"Good riddance," he growled.
I heard something like a muffled sob from what had seemed the direction of Annie's invisible presence.
"The banishment is almost complete," I heard or felt her say.
The old man looked up, his features softening. His pale lips moved soundlessly as he stared in that direction. It looked as if they formed the name "Annie."
"I must leave you, Perry," I heard her say.
"No!" I responded.
"I must, for now," she said sadly. "If I am to keep a doorway open to Poe."
"Don't leave me. There's never been anyone else who really mattered."
"I have to. I've no choice. You are a good man, Perry, a strong man. You can deal with this world or any other. Poe can't. But what will our world be like without him in it? I must stay near him if I can. Forgive me."
And then she was gone.
Tears blinding my eyes I tore out of that accursed cabin. I wandered. It didn't matter where I went. There was no need for concealment in a place where I was effectively nonexistent.
Timeless and haggard I went, snatching pieces of moldy bread and draughts of tepid tea from the galleys. I paced the boards of that ancient stranger, its elder crew tottering about the business of its mysterious voyage. They took not the least notice of my presence, and the green fires of St. Elmo flickered at the edges of everything important.
Again, after what might have been days, did I feel myself addressed.
"Eddie."
"Annie? You've come back?"
"No. You are so far away, Eddie. I can scarce reach you."
"Ligeia?"
"Yes. Better. That's better. You must return to us."
"How? I've no idea where I am or why. I've just lost the most important thing in my life."
"You must try. Try, Eddie. The decision is more important than the means."
"I don't even know how to try."
"Find a way."
I stalked the decks, I cursed the ship, its captain, the crew, the weather. A chaos of foamless water boiled in the blackness about us, though through it occasionally passed floes and mountains of ice. At one time, to either hand, rose immense ramparts of cold whiteness, towering into the darkness like the walls of the universe. Onward, we rushed always onward.
Neither prayers nor curses seemed to avail me. I believe that I was mad for a time, from the loss of Annie, trapped in an environment which did little to improve one's state of mind.
The winds blew cold, out of the blackness, among the icy pillars. I watched the captain come and go, about the business of his observations, but I never approached him again. I noticed by degrees, over what might have been a long span of time, that our speed seemed to be increasing. We still carried a full load of sail and the wind had come to roar with an even greater fury.
The first time the vessel was lifted bodily out of the sea I was frightened, though it was a long while before it happened again. But there came a time when this was occurring at regular intervals. I saw the old man, knowing him now, somehow, as some version of Poe, once more, in the distance. This time, he was not taking measurements or doing calculations, but merely watching as the ice mounts raced round and round about us, his expression one of pain, loss, and beatitude—whether in succession or simultaneously, I do not know (such the consumption of Time in this place, like a green flame ...)—and even as I apprehended our circumstance—that we must be spinning, plunging into the mouth of a whirlpool—I felt again for him that kinship I had known in days of old, and I wanted to go to him, take him in my arms, rescue him, bear him away from this place. Only I knew that I could not; and even if I could, I knew that he would not desire it.
And so I looked inward upon our dizzy whirling about the borders of our gigantic amphitheater of ice, and I saw that our circles were growing smaller, amid a roaring, a bellowing, a thundering. Suddenly, I knew what Poe was feeling, in icy eminence with an eye so close to Death's that he beheld Life with full clarity. I saw as he saw and knew that I could ride as he rode into the final globe of globes, clearminded, pure, to perfect unity—
Saw, but did not wish it. Once we had almost been the same man. He was an artist, and I almost his creation. I mourned him in that instant of his exaltation. Now I remembered Ligeia's words, "Find a way" and I turned from him.
The world had been opened, was totally devouring. What could a man do?
I tried.
A dark unfathom'd tide Of interminable pride—
A mystery, and a dream, Should my early life seem: I say that dream was fraught With a wild, and waking thought Of beings that have been, Which my spirit hath not seen, Had I let them pass me by, With a dreaming eye!
Let none of earth inherit That vision of my spirit; Those thoughts I would control, As a spell upon his souclass="underline" For that bright hope at last And that light time have past, And my worldly rest hath gone With a sigh as it passed on: I care not tho' it perish With a thought I then did cherish.
Imitation Edgar Allan Poe
XII
The tall, dark-haired woman regarded the shorter gray-eyed one there upon the sand streaked orange and sable. A wall of mist passed landward. The sea was a sheet of reflected flame. A sand castle the size of a Georgian townhouse stood half-in, half-out of the fog, a tiny crack flowing up its face.
"So this is your kingdom by the sea," the taller woman said.
The other bit her lip till she tasted blood, nodding.
"Cleverly assembled, my dear. Like all the best designs there is a classic simplicity to it."
Thunder rolled somewhere inshore. A dark cloud drifted into view overhead, its shadow falling upon the bright waters.
"I did not know you could enter here," the younger woman said softly.
"Believe me, it was not easy."
"Do not harm this place."
"Not if you will help me, rather than fight me."
"What do you want?"
"We must bring him back."
Two more clouds came into view, followed by more thunder.
"Which one?"
"The only one we can still save. Or they will both be gone."
The younger woman began to weep, as the rain fell.
"I want them both."
"I am sorry, child, but it will not work that way."
"They call for me again. It is too late."
She stepped backward and the ground opened. She fell into the crevice, but her descent was abruptly halted.
The other extended a hand.
"Now, you must help me now. They've both gone so far away."
"Very well," the younger replied, lowering her hands from her face and reaching forward. "Very well."
The sky grew black and the ocean swirled. They walked upon it.
I came to full consciousness atop a piece of floating wreckage. My memories ceased somewhere before reaching that place. I was cold and the waters dark, though for the first time in what seemed an age the sky was clear, blue... .
I moved, drawing a cold left foot out of the water. I shifted my numb arms about, feeling the circulation come into them again, painfully. I gradually became aware that the back of my neck was sunburned. I scooped a little water with my left hand and splashed it onto it.
If Annie's powers verged upon supernatural manipulations, Poe's upon unnaturally acute perceptions, where might mine—the third member of our trio—lie? It would seem to follow, if we were somehow the same, that I— Of course. Each of them was, in a different respect, otherworldly. But I was a child of this world, the Earth; mine was the religion of life—survival. I was the necessary component for the grounding of fantasies, ideals. I placed my palms flat upon the shifting wood beneath me and I pushed, raising myself. I had, as Ligeia suggested, found the way, again; and I knew that I must turn my head to the left and open my eyes. As I did so, I felt as if some bright presence were departing my company.