The chant went on. Dust whipped up from the trail, and the tops of the pines bent in the sudden winds. A spattering of rain fell. Thunder and lightning continued for several minutes.
At last the chant ended. The clouds slowly moved off, the sun peeking out from the dispersing haze. The wind stopped. He let his arms fall and opened his eyes.
The eyes of the statue were regarding him curiously.
“What are you?” the thing said, its voice deep yet still sounding like a woman’s voice.
“I am a man,” he answered. “How do you feel?”
The wings moved up and down, then lowered and folded.
“Strange,” the creature said. Its eyes moved across the length of its body. “I do not know what I am, yet my form seems familiar to me.”
“It’s a fine form. You are you. You must be used to being you after all this time.”
The human eyes narrowed. “Yes, I seem to remember the past. Many of your kind have been here. They sent up offerings.”
“Yes, they did. Did such doings please you?”
“It was neither pleasing nor displeasing to me. Are you going to offer me something?”
“Yes, the chance for freedom. You have wings, but have you ever flown?”
“I do not remember.”
“I doubt that you have. How does the prospect of doing such a thing strike you?”
“It occurs to me that flying must be part of my nature.”
“Undoubtedly. Uh, I’ll lay it on the line. I need a lift. I must travel quickly and you can help. I wish you to carry me to my destination. How does that strike you?”
The creature considered the matter. Then it said, “I find it odd that I have no objection to this thing. Why is it that I do not?”
“I must confess that I stacked the deck a little. You were brought to life with the desire to repay the kindness bestowed on you.”
“What kindness?”
“That of bringing you to awareness and setting you free. You were getting a little tired of standing up here in the wind, weren’t you?”
“I am glad that it will no longer be necessary. I will repay you for this boon.”
“Good. Wait one second.”
He took the saddle off his horse and put it on the statue’s base. He boosted himself up, picked up the saddle, and placed it on the creature’s back. The girth didn’t reach around the belly, but he positioned the saddle as squarely as he could. A little magical concentration would be needed anyway to hang on, secure saddle or none.
He mounted the creature and seated himself.
“Anytime you’re ready,” he said.
“Where are we going?”
“To the valley of the Mizzerites. Do you know where it lies?”
“No.”
“No matter. I will direct you.”
The wings unfolded and began to move up and down. Soon they were two great pinions beating the air.
The creature left its base and took to the air. The slope dropped away. Beast and rider soared on the cool winds between the peaks, banking one way, then the other, riding the shifting pressures and rising vapors. The rider hung on, his legs tight around the creature’s middle.
“You have not yet told me what I am,” she said.
He suddenly had taken to thinking of the creature as a “she.”
“What do you feel you are?”
“I feel … that I am partly what you are. Partly a man. But not quite. I am …”
“The word is ‘woman.’”
“Yes, I feel that I am a woman. Yet I am more than that. Or less, perhaps.”
“You feel in some way inferior?”
“I cannot say. I am different from anything else in this world. I am alone. I have always been alone.”
“Each of us is inevitably alone in this world. Or any world.”
“I feel that may be true. But some are more alone than others. You say you brought me to life?”
“I did. Do you regret it already?”
“I feel a great emptiness inside. There is a longing, a yearning.”
“That is the woman in you.”
“Indeed? It is a peculiar sensation.”
“So I’ve been told.”
The peaks across the valley drew near. Being higher, these were tipped with snow.
“We need to get over these mountains. Can you do it?”
“I can.”
The huge wings beat faster as she climbed in a spiral. Foothills fell away, and rocky slopes approached. At the top of the spiral she banked, turned, and glided. The snows lay below, very near as the craggy peak passed beneath.
The winds shifted abruptly, and she compensated, subtly changing the angle of attack on the leading surface of her wings. They began the long descent.
“Have you ever hang-glided? Just joking.”
“What is joking?”
“Never mind. Do you feel good about yourself?”
“I still feel very strange. I have been thinking. After we reach your destination, is it your intention to leave me free to my own devices?”
He was long in answering. “I seem unable to lie to you. I have given you life, but it cannot be permanent. Your existence will be brief. But is it not better to exist for even a short time than never to rise to awareness at all?”
“Perhaps. Perhaps not. I do not know the answer yet. Life itself seems unutterably strange. There seems to be no sense in it. All I know is that I hunger for something.”
“Hunger is part of life.”
“I thirst,” she said. “I need.”
“Those things as well.”
“Is that what life is? Unfulfilled needs?”
“Partly. Part of it is the attempt, the struggle to fulfill those needs. When the needs are satisfied, stagnation sometimes sets in.”
“I do not know what that could be. But to continue my thoughts — if I am soon to cease existing, why should I not throw you from my back and fly unburdened? For the short time I have allotted to me, it seems constraining that I should be under obligation.”
“I can understand. But I don’t think you will throw me off.”
“Neither do I,” she said. “I feel a bond with you.”
“Perhaps you feel indebted.”
“That, too. But something else. It relates to my hunger.”
“Oh?”
“Yes. But I have not the words to express it. Tell me. Why did you create me only to exist for so short a time?”
“I must confess I was thinking mostly of my own needs at the moment. I needed you for a specific purpose, an urgent one. I did not fully consider all the consequences. I see that I should have given them some thought.”
“Perhaps you should have. But I exist now, and there is no going back. You have told me the reason why I exist. That is enough. I fulfill an urgent need. I am useful.”
“That you are.”
“But it is not easy to exist.”
“No, it is not.”
“There is pain.”
“Yes. I’m sorry.”
“I now know what this hunger is. It is love.”
“Yes,” he said.
“How can I feel this thing for a being who is not very much like me?”
He answered, “But I am like you in some ways. We share a certain mode of being. A humanness.”
“I also feel that we share this, somehow. It is very strange.”
“Such things always are.”
She asked, “Can you reciprocate my feelings in any way?”
“I can greatly admire you. You are a magnificent creature.”
“But you seem to be saying that you cannot love me.”
“Again, I am sorry. What are you feeling now?”
“Sorrow,” she said.
“Aye.”
“And an unnamable feeling, dark and turbulent.”
“Anger.”
“Yes. Thank you. Again I am thinking that it would be better if I threw you off. It would be interesting to watch what happens to a creature such as you who falls from a great height.”