Perhaps his status was that of a prisoner, but
Shann was too tired to press for an explanation. He was content to
be left alone in the unusual circular, but roofless, room of the
structure to which they had brought him. There was a thick matlike
pallet in one corner, short for the length of his body, but softer
than any bed he had rested on since he had left the Terran camp
before the coming of the Throgs. Above him glimmered those patches
of light symbolizing the lost stars. He blinked at them until they
all ran together in bands like the jeweled coils on Warlockian
bodies; then he slept—dreamlessly.
The Terran awoke with all his senses alert; some silent alarm
might have triggered that instant awareness of himself and his
surroundings. There had been no change in the star pattern still
overhead; no one had entered the round chamber. Shann rolled over
on his mat bed, conscious that all his aches had vanished. Just as
his mind was clearly active, so did his body also respond
effortlessly to his demands. He was not aware of any hunger or
thirst, though a considerable length of time must have passed since
he had made his mysteriously contrived exit from the outer
world.
In spite of the humidity of the air, his ragged garments had
dried on his body. Shann got to his feet, trying to order the sorry
remnants of his uniform, eager to be on the move. Though to where
and for what purpose he could not have answered.
The door through which he had entered remained closed, refusing
to yield to his push. Shann stepped back, eyeing the distance to
the top of the partition between the roofless rooms. The walls were
smooth with the gloss of a sea shell’s interior, but the
exuberant confidence which had been with him since his awakening
refused to accept such a minor obstacle.
He made two test leaps, both times his fingers striking the wall
well below the top of the partition. Shann gathered himself
together as might a cat and tried the third time, putting into that
effort every last ounce of strength, determination and will. He
made it, though his arms jerked as the weight of his body hung from
his hands. Then a scramble, a knee hooked over the top, and he was
perched on the wall, able to study the rest of the building.
In shape, the structure was unlike anything he had seen on his
home world or reproduced in any of the tri-dee records of Survey
accessible to him. The rooms were either circular or oval, each
separated from the next by a short passage, so that the overall
impression was that of ten strings of beads radiating from a
central knot of one large chamber, all with the uniform nacre walls
and a limited amount of furnishings.
As he balanced on the narrow perch, Shann could sight no other
movement in the nearest line of rooms, those connected by corridors
with his own. He got to his feet to walk the tightrope of the upper
walls toward that inner chamber which was the heart of the
Warlockian—palace? town apartment dwelling? At least it was
the only structure on the island, for he could see the outer rim of
that smooth soft sand ringing it about. The island itself was
curiously symmetrical, a perfect oval, too perfect to be a natural
outcrop of sand and rock.
There was no day or night here in the cavern. The light from the
roof patches remained constantly the same, and that flow was
abetted within the building by a soft radiation from the walls.
Shann reached the next room in line, hunkering down to see within
it. To all appearances the chamber was exactly the same as the one
he had just left; there were the same unadorned walls, a thick mat
bed against the far side, and no indication whether it was in use
or had not been entered for days.
He was on the next section of corridor wall when he caught that
faint taint in the air, the very familiar scent of wolverines. Now
it provided Shann with a guide as well as a promise of allies.
The next bead-room gave him what he wanted. Below him Taggi and
Togi paced back and forth. They had already torn to bits the
sleeping mat which had been the chamber’s single furnishing,
and their temper was none too certain. As Shann squatted well above
their range of vision, Taggi reared against the opposite wall, his
claws finding no hold on the smooth coating of its surface. They
were as completely imprisoned as if they had been dropped into a
huge fishbowl, and they were not taking to it kindly.
How had the animals been brought here? Down that water tunnel by
the same unknown method he himself had been transported until that
almost disastrous awakening in the center of the flood? The Terran
did not doubt that the doors of the room were as securely fastened
as those of his own further down the corridor. For the moment the
wolverines were safe; he could not free them. And he was growing
increasingly certain that if he found any of his native jailers, it
would be at the center of that wheel of rooms and corridors.
