Gods of Green Mountain (37 page)

"Ah, that suggests that they have seen me."

"So our tale tellers have said; long ago, our ancestors saw two Gods."

"How long ago?" asked the God, in a rather sad voice.

"Long, long, long ago, older than the hills, when we were but plants growing in the ground, it was reported by some that two giants walked on our earth, and made the Green Mountain their home."

Behind the transparent wall came a long, extenuated silence. Then the booming voice spoke again: "Soon you will be fed, and I will supply you with comforts, though what I have here will be outsize for any of you--but ask me first this most momentous question that put your feet on such a courageous journey."

It was then that Dray-Gon spilled out the story of Bari-Bar, and how it died, and how all of El Dorraine was on the verge of rebellion and war--if the fault for the death of Bari-Bar couldn't be found.

Behind the thick wall of obscurity, the God listened to Dray-Gon's well-told tale of Bari-Bar, and when he had finished speaking, he asked many questions. At length, he extracted from Dray-Gon the entire history of El Sod-a-Por, and how it changed into El Dorraine.

Raykin, who had listened very carefully to both the questions and the answers, growing braver, and tired simultaneously, could not help but interrupt: "Excuse me, Lord God, or sire, or whichever you prefer as title--but how is it that you ask so many questions? As a God, certainly you must know already the entire history of our ancestry! We came for an answer, and you confuse the issue with questions."

"Oh, but this is amusing!" said the God, just short of expressing laughter. "Such impertinence! Such presumption! On such an equal basis you speak to me--your God!" And despite his promise not to laugh and split their ear drums, the space around them thundered with rolling peals of noise that they presumed was laughter.

Raykin whispered to Dray-Gon, "He seems a jolly sort, but I wish his humor would stay under control, my head is splitting!"

"Sssh," cautioned Dray-Gon. "Be grateful he hasn't smashed his fist down on the table like the king does when he's amused."

"Tell me, little men, just what do you think of me, now that you are in my home, and heard my voice?"

"That is most difficult to say, Lord God, since we can only hear your voice in great thundering rolls of sound, and our eyes cannot contain your size. Your appearance is beyond our comprehension. But you seem kind. You speak as we do, as a man, only in Godlike size. Being small, we can only speak to you on our lowly level, not your lordly one."

"And I," began the God, "have already gained my impression of you: that it is just as impossible for ant-size men to be humble, even in the presence of a god, as it is for lordly size men to be humble in the presence of anyone. Though I myself have never met face-to-face any sort of god, so you are blessed in a way that I have not been. At least not yet. But all this difference in size makes conversation most difficult, for your voices are but tiny pipsqueaks to me. I am now going to eliminate this problem of size, so do not fear anything that may happen."

Again there were loud, rumbling noises, crashing bangs, and blurred movements, and the racing colored lights went crazy on the wall! They felt themselves being picked up and carried.

Whatever contained them was set down. Before them appeared a wall, very thick. Behind its transparency was a huge bright light, growing ever smaller and smaller. Another light was beamed directly on them. As they watched the large light in the thick wall shrink in size, very slowly an image came into focus...growing ever smaller, until they saw clearly--a figure!

This time the voice of the God spoke in the equivalent to their own. "Well now, little men, we are all of an equal size and sound. This reducing glass has made me as small as you--and the enlarging glass has made you the equal to me from my side of the glass. What now do you think of your God?"

Dray-Gon seriously studied the image in the thick glass. "You seem to me now, very much a man like us. With the exception that your skin is strangely pale and colorless--and never before have we seen hair the color of night with silver streaks in it, and your eyes are oddly sky blue--but still, all in all, you are very much like us."

The God laughed again, and this time it was pleasant to hear, and comforting. "How alike we are in our comparisons. I myself have never seen men with such greenish complexions, and one with bronze. Nor have I seen such splendid heads of red hair before, of so many different shades--or such fine, purple eyes, like amethysts sparkling with life and vitality. I am very impressed, for if I had imagined such complexions, with such eyes and hair, I would have thought the combination gaudy, or garish, but somehow, it is pleasing. Like flowers you are."

