Tales of the Dying Earth Read online

  Kandive leaned back into his cushions and tapped his nose with a ferrule of carved jade.

  "And it is I who make the venture possible. Further, I am already an accomplished wizard; .the increment of lore will merely enhance my craft.

  You, not even a novice, will gain such knowledge as to rank you among the magicians of Ascolais. This is a far cry from your present ineffectual status. Seen in this light, my gain is small, yours is great."

  Ulan Dhor grimaced. "True enough, though I dispute the word

  'ineffectual'. I know Phandaal's Critique of the Chill, I am reckoned a master of the sword, ranked among the Eight Delaphasians as a ..."

  "Pah!" sneered Kandive. "The vapid mannerisms of pale people, using up their lives. Mincing murder, extravagant debauchery, while Earth passes its last hours, and none of you have ventured a mile from Kaiin."

  Ulan Dhor held his tongue, reflecting that Prince Kandive the Golden was not known to scorn the pleasures of wine, couch, or table; and that his farthest known sally from the domed palace had taken him to his carven barge on the River Scaum.

  Kandive, appeased by Ulan Dhor's silence, brought forward an ivory box. "Thus and so. If we are agreed, I will invest you with knowledge."

  Ulan Dhor nodded. "We are agreed."

  Kandive said, "The mission will take you to the lost city Ampridatvir."

  He watched Ulan Dhor's face from sidelong eyes; Ulan Dhor maintained an even expression.

  "I have never seen it," continued Kandive. "Porrina the Ninth lists it as the last of the Olek'hnit cities, situated on an island in the North Melantine." He opened the box. "This tale I found in an ancient bundle of scrolls—the testament of a poet who fled Ampridatvir after the death of Rogol Domedonfors, their last great leader, a magician of great force, mentioned forty-three times in the Cyclopedia ..."

  Kandive brought forth a crackling scroll, and, whipping it open, read:

  Ampridatvir now is lost. My people have forsaken the doctrine of strength and discipline and concern themselves only with superstition and theology. Unending is the bicker: Is Pansiu the excellent principle and Cazdal depraved, or is Cazdal the virtuous god, and Pansiu the essential evil?

  These questions are debated with fire and steel, and the memory sickens me; now I leave Ampridatvir to the decline which must surely come, and remove to the kind valley of Mel-Palusas, where I will end this firefly life of mine.

  I have known the Ampridatvir of old; I have seen the towers glowing with marvellous light, thrusting beams through the night to challenge the sun itself. Then Ampridatvir was beautiful—ah my heart pains when I think of the olden city. Semir vines cascaded from a thousand hanging gardens, water ran blue as vaul-stone in the three canals. Metal cars rolled the streets, metal hulls swarmed the air as thick as bees around a hive—for marvel of marvels, we had devised wefts of spitting fire to spurn the weighty power of Earth . . . But even in my life I saw the leaching of spirit. A surfeit of honey cloys the tongue; a surfeit of wine addles the brain; so a surfeit of ease guts a man of strength. Light, warmth, food, water, were free to all men, and gained by a minimum of effort. So the people of Ampridatvir, released from toil, gave increasing attention to faddishness, perversity, and the occult.

  To the furthest reach of my memory, Rogol Domedonfors ruled the city. He knew lore of all ages, secrets of fire and light, gravity and counter-gravity, the knowledge of superphysic numeration, metathasm, corolopsis. In spite of his profundity, he was impractical in his rule, and blind to the softening of Ampridatvirian spirit. Such weakness and lethargy as he saw he ascribed to a lack of education, and in his last years he evolved a tremendous machine to release men from all labor, and thus permit full leisure for meditation and ascetic discipline.

  While Rogol Domedonfors completed his great work, the city dissolved into turbulence—the result of a freak religious hysteria.

  The rival sects of Pansiu and Cazdal had long existed, but few other than the priests heeded the dispute. Suddenly the cults became fashionable; the population flocked to worship one or the other of the deities. The priests, long-jealous rivals, were delighted with their new power, and exhorted the converts to a crusading zeal. Friction arose, emotion waxed, there was rioting and violence. And on one evil day a stone struck Rogol Domedonfors, toppled him from a balcony.

