Creatures of Light and Darkness Read online

  They stand so, frozen for a timeless instant, and the firelight wrestles with shadows upon their bodies.

  Then with a gigantic, heaving motion, Wakim raises Dargoth above the ground, turns, and hurls him from him.

  Dargoth’s legs kick wildly as he turns over in the air. His spines rise and fall and his tail reaches out and cracks. He raises his arms up before his face, but he lands with a shattering crash at the foot of the throne of Anubis, and there he lies still, his metal body broken in four places and his head split open upon the first step to the throne.

  Wakim turns toward Anubis.

  “Sufficient?” he inquires.

  “You did not employ temporal fugue,” says Anubis, not even looking downward at the wreck that had been Dargoth.

  “It was unnecessary. He was not that mighty an opponent.”

  “He was mighty,” says Anubis. “Why did you laugh, and make as if you questioned your name when you fought with him?”

  “I do not know. For a moment, when I realized that I could not be beaten, I felt as though I were someone else.”

  “Someone without fear, pity, or remorse?”

  “Yes.”

  “Do you still feel thus?”

  “No.”

  “Then why have you stopped calling me ‘Master’?”

  “The heat of battle raised emotions which overrode my sense of protocol.”

  “Then correct the oversight, immediately.”

  “Very well, Master.”

  “Apologize. Beg my pardon, most humbly.”

  Wakim prostrates himself on the floor.

  “I beg your pardon, Master. Most humbly.”

  “Rise again, and consider yourself pardoned. The contents of your previous stomach have gone the way of all such things. You may go re-refresh yourself now. -Let there be singing and dancing once more! Let there be drinking and laughter in celebration of the name-giving on this, Wakim’s Thousandyear Eve! Let the carcass of Dargoth be gone from my sight!”

  And these things are done.

  After Wakim finishes his meal, and it seems as if the dancing and the singing of the dead will continue until Time’s well-deserved end, Anubis gestures, first to his left, then to his right, and every other flame folds upon every other pillar, dives within itself, is gone. His mouth opens and the words come down upon Wakim: “Take them back. Fetch me my staff.”

  Wakim stands and gives the necessary orders. Then he leads the dead out from the great Hall. As they depart, the tables vanish between the pillars. An impossible breeze tears at the ceiling of smoke. Before that great, gray mat is shredded, however, the other torches have died, and the only illumination within the Hall comes from the two blazing bowls on either side of the throne.

  Anubis stares into the darkness, and the captured light-rays reform themselves at his bidding and he sees Dargoth fall once more at the foot of his throne and lie still, and he sees the one he has named Wakim standing with a skull’s grin upon his lips, and for an instant-had it been a trick of the firelight? -a mark upon his brow.

  Far, in an enormous room where the light is dim and orange and crowded into corners and the dead lay them down once more upon invisible catafalques above their opened graves, faint, rising, then falling, Wakim hears a sound that is not like any sound he has ever heard before. He stays his hand upon the staff and descends the dais.

  “Old man,” he says to one with whom he spoke earlier, one whose hair and whose beard are stained with wine and in whose left wrist a clock has stopped, “old man, hear my words and tell me if you know: What is that sound?”

  The unblinking eyes stare upward, past his own, and the lips move: “Master…”

  “I am not Master here.”

  “… Master, it is but the howling of a dog.”

  Wakim returns then to the dais and gives them all back to their graves.

  Then the light departs and the staff guides him through the dark along the path that has been ordained.

  “I have brought your staff, Master.”

  “Arise, and approach.”

  “The dead are all returned to their proper places.”

  “Very good. -Wakim, you are my man?”

  “Yes, Master.”

  “To do my bidding, and to serve me in all things?”

  “Yes, Master.”

  “This is why you are emissary to the Middle Worlds, and beyond.”

  “I am to depart the House of the Dead?”

  “Yes, I am sending you forth from here on a mission.”

  “What sort of mission?”