"Like men we are--flowers we were once, but now we walk about, no longer rooted in the ground!"

"You take offense, where I meant none. In your own particular ways, you are very handsome, and most colorful. No wonder you find my coloring pale and without excitement. However, I have seen red hair before."

"We have, all of us, various shades of red hair and greenish complexions, with the exception of one. The Princess Sharita has hair of another color, and skin of another hue."

"Oh? I am fascinated. While I sat quietly, tuned in to hear your conversations, I heard mention of this princess many times over. And just what color is her hair, and her skin?"

"Lord God, you will gasp when you see her, she is that beautiful. Her hair is not silver, or not gold, but is something in between, and her complexion is a pale saffron, like rich cream, and perfectly without flaws, and her eyes are inclined to be a bit like yours--violet, on the verge of being blue."

"Ah, she does indeed sound lovely, and someday I must see this rare hair. Such a complexion as you describe sounds unbelievable. Can it be that you see her with eyes of love?"

Dray-Gon felt his face heat with excess blood. "I love her, yes. But she is not without faults--she has one terrible hot temper that should go with fiery red hair like Raykin's here. But then again, she can be as cold as ice, and that suits her pale hair very well. She is a very complex woman; she turns you on; she turns you off; you hate her one minute, and love her madly the next. You can look at her and find her so lovely she takes your breath and look at her again and find her beauty so cold it is inhuman--until she smiles."

A haunted look came to the blue eyes of the God, and sadness sagged his posture. "Yes, I understand what you mean. I have known a woman such as you describe. The very best kind to know, for you never know what to expect, except you can expect never to be bored." And suddenly the God smiled, and sadness departed. "Enough now of small talk, for you are hungry, thirsty, and tired, and no doubt longing to see again this remarkable princess. But before you do, speak to me in all honesty, now that you see me just as I am--do you still believe I am a god?"

"But of course you are!" replied Dray-Gon with enthusiasm. "Who but a god would live in this high and huge mountain home? Who but a god could pick us up like ants! And who but a god could change the large into small, and the small into large, just by using a wall of glass with lights?"

"Tell me then, Dray-Gon, for I have heard your name spoken--if you swept up one of your ants into your hand, and held above it a magnifying glass, would you then be the God and the ant your subject?"

"If you are suggesting, Lord God, that God is merely relative, and only a matter of size and strength over smallness and weakness, then I would say, yes, I am a god to the ant, and able to let it live, or give it death. But death is an easy thing for any man to give--or even some animals. Only life is the gift of Gods. To you, I am the ant--to me, you are only a god if you are more than size and strength. You see, our tale tellers say it was you who came with another God and caused such powerful, funneling winds that we were uprooted from the ground and left weak and dying with our roots exposed. But naturally since I am here, since we are all here, some of us lived as the weak ones died off. We taught ourselves ways to keep alive without rooting ourselves in the ground again, for it was enjoyable to be ambulatory. So, it is you, with the other God, whom we credit for making us into men, and not just flowers. Even so, we had to make ourselves have faith that Gods existed at all, and that they were superior beings, better than us. We heaped everything on you, considering you loving, caring, concerned, and giving--the ideal of what we would be. You were our benefactors, our judges, our executioners, our redeemers, our chastisers, and our deliverers. And I have to confess now, your judgments and your chastisements have not always been kind--but just the opposite. Still, we deemed them justified, and right, even when we suffered and died."

"So," said the God in a considering, thoughtful way that puckered his dark brows, "if I now reach out and sweep your domed cities into rubble with the flick of my smallest finger, without any thought, or justification, would you still consider me a god and give me the respect and awe required by a god?"

"You could do that, I'm sure, and if you did so thoughtlessly, without justification, it would be because you didn't realize fully the reason for delivering your justice--but the reason would be there, lying in the rubble, and you would have performed rightly, since you are a god."