Shann made no attempt to attract the animals’ attention,
but kept on along his tightrope path. He passed two more rooms,
both empty, both differing in no way from those he had already
inspected; and then he came to the central chamber, four times as
big as any of the rest and with a much brighter wall light.
The Terran crouched, one hand on the surface of the partition
top as an additional balance, the other gripping his stunner. For
some reason his captors had not disarmed him. Perhaps they believed
they had no necessity to fear his off-world weapon.
“Have you grown wings?”
The words formed in his brain, bringing with them a sense of
calm amusement to reduce all his bold exploration to the level of a
child’s first staggering steps. Shann fought his first
answering flare of pure irritation. To lose even a fraction of
control was to open a door for them. He remained where he was as if
he had never “heard” that question, surveying the room
below with all the impassiveness he could summon.
Here the walls were no smooth barrier, but honeycombed with
niches in a regular pattern. And in each of the niches rested a
polished skull, a nonhuman skull. Only the outlines of those ranked
bones were familiar; for just so had looked the great purple-red
rock where the wheeling flyers issued from the eye sockets. A rock
island had been fashioned into a skull—by design or
nature?
And upon closer observation the Terran could see that there was
a difference among these ranked skulls, a mutation of coloring from
row to row, a softening of outline, perhaps by the wearing of
time.
There was also a table of dull black, rising from the flooring
on legs which were not more than a very few inches high, so that
from his present perch the board appeared to rest on the pavement
itself. Behind the table in a row, as shopkeepers might await a
customer, three of the Warlockians, sat cross-legged on mats, their
hands folded primly before them. And at the side a fourth, the one
whom he had trapped on the island.
Not one of those spiked heads rose to view him. But they knew
that he was there; perhaps they had known the very instant he had
left the room or cell in which they had shut him. And they were so
very sure of themselves . . . Once again Shann
subdued a spark of anger. That same patience with its core of
stubborn determination which had brought him to Warlock backed his
moves now. The Terran swung down, landing lightly on his feet,
facing the three behind the table, towering well over them as he
stood erect, yet gaining no sense of satisfaction from that merely
physical fact.
“You have come.” The words sounded as if they might
be a part of some polite formula. So he replied in kind and
aloud.
“I have come.” Without waiting for their bidding, he
dropped into the same cross-legged pose, fronting them now on a
more equal level across their dead black table.
“And why have you come, star voyager?” That thought
seemed to be a concentrated effort from all three rather than any
individual questioning.
“And why did you bring me?” He hesitated, trying to
think of some polite form of address. Those he knew which were
appropriate to their sex on other worlds seemed incongruous when
applied to the bizarre figures now facing him. “Wise
ones,” he finally chose.
Those unblinking yellow eyes conveyed no emotion; certainly his
human gaze could detect no change of expression on their nonhuman
faces.
“You are a male.”
“I am,” he agreed, not seeing just what that fact
had to do with either diplomatic fencing or his experiences of the
immediate past.
“Where then is your thoughtguider?”
Shann puzzled over that conception, guessed at its meaning.
“I am my own thoughtguider,” he returned stoutly,
with all the conviction he could manage to put into that reply.
Again he met a yellow-green stare, but he sensed a change in
them. Some of their complacency had ebbed; his reply had been as a
stone dropped into a quiet pool, sending ripples out afar to
disturb the customary mirror surface of smooth serenity.
“The star-born one speaks the truth!” That came from
the Warlockian who had been his first contact.
“It would appear that he does.” The agreement was
measured, and Shann knew that he was meant to
“overhear” that.
“It would seem, Readers-of-the-rods”—the
middle one of the triumvirate at the table spoke
now—“that all living things do not follow our pattern
of life. But that is possible. A male who thinks for
himself . . . unguided, who dreams perhaps! Or
who can understand the truth of dreaming! Strange indeed must be
his people. Sharers-of-my-visions, let us consult the Old Ones
concerning this.” For the first time one of those crested
heads moved, the gaze shifted from Shann to the ranks of the
skulls, pausing at one.