  “The story is long, involved. There are many persons in the Middle Worlds who are very old. You know this?”

  “Yes.”

  “And there are some who are timeless and deathless.”

  “Deathless, Lord?”

  “By one means or another, certain individuals have achieved a kind of immortality. Perhaps they follow the currents of life and draw upon their force, and they flee from the waves of death. Perhaps they have adjusted their biochemistry, or they keep their bodies in constant repair, or they have many bodies and exchange them, or steal new ones. Perhaps they wear metal bodies, or no bodies at all. Whatever the means involved, you will hear talk of the Three Hundred Immortals when you enter the Middle Worlds. This is only an approximate figure, for few truly know much about them. There are two hundred eighty-three immortals, to be exact. They cheat on life, on death, as you can see, and their very existence upsets the balance, inspires others to strive to emulate their legends, causes others to think them gods. Some are harmless wanderers, others are not. All are powerful and subtle, all adept at continuing their existence. One is especially noxious, and I am sending you to destroy him.”

  “Who may he be, Master?”

  “He is called the Prince Who Was A Thousand, and he dwells beyond the Middle Worlds. His kingdom lies beyond the realm of life and death, in a place where it is always twilight. He is difficult to locate, however, for he often departs his own region and trespasses into the Middle Worlds and elsewhere. I desire that he come to an end, as he has opposed both the House of the Dead and the House of Life for many days.”

  “What does he look like, the Prince Who Was A Thousand?”

  “Anything he wishes.”

  “Where shall I find him?”

  “I do not know. You must seek him.”

  “How shall I know him?”

  “By his deeds, by his words. He opposes us in all ways.”

  “Surely others must oppose you also…”

  “Destroy all you come upon who do so. You shall know the Prince Who Was A Thousand, however, because he shall be the most difficult of all to destroy. He will come closest to destroying you.”

  “Suppose he succeeds.”

  “Then I shall take me a thousand years more to train another emissary to set upon this task. I do not desire his downfall today or tomorrow. It will doubtless take you centuries even to locate him. Time matters little. An age will pass before he becomes a threat, to Osiris or myself. You will learn of him as you travel, seeking after him. When you find him you will know him.”

  “Am I mighty enough to work his undoing?”

  “I think you are.”

  “I am ready.”

  “Then I shall set your feet upon the track. I give you the power to summon me, and in times of need to draw force from the fields of Life and of Death while you are among the Middle Worlds. This will make you invincible. You will report back to me when you feel you need to. If I feel this need, I will reach out after you.”

  “Thank you, Master.”

  “You will obey all my sendings, instantly.”

  “Yes.”

  “Go now and rest. After you have slept and eaten again, you will depart and begin your mission.”

  “Thank you.”

  “This will be your second-last sleep within this House, Wakim. Meditate upon the mysteries it contains.”

  “I do so constantly.”

  “I am o
ne of them.”

  “Master…”

  “That is part of my name. Never forget it.”

  “Master-how could I?”

  THE WAKING OF THE RED WITCH

  The Witch of the Loggia stirs in her sleep and cries out twice. Long has she slept now, and deeply. Her familiar rushes to comfort her, but bungles the job and causes her to awaken. She sits up then among cushions in her cathedral-high hall, and Time with Tarquin’s ravishing stride from her divan moves like a ghost, but she sees him and freezes him in his tracklessness with a gesture and a word, and hears then her doubled cry and looks backward with her eyes upon the dreamdark scream-sought thing she’d borne. Let there be ten cannon crashes and remove them from the air and the ear, preserving the nine crowded silences that lie between. Let these be heartbeats, then, and felt throughout the body mystical. In this still center, place a dry skin which has sloughed its snake. Now, let there be no moaning at the bar should a sunken ship return to port. Instead, withdraw from the dreamdark thing, with its rain like rapid-fire rosaries of guilt, cold and untold upon your belly. Think instead of broken horses, the curse of the Dutchman, and perhaps a line by the mad poet Vramin, such as, ”The bulb resurrects the daffodil, within its season.” If you ever loved anything in your life, try to remember it. If you ever betrayed anything, pretend for a moment that you have been forgiven. If you ever feared anything, pretend for an instant that those days are gone and will never return. Buy the lie and hold to it for as long as you can. Press your familiar, whatever its name, to your breast and stroke it till it purrs. Trade life and death for oblivion, but light or dark will reach your bones or your flesh. Morning will come, and with it remembrance.

