The Stone God Awakens Page 6

  “My Lord?” she said. “Spying?”

  “Yes, I’m sure that he is working for somebody other than himself or his people. I cannot put my finger on anything that will hold still. But I feel it.”

  “Perhaps he works for Wurutana…?” she said.

  “He may,” he said. “We’ll find out. We’ll be going south to find Wurutana after we set these tusks up before the temple.”

  “Will I be coming along?” she said. Her great Siamese-cat-blue eyes were fixed on him, and her posture betrayed tension.

  “I understand it will be very dangerous,” he said. “But you do not seem to be afraid of danger. Yes, I will be very happy if you will come with me. But I will not order anyone to accompany me. I will take only volunteers.”

  “I am very happy to be able to go with my Lord,” she said. And then she added, “But are you going to face Wurutana or look for your sons and daughters?”

  “My what?”

  “For those mortals of whom Ghlikh spoke. The beings who look so much like you that they must be your children.”

  He smiled and said, “You are very intelligent and very perceptive, Awina. I will be going south to do both, of course.”

  “And will you be looking for a mate among the mortals who are your children?”

  “I do not know!” he said, more harshly than he had intended. Why should this question upset him? Of course, he would be looking for a mate. What a question! And then he thought, well, she is a female, and her question is only natural for her.

  But Awina was subdued for several days thereafter. Not until he tried hard to get her into conversation and to jolly her up did she come out of her blueness. Even so, many times he caught her looking at him with a strange expression.

  They reached the Wufea village after making some detours to villages near their direct route. They set up the tusks to form the corners of a square before the temple gates and then they built a roof supported by the tusks. There were celebrations and ceremonies until the chiefs complained that the Wufea were going bankrupt. Moreover, the crops were not being properly taken care of, and the extensive hunting to feed all the guests had cleaned out the game for far too many miles around.

  Ulysses had ordered the making of more bombs and a few rockets. While this was being done, he went on a great hunt into the southern plains. He also wanted to capture some wild horses and to get a closer look at Wurutana.

  The main body of the party returned to the villages with great piles of smoked meat dragged on sledges. They also took with them a number of captured horses with instructions to treat them gently and not to slaughter them.

  Ulysses pushed on southward with forty warriors and Awina. They passed great herds of elephants about the size of African elephants but with a mound of fat on the haunches and considerably longer hairs. They went by herds of antelopes of many various species and genera, some of which looked like the American and African antelope of his day.

  They sighted packs of wolf-like notch-eared dogs with white and red spots all over their bodies. There were prides of a large cheetah-like striped cat and of lion-sized jaguar-like cats. There were many of the twelve-foot high road-runners. Once, Ulysses saw two of the great birds drive off two jaguars from a horse the big cats had just killed.

  His people did not seem as worried about the birds and the animals as they did about the Kurieiaumea. These were a tall long-legged people with reddish fur and white faces. A very savage people, Awina said. They were not related to the Wufea, Wagarondit or Alkunquib. They used bolas and atlatis or spear-throwers.

  Nobody said anything about turning back, but the deeper they got into Kurieiaumea territory, the more nervous his people became.

  Ulysses insisted that they keep going south. But after two more days, and seemingly no closer to the dark mass, he decided to turn back. His indirect questions had, however, revealed one item of information, though he was not sure that he could believe it.

  Unless he misinterpreted their comments, Wurutana was a tree. A tree like no other tree that had existed since the dawn of trees.

  They returned without seeing any sign of the dread Kurieiaumea, and Ulysses at once began preparations for the big journey. But now the leaves fell; the winds began to blow cold; he decided to wait until spring.

  A month later, with the first snows, Ghlikh and his wife, Ghuakh, flew into the village. Wearing lightweight furs, they looked like winged pygmy Eskimos. Ghuakh was even smaller than Ghlikh but much louder. She was a brassy, bigmouthed, nagging and nosy female whom Ulysses immediately disliked. If she had had feathers and bird-feet, she could truly have been called a harpy.