Shann, ready for any wonder, did not betray his amazement when
the ivory inhabitant of that particular niche moved, lifted from
its small compartment, and drifted buoyantly through the air to
settle at the right-hand corner of the table. Only when it had
safely grounded did the eyes of the Warlockian move to another
niche on the other side of the curving room, this time bringing up
from close to floor level a time-darkened skull to occupy the left
corner of the table.
There was a third shifting from the weird storehouse, a last
skull to place between the other two. And now the youngest native
arose from her mat to bring a bowl of green crystal. One of her
seniors took it in both hands, making a gesture of offering it to
all three skulls, and then gazed over its rim at the Terran.
“We shall cast the rods, man-who-thinks-without-a-guide.
Perhaps then we shall see how strong your dreams
are—to be bent to your using, or to break you for your
impudence.”
Her hands swayed the bowl from side to side, and there was an
answering whisper from its interior as if the contents slid loosely
there. Then one of her companions reached forward and gave a quick
tap to the bottom of that container, spilling out upon the table a
shower of brightly colored slivers each an inch or so long.
Shann, staring at the display in bewilderment, saw that in spite
of the seeming carelessness of that toss the small needles had
spread out on the blank surface to form a design in arrangement and
color. And he wondered how that skillful trick had been
accomplished.
All three of the Warlockians bent their heads to study the
grouping of the tiny sticks, their young subordinate leaning
forward also, her eagerness less well controlled than her
elders’. And now it was as if a curtain had fallen between
the Terran and the aliens, all sense of communication which had
been with him since he had entered the skull-lined chamber was
summarily cut off.
A hand moved, making the jeweled pattern—braceleting wrist
and extending up the arm—flash subdued fire. Fingers swept
the sticks back into the bowl; four pairs of yellow eyes raised to
regard Shann once more, but the blanket of their withdrawal still
held.
The youngest Warlockian took the bowl from the elder who held
it, stood for a long moment with it resting between her palms,
fixing Shann with an unreadable stare. Then she came toward him.
One of those at the table put out a restraining hand.
This time Shann did not master his start as he heard
the first audible voice which had not been his own. The skull at
the left hand on the table, by its yellowed color the oldest of
those summoned from the niches, was moving, moving because its jaws
gaped and then snapped, emitting a faint bleat which might have
been a word or two.
She who would have halted the young Warlockian’s advance
withdrew her hand. Then her fingers curled in an unmistakable
beckoning gesture. Shann came to the table, but he could not quite
force himself near that chattering skull, even though it had
stopped its jig of speech.
The bowl of sticks was offered to him. Still no message from
mind to mind, but he could guess at what they wanted of him. The
crystal substance was not cool to the touch as he had expected;
rather it was warm, as living flesh might feel. And the colored
sticks filled about two thirds of the interior, lying all mixed
together without any order.
Shann concentrated on recalling the ceremony the Warlockian had
used before the first toss. She had offered the bowl to the skulls
in turn. The skulls! But he was no consulter of skulls. Still
holding the bowl close to his chest, Shann looked up over the
roofless walls at the star map on the roof of the cavern. There,
that was Rama; and to its left, just a little above, was
Tyr’s system where swung the stark world of his birth, and of
which he had only few good memories, but of which he was a part.
The Terran raised the bowl to that spot of light which marked
Tyr’s pale sun.
Smiling with a wry twist, he lowered the bowl, and on impulse of
pure defiance he offered it to the skull that had chattered.
Immediately he realized that the move had had an electric effect
upon the aliens. Slowly at first, and then faster, he began to
swing the bowl from side to side, the needles slipping, mixing
within. And as he swung it, Shann held it out over the expanse of
the table.
The Warlockian who had given him the bowl was the one who struck
it on the bottom, causing a rain of splinters. To Shann’s
astonishment, mixed as they had been in the container, they once
more formed a pattern, and not the same pattern the Warlockians had
consulted earlier. The dampening curtain between them vanished; he
was in touch mind to mind once again.
