The Island Under the Earth (15 page)

For the most part it had been dry enough at the base of the tree where crouched the hapless homophage, but the water had collected in a depression on the old harpy’s nest far above, and presently the pool burst through. It spilled onto the limbs and leaves below and ran onto one huge branch which acted as a sort of open funnel. The spillage came roaring down and cascaded at last onto the ground not far from where the mad and miserable creature lay huddled, and woke him with its splatterings. There had been lines and marks scratched into the earth nearby, but the brief inundation washed them quite away. Hence, awakened by the short storm, the homophage began automatically to crawl and grope around the confined area within which the soothsayer’s magic circumscription had confined him. And in another moment found that he was free. He howled once. He lurched forward.

He sniffed the air. He put his face to the earth and sniffled and snuffled. He moved on. He moved ahead. There was a familiar scent. Familiar, hated. There was hunger in it and there was trickery and treachery and there was wrath. Nothing like a detailed remembrance persisted in the warped and twisted wreckage of the homophage’s mind. He trotted forward in the darkness. He lost the scent. He dropped to all fours and passed his nose and mouth back and forth across the ground. He passed to the right. He passed to the left. He moved ahead at an angle. The memory of the scent and its hate did not leave him. Then he picked it up. With a grunt and a howl he leaped up and ran on.

The hate-scent. The scent-hate. It drew him on through the blackness and the damp. It had a name … dimly, dimly, he knew it had a name. Sounds growled in his throat and clicked in his mouth and rattled between his teeth and his tongue. Ug. Ugh-urr. Gar. Grr. Rish. Rrr. Tick. Ksh. Kss. Hrr. He shook his troubled head as though to punish or to clear it. He hawked up phlegms and spat them out. Then he opened his mouth and bayed at the cold and the hunger and the dampness and the dark. He lunged, hating and hungering, through the blackness. “
Gore
…!” he cried. “
Take
…!” he cried. He cried, “
Crush …!
” He cried,
“Crash …!”

But these long-forgotten syllables did not seem to be the right ones. Once more he howled and he beat shaggy head with his hands. And suddenly it came to him. The name. The name of the hate-he-could-smell.
“G’or’t’ec’as!”
It felt right. It felt … almost … right. Once more —

“Gortecas!”

The very repetition of its name seemed to bring it more strongly to him. He knew it now. He would not forget it. He would not lose it. He would find it. He followed on in the darkness and the damp.

Dellatindílla scowled at his winecup. Atom mimicked him and, drawing back into a shadow, thrust out his tongue. “And my best jewels gone, too,” muttered Dellatindílla.
“His
jewels,” muttered the mite. “Had that scoundrel Lo to do with that, as well? It wouldn’t surprise me …” (“It wouldn’t surprise
him …
”)

The comprador clenched his teeth. The dwarf clenched his. His large eyes rolled around the room. Then he shook his tiny fist. “To recapitulate,” said the eunuch, smacking his thin lips after a sip of wine. Atom looked into his own winecup. It was empty. He held it up. Dellatindílla lifted the jug, refilled his own cup, set the jug back in its place. After a moment the mite withdrew his hand. “To recapitulate. Plainly, this Captain Stag raided Allitu with Lo’s backing. Plainly, they must have gotten great store of treasure. But was this plainly their only motive? Was there not this babble about the Cap of Grace? Hints it was, or at least had been, on Allitu? Was it found? Was anything at any rate learned about it? This I must know. I must know this. Why did Stag leave first? Did Lo not depart for some secret rendezvous with him? And for what purpose? Do they trust one another?
Can
they trust one another? Can I trust that augur whom I engaged to follow and to spy? Certainly not. But I can trust the mite dwarf I sent with him….” He gurgled at the cup again. Atom threw him an ugly look. “Eventually he must return with information. And if he does not? Ay well, I have another dwarf….” The other dwarf approached the eunuch’s ankle and bared his teeth. The foot moved, the dwarf scuttled off into the shadows. “… another dwarf,” the voice above repeated. “And to speak of the which, where is it? Come forth, there…. Come forth….” The voice died away into a mutter and another gurgle.

