The slowly passed. Maskull some movements, and
opened his eyes. He sat up, blinking. All was night-like and in
the forest. The light had gone, the music had ceased,
Dreamsinter had vanished. He his beard, with Tydomin’s
blood, and into a muse.
“According to Panawe and Catice, this wise men. Perhaps
Dreamsinter was one. Perhaps that I have just was a specimen
of his wisdom. It looked almost like an answer to my question.... I
ought not to have asked about myself, but about Surtur. Then I would
have got a different answer. I might have learned something... I might
have him.”
He and for a bit.
“But I couldn’t that glare,” he proceeded. “It was bursting
my body. He me, too. And so Surtur exist, and my
journey for something. But why am I here, and what can I do? Who
is Surtur? Where is he to be found?”
Something wild came into his eyes.
“What did Dreamsinter by his ‘Not you, but Nightspore’? Am I a
secondary character—is he as important; and I as unimportant?
Where is Nightspore, and what is he doing? Am I to wait for his time and
pleasure—can I nothing?”
He up, with straight-extended legs.
“I must make up my mind that this is a journey, and that the
strangest will in it. It’s no use making plans, for I
can’t see two steps ahead—everything is unknown. But one thing’s
evident: nothing but the will me through, and I
must else to that. And therefore if Surtur shows
himself again, I shall go to meet him, if it means death.”
Through the black, of the the came again.
The was a long way off and very faint. It was like the last
mutterings of after a storm. Maskull listened, without
getting up. The into silence, and did not return.
He queerly, and said aloud, “Thanks, Surtur! I accept the omen.”
When he was about to up, he that the skin that had
been his third arm was with every movement of
his body. He in it all around, as close to his chest
as possible, with the of hands; then he carefully
twisted it off. In that world of and he judged
that the would soon disappear. After that, he rose and into
the darkness.
The at that point and, without thinking
twice about it, he took the direction, it would
bring him somewhere. As soon as he started walking, his became
gloomy and morose—he was shaken, tired, dirty, and with hunger;
moreover, he that the walk was not going to be a one. Be
that as it may, he to no more until the whole dismal
forest was at his back.
One after another the shadowy, trees were observed, avoided,
and passed. Far overhead the little of sky was still
always visible; otherwise he had no to the time of day. He
continued the for many damp, slippery
miles—in some places through bogs. When, presently, the seemed
to thin, he that the open world was not away. The forest
grew more and grey, and now he saw its better. The tree
trunks were like towers, and so wide were the that they
resembled natural amphitheatres. He not make out the colour of the
bark. Everything he saw him, but his was of the
growling, kind. The in light the forest
behind him and the ahead so marked that he no longer
doubt that he was on the point of out.
Real light was in of him; looking back, he he had a shadow.
The a tint. He his pace. As the
minutes by, the ahead and vivid; it had
a of blue. He also that he the of surf.
All that part of the toward which he was moving rich with
colour. The of the trees were of a deep, dark red; their leaves,
high above his head, were ulfire-hued; the on the ground
were of a colour he not name. At the same time he the
use of his third eye. By adding a third to his sight, every object
he looked at out in relief. The world looked less
flat—more and significant. He had a toward
his surroundings; he somehow to his egotism, and to become
free and thoughtful.
Now through the last trees he saw full daylight. Less than a mile
separated him from the border of the forest, and, to what
lay beyond, he into a run. He the louder. It was a
peculiar that only from water, yet was
unlike the sea. Almost he came of an enormous
horizon of dancing waves, which he must be the Sinking Sea. He fell
back into a quick walk, to hard. The wind that met him
was hot, fresh and sweet.
When he at the final of forest, which joined the wide
sands of the without any of level, he with his back
to a great tree and his fill, motionless, at what in of
him. The east and west in a line, only
here and there by a creeks. They were of a orange colour,
but there were of violet. The appeared to sentinel
over the for its entire length. Everything else was sea and sky—he
had so much water. The of the was so vast
that he might have himself on a world, with a range of
vision only by the power of his eye. The sea was any
sea on Earth. It an liquid opal. On a colour of
rich, emerald-green, of red, yellow, and were
everywhere up and vanishing. The motion was extraordinary.