  Crippled and wasting but refusing to die, Rogol Domedonfors completed his underground mechanism, installed vestibules throughout the city, and then took to his death-bed. He issued one directive to his new machine, and when Ampridatvir awoke the next morning, the people found their city without power or light, the food factories quiet, the canals diverted.

  In terror they rushed to Rogol Domedonfors, who said: "I have long been blind to your decadence and eccentricities; now I despise you; you have been the death of me."

  "But the city dies! The race perishes!" they cried.

  "You must save yourselves," Rogol Domedonfors told them. "You have ignored the ancient wisdom, you have been too indolent to learn, you have sought easy complacence from religion, rather than facing manfully to the world. I have resolved to impose a bitter experience upon you, which I hope will be salutary."

  He called the rival priests of Pansiu and Cazdal, and handed to each a tablet of transparent metal.

  " These tablets singly are useless; laid together a message may be read. He who reads the message will have the key to the ancient knowledge, and will wield the power I had planned for my own use. Now go, and I will die."

  The priests, glaring at each other, departed, called their followers, and so began a great war.

  The body of Rogol Domedonfors was never found, and some say his skeleton still lies in the passages below the city. The tablets are housed in the rival temples. By night there is murder, by day there is starvation in the streets. Many have fled to the mainland, and now I follow, leaving Ampridatvir, the last home of the race. I will build a wooden hut on the slope of Mount Liu and live out my days in the valley of Mel-Palusas.'"

  Kandive twisted the scroll and replaced it in the box. "Your task," he told Ulan Dhor, "is to journey to Ampridatvir and recover the magic of Rogol Domedonfors."

  Ulan Dhor said thoughtfully, "It was a long time ago ... Thousands of years ..."

  "Correct," said Kandive. "However, none of the histories of indices make further mention of Rogol Domedonfors, and herefore I believe that the wisdom of Rogol Domedonfors still remains to be found in ancient Ampridatvir."

  Three weeks Ulan Dhor sailed the nerveless ocean. The sun rose bright as blood from the horizon and belled across the sky, and the water was calm, save for the ruffle of the breeze and the twin widening marks of Ulan Dhor's wake.

  Then came the setting, the last sad glance across the world; then purple twilight and the night. The old stars spanned the sky and the wake behind Ulan Dhor shone ghastly white. Then did he watch for heavings of the surface, for he felt greatly alone on the dark face of the ocean.

  Three weeks Ulan Dhor sailed the Melantine Gulf, to the north and west, and one morning he saw to the right the dark shadow of coastland and to the left the loom of an island, almost lost in the haze.

  Close off his bow goated an ungainly barge, moving sluggishly under a square sail of plaited reeds.

  Ulan Dhor laid a course so as to draw alongside, and saw on the barge two men in coarse green smocks trolling for fish. They had oat-yellow hair and blue eyes, and they wore expressions of stupefaction.

  Ulan Dhor dropped his sail and laid hold of the barge. The fishermen neither moved nor spoke.

  Ulan Dhor said, "You seem unfamiliar with the sight of man."

  The older man broke into a nervous chant which Ulan Dhor understood to be an invocation against demons and frits.

  Ulan Dhor laughed. "Why do you inveigh against me? I am a man like yourself."

  The younger man said in a broad dialect: "We reason you to be a demon. First, there are none of our race with night-black hair and eyes.

  Second, the Word of
Pansiu denies the existence of all other men.

  Therefore you can be no man, and must be a demon."

  The older man said under his hand, "Hold your tongue; speak no word. He will curse the tones of your voice . . ."

  "You are wrong, I assure you," replied Ulan Dhor politely. "Have either of you ever seen a demon?"

  "None but the Gauns."

  "Do I resemble the Gauns?"

  "Not at all," admitted the older man. His companion indicated Ulan Dhor's dull scarlet coat and green trousers. "He is evidently a Raider; note the color of his garb."

  Ulan Dhor said, "No, I am neither Raider nor demon. I am merely a man ..."

  "No men exist except the Greens—so says Pansiu."

  Ulan Dhor threw back his head and laughed. "Earth is but wilderness and ruins, true enough, but many men yet walk abroad . . . Tell me, is the city Ampridatvir to be found on that island ahead?"

  The younger man nodded.

  "And you live there?"

  Again the young man assented.