“So be it.” The center Warlockian spread out her
four-fingered thumbless hands above the scattered needles.
“What is read, is read.”
Again a formula. He caught a chorus of answer from the
others.
“What is read, is read. To the dreamer the dream. Let the
dream be known for what it is, and there is life. Let the dream
encompass the dreamer falsely, and all is lost.”
“Who can question the wisdom of the Old Ones?” asked
their leader. “We are those who read the messages they send,
out of their mercy. This is a strange thing they bid us do,
man—open for you our own initiates’ road to the veil of
illusion. That way has never been for males, who dream without set
purpose and have not the ability to know true from false, have no
the courage to face their dreams to the truth. Do so—if you
can!” There was a flash of mockery in that; combined with
something else—stronger than distaste, not as strong as
hatred, but certainly not friendly.
She held out her hands and Shann saw now, lying on a slowly
closing palm, a disk such as the one Thorvald had shown him. The
Terran had only one moment of fear and then came blackness, more
absolute than the dark of any night he had ever known.
Light once more, green light with an odd shimmering quality to
it. The skull-lined walls were gone; there were no walls, no
building held him. Shann strode forward, and his boots sank in
sand, that smooth, satin sand which had ringed the island in the
cavern. But he was certain he was no longer on that island, even
within that cavern, though far above him there was still a dome of
roof.
The source of the green shimmer lay to his left. Somehow he
found himself reluctant to turn and face it. That would commit him
to action. But Shann turned.
A veil, a veil of rippling green. Material? No, rather mist or
light. A veil depending from some source so far over his head that
its origin was hidden in the upper gloom, a veil which was a
barrier he must cross.
With every nerve protesting, Shann walked forward, unable to
keep back. He flung up his arm to protect his face as he marched
into that stuff. It was warm, and the gas—if gas it
was—left no slick of moisture on his skin in spite of its
foggy consistency. And it was no veil or curtain, for although he
was already well into the murk, he saw no end to it. Blindly he
trudged on, unable to sight anything but the rolling billows of
green, pausing now and again to go down on one knee and pat the
sand underfoot, reassured at the reality of that footing.
And when he met nothing menacing, Shann began to relax. His
heart no longer labored; he made no move to draw the stunner or
knife. Where he was and for what purpose, he had no idea. But there
was a purpose in this and that the Warlockians were behind
it, he did not doubt. The “initiates’ road,” the
leader had said, and the conviction was steady in his mind that he
faced some test of alien devising.
A cavern with a green veil—his memory awoke.
Thorvald’s dream! Shann paused, trying to remember how the
other had described this place. So he was enacting Thorvald’s
dream! And could the Survey officer now be caught in Shann’s
dream in turn, climbing up somewhere into the nose slit of a
skull-shaped mountain?
Green fog without end, and Shann lost in it. How long had he
been here? Shann tried to reckon time, the time since his coming
into the water-world of the starred cavern. He realized that he had
not eaten, nor drank, nor desired to do so either—nor did he
now. Yet he was not weak; in fact, he had never felt such tireless
energy as possessed his spare body.
Was this all a dream? His threatened drowning in the
underground stream a nightmare? Yet there was a pattern in this,
just as there had been a pattern in the needles he had spilled
across the table. One even led to another with discernible logic;
because he had tossed that particular pattern he had come here.
According to the ambiguous instructions or warnings of the
Warlockian witch, his safety in this place would depend upon his
ability to tell true dreams from false. But
how . . . why? So far he
had done nothing except walk through a green fog and for all he
knew, he might well be traveling in circles.
Because there was nothing else to do, Shann walked on, his boots
pressing sand, rising from each step with a small sucking sound.
Then, as he stooped to search for some indication of a path or road
which might guide him, his ears caught the slightest of
noises—other small sucking whimpers. He was not the only
wayfarer in this place!