Pinnacles of water were slowly until they a of
perhaps ten or twenty feet, when they would and
outward, in their a series of for long
distances around them. Quickly moving currents, like in the sea,
could be seen, away from land; they were of a green and
bore no pinnacles. Where the sea met the shore, the over
the in, with almost rapidity—accompanied by a weird,
hissing, sound, which was what Maskull had heard. The green
tongues rolled in without foam.
About twenty miles distant, as he judged, directly opposite him, a long,
low up from the sea, black and not in
outline. It was Swaylone’s Island. Maskull was less in that
than in the that its back. Alppain had set,
but the whole northern sky was into the minor key by its
afterlight. Branchspell in the was white and overpowering, the
day was and hot; but where the sun had sunk,
a to the world. Maskull had a of
disintegration—just as if two were
simultaneously acting upon the of his body. Since the of
Alppain him like this, he it more than likely that he
would be able to that sun itself, and go on living. Still,
some might to him that would make it possible.
The sea him. He up his mind to bathe, and at once walked
toward the shore. The he the line of the
forest trees, the of the sun on him so savagely
that for a minutes he and his swam. He quickly
across the sands. The orange-coloured parts were nearly to
roast food, he judged, but the parts were like fire itself. He
stepped on a in ignorance, and jumped high into the
air with a yell.
The sea was warm. It would not his weight, so he
determined to try swimming. First of all he off his skin
garment, it with and water, and it in the
sun to dry. Then he himself as well as he and out
his and hair. After that, he in a long way, until the water
reached his breast, and took to swimming—avoiding the as as
possible He it no pastime. The water was of unequal
density. In some places he swim, in others he save
himself from drowning, in others again he not himself
beneath the surface at all. There were no to what the
water ahead in store for him. The whole was most
dangerous.
He came out, clean and invigorated. For a time he walked up and
down the sands, himself in the and looking around
him. He was a in a huge, foreign, world, and
whichever way he turned, unknown and were at
him. The gigantic, white, Branchspell, the awful, body-
changing Alppain, the beautiful, deadly, sea, the dark and
eerie Swaylone’s Island, the spirit-crushing out of which he had
just escaped—to all these powers, him on every side,
what had he, a feeble, from a planet
on the other of space, to oppose, to avoid being utterly
destroyed?... Then he to himself. “I’ve already been here two
days, and still I survive. I have luck—and with that one can the
universe. But what is luck—a expression, or a thing?”
As he was on his skin, which was now dry, the answer came to
him, and this time he was grave. “Surtur me here, and Surtur is
watching over me. That is my ‘luck.’... But what is Surtur in this
world?... How is he able to protect me against the and
ungovernable of nature? Is he than Nature?...”
Hungry as he was for food, he was still for society, for
he to about all these things. He asked himself which way
he should turn his steps. There were only two ways; along the shore,
either east or west. The nearest to the east, the
sands about a mile away. He walked toward it.
The was and high. It was so squarely
turned to the sea that it looked as though it had been planed by tools.
Maskull along in the of the trees, but his head
constantly away from them, toward the sea—there it was more
cheerful. The creek, when he it, proved to be and flat-
banked. It was not a river, but an arm of the sea. Its still, dark green
water around a out of sight, into the forest. The trees on
both banks the water, so that it was in shadow.
He as as the bend, which another appeared. A
man was on a narrow of bank, with his in the water.
He was in a coarse, hide, which left his bare. He
was short, thick, and sturdy, with and a long, powerful arms,
terminating in hands of an size. He was oldish. His face
was plain, slablike, and expressionless; it was full of wrinkles, and
walnut-coloured. Both and were bald, and his skin was tough
and leathery. He to be some of peasant, or fisherman; there
was no in his of for others, or of feeling.
He three eyes, of different colors—jade-green, blue, and
ulfire.
In of him, on the water, to the bank, was an
elementary raft, of the of trees, corded
together.
Maskull him. “Are you another of the wise men of the Wombflash
Forest?”
The man answered him in a gruff, voice, looking up as he did so.
“I’m a fisherman. I know nothing about wisdom.”
“What name do you go by?”
“Polecrab. What’s yours?”
“Maskull. If you’re a fisherman, you ought to have fish. I’m famishing.”
