As the Green Star Rises
Lin Carter
Part I.
THE BOOK OF ANDAR THE KOMARIAN
Chapter 1.
ON THE BRINK OF DEATH
I had only minutes to live. Soon the tides would rise, the waves of the sea would wash over the tiny islet upon which I had been marooned by the treachery of a supposed friend, and I would drown. How strange it was to find that I feared extinction—I, who have died once, already, only to be reborn in the body of another!
Mine must surely be the strangest story in all the annals of human experience. Born to wealth and social position on the distant planet Earth, I had traversed the abyss of space to become a homeless wanderer; a savage boy, lost and helpless amid the wonders and perils of an alien world.
Chained to a cripple’s body, I had learned to burst those chains that bind the spirit to its habitation of flesh. I had set my spirit free, to roam the infinite wilderness of stars! For within that crippled carcass beat a warrior’s heart, whose blood stirred to the siren-call of adventure and mystery.
Across the universe I had drifted to a new life in a new body, upon a strange and marvelous planet which revolves about a star of green fire—a star unknown and unnamed by the astronomers of my native world. But a star under which such as I might find the life of excitement, bravery and battle for which my spirit had been forged.
In the body of the warrior hero, Chong, I had loved and won the love of Niamh the Fair, princess of the Jewel City of Phaolon. And in defending her against her enemies, I had fallen beneath the treacherous blow of a coward’s knife, I had gone down to the Black Gates of Death, leaving my beloved Princess alone and helpless in the power of her enemies.
But the love I felt for Niamh the Fair proved stronger than death itself, and from the portals of his Dark Kingdom I had come back to dwell in a second body, that of a savage boy named Karn of the Red Dragon people.
In this second incarnation upon the World of the Green Star I had found new friends to aid me in the search for my lost beloved. Zarqa the Kalood was one—an alien being; tall, gaunt and golden-skinned, nude, sexless and bewinged. The last survivor of a prehuman race which had ruled this planet in former ages, Zarqa became my ally and my friend.
Janchan of Phaolon was another—the bold and daring young princeling who had quested through the extremities of the world to find the lost princess of his realm.
By a strange trick of fate it had been these, the Winged Man and the Phaolonese noble, who had set my Princess free from the temples of Ardha, and not I. For I had fallen captive to the Assassins when fate sundered our company. But even in that grim fellowship of thieves and murderers, I had found a friend and companion in the Assassin Klygon.
Grinning, sly, ugly little Klygon! Within his homely breast beat a hero’s heart—staunch and loyal and courageous. Together we had fled from the treetop city of Ardha, seeking to rejoin Zarqa and Janchan and my Princess. But among the world-broad forest of the sky-tall trees we had become irretrievably lost. In the depths of the night-black gigantic wood, where enormous worms slither through the unbroken gloom, among the tangled roots of the tremendous trees, we had fallen captive to a repulsive race of albino cannibals who dwelt in noisome caverns tunneled beneath the ground.
There we had met with Delgan of the Isles—or so he called himself. A blue-skinned man of indeterminate age, Delgan was a slave as were we. Together, we three had escaped from the albino troglodytes and won freedom… but at the price of my eyesight. For, in battling the monster Nithogg, giant worm-god of the savages, I had been blinded by an explosion of light. So intense had been that burst of brilliance, I feared my vision would be forever impaired.
Together, riding upon an immense leaf fallen from a tree taller than any Everest, we followed a river down to the sea. I wish I could convey the mystery of this astounding discovery to the reader this manuscript may find. In a world where one interminable forest of mile-high trees marched from horizon to horizon, and from pole to pole, the very existence of this immense tract of waters under the open sky was more than a legend; it was a myth.
But we found it, Klygon, Delgan, and I, Karn.
That very night our friend betrayed us. While we slept upon a tiny islet, scarcely more than a reef of sand, he thieved our stores and weapons from us. Striking down my faithful Klygon with a blow that would have cracked open any skull less hard than his, bidding me a mocking adieu, he sailed off in our leaf-boat; he left me stranded—blind and helpless, to await my death at the turning of the tide.
And so my long saga of peril and adventure drew close to its end.
I sat there, hugging my knees, listening to the rising wind and the lapping of waves. There was nothing I could do. The isle was bare and empty; and our only road to safety had been the leaf-boat, crisp and curled, long and narrow as a canoe. With that taken from us, we were marooned here.
Klygon, as I have said, yet lived. The coward’s blow in the dark had only rendered him unconscious. Now roused to consciousness again, he was groggy and still partially stunned. I had dragged him up to the highest point of land and sat there by his side, awaiting the end of our travail.
It would not be long in coming, that I knew. The wind was rising, dawn was glimmering in the east even now (I sensed); and the water rose inch by inch, foot by foot.
The unknown sea was a very large one—bigger than Lake Superior, perhaps bigger than the Caspian. The gravitational pull of the Green Star is strong—many times stronger than the Moon’s pull, back on my native world. This planet revolves so closely about the Green Star that its surface would have been seared to a lifeless desert, had it not been for the eternal blanket of cloud-barrier which envelopes it, even as Venus is enveloped; this alone makes life endurable here.
And, as the Green Star rises, so rise the tides of that sea!
I had failed in everything. Janchan and Zarqa, together with the incarnate Goddess Arjala, had freed Niamh from her prison, flying off with her into the unknown. I did not know what had become of them. For aught I knew, they might stand in direst peril at this very moment.
Their fate was as unknown to me as mine would be to them. They must often have wondered what had become of the wild boy, Karn the Hunter, who had saved them from the clutches of the mad magician, Sarchimus.
In another moment—or another hour—the tides would rise to drag me down. And I, who had passed through the Black Gates once, would do so again. And those who loved me would not ever know what had chanced, or how I met my end.
The Green Star was rising. I could not see its emerald splendor touching the clouds to fire. But I could feel the warmth of daylight, beating on my face.
And I thought of Delgan, who had left us here to die.
Why had he first befriended, then turned upon us? Klygon, I remembered, had not trusted him from the very first. But it had ever been my way, perhaps foolishly, to take men at their face value, to accept them at their word. Well, now that trait had brought me down—not only me alone, but the homely, loyal, faithful Klygon, as well.
My eyes were scaled in darkness; but I remembered the sound of Delgan’s voice—smooth, obsequious, with a hint of mockery behind his words and the glint of cunning in his candid, innocent eyes.
If this were not to be the end, after all, perhaps we would meet again, Delgan and I. My jaw tightened at the thought. Oh, to have my eyes again, and a longsword in my hand, and to be brought face to face with Delgan of the Isles! Then it would be steel against steel; my courage and skill and determination against his cunning and slyness and treachery… and I would abide by the outcome of the gamble. For Delgan would not walk away from me a second time, I silently vowed…