  Ulan Dhor said uncomfortably, "I understood that Ampridatvir was a deserted ruin—forlorn, desolate."

  The young man asked with a shrewd expression, "And what do you seek at Ampridatvir?"

  Ulan Dhor thought, I will mention the tablets and observe their reaction. It is well to learn if these tablets are known, and if so, how they are regarded. He said, "I have sailed three weeks to find Ampridatvir and investigate some legendary tablets."

  "Ah," said the older man. “The tablets! He is a Raider, then. I see it clearly. Note his green trousers. A Raider for the Greens ..."

  Ulan Dhor, expecting hostility as a result of this identification, was surprised to find a more pleasant expression on the faces of the men, as if now they had resolved a troublesome parodox. Very well, he thought, if that is how they will Have it, let it be.

  The younger man wished total clarity. "Is that your claim then, dark man? Do you wear red as a Raider for the Greens?"

  Ulan Dhor said cautiously, "My plans are not settled."

  "But you wear red! That is the color the Raiders wear!"

  Here is a peculiarly disrupted way of thinking, reflected Ulan Dhor. It is almost as if a rock blocked the stream of their thought and diverted the current in a splash and a spray. He said, "Where I come from, a man wears such colors as he chooses."

  The older man said eagerly, "But you wear Green, so evidently you have chosen to raid for the Greens."

  Ulan Dhor shrugged, sensing the block across a mental channel. "If you wish ... What others are there?"

  "None, no other," replied the older man. "We are the Greens of Ampridatvir."

  "Then—whom does a Raider raid?"

  The younger man moved uneasily and pulled in his line.

  "He raids a ruined temple to the demon Cazdal, for the lost tablet of Rogol Domedonfors."

  "In that case," said Ulan Dhor, "I might become a Raider."

  "For the Greens," said the old man, peering at him side-wise.

  "Enough, enough," said the other. "The sun is past the zenith. We had best be homeward."

  "Aye, aye," said the older man, with sudden energy. "The sun drops."

  The younger man looked at Ulan Dhor. "If you propose to raid, you had best come with us."

  Ulan Dhor passed a line to the barge, adding his fabric sail to the plaited reeds, and they turned their bows toward shore.

  It was very beautiful, crossing the sunny afternoon swells toward the forested island, and as they rounded the eastern cape, Ampridatvir came into view.

  A line of low buildings faced the harbor, and beyond rose such towers as Ulan Dhor had never imagined to exist—metal spires soaring past the central height of the island to glisten in the light of the setting sun. Such cities were legends of the past, dreams of the time when the Earth was young.

  Ulan Dhor stared speculatively at the barge, at the coarse green cloaks of the fishermen. Were they peasants? Would he become a butt for ridicule, thus arriving at the glistening city? He turned uncomfortably back to the island, chewing his lips. According to Kandive, Ampridatvir would be toppled columns and rubble, like the Old Town above Kaiin ...

  The sun dropped against the water, and now Ulan Dhor, with a sudden shock, noticed the crumble at the base of the towers; here was his expectation, as much desolation as Kandive had predicted. Strangely the fact gave Ampridatvir an added majesty, the dignity of a lost monument.

  The wind had slackened, the progress of boat and barge was slow indeed. The fishermen betrayed anxiety, muttering to each other, adjusting their sail to draw its best, tightening their stays. But before they drifted inside the breakwater, purple twilight had dropped across the city, and the towers became tremendous black monoliths.

  In near-darkness they tied to a landing of logs, among other barges, some painted green, others gray.

  Ulan Dhor jumped up to the dock. "A moment," said the younger fisherman, eyeing Ulan Dhor's red coat. "It would be unwise to dress thus, even at night." He rummaged through a box and brought forth a green cape, ragged and smelling of fish. "Wear this, and hold the hood over your black hair ..."

  Ulan Dhor obeyed with a private grimace of distaste. He asked,

  "Where may I sup and bed tonight? Are there inns or hostels in Ampridatvir?"

  The younger man said without enthusiasm, "You may pass the night at my hall."

  The fishermen slung the day's catch over their shoulders, climbed to the dock, and peered anxiously through the rubble.

  "You are ill at ease," observed Ulan Dhor.

  "Aye," said the younger man. "At night the Gauns roam the streets."

  "What are the Gauns?"