Polecrab grunted, and paused a minute answering.
“There’s fish enough. My dinner is cooking in the now. It’s easy
enough to you some more.”
Maskull this a speech.
“But how long will it take?” he asked.
The man the of his hands together, producing a shrill,
screeching noise. He his from the water, and onto
the bank. In a minute or two a little came up to
his feet, its and up affectionately, like a dog. It
was about two long, and a small seal, but had
six legs, in claws.
“Arg, go fish!” said Polecrab hoarsely.
The animal off the bank into the water. It swam
gracefully to the middle of the and a pivotal beneath
the surface, where it a great while.
“Simple fishing,” Maskull. “But what’s the for?”
“To go to sea with. The best fish are out at sea. These are eatable.”
“That a creature.”
Polecrab again. “I’ve close on a hundred of them. The
bigheads learn best, but they’re slow swimmers. The swim
like eels, but can’t be taught. Now I’ve started them—he’s
one of them.”
“Do you live here alone?”
“No, I’ve got a wife and three boys. My wife’s sleeping somewhere, but
where the are, Shaping knows.”
Maskull to very much at home with this being.
“The raft’s all crazy,” he remarked, at it. “If you go out
in that, you’ve got more than I have.”
“I’ve been to Matterplay on it,” said Polecrab.
The and started to shore, but this time
clumsily, as if it were a weight under the surface. When
it at its master’s feet, they saw that each set of was
clutching a fish—six in all. Polecrab took them from it. He to
cut off the and with a sharp-edged which he up;
these he to the arg, which them without any fuss.
Polecrab to Maskull to him and, the fish,
walked toward the open shore, by the same way that he had come. When
they the sands, he the fish, the entrails, and
digging a in a of sand, the remainder
of the in it, and them over again. Then he up his
own dinner. Maskull’s at the smell, but he was
not yet to dine.
Polecrab, to go with the fish in his hands, said, “These
are mine, not yours. When yours are done, you can come and join me,
supposing you want company.”
“How soon will that be?”
“About twenty minutes,” the fisherman, over his shoulder.
Maskull himself in the of the forest, and waited. When
the time had elapsed, he his meal, scorching
his in the operation, although it was only the surface of the
sand which was so hot. Then he returned to Polecrab.
In the warm, still air and of the inlet, they in
silence, looking from their food to the water, and again.
With every Maskull his returning. He finished
before Polecrab, who ate like a man for time has no value. When he
had done, he up.
“Come and drink,” he said, in his voice.
Maskull looked at him inquiringly.
The man him a little way into the forest, and walked up to
a tree. At a in its a had been
tapped and plugged. Polecrab the and put his mouth to the
aperture, for a long time, like a child at its mother’s
breast. Maskull, him, that he saw his growing
brighter.
When his own turn came to drink, he the juice of the tree somewhat
like milk in flavour, but intoxicating. It was a new of
intoxication, however, for neither his will not his were
excited, but only his intellect—and that only in a way. His
thoughts and images were not and loosened, but on the contrary
kept and painfully, until they the full
beauty of an aperçu, which would then up in his consciousness,
burst, and vanish. After that, the whole started over again. But
there was a moment when he was not perfectly cool, and master of
his senses. When each had twice, Polecrab the hole, and
they returned to their bank.
“Is it Blodsombre yet?” asked Maskull, on the ground, well
content.
Polecrab his old posture, with his in the
water. “Just beginning,” was his response.
“Then I must here till it’s over.... Shall we talk?”
“We can,” said the other, without enthusiasm.
Maskull at him through half-closed lids, if he were
exactly what he to be. In his he he a wise
light.
“Have you much, Polecrab?”
“Not what you would call travelling.”
“You tell me you’ve been to Matterplay—what of country is that?”
“I don’t know. I there to up flints.”
“What it?”
“Threal comes next, as you go north. They say it’s a land of mystics...
I don’t know.”
“Mystics?”
“So I’m told.... Still north there’s Lichstorm.”
“Now we’re going afield.”
“There are there—and it must be a very dangerous
place, for a full-blooded man like you. Take of
yourself.”
“This is premature, Polecrab. How do you know I’m going there?”
“As you’ve come from the south, I you’ll go north.”