Perhaps his status was that of a prisoner, but
Shann was too tired to press for an explanation. He was content to
be left alone in the unusual circular, but roofless, room of the
structure to which they had brought him. There was a thick matlike
pallet in one corner, short for the length of his body, but softer
than any bed he had rested on since he had left the Terran camp
before the coming of the Throgs. Above him glimmered those patches
of light symbolizing the lost stars. He blinked at them until they
all ran together in bands like the jeweled coils on Warlockian
bodies; then he slept—dreamlessly.
The Terran awoke with all his senses alert; some silent alarm
might have triggered that instant awareness of himself and his
surroundings. There had been no change in the star pattern still
overhead; no one had entered the round chamber. Shann rolled over
on his mat bed, conscious that all his aches had vanished. Just as
his mind was clearly active, so did his body also respond
effortlessly to his demands. He was not aware of any hunger or
thirst, though a considerable length of time must have passed since
he had made his mysteriously contrived exit from the outer
world.
In spite of the humidity of the air, his ragged garments had
dried on his body. Shann got to his feet, trying to order the sorry
remnants of his uniform, eager to be on the move. Though to where
and for what purpose he could not have answered.
The door through which he had entered remained closed, refusing
to yield to his push. Shann stepped back, eyeing the distance to
the top of the partition between the roofless rooms. The walls were
smooth with the gloss of a sea shell’s interior, but the
exuberant confidence which had been with him since his awakening
refused to accept such a minor obstacle.
He made two test leaps, both times his fingers striking the wall
well below the top of the partition. Shann gathered himself
together as might a cat and tried the third time, putting into that
effort every last ounce of strength, determination and will. He
made it, though his arms jerked as the weight of his body hung from
his hands. Then a scramble, a knee hooked over the top, and he was
perched on the wall, able to study the rest of the building.
In shape, the structure was unlike anything he had seen on his
home world or reproduced in any of the tri-dee records of Survey
accessible to him. The rooms were either circular or oval, each
separated from the next by a short passage, so that the overall
impression was that of ten strings of beads radiating from a
central knot of one large chamber, all with the uniform nacre walls
and a limited amount of furnishings.
As he balanced on the narrow perch, Shann could sight no other
movement in the nearest line of rooms, those connected by corridors
with his own. He got to his feet to walk the tightrope of the upper
walls toward that inner chamber which was the heart of the
Warlockian—palace? town apartment dwelling? At least it was
the only structure on the island, for he could see the outer rim of
that smooth soft sand ringing it about. The island itself was
curiously symmetrical, a perfect oval, too perfect to be a natural
outcrop of sand and rock.
There was no day or night here in the cavern. The light from the
roof patches remained constantly the same, and that flow was
abetted within the building by a soft radiation from the walls.
Shann reached the next room in line, hunkering down to see within
it. To all appearances the chamber was exactly the same as the one
he had just left; there were the same unadorned walls, a thick mat
bed against the far side, and no indication whether it was in use
or had not been entered for days.
He was on the next section of corridor wall when he caught that
faint taint in the air, the very familiar scent of wolverines. Now
it provided Shann with a guide as well as a promise of allies.
The next bead-room gave him what he wanted. Below him Taggi and
Togi paced back and forth. They had already torn to bits the
sleeping mat which had been the chamber’s single furnishing,
and their temper was none too certain. As Shann squatted well above
their range of vision, Taggi reared against the opposite wall, his
claws finding no hold on the smooth coating of its surface. They
were as completely imprisoned as if they had been dropped into a
huge fishbowl, and they were not taking to it kindly.
How had the animals been brought here? Down that water tunnel by
the same unknown method he himself had been transported until that
almost disastrous awakening in the center of the flood? The Terran
did not doubt that the doors of the room were as securely fastened
as those of his own further down the corridor. For the moment the
wolverines were safe; he could not free them. And he was growing
increasingly certain that if he found any of his native jailers, it
would be at the center of that wheel of rooms and corridors.
