Gods of the Greataway
GODS OF THE GREATAWAY
Michael Coney
In the last years of the twentieth century (as Wells might have put it), Gollancz, Britain’s oldest and most distinguished science fiction imprint, created the SF and Fantasy Masterworks series. Dedicated to re-publishing the English language’s finest works of SF and Fantasy, most of which were languishing out of print at the time, they were – and remain – landmark lists, consummately fulfilling the original mission statement:
‘SF MASTERWORKS is a library of the greatest SF ever written, chosen with the help of today’s leading SF writers and editors. These books show that genuinely innovative SF is as exciting today as when it was first written.’
Now, as we move inexorably into the twenty-first century, we are delighted to be widening our remit even more. The realities of commercial publishing are such that vast troves of classic SF & Fantasy are almost certainly destined never again to see print. Until very recently, this meant that anyone interested in reading any of these books would have been confined to scouring second-hand bookshops. The advent of digital publishing has changed that paradigm for ever.
The technology now exists to enable us to make available, for the first time, the entire backlists of an incredibly wide range of classic and modern SF and fantasy authors. Our plan is, at its simplest, to use this technology to build on the success of the SF and Fantasy Masterworks series and to go even further.
Welcome to the new home of Science Fiction & Fantasy. Welcome to the most comprehensive electronic library of classic SFF titles ever assembled.
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Prologue: Starquin the Almighty
The Story of the Blind Craftsman
Creatures of the People Planet
What Happened in the Year 180,285
The First Battle with the Bale Wolves
Shake hands with the dragon and smile at the snake
,
And jest with the Madmen Three
.
But beware of the Mute with his shovel and rake
,
He’ll quarry the soul out of thee
.
—
Song of the Locomotive
ROLOGUE
: S
TARQUIN THE
A
LMIGHTY
M
illennia ago Starquin visited the Solar System. Because he is huge — some say bigger than the Solar System itself — he could not set foot on Earth personally. Yet events here were beginning to interest him, and he wanted to observe more closely.
So he sent down extensions of himself, creatures fashioned after Earth’s dominant life-form. In one of Earth’s languages they became known as
Dedos
, or Fingers of Starquin. Disguised, they mingled with Mankind.
We know this now, here at the end of Earth’s time. The information is all held in Earth’s great computer, the Rainbow. The Rainbow will endure so long as Earth exists, watching, listening, recording and thinking. I am an extension of the Rainbow, just as the Dedos are extensions of Starquin. My name is Alan-Blue-Cloud.
It is quite possible you cannot see me but are aware of me only as a voice speaking to you from a desolate hillside, telling you tales from the Song of Earth. I can see
you
, the motley remains of the human race, however. You sit there with your clubs and you chew at your roots, entranced and half-disbelieving as I sing the Song — and in your faces are signs of the work of your great geneticist, Mordecai N. Whirst. Catlike eyes here, broad muzzles there, all the genes of Earth’s life, expertly blended, each having its purpose. Strong people, adaptable people, people who have survived.
The
story I will tell is about people who were not so strong. It is perhaps the most famous in the whole Song of Earth, and it tells of three simple human beings involved in a quest who unwittingly became involved in much greater events concerning the almighty Starquin himself. It is a story of heroism and love, and it ends in triumph — and it will remind the humans among you of the greatness that was once yours.
H
ERE BEGINS THAT PART OF
THE
S
ONG OF
E
ARTH KNOWN TO MEN AS
THE
L
OST
I
SLANDS OF
P
OLYSITIA
where the Triad enlists help
and sails eastward
to lands beyond the Rainbow’s ken
HE
R
ETURN OF
M
ANUEL
T
he quiet boy was back.
Ellie saw him first,
on
a dull,
windy day when the guanaco clouds swept in from the sea, promising rain with every gust. He stood at the rim of the tide, his cloak of pacarana skins flapping, ignoring the waves that rushed past him.
“Manuel! Hi, Manuel!”
She clambered down the bank to the beach, ran barefoot across the sand and arrived at his side, breathless. “Manuel,” she said again. “You’re back.”
At last he looked at her. “Hello, Ellie.” His eyes were different. There was a remnant of a vision in there, so that he didn’t see her with all his mind. And he looked taller, his barrel-chested figure towering over her. Suddenly she was a little frightened of him, and her half-formed plan didn’t seem such a good idea.
She tried it nevertheless. “While you were away, we had some high tides. Your shack was damaged.” She indicated the tumbledown structure huddled under the brow of the low cliff.
