The Seventh Gate (The Seven Citadels ) (24 page)

“Help him,” commanded the sorceress.

Kerish stripped away the cloak and helped a
stranger to his feet. He was taller than the Prince, but nearly as slender. In
features, they might have been brothers, but the hair was gleaming silver and
the eyes a marvelous green, flecked with grey and gold.

“Let go of my wrists.” The inflection was
Gidjabolgo's but the voice was softer and more resonant.

Wordless, Kerish released him and
Gidjabolgo walked unsteadily to the pool. The Prince could see the edge of an
incredulous smile, strange on that perfect face, as the Forgite looked at his
own reflection.

“Now,” said Tebreega, “I will tell you a
story. Once in Joze, the City of Dreamers, a child was born, a child so big her
mother died during the birth. She had three beautiful sisters and a father who
could not love her. She grew up from clumsy child to ugly girl. Some shouted
names at her in the street, but most people were distantly kind, as they would
have been to a lack-wit or a cripple. She had a studious nature and far outstripped
her sisters in learning. But they won the husbands they desired and she went
veiled to their weddings.

“There she saw a young captain and loved
him. She thought her love well hidden but the city gossips, who saw everything,
whispered it to him as a fine joke. She saw the disgust in his eyes. Shortly
after that, she stole a dagger and slashed her cheek over and over. The
festering of the wounds nearly killed her but at least, when she was well
again, people saw nothing comical in her face.”

“Her father, so long as he did not have to
see her, denied her nothing to further her studies. Many wise men, who might
have refused to receive an ordinary woman, gladly taught her. When her father
died, she left Joze and then Galkis, seeking knowledge. Over long years she
found it: deep and ancient knowledge to help her win the key to immortality and
the power to be beautiful.”

“She became lovelier than any other woman.
Men blasphemed, calling her fairer than Imarko, and loved her helplessly. A
certain young captain of Joze died of his passion but she gave herself to none
of them. Their love was bitter. Every longing look, every gasp of admiration,
reminded her of what she had been. No one recognized the person within the
beauty and she despised them for it. She vowed to live, not among men, but
among beasts.”

“Grieving, she entered the Forbidden Jungle
and found there more than beasts. They came to her, the ancient people, and in
her bitterness she was not afraid. Slowly they accepted her and allowed her
dominion over birds and beasts, but they did not understand her and
communication was difficult and slow. At last they began to perceive her grief
and the causes of it. They tried in their own way to heal her and made for her
the Valley of the Rocks. Over the centuries they carved her human body as they
saw it: intricate and beautiful in every part. They saw no ugliness in her; to
them, all creatures were fascinating in what they shared and beautiful in the
ways they differed.”

“At last she understood. She stayed in the
jungle and took on the task of showing humankind to the ancient ones. She
welcomed her own form again and discarded the false beauty that had walled her
in with hatred. That is the story, Gidjabolgo.”

The Forgite remained silent by the pool.

“Now Prince,” whispered Tebreega, “open
your mind - let Gidjabolgo know how you see him.”

Kerish tried to form a clear picture, but
it was constantly swept away by eddies of thought as he remembered Gidjabolgo's
sour humor, his guarded loyalty, the way music possessed him, the grace that
could transform his features when he looked at something beautiful. Most
vividly of all, Kerish recalled the night the Forgite had risked rejection by
telling him the truth and had held him when he wept.

“Enough,” said the lovely alien voice.

“Prince,” murmured Tebreega, “tell him what
you see now.

“A stranger. That is...I have no right to .
. . I will get used to it in time,” said Kerish clumsily. “I am glad that you
have what you've always wanted.”

“A stranger,” repeated Gidjabolgo, as if he
had not heard the rest.

“Once, you refused to sacrifice your only
friend for your heart's desire,” said Tebreega. “You deserve fulfillment. Which
form do you choose?”

“My own,” answered Gidjabolgo.

The air shimmered and the handsome stranger
was gone. Kerish held out his hands to his own familiar and hideous Gidjabolgo
and the Forgite's face twisted with anguish.

“Look at your eyes,” said Kerish
desperately. “Gidjabolgo, look at your eyes!”

The Forgite swung round and knelt by the
pool.

“That is no false, sorcerous glamour.”
Tebreega's voice was very gentle. “I have merely made your true self more
visible. All your life you have looked for beauty. There is its reflection.”

The eyes remained the same rich green and
gold. No one looking at Gidjabolgo's face would notice anything else.

“Then I'll save the thanks I would have
wasted on you,” growled Gidjabolgo, to Kerish's great delight.

Tebreega also smiled. “Now,” she said, “we
shall return to the Valley of the Rocks.”

Chapter
11

The Book of the Emperors:
Wisdom

The time came
for the High Priest to choose his successor and the names of three priests were
put forward. The three were brought to his lodging place in the Golden City and
told to wait in an ante-room. For an hour they waited and then the High Priest
came out and laid his hand on the shoulder of the third priest, saying, “You
shall be my successor.” The other men protested, saying, “Holiness, you have
never seen or spoken to us, why then reject us?” The High Priest answered, “I
have judged you not by your deeds or words but by the use you made of idleness.
You,” he pointed at the first priest, “you made of this chamber a pit for petty
thoughts to wrangle in. You,” he pointed at the second priest, “noted every
detail of the chamber but left it as barren as you found it.” Tenderly he
smiled at the third priest. “You furnished the chamber with the splendors of
your mind and made it a place fit for Zeldin to enter. Go and do likewise with
all of Galkis.”