Shann made no attempt to attract the animals’ attention,
but kept on along his tightrope path. He passed two more rooms,
both empty, both differing in no way from those he had already
inspected; and then he came to the central chamber, four times as
big as any of the rest and with a much brighter wall light.
The Terran crouched, one hand on the surface of the partition
top as an additional balance, the other gripping his stunner. For
some reason his captors had not disarmed him. Perhaps they believed
they had no necessity to fear his off-world weapon.
“Have you grown wings?”
The words formed in his brain, bringing with them a sense of
calm amusement to reduce all his bold exploration to the level of a
child’s first staggering steps. Shann fought his first
answering flare of pure irritation. To lose even a fraction of
control was to open a door for them. He remained where he was as if
he had never “heard” that question, surveying the room
below with all the impassiveness he could summon.
Here the walls were no smooth barrier, but honeycombed with
niches in a regular pattern. And in each of the niches rested a
polished skull, a nonhuman skull. Only the outlines of those ranked
bones were familiar; for just so had looked the great purple-red
rock where the wheeling flyers issued from the eye sockets. A rock
island had been fashioned into a skull—by design or
nature?
And upon closer observation the Terran could see that there was
a difference among these ranked skulls, a mutation of coloring from
row to row, a softening of outline, perhaps by the wearing of
time.
There was also a table of dull black, rising from the flooring
on legs which were not more than a very few inches high, so that
from his present perch the board appeared to rest on the pavement
itself. Behind the table in a row, as shopkeepers might await a
customer, three of the Warlockians, sat cross-legged on mats, their
hands folded primly before them. And at the side a fourth, the one
whom he had trapped on the island.
Not one of those spiked heads rose to view him. But they knew
that he was there; perhaps they had known the very instant he had
left the room or cell in which they had shut him. And they were so
very sure of themselves . . . Once again Shann
subdued a spark of anger. That same patience with its core of
stubborn determination which had brought him to Warlock backed his
moves now. The Terran swung down, landing lightly on his feet,
facing the three behind the table, towering well over them as he
stood erect, yet gaining no sense of satisfaction from that merely
physical fact.
“You have come.” The words sounded as if they might
be a part of some polite formula. So he replied in kind and
aloud.
“I have come.” Without waiting for their bidding, he
dropped into the same cross-legged pose, fronting them now on a
more equal level across their dead black table.
“And why have you come, star voyager?” That thought
seemed to be a concentrated effort from all three rather than any
individual questioning.
“And why did you bring me?” He hesitated, trying to
think of some polite form of address. Those he knew which were
appropriate to their sex on other worlds seemed incongruous when
applied to the bizarre figures now facing him. “Wise
ones,” he finally chose.
Those unblinking yellow eyes conveyed no emotion; certainly his
human gaze could detect no change of expression on their nonhuman
faces.
“You are a male.”
“I am,” he agreed, not seeing just what that fact
had to do with either diplomatic fencing or his experiences of the
immediate past.
“Where then is your thoughtguider?”
Shann puzzled over that conception, guessed at its meaning.
“I am my own thoughtguider,” he returned stoutly,
with all the conviction he could manage to put into that reply.
Again he met a yellow-green stare, but he sensed a change in
them. Some of their complacency had ebbed; his reply had been as a
stone dropped into a quiet pool, sending ripples out afar to
disturb the customary mirror surface of smooth serenity.
“The star-born one speaks the truth!” That came from
the Warlockian who had been his first contact.
“It would appear that he does.” The agreement was
measured, and Shann knew that he was meant to
“overhear” that.
“It would seem, Readers-of-the-rods”—the
middle one of the triumvirate at the table spoke
now—“that all living things do not follow our pattern
of life. But that is possible. A male who thinks for
himself . . . unguided, who dreams perhaps! Or
who can understand the truth of dreaming! Strange indeed must be
his people. Sharers-of-my-visions, let us consult the Old Ones
concerning this.” For the first time one of those crested
heads moved, the gaze shifted from Shann to the ranks of the
skulls, pausing at one.