“I’ll soon put that right.”
“Perhaps you should stay in the village for a while, Manuel. We have room in our house, if you like.”
“I’ll manage, thanks.” He’d turned away again and was gazing at the horizon so intently that she looked, too, but could see nothing.
“It’s that
girl, isn’t it,” she said unhappily.
“What girl?”
“I saw her around here — you can’t fool me. A skinny girl with next to no clothes on. And sometimes with
your
clothes on. She looked as though she’d expire at the sight of a snake cloud. She stayed with you for days. And then you both went away. Where have you been, Manuel? I … I’ve missed you.” Her head spun a little. She didn’t know if it was because of the oxygen that the wind was bringing from the sea or the nearness of Manuel.
Manuel said, mostly to himself, “Belinda’s out there somewhere. But how can she be? There are no islands — the Rainbow said so.”
“The rainbow? What rainbow?”
“It’s a big computer. You wouldn’t understand.”
“Come and stay with me, Manuel. Please.”
He looked at her properly now and smiled. “Maybe. I’ll walk you back to the village, anyway. I have to go up to the church. I need a few answers.”
“You won’t get them from Dad Ose.” Ellie laughed breathlessly, happy now that he had half promised.
“I’ll get them from God,” said Manuel, and Ellie’s smile died.
*
The village was preparing for the forthcoming Horse Day celebrations. Fat Chine, the village chief, strutted to and fro, supervising the seamstresses who worked on the bodies of the symbolic combatants — the Horse and the Snake. Nearby, the head of the Snake was being painted in bright and threatening colors, having been formed of clay and baked in a pit. The head of the Horse required little attention. The Horse was the hero of the celebration and the same head was used from year to year. The Snake was the villain and always lost the battle and was destroyed.
Subconsciously, each villager cherished the hope that one year the latest version of the Snake would prove to be of such a terrible aspect that it would put the Horse to flight and provide the spice of variety to the festivities, but this hadn’t happened yet. Dad Ose, the priest, hoped it never would. He had quite enough difficulty persuading the villagers of the superiority of Good over Evil without their wretched little pagan ceremony adding to the confusion.
Meanwhile Insel, the most
devout of the villagers, to the extent of being totally cloud-struck, lay on his back praying to the heavens for good weather.
Horse clouds keep blowing from out of the sea
,
Make easy breathing for you and for me
.
Manuel waved to the villagers as he plodded up the hill to the church, and they waved back, if half-heartedly. They were a little afraid of him. He had curious powers and strange friends — and an unwholesome lack of respect for their leader, Chine. For such a young man he was enviably self-possessed. Tongues were clicked in disapproval as Ellie left his side with obvious reluctance and approached the village huts.
“You’ll come to a bad end, my girl,” shrilled old Jinny. “The Snake will come for you one day, mark my words!”
“I can outrun you to the Life Caves any day, old woman.”
“Not if you’re dreaming on the beach like a lovesick llama, making eyes at that young goat!.”
Meanwhile, the young goat himself, mind full of wonders, was nearing the ancient sandstone church. The priest huddled against the lee wall, sheltered from the wind, gazing at the mountains and practicing his daily Inner Think.
The fabric of my body is replenishing itself
, he told himself, absently fingering an ancient religious symbol in the form of a faceted piece of rock, which hung around his neck.
Each cell is regenerating even as I think, and I shall therefore never, never die. The Clock that tells my body to age is stilled, stilled
.
If the villagers had known of Dad Ose’s daily practice, they would have pointed the finger of ridicule. So he had kept his secret, imagining it to be a matter of exceptional spiritual control over the baser bodily processes, and certainly not a thing the villagers would have understood.
In fact, the explanation of
Dad Ose’s longevity — he was now 496 years old — would have alarmed the priest himself. There were tiny alien parasites within his chromosomes, known to an earlier age as Macrobes, and they didn’t want to die. Since the priest was determinedly celibate, it was unlikely that he would ever sire descendants for the Macrobes to attach themselves to. So it was in the aliens’ best interests to keep Dad Ose alive — forever, if necessary.
“Dad Ose!”
The priest sighed, recognizing the voice. Manuel was back from his wanderings and had come to pester and embarrass him again. Mentally releasing each body cell from his care, he stood, dusted off his robe and turned to greet the young man.
“So you’ve come back. Did you find your girl, Manuel?”
“No, I didn’t. I met a lot of people and … things, but I didn’t find Belinda. I know she’s out there somewhere, but I must have been looking in the wrong place.”