  “Did you get tired of waiting for me?” Ulysses said, smiling.

  “I, waiting? Truly, my Lord, I do not know what you mean,” Ghlikh said.

  But he and his wife asked many questions among the villagers after they had passed on their gossip, news and reports on the movements of game to the south. It was not difficult for them to find out that the stone god was planning to march on Wurutana after the spring thaws. Ulysses, meanwhile, questioned Awina and others and found out that the batpeople seldom came by at this time of the year. The chief priest said that one of the “winged mouths” had not come by this late for at least twenty years, maybe more.

  Ulysses nodded on hearing this. He suspected that the batpeople had been sent to find out what was holding him up. And he was sure that the two would be coming back much earlier in the spring than they usually did. He said goodbye to them one cold morning and decided that he would set out even earlier than he planned.

  In the meantime, he broke his horses and taught the warriors how to ride. The winter snows were not nearly as heavy as those to which he had been accustomed. This might still be Syracuse geographically, but the climate had become milder. The snows fell frequently but not as thickly, and they melted often. He had plenty of space to ride his horses, which he kept inside the temple. That spring, colts were born, and he instructed his people how to take care of them. He was strong in his insistence that the animals be treated humanely.

  Spring finally released the frozen soil, and the plains became muddy. He was delayed starting the expedition because of a sickness that appeared among the Wufea. Dozens died within a few weeks, and then Awina went to bed with the fever. He stayed by her side much of the time and nursed her himself. Aytheera came in often to perform cleansing ceremonies. The germ theory of disease was unknown. The ancient theory of possession by spirits and of evil sent by witches had reasserted itself. Ulysses did not argue with this idea. Without microscopes, he could not prove his explanation, and even if he could nothing could be done to cure the disease. The fever and the accompanying boils on the head lasted about a week in each person. Some died, and some recovered; there seemed to be no apparent reason for some having survived and the others succumbing. There were burials almost every day, and then the fever was gone.

  Ulysses had speculated on how ironic it would be if he should fall victim to a disease after having ridden out many millions of years. But he was untouched by the illness. This was an advantage in more ways than one. To have suffered the sickness might have made the others doubt his godhood.

  The fever took a month to pass through the area. When it had left, about an eighth of the population had been put under the ground. The disease did not respect age; it took babies, children, adults, and old people.

  He felt despondent for several reasons. First, he was getting closer to these people, despite their nonhuman features of body and psychology. Some of the deaths genuinely grieved him, especially that of Aytheera. Perhaps Awina’s grief for her father touched him more than the old one’s death, but he was affected. Second, the Wufea needed every hand they could get for the spring planting and the spring hunts. They really could not spare the warriors he would need for this expedition.

  However, the stone god had given them the bow and the arrow and the horse as transportation. They were now far more efficient in hunting than before
he had awakened. And so they went on great communal hunts and brought in great quantities of horse and antelope meat. Moreover, the idea of raising the horses for food occurred to them with no word from their god. They separated the stock into two groups for breeding purposes. One would become their transportation and the other would be bred for short legs and big bodies. They knew the principles of genetics, having raised dogs and pigs for various purposes for a long time.

  By then it was really too late to set out on the plains, or too early, depending on the point of view. The mud would have to dry out. So Ulysses waited and deepened his preparations and imagined even more obstacles against which he should prepare or which he could not possibly be prepared. His warriors found the waiting hard, too. The longer the expedition was put off, the gloomier and the more horrible became the tales about the always evil deeds of Wurutana.

  Three days before the expedition was to set out, Ghlikh and his wife Ghuakh glided out of the blue.

  “My Lord, I thought I could be of service to you!” Ghlikh said, his leathery big-toothed face wrinkling into the similitude of a bat’s. Or a very ugly fox’s, Ulysses thought.