“Well, that’s right enough,” said Maskull, hard at him. “But how
do you know I’ve come from the south?”
“Well, then, you haven’t—but there’s a look of Ifdawn about
you.”
“What of look?”
“A look,” said Polecrab. He at Maskull, but
was at a spot on the water with eyes.
“What Lichstorm?” asked Maskull, after a minute or two.
“Barey, where you have two of one—but that I
know nothing about it.... Then comes the ocean.”
“And what’s on the other of the ocean?”
“That you must out for yourself, for I if has ever
crossed it and come back.”
Maskull was for a little while.
“How is it that your people are so unadventurous? I to be the only
one from curiosity.”
“What do you by ‘your people’?”
“True—you don’t know that I don’t to your at all. I’ve
come from another world, Polecrab.”
“What to find?”
“I came here with Krag and Nightspore—to Surtur. I must have
fainted the moment I arrived. When I sat up, it was night and the others
had vanished. Since then I’ve been at random.”
Polecrab his nose. “You haven’t Surtur yet?”
“I’ve his frequently. In the this I came
quite close to him. Then two days ago, in the Lusion Plain, I saw a
vision—a being in man’s shape, who called himself Surtur.”
“Well, maybe it was Surtur.”
“No, that’s impossible,” Maskull reflectively. “It was
Crystalman. And it isn’t a question of my it—I know it.”
“How?”
“Because this is Crystalman’s world, and Surtur’s world is something
quite different.”
“That’s queer, then,” said Polecrab.
“Since I’ve come out of that forest,” Maskull, talking to
himself, “a has come over me, and I see differently.
Everything here looks much more solid and in my than in other
places so much so that I can’t the least of its
existence. It not only looks real, it is real—and on that I would stake
my life.... But at the same time that it’s real, it is false.”
“Like a dream?”
“No—not at all like a dream, and that’s just what I want to explain.
This world of yours—and of mine too, for that matter—doesn’t
give me the of a dream, or an illusion, or anything
of that sort. I know it’s here at this moment, and it’s exactly
as we’re it, you and I. Yet it’s false. It’s false in this sense,
Polecrab. Side by with it another world exists, and that other
world is the true one, and this one is all false and deceitful, to the
very core. And so it to me that and are two
words for the same thing.”
“Perhaps there is such another world,” said Polecrab huskily. “But did
that also and false to you?”
“Very real, but not false then, for then I didn’t all this.
But just it was real, it couldn’t have been Surtur, who has no
connection with reality.”
“Didn’t those to you?”
“I had to them with my ears, and so they to me. Still,
they were somehow different, and they came from Surtur. If I
didn’t them correctly, that was my fault and not his.”
Polecrab a little. “If Surtur to speak to you in that
fashion, it he’s trying to say something.”
“What else can I think? But, Polecrab, what’s your opinion—is he calling
me to the life after death?”
The old man uneasily. “I’m a fisherman,” he said, after a minute
or two. “I live by killing, and so everybody. This life to me
all wrong. So maybe life of any is wrong, and Surtur’s world is not
life at all, but something else.”
“Yes, but will death lead me to it, it is?”
“Ask the dead,” said Polecrab, “and not a man.”
Maskull continued. “In the I music and saw a light, which
could not have to this world. They were too for my
senses, and I must have for a long time. There was a as
well, in which I saw myself killed, while Nightspore walked on toward
the light, alone.”
Polecrab his grunt. “You have to think over.”
A ensued, which was by Maskull.
“So is my of the of this present life, that it may
come to my an end to myself.” The and
immobile.
Maskull on his stomach, his on his hands, and at
him. “What do you think, Polecrab? Is it possible for any man, while in
the body, to a closer view of that other world than I have done?”
“I am an man, stranger, so I can’t say. Perhaps there are many
others like you who would know.”
“Where? I should like to meet them.”
“Do you think you were of one stuff, and the of of
another stuff?”
“I can’t be so presumptuous. Possibly all men are out toward
Muspel, in most cases without being aware of it.”
“In the direction,” said Polecrab.
Maskull gave him a look. “How so?”
