as she was speaking on the shore, a thoughtful little girl seven or eight years old appeared. Her thin and asymmetrical face was concealed by her dark hair, but her brown eyes were intensely keen. She wanted to approach. The young women smiled and said: “Go and play”—but Hertha sat her down next to her.

  That evening, she was talking about the Woman who had said: “Suffer the little children to come unto me.” But it was necessary to admit that she had been killed, and the virgins of Nirvanir said: “How was Nevea able to be good there? The wicked would have wanted you dead too. We can thank the Goddess that we were not born on Earth.”

  The little girl came back. She was grave and placid, huddling close to Hertha, and appeared to understand. Then, one day, she disappeared. Hertha missed her, but did not know her name.

  She tried to get to know her pupils. Souls seemed to her more important than lessons. Everything goes smoothly when one knows how to handle those one is teaching—and she was able to do that.

  There are two kinds of innocence: that of the ignorance below evil, and that of the science above. Hertha had read and understood a great deal during her Earthly life. She was equally familiar with the brilliance and the monstrousness of our world. Her knowledge extended from Eden to Gomorrah, but she thought about it as little as possible, knowing what beings dismal thoughts of evil attract.

  Besides, she was rarely alone in the silver dawn. Nyve’s slender arm parted the draperies, the little princess came to lie down beside her until she went to sleep, to talk about the thousand events of the day, sure that Nevea would be able to understand everything and clarify everything, like the Goddess herself. For the daughter of Earth had also learned how harsh, and sometime mortal, words can be. If she found fault, it was with a smile. Her eyes spoke sufficiently.

  Then her ship arrived. She named it the Seagull, in the language of Nirvanir. It was a large vessel as light as a bird, with two masts and the Drymean system of sails that unfolded like a fan. Graceful, docile and unsinkable, combining terrestrial science with Drymean artistry, the Seagull moved over the waves. From that day on, all of Hertha’s leisure time was spent at sea, accompanied by those who wanted to, with expert pilots.

  The days went by. One night, as Hertha slipped into sleep, a scene from the past abruptly resurfaced. On Earth, in Kartha the superb, beside the enormous Atlantic, a woman dressed in ermine, with oblique eyes in a gilded face, confronted her. Her hair was like a black radiance. With a strange smile, she said:

  “Poets have sung about Our Lady of Tears or Our Lady of Darkness—but their powerful sister, me, they have forgotten. Now, I am our Lady of Evil Desires, those which one dares not admit even to oneself: sins of the mind that do not descend into action and which are seven times worse than the others. I once reigned over accursed cities, over islands of strange amou
rs. How many still worship me in their hearts! And by night, I whisper monstrous dreams!”

  Then the Atlantic became blue, and the Inland Sea extended its azure isles. The phantom went on:

  “Proud cold daughter, you reign here, worse than the despots of Asia or the Caesars of Rome. They only caused their bodies to be adored, but you have elevated your thought on to the altar, and you make the gentle daughters of Nirvanir kneel before it. Even when dead, you flatter yourself that they will still be enchained—and does not your heart covet the place of God, you who are an immortal Being? You have refused a crown, but out of pride. You want to encircle yourself with a more beautiful one, and of your own accord!

  “Now, when you walk in the silver dawn with your pupils, you rejoice in knowing than their souls are in your hand, like a fledgling in a fowler’s. And I have read your heart when Nyve with the soft eyes puts her head on your shoulder and gazes at you, smiling and attentive. You say to yourself: ‘My thought is her thought, my law is her law, my will is hers. She would follow me, if I wished, beyond the good and evil of her world and mine! I hold that ignorant child Nyve of Nirvanir in my fingers, for Heaven or Hell.’ You are queen of a black realm, like our all-father Satan. It’s not bodies that you want but souls, and not for a time but for eternity.”

  Then Hertha, shivering, cried: “You’re lying, for I have sounded my heart!”

  “I wear an immaculate garment,” the apparition jeered, “to show that externally, I am irreproachable! You resemble me. For you remain pure in your cold whiteness, not out of virtue, but out of pride—Pharisee, as the Christ I hate would have said. But don’t think that you can mock me forever. One day, your thoughts will descend to action. Then, you will no longer belong to me. Your race will reawaken within you, horribly! You will be the queen of war, the sovereign of exterminations. You will pit one half of a world against another. You will set tortured cities on fire. Your dismal troops will follow the army of war-machines behind your Behemoth of steel, daughter of the Antichrist, smasher of the altars of the veiled Goddess. Terrible being who combines the strength of men with the cunning of women, you will mount the throne of Drymea on the bloody eve of great massacres. And you will not forget, in making yourself Queen, your Princess with the soft eyes, bewildered but submissive!”