  Ulysses said that he could be of great service. And so he could, up to a point. Beyond that, he would not be trusted. Ulysses had had time to dwell much on the incident with The Old Being and on reports about the bat-people.

  Ghlikh’s eyes opened when he saw the four wagons that Ulysses had had built. He said, “My Lord, you have given your people many new and serviceable things. With the bows and arrows and the gunpowder and the use of horses, your people could sweep out all the peoples to the north of here.”

  “True, but I am interested in the conquest of only one being,” Ulysses said.

  “Ah, yes, Wurutana!”

  Ghlikh did not sound surprised. If anything, he seemed satisfied.

  The third morning, the caravan started out. Ulysses Singing Bear was mounted on the biggest pony he could find. By his side Awina rode a mare, and then Ghlikh and Ghuakh rode behind two warriors. Forty warriors rode behind them and then came the four horse-drawn wagons and sixty more warriors. On the flanks, ahead and behind, scouts rode. The party was composed in almost equal part of Wufea, Wagarondit and Alkunquib. Ulysses would have preferred that the fighting men all be of one race, because he was tired of preventing or settling quarrels or outright bloodshed between the old enemies. But he wanted to preserve the union and to have taken along only one race would have insulted the other two.

  They certainly made a strange and colorful assembly. By then he had decided that all three were feline and had a common ancestor. The resemblance of the Wagarondit and Alkunquib to raccoons was superficial.

  The parade wound across the plains, stopping before dusk, or earlier, near a waterhole or creek. They killed much meat and all ate well. Day after day, the huge mass to the south became slightly larger and then, suddenly, it began to grow swiftly. Once, a small war party of the Kurieiaumea came close, but they were equaled in numbers by the invaders. Moreover, they seemed amazed by the fact that these people were riding horses. They kept a respectable distance and tried to keep up with them, but after the second day they lost them. Then, two days later, they were confronted by an army of almost a thousand feathered and beaded Kurieiaumea. Ulysses was not surprised by them. The Dhulhulikh had spotted them half a day before.

  Ulysses stopped the caravan and studied them. They were almost as tall as he but as slim as greyhounds. Their fur was reddish, and their ears were set more forward on their heads. Though their faces were as human as those of the Wufea, their teeth were also those of carnivores. They were definitely not feline. There was something doggy about them. They even stank like dogs, and they sweat from their tongues.

  Kdanguwing, the chief of the Alkunquib, said, “Lord, shall we charge them?”

  The other chiefs scowled at him for presuming to talk. Ulysses held up his hand for him to wait and regarded the enemy even more closely. Their big war drums were beating, and they were all doing a little dance while their chiefs harangued them. They were strung out in a crescent which would enfold the caravan.

  He gave orders and the war party spread out in a wedge with himself at the head and the wagons in the center of the mass. It was a formation that had taken a long time for the undisciplined savages to adhere to.

  Most of the warriors were armed with bows and arrows, but a number carried bazookas. These would have to dismount, however, to be effective, since the bazooka handler could not touch off the rocket himself. The tops of the wagons were platforms on which rocket tubes were mounted, on swiveling columns.

  Ulysses gave the order to advance, and the wedge started at a trot toward the canines. That a numerically inferior force would dare attack them on their home grounds seemed to paralyze the canines for a few minutes. But the chiefs finally got them going, and they came running at Ulysses’ party. Their ranks got progressively less organized the nearer they came to the horsemen, and by the time the two had almost met, the canines were in a state of chaos. Every man—or every dog-like man—for himself.

  Ulysses stopped the cavalry, the bazooka men dismounted, and the archers fired a volley. This was followed by six more volleys, each under the direction of sergeants who watched Ulysses for signals. It was an excellent exercise. The training paid off, and about two hundred Kurieiaumea went down with arrows in them.

  Then, as they broke and ran, rockets struck among them and exploded. Though the warheads carried stone chips as shrapnel, the main effect of the missiles was panic. They threw away their weapons and fled. The cavalry advanced slowly and then stopped while a number retrieved the arrows and cut the ears off the dead and the wounded for trophies.