Shann, ready for any wonder, did not betray his amazement when
the ivory inhabitant of that particular niche moved, lifted from
its small compartment, and drifted buoyantly through the air to
settle at the right-hand corner of the table. Only when it had
safely grounded did the eyes of the Warlockian move to another
niche on the other side of the curving room, this time bringing up
from close to floor level a time-darkened skull to occupy the left
corner of the table.
There was a third shifting from the weird storehouse, a last
skull to place between the other two. And now the youngest native
arose from her mat to bring a bowl of green crystal. One of her
seniors took it in both hands, making a gesture of offering it to
all three skulls, and then gazed over its rim at the Terran.
“We shall cast the rods, man-who-thinks-without-a-guide.
Perhaps then we shall see how strong your dreams
are—to be bent to your using, or to break you for your
impudence.”
Her hands swayed the bowl from side to side, and there was an
answering whisper from its interior as if the contents slid loosely
there. Then one of her companions reached forward and gave a quick
tap to the bottom of that container, spilling out upon the table a
shower of brightly colored slivers each an inch or so long.
Shann, staring at the display in bewilderment, saw that in spite
of the seeming carelessness of that toss the small needles had
spread out on the blank surface to form a design in arrangement and
color. And he wondered how that skillful trick had been
accomplished.
All three of the Warlockians bent their heads to study the
grouping of the tiny sticks, their young subordinate leaning
forward also, her eagerness less well controlled than her
elders’. And now it was as if a curtain had fallen between
the Terran and the aliens, all sense of communication which had
been with him since he had entered the skull-lined chamber was
summarily cut off.
A hand moved, making the jeweled pattern—braceleting wrist
and extending up the arm—flash subdued fire. Fingers swept
the sticks back into the bowl; four pairs of yellow eyes raised to
regard Shann once more, but the blanket of their withdrawal still
held.
The youngest Warlockian took the bowl from the elder who held
it, stood for a long moment with it resting between her palms,
fixing Shann with an unreadable stare. Then she came toward him.
One of those at the table put out a restraining hand.
This time Shann did not master his start as he heard
the first audible voice which had not been his own. The skull at
the left hand on the table, by its yellowed color the oldest of
those summoned from the niches, was moving, moving because its jaws
gaped and then snapped, emitting a faint bleat which might have
been a word or two.
She who would have halted the young Warlockian’s advance
withdrew her hand. Then her fingers curled in an unmistakable
beckoning gesture. Shann came to the table, but he could not quite
force himself near that chattering skull, even though it had
stopped its jig of speech.
The bowl of sticks was offered to him. Still no message from
mind to mind, but he could guess at what they wanted of him. The
crystal substance was not cool to the touch as he had expected;
rather it was warm, as living flesh might feel. And the colored
sticks filled about two thirds of the interior, lying all mixed
together without any order.
Shann concentrated on recalling the ceremony the Warlockian had
used before the first toss. She had offered the bowl to the skulls
in turn. The skulls! But he was no consulter of skulls. Still
holding the bowl close to his chest, Shann looked up over the
roofless walls at the star map on the roof of the cavern. There,
that was Rama; and to its left, just a little above, was
Tyr’s system where swung the stark world of his birth, and of
which he had only few good memories, but of which he was a part.
The Terran raised the bowl to that spot of light which marked
Tyr’s pale sun.
Smiling with a wry twist, he lowered the bowl, and on impulse of
pure defiance he offered it to the skull that had chattered.
Immediately he realized that the move had had an electric effect
upon the aliens. Slowly at first, and then faster, he began to
swing the bowl from side to side, the needles slipping, mixing
within. And as he swung it, Shann held it out over the expanse of
the table.
The Warlockian who had given him the bowl was the one who struck
it on the bottom, causing a rain of splinters. To Shann’s
astonishment, mixed as they had been in the container, they once
more formed a pattern, and not the same pattern the Warlockians had
consulted earlier. The dampening curtain between them vanished; he
was in touch mind to mind once again.