The eunuch’s thin lips went pendulous, began to quiver. “And what of earthflux, too,” he beggingly inquired. “Will grace save us therefrom? Or wealth? power? wisdom? Will,” his voice going high and cricket-shrill, “will
any
thing?
Can
anything? If the weight of sin and grief and guilt becomes too much for the world to bear, and it topples off into chaos and flux, of what use then will be all my acquisitions and desires, either selfish or unselfish — what?
what?
”

Eyes rolled, eyes gleamed, a smaller voice murmured,
“What.”

The eunuch’s lips pursed, curved, set into a frightful lear. “Long ago I heard it read, ‘Thus say the geographers: Justice and equity are the sole sure foundations of the world.’ Do you hear? Do you
hear? I
s it
true?
Then the world has no sure foundations — !”

(“
No
sure foun
da
tions …”)

“This being so, what prevents it from falling constantly into flux and from remaining in constant flux? Only grace, grace, grace …”

(“Only
grace?
”)

“… only grace …”

Atom tiptoed under the table and thence to the far corner of the wall. He lifted the bottom of the hanging, and was gone. A few minutes later he emerged on the rooftop, and drew a deep breath. “I don’t like it,” he said. “He shouldn’t have sent my brother. My brother shouldn’t have gone. I don’t believe it was the same augur. I believe it was a different augur. I don’t like it here anymore. All he does is drink, drink, drink, and he never gives me hardly any. I’m tired of being cooped up. Nothing is any fun anymore. And — ”

He stopped. He had been vaguely aware of something droning not far off. Now he became less vaguely aware that its evident source was an oddly shaped figure standing in front of and apparently addressing one of the chimney-pots. He moved closer, cautiously, to assess this curiosity.

“Speak up, speak up,” the oddity said, addressing the chimneypot. “Tom Korp, that’s for whom I’m in search of, has a brother name of Mope Korp, little boy, what’s the matter that you can’t reply to a civil harpy, ‘Eat something,’ I keep telling him, ‘There’s some nice carrion in the corner, or have a piece fruit on the other hand,’ does he say yes, does he say no, he reiterates he wants his brother by the name of Tom or Tum or Thumb, who can pronounce these names, ‘Well,’ I said to him, because it’s a funny thing about me, that’s the way I am, ‘if Aunty Ghreck can’t get your brother for you after the way your mommyharp just walked off and bereft you, or flew, as the case might be, then who else will do it, answer me that, just kindly answer the question,’ ” and she fell into a fit of coughing. The mite, who had gradually slipped up behind her, slapped her on the back.

“Thanks very much for the kindness,” she said, and, “Who are you, other little boy?”

“I’m Atom,” he said, “and I’m not a little boy, I’m a dwarf.”

The harpy gave a squawk of excitement, flew up in a flutter of feathers, seized hold of him, fell off the roof, coasted, in another moment was aloft, her wings beating steadily upon the soft night air. “Fleet, fleet,” she muttered. “Later we’ll walk.”

In theory, the two great bullroarers were supposed to be kept at a prescribed distance from a fire of a prescribed size and turned regularly, and regularly “fed” with bread and milk and wine. In fact, the fire had gone out long ago and no one had known how to relight it nor had anyone done anything to implement the intermittent plan of capturing a Fourlimbs to make and tend the fire. Neither bread nor milk had been available for ages. Nevertheless the two objects were sounded regularly — to announce the beginning of courting and mating at the High Far Glades — and irregularly — to herald the start of a raid, to inspire the raiders, and to terrorize the raided.

Each one had a name, or had had a name, but these had been forgotten; it was remembered only that one was male and one was female, and no one who heard them was likely to forget which was which. They had, for a wonder, been given a little wine after the last raid which yielded wine, but it had been given grudgingly, and it was felt that damp had effected their tones. As to who had made them or when they were made or where or why — there were not only no histories, there were not even myths: here was
He
and here was
She
, it was for gladsome things that they were sounded, for exciting things that they were sounded, and the sounds themselves were in themselves exciting.