“I don’t speak from my own wisdom,” said Polecrab, “for I have none; but
I have just now what Broodviol once told me, when I was a young
man, and he was an old one. He said that Crystalman to turn all
things into one, and that way his march, in order to
escape from him, they themselves again to with
Crystalman, and are into new crystals. But that this of
shapes (which we call ‘forking’) from the to
find Surtur, but is in the opposite direction to the right one. For
Surtur’s world not on this of the one, which was the
beginning of life, but on the other side; and to to it we must
repass through the one. But this can only be by our self-
life, and ourselves to the whole of Crystalman’s world. And
when this has been done, it is only the stage of the journey;
though many good men it to be the whole journey.... As as I
can remember, that is what Broodviol said, but perhaps, as I was then a
young and man, I may have left out which would explain
his meaning better.”
Maskull, who had to all this, thoughtful
at the end.
“It’s plain enough,” he said. “But what did he by our reuniting
ourselves to Crystalman’s world? If it is false, are we to make
ourselves false as well?”
“I didn’t ask him that question, and you are as well to answer
it as I am.”
“He must have meant that, as it is, we are each of us in a false,
private world of our own, a world of and and distorted
perceptions. By the great world we nothing in
truth and reality.”
Polecrab his from the water, up, yawned, and
stretched his limbs.
“I have told you all I know,” he said in a voice. “Now let me go
to sleep.”
Maskull his on him, but no reply. The old man let
himself on to the ground, and prepared to rest.
While he was still his position to his liking, a footfall
sounded the two men, from the direction of the forest.
Maskull his neck, and saw a woman them. He at once
guessed that it was Polecrab’s wife. He sat up, but the did
not stir. The woman came and in of them, looking from
what appeared a great height.
Her dress was to her husband’s, but her more. She
was young, tall, slender, and erect. Her skin was lightly
tanned, and she looked strong, but not at all peasantlike. Refinement
was all over her. Her had too much energy of for
a woman, and she was not beautiful. Her three great flashing
and glowing. She had great of fine, yellow hair, up and
fastened, but so that some of the were down
her back.
When she spoke, it was in a weak voice, but full of lights and
shades, and somehow to be away
from it.
“Forgiveness is asked for to your conversation,” she said,
addressing Maskull. “I was the tree, and it all.”
He got up slowly. “Are you Polecrab’s wife?”
“She is my wife,” said Polecrab, “and her name is Gleameil. Sit down
again, stranger—and you too, wife, since you are here.”
They obeyed. “I everything,” Gleameil. “But what I
did not was where you are going to, Maskull, after you have left
us.”
“I know no more than you do.”
“Listen, then. There’s only one place for you to go to, and that is
Swaylone’s Island. I will you across myself sunset.”
“What shall I there?”
“He may go, wife,” put in the old man hoarsely, “but I won’t allow you
to go. I will take him over myself.”
“No, you have always put me off,” said Gleameil, with some emotion.
“This time I to go. When Teargeld at night, and I on the
shore here, to Earthrid’s music across the
sea, I am tortured—I can’t it.... I have long since up my
mind to go to the island, and see what this music is. If it’s bad, if it
kills me—well.”
“What have I to do with the man and his music, Gleameil?” demanded
Maskull.
“I think the music will answer all your questions than Polecrab
has done—and possibly in a way that will you.”
“What of music can it be to travel all those miles across the sea?”
“A kind, so we are told. Not pleasant, but painful. And the man
that can play the of Earthrid would be able to up the
most forms, which are not phantasms, but realities.”
“That may be so,” Polecrab. “But I have been to the by
daylight, and what did I there? Human bones, new and ancient. Those
are Earthrid’s victims. And you, wife, shall not go.”
“But will that music play tonight?” asked Maskull.
“Yes,” Gleameil, at him intently. “When Teargeld rises,
which is our moon.”
“If Earthrid plays men to death, it to me that his own death is
due. In any case I should like to those for myself. But as
for taking you with me, Gleameil—women die too easily in Tormance. I
have only just now myself clean of the death blood of another
woman.”
Gleameil laughed, but said nothing.
“Now go to sleep,” said Polecrab. “When the time comes, I will take you
across myself.”
He again, and closed his eyes. Maskull his example;
but Gleameil erect, with her under her.
“Who was that other woman, Maskull?” she asked presently.
He did not answer, but to sleep.
