Helliconia Summer - Brian W. Aldiss [134]
‘Stop, stop, I wish to hear no more—’ cried the soul, overwhelmed.
But the malicious gale blew over her. ‘You asked you asked you could not stand the truth you mortal soul, you’ll see when you get here. To find your wish of useless wisdom you should journey far to far Sibornal there to seek the great wheel where all is done and known and all things understood as pertains to existence on your side of the bitter bitter grave, yet good none good will it do you you prying dry-quemed failure of the dead’s daughter for what is real or true or tested or a testament to time even Wutra himself except this prison where we find ourselves all undeserving …’
The soul, quailing, hoisted sail and floated upwards through the bleak mansions, through rank after rank of screaming mouths.
The word, the poisonous word, had come from the far fessups. Sibornal had to be her goal, and a great wheel. Fessups were deceivers, their endless rages led them to limitless malice, but their powers in that respect were limited. It seemed true that Wutra had deserted not merely the living but the dead as well.
The soul fled upward in anguish, scenting far above it a bed on which lay a pallid body without movement.
Above ground, processes of change, endless periods of upheaval, expressed themselves through such biological beings as animals, men, and phagors.
From the northern continent, Sibornalans still moved southwards across the treacherous isthmus of Chalce, propelled by a sporadically improving climate to seek more hospitable lands. The inhabitants of Pannoval expanded northwards across the great plains. Elsewhere, too, from a thousand favoured habitats, people began to emerge. On the south of the continent of Campannlat, in such coastal fortresses as Ottassol, numbers multiplied, growing fat on the abundance of the seas.
In that haven of life, the sea, many things moved. Faceless beings shaped like men climbed to the shore, or were washed by storms far inland.
And the phagors, too. Lovers of cold, they also were propelled by change, seeking new habitats along benign air-octaves. Over all the three measureless continents of Helliconia, their components stirred and reproduced and fought the war against the Sons of Freyr.
The crusade of the young kzahhn of Hrastyprt, Hrr-Brahl Yprt, came slowly down from the high shoulders of Nktryhk, proceeding through the mountains, always obeying the air-octaves. The kzahhn and his advisers knew that Freyr was slowly gaining the ascendancy over Batalix, and so moving against them; but that knowledge could not speed the pace of their advance. Often they stopped to make raids, on the protognostic peoples humbly traversing the snowfields barefoot, or on components of their own kind towards whom they smelled hostility. No sense of urgency burned in their pale harneys, only a sense of destination.
Hrr-Brahl Yprt rode Rukk-Ggrl, and his cowbird rode mainly on his shoulder. Sometimes it took off with a clatter of wings, climbing to soar above the company, whence it could watch with its beady eyes the long procession of stalluns and gillots, most of them on foot, tailing all the way back to the defiles of higher ground. Zzhrrk would ride the up-draught so that he maintained a position directly above his master for hours at a time, wings outstretched, only his head moving from side to side, alert for other cowbirds gliding nearby.
There were little knots of the protognostic peoples, generally Madis trying to lead their goats to the next thorn or ice bush, who sighted the white birds from afar. They would cry to each other and point. All knew what the distant cowbirds signified. And they would escape while they had the chance, from death or captivity. Thus the insignificant louse that lived on phagors, burrowing in their coats, a titbit for cowbirds, became an unknowing instrument in saving the lives of many a protognostic.
The Madis themselves