The male roarer was supposed to be that bit more prestigious to justify fighting for the chance to sound it. Trebondóndos reached it first, but Chevantirósos decided to take up the other rather than dispute; and, since it was somewhat lighter and since Trebondóndos stood, halting and scowling defiance, it was the female which was first swung round on its halter, up and around and around, the long slit wood whirling faster and faster and faster, until at first there came a thin squeak and then a treble squeal and then a trembling shrill sound which went on and on and on and by this time Trebandóndos had the male roarer going and there came forth a small hum and then a loud drone and then an increasing bellow and finally the full volume of the sound which gave the devices their name of bullroarer. Loud and earsplitting and terrible, and terribly, terribly exciting, the shrill and the deep, male and female, the noise roused the Sixlimbs from their slumbers and diverted them from their play.
Stallion and yearlion and colt and crone and cob, matron-mare and maiden-mare …

And one among the latter, trotting back and forth, unable to make her own voice heard above the two-fold clamor of the chanter and the drone, held out her two hands, two fingers up, two fingers down, one finger held in: the ancient sign which all well knew: Fourlimbs. Fourlimbs!
Fourlimbs!
Usurpers of the True Folk’s land, stealers of the Sixlimbs’ fields and forests, thicketlurkers, ambushslayers, the stinking, the malformed, the cunning, cruel, corrupt, coupling (shameless) face to face … Fourlimbs, filthy …

It was easy to rouse the centaurs, easy, once the shree-shreeing and the broo-brooing had died away, save for its interminable echoes; easy to rouse them to agree to gather and attack in force and destroy the invaders. All of them howled and beat upon their bosoms and dashed backwards and forwards. Quite a number of them actually started down in the general direction hinted by the maiden-mare Ananarusa. Interest slackened when it was realized that neither Trebandóndos nor Chevantirósos intended to leave her side for an instant, and quite a number of the fiercest dropped out of the troop. Other reasons, as, for instant, hunger or thirst, the chance for a good and an immediate fight, resulted in the loss of others. And a good few put their heads together and muttered of certain matters and stealthily slid away in order to return and see what could be done about commencing a movement of both sexes to the High Far Glades….

Still, there were quite a few who persisted. Ananarusa had mentioned certain known areas and landmarks, and there was a common opinion that they would certainly scout them all out. And yet none protested when the foremost sixies took the trail which went by Stonehouse Hobar. Ananarusa had not indeed mentioned it, but it seemed logical that they should go there; they had all of them been there, at one time or another, sniffing and peering, hatefully-hopefully: the den of ancient enemies, takers of the land and yet providers of bounty. None doubted Ananarusa’s sightings, yet the old stone house was, as far as Fourlimbs were concerned, the landmark of all landmarks. Actual human presence there was rare and long ago; this did not matter. Stonehouse equaled Hobar equaled Fourlimbed Folk. None of them explained it so, none of them even so clearly and coherently thought it so.

Nevertheless it was so.

And it was with no surprise but with thrill and relish and even with somewhat of fear but certainly with no diminuition of desire that they heard Trebandóndos, lifting up his head and dilating his nostrils, declare as they approached, “It is smoke which I smell, and also I smell that they have been burning food — Wittolds, cuckolds, drum upon your ticky chests and rouse and warn them all? Be still. Be quiet and be sly. And so we shall catch them in the open….”

Gortecas did not choose that what afterwards happened should happen, afterwards or otherwise. Much as he feared brute-simple, human force, much as he preferred the single subtility of his own way and the protection of his augurial science, there came a point when he had no choice. It was of course upsetting, and a lesser man would have been dismayed; but Gortecas was not a lesser man: lesser men so often fall prey to vices such as loyalty, love, pity, kindliness, generosity, and other disgusting impulses and totally degrading practices. It was hardly the resolution of a second, before, with an inner and an outer shrug, he came to terms with the situation and determined to sail with the winds.

Several issues and items were involved; for one thing, he had become aware, as the first faint twinge in a tooth — not yet pain, not yet even discomfort — gives warning and advice … he had become aware that if he proceeded on his present path he would meet the other moiety: and he desired few happenings less than that he should at present happen to meet the other moiety. For another, in one form or another, he had traveled enough upon the sea and along its coasts to know all sorts of sailingmen, to appreciate the differences between raiders and wreckers, corsairs and pirates: he did not too much care for any of them, but being able to distinguish and to appreciate the ever-fluid distinctions could be a great help. And, lastly, but certainly first in ultimate importance, he was aware that he was being followed, and he was almost entirely certain by whom (or by what) and what for.