“So be it.” The center Warlockian spread out her
four-fingered thumbless hands above the scattered needles.
“What is read, is read.”
Again a formula. He caught a chorus of answer from the
others.
“What is read, is read. To the dreamer the dream. Let the
dream be known for what it is, and there is life. Let the dream
encompass the dreamer falsely, and all is lost.”
“Who can question the wisdom of the Old Ones?” asked
their leader. “We are those who read the messages they send,
out of their mercy. This is a strange thing they bid us do,
man—open for you our own initiates’ road to the veil of
illusion. That way has never been for males, who dream without set
purpose and have not the ability to know true from false, have no
the courage to face their dreams to the truth. Do so—if you
can!” There was a flash of mockery in that; combined with
something else—stronger than distaste, not as strong as
hatred, but certainly not friendly.
She held out her hands and Shann saw now, lying on a slowly
closing palm, a disk such as the one Thorvald had shown him. The
Terran had only one moment of fear and then came blackness, more
absolute than the dark of any night he had ever known.
Light once more, green light with an odd shimmering quality to
it. The skull-lined walls were gone; there were no walls, no
building held him. Shann strode forward, and his boots sank in
sand, that smooth, satin sand which had ringed the island in the
cavern. But he was certain he was no longer on that island, even
within that cavern, though far above him there was still a dome of
roof.
The source of the green shimmer lay to his left. Somehow he
found himself reluctant to turn and face it. That would commit him
to action. But Shann turned.
A veil, a veil of rippling green. Material? No, rather mist or
light. A veil depending from some source so far over his head that
its origin was hidden in the upper gloom, a veil which was a
barrier he must cross.
With every nerve protesting, Shann walked forward, unable to
keep back. He flung up his arm to protect his face as he marched
into that stuff. It was warm, and the gas—if gas it
was—left no slick of moisture on his skin in spite of its
foggy consistency. And it was no veil or curtain, for although he
was already well into the murk, he saw no end to it. Blindly he
trudged on, unable to sight anything but the rolling billows of
green, pausing now and again to go down on one knee and pat the
sand underfoot, reassured at the reality of that footing.
And when he met nothing menacing, Shann began to relax. His
heart no longer labored; he made no move to draw the stunner or
knife. Where he was and for what purpose, he had no idea. But there
was a purpose in this and that the Warlockians were behind
it, he did not doubt. The “initiates’ road,” the
leader had said, and the conviction was steady in his mind that he
faced some test of alien devising.
A cavern with a green veil—his memory awoke.
Thorvald’s dream! Shann paused, trying to remember how the
other had described this place. So he was enacting Thorvald’s
dream! And could the Survey officer now be caught in Shann’s
dream in turn, climbing up somewhere into the nose slit of a
skull-shaped mountain?
Green fog without end, and Shann lost in it. How long had he
been here? Shann tried to reckon time, the time since his coming
into the water-world of the starred cavern. He realized that he had
not eaten, nor drank, nor desired to do so either—nor did he
now. Yet he was not weak; in fact, he had never felt such tireless
energy as possessed his spare body.
Was this all a dream? His threatened drowning in the
underground stream a nightmare? Yet there was a pattern in this,
just as there had been a pattern in the needles he had spilled
across the table. One even led to another with discernible logic;
because he had tossed that particular pattern he had come here.
According to the ambiguous instructions or warnings of the
Warlockian witch, his safety in this place would depend upon his
ability to tell true dreams from false. But
how . . . why? So far he
had done nothing except walk through a green fog and for all he
knew, he might well be traveling in circles.
Because there was nothing else to do, Shann walked on, his boots
pressing sand, rising from each step with a small sucking sound.
Then, as he stooped to search for some indication of a path or road
which might guide him, his ears caught the slightest of
noises—other small sucking whimpers. He was not the only
wayfarer in this place!