  Two hours later, the dog-men, reorganized, their courage renewed by the scorn of the chiefs, attacked. And again they were cut down and sent running.

  It was a great day for the felines, who had usually lost whenever they encountered the canines on their own grounds. They wanted to push on, burn the dog-men’s villages, and massacre the females and children, but Ulysses forbade this.

  Two days later, the blackish mass ahead became a dark green. Later, they saw blooms of many colors and hues. Gray streaks appeared in the green. These hardened into immense trunks and branches and roots.

  Wurutana was a tree, the mightiest that had ever existed. Ulysses, thinking of Yggdrasil, the world tree of Norse religion, thought that here was one to match it. It was a world tree if he were to believe Ghlikh’s and Ghuakh’s description. It was like a banyan tree ten thousand feet high in many places and spreading out for thousands of square miles. It extended branches which eventually dropped to the earth, dived into the earth, and reemerged as new trunks and new branches. It was a solid mass, all continuity. Somewhere in that vast octopus of tree the original trunk and branches were still living.

  When1 they came to the first branch, which plunged from a great distance into the ground before them, they paused in awe. Then they rode around the gray corrugated-bark pillar and estimated that this branch was at least five hundred yards in diameter. The bark was so thick and fissured and indented, it looked like a heavily eroded cliffside.

  They were all silent. Wurutana was overwhelming, like the sea, a great earthquake, a flood, a hurricane, a cyclone or a huge meteorite falling.

  “Look!” Awina said, pointing. “There are trees growing on The Tree!”

  Dirt had collected in many of the deep fissures, and seeds had blown or been dropped by birds, and trees had taken root in the earth in the fissures. Some of them were over a hundred feet tall.

  Ulysses looked inside the gloom at the bottom. So thick was the vegetation above, very little sun penetrated down here. But Ghlikh had said that it was easier to travel in the upper terraces than on the bottom. So much water dripped from the tree onto the ground that it formed vast swamps. There were also quicksand and poisonous growths that did not seem to need the sun, and snakes that were venomous and cared not at all for the light. The caravan
would disappear in the bogs and marshes within a few days.

  Ulysses did not trust the bat-man, but he could believe this account. A dank unwholesome odor was breathed out from the roots. It stank of decay and pale furtive things and soil under water that would suck up anybody who was foolish enough to venture on it.

  He looked up along the nearest branch. It came down at a forty-five degree angle from somewhere in that green and multicolored welter several miles away.

  “We’ll ride on to the next one,” he said, “and look around.”

  It was already evident that they would have to leave the horses behind. It was too bad they were not domesticated goats. He had seen goats bounding from the edge of one bark-ledge to another. They were orange-haired creatures with doubly curved horns and little black chin whiskers.

  There were other animals, too. Black-bodied, yellow-faced monkeys with long ringed tails. A baboonish monkey with a green posterior and a scarlet coat. A tiny deer with knobby horns. A coatimundi-type animal. Something hog-like and grunting. And birds, birds, birds!

  They rode for a half-mile until they came to the next branch—or root—entering the earth. Water flowed down a channel, a deep groove, on its back and into a creek bed. Ghlikh had said that there were many springs, creeks and even small rivers in the grooves on the tops of the branches. Now Ulysses could believe it. What a mighty pump this tree was! It must send its roots deep into the earth, driving through stone, and it sucked up the water contained in the rock and tapped domes of water far underground. It might even tap the ocean and turn its water into fresh liquid, rejecting the salts. Then it exuded the water at various places, and springs, creeks and riverlets ran.

  “This is as good a place as any,” he said. “Unpack the horses. And let them go.”

  “All that good meat!” Awina said.

  “I know. But I don’t like to kill them. They’ve been of service to us; they have a right to live.”

  “They’ll get eaten up before the week’s over,” Awina grumbled, but she relayed the order.