Wreckers by definition must know well the coast on which they ply their uncertain trade — and a hard trade it is, too: when the stay-at-home craftsman or farmer sits warm by his fire, the wrecker must be out in the snow and the sleet and the hard-driving rains, with his false lights — and anyone who knew this coast well knew that in wrecking weather all mariners either put into cove or stood so far out to sea that no lights could be seen at all. Furthermore, it was much too far inland: hence they were not wreckers. As for raiders, who would raid an empty land? and who would raid a forest? — As for pirates, and as for corsairs, were not the same objections levelable?

But the augur tired, in an instant, of these quibbles and trifles. There was really only one reason why any crew or group of this general nature would be in this vicinage at all. It was too annoying, it was damnably vexatious, it meant almost certainly a long and rough sea journey at best, it meant an end to any chance of profit from the codless Dellatindílla, it meant … It meant, of course, protection. These grim-faced men in their metal doublets, with their short bows and their swords and javelins, would be more than a match for that nameless (except generically) thing which howled and prowled and hunted and pursued after him. How had it escaped the confining circulum which he had so careful drawn about the tree after carefully and cunningly luring it inside? Ah, well: a riddle and a speculation for other hours.

He stepped forward upon a ledge so that they could not fail to see him as they came up the hill; this would give a good enough time before they came within bowshot for them to decide he was not dangerous. Of course they stopped short and of course the bowmen nocked arrows and of course they talked and muttered and, then, finally (of course) they gestured him to come down and to approach. They wore no trousers, wore no robes, only a short tunic down to the hips, and breech-clouts; they were barefooted. Marshies, or at least of marshy decent. Yes, yes, it all fitted in, it was almost tiresome how easily it all fitted in; there was no zest or problematical about it at all.

“Greetings, greetings, men of Allitu,” he said.

It was with difficulty that he stifled a yawn.

Aunty Ghreck spoke in a steady stream of words which reached his ears as a sort of soughing murmur, mutter, or mumble; the wind suddenly shifted, and, as she coasted down upon it, he heard her saying, “… troubles, who doesn’t have troubles, do
I
speak of
my
troubles? no, because that’s not my nature, I don’t say a word, never mind what I suffer, pay no attention to it, what a lovely nest I used to have in the old days, southern exposure, the finest quality carrion nearby,
blam!
comes an earthflux, and right away: no nest, overnight the whole neighborhood was changed, ‘So who told you to build here?’ this one says and that one says, did I say a word, no I didn’t say a single word, what, they didn’t complain to me, the whole clutch of them, ‘We thought we had a nice nest to come home to and this is what we find’….

“Listen, you think I didn’t tell them what was on my mind, because it’s a funny thing about me, I have to speak the truth, wasn’t I saying, oh, just the other aeon, to my daughter Aabba, my daughter Aacca, my daughter Aadda … Aeea, Affa, Agga, Ahha, Aiia, Ajja, Akka …

“… my daughter Zabba, Zacca, Zadda …

“… my daughter Zazza, ‘Listen,’ I was saying, ‘Don’t blame
me
,’ I told them, ‘for all your troublements and woes: blame the island! — look at me while I’m talking to you — blame the
island!
’ ”

But her sole present listener, by reason of their present positions, could not look at her at all.

• • •

Tabnath Lo had been twice to Stonehouse Hobar, as well as having heard the way thither discussed at his wife’s family’s table more than once; indeed, it had seemed to him that the whole house of Hobar was a great deal fonder of talking about going there than of actually going there…. Not that any of that mattered. Already, it seemed to belong to another world, the world of cords knotted to indicate measures of meal and bales of stockfish: in short, the world of barley-puddings. It was good to realize that he never need have any more thing to do with barley-puddings. People would laugh, to think that a Syndic of the Sea had ever concerned himself with barley-pudding.

The price of a syndicship was legally set: no matter how little a syndic might care to part with his position, if anyone of qualifying status came before the Council and produced one-quarter more than the last price paid for a syndicship, then the eldest syndic in office had no choice but to descend from his dais, embrace the one making the offer, and accept. To be sure, more often than otherwise, positions went from father to son … or son-in-law … or grandson…. But that was merely the way things usually had
gone
. It was
not
the way things had to go. Lo’s original share of the loot of Allitu would cover the purchase price quite nicely, thank you. And the other share, the share which was also rightfully his, though withheld by the cunning and unscrupulous Stag, that should serve as working capital.

