Menagerie - Martin Day [31]
'I can't leave,' said Zoe. 'My friends are here. We're travellers, you see. I didn't want to get involved with any of this. If they leave without me —'
'The law is the law,' said the man. 'Especially here.' He paused in thought for a few moments. 'Here's what I'll do,'
he said. 'I'll have my friend make some enquiries. If your companions are willing to come to me and make me an offer, then we shall see.'
'Where are we going?'
Not too far. The next town. Trouble is, my horse is not the fastest creature that the sun has blessed, and with two of us on it . . .'
'Two of us, on one horse?' Zoe's mind filled with a confused rush of domesticated mammals that she had learnt about, and for the moment she couldn't remember which one was a horse. But whichever it was, surely it wouldn't be big enough.
'I'm afraid so,' said the man, leading Zoe through the crowd of the market. 'I also purchased an interesting casket, which is being sent ahead separately. I'm afraid I cannot do the same with you.'
'Oh,' said Zoe. She really didn't know what to say.
'Don't worry,' said the man, finally coming to a halt by a huge, pale, four-legged thing with flowing hair and large teeth. 'We'll be as gentle and as quick as we can.'
And without another word he reached down to bind Zoe's ankles together, and flung her over the back of the creature.
Moments later they were off and beyond the city walls.
'It has been put to me that, by striving to exist beyond the harsh strictures of time, the Kuabris effectively have no meaning.
'Nothing could be further from the truth.
'As we have seen, it is the definition of science that begins to give it substance. Opposition needs to stem from knowledge, from definitions, from a pinning-down of the moth that is meaning. As impossible as it sounds, we must know what science has been, and what forms it could take in the future. We use the words of our enemies to condemn them.
'Therefore, we gain our existence as a contrast to the existence of something else. The Kuabris take on form to combat science: without science, we have no meaning.
When we truly succeed in overthrowing science and the rational beast that lies dormant in all our minds, then —
and at that very moment — the Kuabris will cease to exist, will take on some new and distant form.
'As with science, as with time. It is in the casting down of our knowledge of time that the Kuabris have meaning. Our secret knowledge points always in this direction. And when time stops, the Kuabris will take on a new form, a new pattern. For the moment, we exist because our battle exists.
The further the evil man wanders from the Higher, the more he thinks in terms of legends. It could almost be argued that legends and stories from the past are in themselves meaningless, that they have no essential power.
They are mere phantoms, voices without motivation.
'Some might claim that the legends that exist beyond the Kuabris are similar to our own noble secrets. However, the nature of the secrets and legends is paramount: this gives them a hint of divinity or the stink of evil. The common legends of the masses point to the past and insinuate an effect upon the ongoing now. The Higher secrets of the Knights of Kuabris instead have no meaning beyond their very existence. There was never a time when they did not exist. They encourage us to travel onwards now. Mere legends point to the past and struggle to engineer an influence.
'Our legends, our great artefacts, are made great by our resolute strivings to attain the changeless now. Just as science tugs and tempts, so tales "from the past" are birthed in evil. Science and depraved legend are strange bedfellows, but when they are allowed to combine their grotesque