  "Demons."

  'There are many varieties of demons," Ulan Dhor said lightly. "What be these?"

  "They are like horrible men. They have great long arms that clutch and rend ..."

  "Ho!" muttered Ulan Dhor, feeling for his sword hilt. "Why do you permit them abroad?"

  "We cannot harm them. They are fierce and strong— but fortunately not too agile. With luck and watchfulness .. ."

  Ulan Dhor now searched the rubble with an expression as careful as the fishermen's. These people were familiar with the dangers of the place; he would obey their counsel until he knew better.

  They threaded the first tumble of ruins, entered a canyon shadowed from the afterglow by the pinnacles to either side, brimming with gloom.

  Deadness! thought Ulan Dhor. The place was under the pall of dusty death. Where were the active millions of long ago Ampridatvir? Dead dust, their moisture mingled in the ocean, beside that of every other man and woman who had lived on Earth.

  Ulan Dhor and the two fishermen moved down the avenue, pygmy figures wandering a dream-city, and Ulan Dhor looked coldly from side to side . . . Prince Kandive the Golden had spoken truth. Ampridatvir was the very definition of antiquity. The windows gaped black, concrete had cracked, balconies hung crazily, terraces were mounded with dust.

  Debris filled the streets—blocks of stone from fallen columns, crushed and battered metal.

  But Ampridatvir still moved with a weird unending life where the builders had used ageless substance, eternal energies. Strips of a dark glistening material flowed like water at each side of the street—slowly at the edges, rapidly at the center.

  The fishermen matter-of-factly stepped on this strip, and Ulan Dhor gingerly followed them to the swift center. "I see roads flowing like rivers in Ampridatvir," he said. "You call me demon; truly I think the glove is on the other hand."

  "It is no magic," said the younger man shortly. "It is the way of Ampridatvir."

  At regular intervals along the street stood stone vestibules about ten feet high that had the appearance of sheltering ramps leading below the street.

  "What lies below?" inquired Ulan Dhor.

  The fishermen shrugged. "The doors are tight. No man has ever gone through. Legend says it was the last work of Rogol Domedonfors."

  Ulan Dhor withheld further qu
estions, observing a growing nervousness in the fishermen. Infected by their apprehension he kept his hand at his sword.

  "None live in this part of Ampridatvir," said the old fisherman in a hoarse whisper. "It is ancient beyond imagining, ridden with ghosts."

  The streets broke into a central square, the towers fell away before them. The sliding strip coasted to a stop, like water flowing into a pool.

  Here glowed the first artificial light Ulan Dhor had seen—a bright globe hung on a looping metal stanchion.

  In this light Ulan Dhor saw a youth in a gray cloak hurrying across the square ... A movement among the ruins; the fishermen gasped, crouched. A corpse-pale creature sprang out into the light. Its arms hung knotted and long; dirty fur covered its legs. Great eyes glared from a peaked, fungus-white skull; two fangs hung over the undershot mouth. It leapt upon the wretch in the gray robe and tucked him under his arm; then, turning, gave Ulan Dhor and the fishermen a look of baleful triumph. And now they saw that the victim was a woman ...

  Ulan Dhor drew his sword. "No, no!" whispered the older man. "The Gaun will go its way!"

  "But the woman it has taken! We can save her!"

  "The Gaun has seized no one." The old man clutched at his shoulder.

  "Are you blind, man?" cried Ulan Dhor.

  "There are none in Ampridatvir but the Greens," said the younger man. "Stay by us."

  Ulan Dhor hesitated. Was the woman in gray, then, a ghost? If so, why did not the fishermen say as much? . . .

  The Gaun, with insolent leisure, stalked toward a long edifice of dark tumbled arches.

  Ulan Dhor ran across the white square of ancient Ampridatvir.

  The monster twisted to face him and flung out a great knotted arm, as long as a man was tall, ending in a white-furred clump of fingers. Ulan Dhor hewed a tremendous blow with his sword; the Gaun's forearm dangled by a shred of flesh and bone-splinter.

  Jumping back to avoid the spray of blood, Ulan Dhor ducked the grasp of the other arm as it swung past. He hacked again, another great blow, and the second forearm dangled loosely. He sprang close, plunged his blade at the creature's eye and struck up into the beast's skull-case.