The God in the wall of glass smiled and chuckled. "Dray-Gon, are you sure you are not an escaped refugee from that doomed city of Bari-Bar? Your reasoning impresses me at the same time it leaves me baffled. And I have a story of my own to tell, a long one. But you are all tired and ill at ease. So, I will allow you a period of rest, and time to eat and drink--and that will also give me time to consider an answer for your very weighty problem, to place the blame for such a horrendous deed is in itself a problem for a god."

Dray-Gon stepped forward as the God began to retreat into the thick magnifying glass. "Please, Lord God, we cannot rest here, or eat, or drink, or listen to your story, without our princess, and the other men who traveled to talk to you, and hear your considered opinion."

The figure in the glass nodded his head--and disappeared.

"This is hardly what I expected," said Raykin, "but then, nothing ever is. And time means nothing to that God. We stand, we sit, we sleep, and wake up to another day without nourishment!"

"I could eat grass!" declared Arth-Rin. "So let us sleep, and wait, and perhaps a meal will come, eventually."

The God's Tale

I
n the darkness of the night, which was to the God but a flickering dimness lasting momentarily, the God reached out of his high green home and manipulated long mechanical arms and tonglike hands. He lifted, and carried most carefully, a clod of earth on which minute tents were raised, housing the remainder of the expedition from El Dorraine. On her bed, the Princess Sharita never stirred, so smooth was the transition.

Dray-Gon awoke to the sound of rilling puhlets, and the braying of the horshets. He couldn't believe his ears when he had oriented himself to where he was. Oh, that man in the glass was a god all right! He sprang to his feet, and raced to the shimmering tent that raised the royal blue-and-purple emblem of the princess.

She was still asleep, half on her side, half on her back, an enticing flow of feminine curves. Dray-Gon stood and silently feasted his eyes, before he sat on her bed, and lightly traced his forefinger over her smooth saffron brow, down over her small exquisite nose, and then over the soft curve of her pink lips. How sweet, he thought, to have a proportional dream to cling to.

Sharita half-wakened, sleepily lifting long-lashed eyelids--and so quickly did her eyes widen in disbelief, and then flooded with delighted happiness! She sat up and threw her arms about him, without any reserve, meeting and responding to his hungry, demanding kisses, until they were both breathless and laughing, and both trying to talk at once between kisses, between caresses, and between gasping explanations of where they were, and what had happened, and how much he had missed her, and she had missed him and how exhilarating it was to be together like this--at last! "And you are bearded again," she said, stroking gently his face. "Hasn't that God supplied any of you with conveniences?" To think of the size of the God's razor split Dray-Gon's face with a large smile.

"And look at me: I am dressed only in my nightgown. Oh, I must hurry and dress, and do my hair."

"Silly little princess, the God supplied me with you--what I really need--and look about, you are in your own tent, with all our animals outside grazing on grass. You know, he picked up a mile or two of our earth and set it down inside of his home. On Sharita, now he is a god! That is a god!"

"But look at me--my hair is a tangle, my gown transparent--my father would be shocked and ashamed if the God saw me first like this!" Grinning, Dray-Gon suppressed the words that would say the God might very well appreciate seeing her just the way she was. He said instead: "All right, I will leave and let you do all those things to ready yourself, and I will start meal preparations, for six of us are starving at least!"

All the young men patiently waited until the princess came flying out of her tent, dressed in her best, wearing her small crown and jewels, and hastily they all sat down to eat and drink, and talk excitedly, not fully believing any of this was really happening. The princess scanned her eyes over them, freshly shaven and bathed, wearing their best uniforms, and felt an overwhelming pride in everyone.

"But we are unbalanced," complained Ral-Bar. "There were supposed to be ten from Upper Dorraine, and ten from Lower Dorraine, and see, now there are eleven representing the upperlands."

"Not really," calculated Sharita quickly. "While we are here, there are no Uppers and no Lowers, we are all just citizens of El Dorraine." Then she had hold of Dray-Gon's hand, her eyes soft as she asked: "Is there only one God--not two? What does he look like? What happened at Bari-Bar? Why is he so cruel to punish our lands with so many storms? Do I look all right? Is my hairstyle becoming--or should I brush it out long and loose and take off the crown? And why didn't you make him bring us in much sooner, so we too could hear everything from the beginning?"