  The Red Witch sleeps within her cathedral-high hall, between the past and the future. Her fleeing rapist of a dream disappears down dark alleyways, while Time ticks history around events. And she smiles now as she sleeps, for Janus is again doing things by halves…

  Backward-turned to glory, she dwells in his warm, green gaze.

  DEATH, LIFE, THE MAGICIAN AND ROSES

  Listen to the world. It is called Blis, and it is not hard to hear at all: The sounds may be laughter, sighs, contented belches. They may be the clog-clog of machinery or beating hearts. They may be the breathing of multitudes or their words. They may be footsteps, footsteps, the sound of a kiss, a slap, the cry of a baby. Music. Music, perhaps. The sound of typewriter keys through the Black Daddy Night, consciousness kissing paper only? Perhaps. Then forget the sounds and the words and look at the world.

  First, colors: Name one. Red? There’s a riverbank that color, green stream hauled between, snagged on purple rocks. Yellow and gray and black is the city in the distance. Here in the open field, both sides of the river, are pavilions. Pick any color-they’re all about. Over a thousand pavilions, like balloons and tepees and stemless mushrooms, blazing in the midst of a blue field, strung with pennons, full of moving colors that are people. Three lime-bright bridges span the river. The river leads to a creamy sea which swells but seldom breaks. From it, up the river, come barges and boats and other vessels which moor along the banks. More come out of the sky, settling anywhere upon the blue fabric of the field. Their passengers move among the pavilions. They are of all races and sorts. They eat and they talk. They play. They are making the sounds and wearing the colors. Okay?

  The odors are of sweet and growing things and kissful come the breezes. When these breezes and these odors reach the fairground, they are altered subtly. There comes up the odor of sawdust, which is hardly unpleasant; and that of perspiration, which cannot be too unpleasant if some of it is your own. Then there are smells of wood-smoke, smells of food, and the clean aroma of alcohol. Smell the world. Taste it, swallow it and hold it in your belly. Burst with it.

  … Like the man with the eyepatch and the alpenstock.

  He walks among the hucksters and the fillies, fat as a eunuch, but not. His flesh is strangely flesh-colored, and his right eye is a gray wheel, rolling. A week's growth of beard frames his face, and all colors are missing from the blot of his garments. His gait is steady. His hands are hard.

  He stops to buy a mug of beer, moves to watch a cockfight.

  He wagers a coin on the smaller bird, which tears the larger apart and so pays for his beer.

  He watches the deflowering-show, samples the narcotics exhibit, foils a brown man in a white shirt who attempts to guess his weight. A short man with close-set dark eyes then emerges from a nearby tent, moves his side, tugs upon his sleeve.

  “Yes?” His voice seems centrally located, that deeply potent does it stir.

  “I see by your outfit you may be a preacher.”

  “Yes, I am-of the non-theistic, non-sectarian sort.”

  “Very good. Would you care to earn some money? It will only take a few moments.”

  “What would you have me do?”

  “A man is going to commit suicide and be buried in that tent. The grave is already dug and all the tickets have been sold. The audience is growing restless now, though. The performer won’t do it without proper religious accompaniment, and we can’t sober up the preacher.”

  “I see. It will cost you ten.”

  “Make it five?”

  “Get yourself another preacher.”

  “All right ten! C’mon! They’re starting to clap their hands and boo!”

  He moves into the tent, blinks his eyes.

  “Here’s the preacher!” calls out the emcee. “We’re ready to go ahead now. -What’cher name, Dad?”

