“Do you live here?” she asked.
He nodded. His head was in his hands.
“How did you come from the other world? Where is the ‘ship’?”
He looked up, smiling wearily. “This is the ship. It flies up into the sky where the other worlds are. But it’s damaged and won’t fly now. I crash-landed here.”
She sat down beside him. Her hand seemed to move of its own volition, and began feeling him between his legs through the smooth cloth of the garment he wore. Automatically, absently, he lifted the hem of her gown, slid his hand up and began performing the same service for her.
“Do Ormazd and Ahriman rule in the other worlds, too?”
“Why should they? Not in the way you mean, anyhow…”
“Well, you belong to the Evil One’s horde…”
“No, I’m a guest here. The master is intrigued by me. He’s helping me.”
“Yes, but you belong to Ahriman.” She glanced down at their two slowly massaging hands and giggled.
“Look what you’re doing!”
“What?” He snorted. “There’s nothing wicked about it.”
“But of course it’s wicked.” She leered at him, and licked her lips. “I like being wicked…”
He brushed her off and stood up. “Rubbish!” He seemed annoyed. “It does no one any harm. Doing harm to people is what’s wrong.”
Histrina leaned back. “Hugger told me the gods don’t exist. That it all comes from our own minds. Is that what you think? Perhaps it’s right.”
Hugger had been no fool, she thought. He was able to think for himself, and not many people could do that. This man Laedo seemed sceptical, too. And he saw no sin in fornication, so…
But his next words surprised her. “Your thoughts don’t come from within you,” he said quietly. “Not entirely. Ormazd and Ahriman do exist. They live up in the sky and struggle for domination of Erspia.
Here, I’ll prove it to you.”
He beckoned to her and went through a door in the opposite wall from the one they had come in by.
Curiously Histrina followed him up a steep ramp which she found she could climb just as if it had been a staircase, due to the way her sandals clung to its surface. Then they went through a poky little corridor and eventually came out into a large room filled with rows of racks, all laden with variously shaped objects whose purposes she couldn’t guess.
Laedo led her to what seemed to be an enormous metal block secured to the floor. He touched a button and part of the block swung open, revealing that it was hollow inside, like a cabinet or kiosk. But its walls, she saw, were more than a foot thick.
“This cabinet is used for storing radioactive materials,” he told her. “It’s made of a lead compound that stops any kind of radiation known. I was taking it to Harkio, but here on Erspia I’ve found my own use for it.”
She stared at him in incomprehension. “Get inside,” he ordered. Then, when she didn’t move, he pushed her in, joining her himself and closing the narrow door behind them.
It was dark until he produced from his pocket a strange stick-like gadget which gave off a soft glow and illuminated the interior. They sat on the floor facing one another, knees touching. Laedo gazed absently at her face, as if expecting something.
For what seemed a long time nothing happened, and Histrina was merely bewildered. But then a sense of peace seemed to come over her. The compelling thoughts that for the past hours had been bubbling with gusto in her head—thoughts of lechery, of cruelty, even of murder—died away, and all at once seemed foreign to her.
But the other thoughts, those that lately had been defeated and which previously, when supported by the priests, had ruled her—they faded too. Thoughts of good and proper behaviour, of kind actions which she must always seek to do, of social niceties which must always be observed. These, now, seemed just as foreign to her as did the bad thoughts.
She was simply neutral, peaceful and calm.
“Neither Ahriman nor Ormazd can enter here,” Laedo said softly.
She delved into her mind. Yes, she could summon these thoughts if she wanted to. They were still there.
But it took an effort of will. She had to make herself want to savour them. They did not rush in and force themselves on her attention, as formerly they always had.
It was like waking from a dream. Her mind was her own, in a way it never had been before.
“I noticed it very soon after I landed,” Laedo said. “Thoughts, urges, pulling and twisting me in two different directions. A lot of people might not have suspected anything, since after all they’re the same urges that people are apt to get anyway, with varying degrees of obsession. And of course there’s the social thing, which masks it to some extent. The two gods tend to win over social groups, rather than individuals, since people are inevitably influenced by those around them. Paradoxically it’s the more individualistic, with naturally stronger minds, who more readily accept impulses from whichever is the enemy god. That’s what happened to you, right? You come from a village ruled by Ormazd. But you fell prey to Ahriman.”
She nodded, understanding his final words, at least. “So the gods are real,” she replied wonderingly.
“You could say that. But why is it they can’t get into my anti-radiation chamber?” He smiled broadly. “I come in here twice a day just so as to calm down. But for that I’d probably end up like those out there.”
He jerked a thumb.
She liked the new feeling of calmness, so much so that she was loth for him to open the door. But eventually he did. They stepped out, left the hold and went back to the control cabin-cum-living room.
After a few minutes she found desirous thoughts jostling in her again, like a crowd of deranged satyrs.
He carried on talking. “I noticed that Ahriman is stronger during the night and Ormazd during the day.
That gave the game away altogether.”
He moved to the table and touched one of the queer-looking objects there, spinning a little disk. Histrina gasped as a section of wall suddenly changed colour and then seemed to disappear altogether, so that she was looking beyond it into the starry sky. But surely she should only see another part of this strange house’s interior?
“Don’t be afraid,” Laedo said, noting her amazed expression. “It’s only a picture. You’re looking at the night zenith.”
As he spun the disk again something sprang into being in the centre of the picture and grew swiftly. It became a ball, or globe, with a cylindrical shaft or well projecting from one side of it and pointing almost directly at them.
The object was pale cream in colour and gleamed dully in the starlight, though one side seemed much more brightly lit than the other.
“This is Ahriman,” Laedo told her. “Or rather, this is where his thoughts come from. See that cylinder?
That’s the projector.”
Again he flicked switches and spun disks. The picture was replaced by what appeared to be blue sky dotted with fleecy cloud, with the sun flaring fiercely in the centre. The clouds swelled, then vanished and once again there was blackness and stars, with, contradictorily, the sun still glowing, a hard, steady point of light.
And there ahead of them was an identical ball and cylinder, this time shining in the glare of the sun.
“And this is Ormazd,” he announced. “The sun is artificial, too. It’s no bigger than a medicine ball. That’s why shadows are abnormally large here—but of course, that doesn’t seem abnormal to you, does it?