I? I am—Life! Life without end and without beginning! Old as the stars am I, who once was one with them.. . but that was long ago, O very long ago … at the Creation.
The spangled mists writhed, floating vapors spun from pure light drifting on the air their opal luminescence. The blazing spindle at the core seemed to fade, then to brighten, then to ebb again, like the slow pulsing of a mighty heart.
When the Universe began was I born … one with the stars was I, but different—different! For I lived, and knew that I lived, and the great suns about me knew not that they lived… thus was I alone in my sentience and my being, and they, the stars, of which I had been born, they knew me not, nor danced as I danced in my joy, for I alone lived.
“Child-of-Stars,” whispered Doc Herzog faintly, staring up into the Glory. “Born of the chance interplay of energy—perhaps once in a billion times a billion years such a thing is born, a creature of pure energy, self-sustaining, eternal—”
The Glory laughed, like silver bugles ringing faint and far.
“Yes, the Child-of-Stars am I! Long ages did I drift through the starry spaces, seeking to find another such as I to be my friend. But there was no other one such as I, for I was alone in all that vast immensity! And so, in time, I came down to this little world, as I had visited ten thousand others in my quest, and here—here I found living things that knew and felt and loved and thought, even as I. Different from the Child-of-Stars they were, their core of splendor trapped in a prison-house of flesh, but, yet, more like to me than aught that I had found among the cold and empty splendor of the star-thronged galaxies. So here I dwelt, befriending the little creatures, one tribe of them that did not flee from me in terror… ah, it was long and long ago!”
“A billion years, maybe,” breathed Herzog.
So long as that? Mayhap, old man. But when their brothers turned to rend them for that they worshipped me, I brought them here, here to Zhiam, here to the City that we built together outside the world. Ah, it was hard, hard to open wide the Doors of Time to bring them here to Yesterday, but I was young and strong and filled with love for them, my friends, my people, my little brethren, and I worked the wonder! So that they should be safe from the enmity and the hatred of their own kind, I brought them here to this place and to this age which even time itself had forgotten, and which no men knew, for here it is a billion years before the first men rose to sentience upon this planet, and here I gave unto them that land of peace and plenty, even as I had sworn that I would do … if they would only keep sacrosanct that Vow which I extracted from them, that no life should be taken here, and no blood spilt.
Doc’s old face, lifted to the Glory, was saintly, enthralled, rapt with fascination as he drank in this uncanny tale of a vast exodus across the ages. And, perhaps, he was remembering another age, and another exodus, and another people whose God had brought them also out of bondage and peril, into a promised land of peace and plenty that was to be theirs, so long as they held true to another Vow, and obeyed another set of Commandments.
But that was long and long ago, I see … and there be those among my children who weary of their obedience to that Vow, and would break it, and shed blood against my will … and others, too, sprung from the loins of ancient enemies, who have at length pursued us here across the ages! And who would now renew that old, forgotten war—ah, children! Children! How jealously you cling to those little toys of steel and iron that ye love so well—and to those newer toys, as I observe, which your brothers on a younger world nearer to the sun have brought hither … well, and well! Then I must chastise thee, and close the Door which ye have opened—and then? And then, ah, then—I shall sleep again, for as I slumbered long centuries here in this place below the world, what lovely dreams I knew, what lovely dreams! But, now, to my toil!
And veils of lacy incandescence swirled wide like the bright wings of angels from Paradise, and swept them up, one and all—and the rocky cavern roof above their heads split asunder—and they rose, webbed about in scintillant splendor, and soared up above the City where bands of men fought and slew, and beasts screamed, and buildings burned with red flame, and black smoke dirtied the pure and lambent skies of morning.
Up to a towering height the Glory soared, and there, atop the great parapet that enclosed the utmost tier of the Temple, which was itself built upon the greatest height of the City, it left them, and they turned, dazed and dazzled, blinking in wonder at each other, and at themselves.
Valarda still clung to Ryker, and his arm was strong about her slim waist. They were beyond wonder now, and beyond awe and marvel, clinging together like children, seeking comfort in the warmth of sheltering arms and the nearness of another.
And they turned and looked down upon the City.
And the Glory fell upon the City, in a storm of crystalline chiming.
So ye would war, would ye? it sang—cold and serene and merciless was that piercing music! Well, I shall teach you—war!
25. When Gods War
Zhaim lay helpless in the grip of the enemies who had come out of the deeps of time to slay and thieve and ravage.
Few indeed were the desert raiders Zarouk had brought with him, but even a few fighting men can cut a red swath through men with empty hands, who may not make or bear arms.
Such little as men may do to defend their wives and homes and children, the men of Zhiam had already done. Barricades had been built, streets blocked, doors locked, and women hidden away. But barricades may be torn down by many strong, determined hands, locked doors be beaten in, and houses burned. And when men with empty hands strive to shield their loved ones with their own bodies, sharp steel can rend asunder that flimsy barricade as well.
And Zarouk’s horde was very good at its work.
Flames flickered in the ruins of gutted houses. Villas lay open, ravished of their lovely loot by swaggering conquerers. Men had been cut down and lay now staring with dead, uncomprehending eyes upon the ruin, from pools of spreading redness.
Women—especially those who were young and beautiful—were not slain. But there were those among them who ere long would wish for the benison of the knife, rather than the shame of serving their conquerors in the immemorial way in which the women of the conquered must serve their conquerors.
Palaces stood open, doors battered in, flames flickering through shattered windows, while rough, cursing men carried heaps of plunder through trampled gardens.
Children—those young enough, and desirable enough to make good slaves—huddled together, tongueless, wide eyed, under guard.
Then, suddenly, the Glory was there.
It was vaster now than it had been in the depths of the world, like some enormous cloud of scintillation and jewelled splendor, it hung above the rubble choked streets bestrewn with corpses, loot and nubile captives.
The desert hawks stared up at it curiously, wonderingly, then shrugged, and turned back to their red work.
There were many marvels in this strange world, and all were harmless. What is one marvel more?
They would learn soon enough, and to their sorrow.
Prone in a puddle of congealing gore, a dead man sprawled. He had been a guard stationed before the Temple, more a position of honor than aught else, in this paradisical world where there were no thieves or murderers, and his weapons were ornamental, little more. But his heart had been brave and true, and when the desert men came swaggering and laughing through the streets, he had gone against them, using only his bare hands and not the flimsy weapons at his side. And they had cut him down, slashing open his belly with a careless, backhand stroke, so that his bowels fell out upon the pavement.