  “Sometimes I'm called Madrak.”

  The man stops, turns and stares at him, licks his lips.

  “I… didn’t realize.”

  “Let’s be on with it”

  “Okay, sir. -Make way here! Coming through! Hot stuff!”

  The crowd parts. There are perhaps three hundred people within the tent. Overhead lights blaze down upon a roped-in circle of bare earth in which a grave has been dug. Insects fly in rings through falling dust within the ladders of light. An opened coffin lies beside the opened grave. On a small platform of wood is a chair. The man seated upon the chair is perhaps fifty years of age. His face is flat and full of wrinkles, his complexion pale. His eyes bulge slightly. He wears only a pair of shorts, and he has much gray hair upon his chest, his arms, his legs. He leans forward and squints as the two approach through the crowd.

  “All set, Dolmin,” says the small man.

  “My ten,” says Madrak.

  The small man slips him a folded bill, which Madrak inspects and places in his wallet.

  The small man climbs up onto the platform and smiles out over the crowd. Then he pushes his straw hat back upon his head.

  “All right, folks,” he begins, “now we’re all set to go. I know you’ll find this was worth waiting for. As I announced earlier, this man Dolmin is about to commit suicide before your very eyes. For personal reasons he is resigning from the big race, and he has consented to earn a little money for his family by doing it in full sight of all. His performance will be followed by a genuine burial, in this same ground upon which you are now standing. It has doubtless been a long time since any of you have seen a real death-and I doubt anyone here present has ever seen a burial. So we’re about ready to turn this show over to the preacher and Mister Dolmin. Let’s have a nice hand

  for them both!”

  There is applause within the tent.

  “… And a final word of caution. Do not stand too close. We are bending an ordnance, despite the fact that this tent has been fully fireproofed. Okay! Take it away!”

  He jumps down from the platform as Madrak mounts it. Madrak leans toward the seated man as a can marked flammable is placed beside his chair. “Are you sure you want to go through with this?” he asks the man.

  “Yes.”

  He looks into the man’s eyes, but the pupils are not enlarged, nor are they shrunken.

  “Why?”

  “Personal reasons, Dad. I'd rather not go into them. Shr
ive me, please.”

  Madrak places his hand upon the man’s head.

  “Insofar as I may be heard by anything, which may or may not care what I say, I ask, if it matters, that you be forgiven for anything you may have done or failed to do which requires forgiveness. Conversely, if not forgiveness but something else may be required to insure any possible benefit for which you may be eligible after the destruction of your body, I ask that this, whatever it may be, be granted or withheld, as the case may be, in such a manner as to insure your receiving said benefit I ask this in my capacity as your elected intermediary between yourself and that which may not be yourself, but which may have an interest in the matter of your receiving as much as it is possible for you to receive of this thing, and which may in some way be influenced by this ceremony. Amen.”

  “Thank you, Dad.”

  “Beautiful!” sobs a fat woman with blue wings, from the front row.

  The man called Dolmin raises the can marked flammable, unscrews the cap, pours its contents over himself. “Has anyone got a cigarette?” he asks, and the small man hands one up to him. Dolmin reaches into the pocket of his shorts and withdraws a lighter. Then he pauses and looks out over the crowd. Someone calls out, “Why are you doing it?” He smiles then and replies, “A general protest against life, perhaps, which is a foolish game, is it not? Follow me…” Then he lights the lighter. By this time, Madrak is well outside the roped-in circle.

  A blast of heat follows the blaze, and the single scream is a hot nail driven through everything.

  The six men who are standing by with fire extinguishers relax when they see that the flames will not spread.

  Madrak folds his hands beneath his chin and rests them upon his staff.

  After a time, the flames go out and the men with asbestos gloves come forward to handle the remains. The audience is quiet. There has been no applause thus far.

  “So that’s what it's like!” someone finally whispers, and the words carry throughout the tent.

  “Perhaps,” comes a precise, cheerful voice from the back of the tent, “and perhaps not, also.”