For a man of vision and capacity wouldn’t simply be content to regard the office as a sinecure, resting at home and letting the bailiffs bring in his set fees and statutory commissions; no, no. A man of vision —

His mute hissed. Lo blinked. Ah so. Ay yes. Here they were almost there. He composed his mind to deal with the present. Stag was shrewd, Stag was cunning, Stag had almost, almost put him off with all that sly talk of going to the Lonelands. Stag would be on his guard. The best thing, then, would be simply to walk right in, calm and canny, accept the hospitality, and await the best occasion. Stag would
not
be expecting
that
. Lo smiled all on one side of his face, and, becoming aware of it, wondered aloud to his mute. “I wonder what Stag’s face will look like when I walk up to the house,” he said.

“Ssss …” said the mute.

But of course Stag was not there. It was all a letdown and an anticlimax. Stag’s woman didn’t say very much, but then, she never did say much. There was a countrywoman whom Lo had never seen before; she asked him if he had seen her children. That was all she asked him. The only one who really seemed to have anything to say was the augur — the augur who seemed slightly familiar, but then, one augur does for all augurs. “It was in your mind, you know,” the augur said.

“What?” Lo was puzzled.

“It was all inside your own mind.”

“Augurial riddles? I shan’t bother trying to find the answer; that sort of thing doesn’t interest me,” Lo said. But his mute hissed in a sad sort of manner and slowly nodded his head. And at that moment the arrow thudded into the doorpost, and even if anyone had been prepared to do anything, it was too late. For in a moment men whelmed through Stonehouse Hobar, shouting and growling and a-grumbling; and with them slipped in their lately met companion: Gortecas.

“Well, goody moiety,” said the augur Gortecas.

“Well, wicked moiety,” said the augur Castegor.

“Can’t live with you and can’t live without you,” said the augur Gortecas, moving close to him.

“Confusion take you,” said the augur Castegor.

“It will, it will.”

They faced each other. They sighed. They removed both of them their clothes. They walked into each other, fused, swelled. A different person stood there, and, observing everyone’s astonished look, hastily donned clothes at random from either heap. “Troscegac, Troscegac, Troscegac,” he muttered. And, “It’s so difficult, you see,” he said, “keeping body and soul together….”

The corsairs who had run upstairs came running down. “Nobody there,” they said. There was hasty talk. To Lo they said, “Almost we did miss you — we’d turned back had we not found that monsterkin as mumbled
Allitu
betimes it sucked air, so that we knew our trail and spoor was right —
where is he, then?
Where is he, him whom you hired to rob us, eh, where?”

Lo was paralyzed with terror. His feet, hands and mouth trembled. The corsairs made mention, some of them, of such things as feet held to fires, of sharpened sticks, knotted cords used not to measure merchandise but to twist around temples as aids to memory. However, the one who seemed the most in authority discountenanced the notion. “The woman, we have,” he said; “and the partner we have, too. The lever, we have; and the fulcrum we have, too. So let us now be getten back to boat and shore and oar.”

There was some dissident clamor at this. What! Were they not to wait for Stag and all this way they had come — what? The senior was firm. No, they were not to wait for Stag; it was likely enough that Stag would come after them; if he did not, they could command information … ransom … satisfaction — his cold eyes turned to Lo’s cold-sweaty face and limp figure — without Stag. “Meanwhile,” the senior said, “in a place where sixies have been or are likely to be, I care not to linger. Up, then, and down — ”

He had struck the necessary note. Little enough they knew of sixies, sons of marshdwellers, themselves islanders; but the little was larded with legend and braised with fear and fantasy. Sixies! Ah ho, ay well, yes …

Only Rary resisted, and they struck her down and left her.

So, when at last the sixies did come, they found the house empty, and great was their disappointment: nor was there so much as a bit of bread, a sop of milk or a drain of wine to comfort them. “They have taken yander narrow trail,” said Chevantiróros, “thinking perhaps to pass thus unseen.” He threw back his head and guffawed. “Ah ha…. Well, let them, tis uncomfortable for all us to crowd upon it, let us go by the broader way, let us go slow and easy, the wee path falls adown into the broad main. We shall go, brothers, slow and easy, easy and slow, brothers. And when we have gotten them between the half-hills and the sea, brothers:
Ah
ha! And,
oh
ho!”