Breathless from a giddy flight smothered in
the folds of Tebreega's cloak, the travelers stood again in the Valley of the
Rocks.

“You thought them beautiful until you began
to understand, Kerish,” murmured the sorceress. “You must think them beautiful
again before I give you the key. But you, Gidjabolgo - your horror seemed to
exist beside your pleasure without tainting it.”

“I am greedy,” answered Gidjabolgo. “I will
squeeze pleasure from anything.”

“Without a qualm? Good!” exclaimed
Tebreega. “If you had won a key, you would not have wasted your immortality.”

She moved impatiently past creeper-infested
rocks and they could hardly keep up with her long strides.

“When I was a child in Joze, I saw a man
knocked down by a horse in the street and kicked in the head. His blood made
exquisite patterns on the cobbles. I told my nurse so and was beaten for it.
That was wrong. I was no less sorry for the man because the patterns were
beautiful. All the onlookers praised the man's courage as he died and saw
nothing wrong in separating and admiring that. The Ferrabrinth have many
reactions to one event and so it is easy to believe them callous.”

“Isn't there a danger,” began Kerish, “that
in time only the admired elements may retain their meaning? Then compassion,
and the urge to give practical help, might disappear?”

“Where now is Vashordek the great? Where is
the King of Roac?” murmured Tebreega. “Yes, that is a danger, but the aim is
noble: to enrich our lives by a wider range of thoughts and feelings, all
happening in one precious instant. Yet, narrowness is safer.”

They had come to the first of the naked
rocks and Tebreega rounded on them suddenly. “How do you judge a woman's
beauty? My ugliness distresses you, Kerish, because you feel guilty at even
noticing it. Gidjabolgo merely dislikes it as he does any unsightly thing. I
take no offence. Once I would have been equally repelled by him. Only the
handsome are charitable about other people's looks. Would you both prefer this?”

The great bulk of the sorceress suddenly
span round. Her cloak swirled outwards. Kerish shielded his eyes from the
dazzling blue and scarlet that engulfed him. Feathers caressed his cheek and a
woman laughed softly. The colors shrank back, to cling to the slender form of
the Mistress of the Birds. The heavy black hair framed a face as perfect as any
image of Imarko, but the lips were like fire-flowers and the violet eyes were
bright with contempt.

“This is what the men of Jenoza saw.” She
moved gracefully towards them and Gidjabolgo eyed her as warily as a beast of
prey.

“Do you find me beautiful? Many did, and
lived to regret their passion when I was young and angry with the world. They
reached for me as children snatch at bells or colored ribbons tied above the
cradle. Tawdry images. You lose yourself if you desire them. In lust, all men
are alike.”

She began to dance, sensuously, furiously,
and the scarlet blurred. The figure slowed again and there was Tebreega, her
chins wobbling as she gasped for breath.

“Now look at me again.” She pushed back
swathes of hair with ugly, reassuring hands. “At me. I am like the puzzle boxes
that the Men of Dorak carve to give to their sweethearts: from large to small,
each inside the other, growing ever more intricate and inaccessible. We can
never really see ourselves but the Ferrabrinth have different skills. Vethnar
understands. Now you must try.”

She seized Kerish's wrist and pulled him
after her, forcing him to look again at the rocks and touch the carvings.

“Here I am,” cried the sorceress, “spread
out among the rocks; a maze of marvels. There are gardens in my blood; see how
they flower. Have you ever met so perfect a spiral? And here, no sea could
boast of such fantastic creatures, but they are all contained in me. Look at
this tracery, could any lace be more exquisite? Yet it is a tracery of pain. Do
you begin to understand?”

Slowly, as they wandered through the
valley, Kerish's horror began to give way to fascination and then to wonder.

“Ah, the heart itself,” Tebreega bore down
on the rust-red outcrop. “How lightly we speak of it but here is the reality.
Listen to your own heart beating, Kerish, and then look. Gidjabolgo, see
yourself here too, a casket of wonders.”

The Forgite lingered beside a white rock
tracing the elegant curve of a rib with his stubby fingers.

“We are rich,” he said.

Tebreega laughed joyously. “See the
complexity of a single hair and all the colors contained in it. Now, don't
shrink, look at the prison of memory, the shape of the mind itself.”

Kerish looked steadily at the pale coils. “And
we are all like this?”

“All, and having seen it, could you ever
again think a human worthless?” asked Tebreega. “You should grieve for the fall
of any man as you would for the breaking of some marvelous sculpture.”

“I begin to understand,” said Kerish, “but
illness, age, death . . .”

“Much of what you see is never blemished by
age and even the form of disease can be beautiful: alien flowers in the body's
garden. Death is something for the mind to struggle with and you have done so.
I wanted you to understand the glory of life more fully,” whispered Tebreega, “or
acceptance of death will not be the great step that it should be.”

She stooped to kiss his cheek and Kerish
stood frozen, understanding more than she had said aloud.

“The last rocks in the valley,” Gidjabolgo
had caught them up. “Why are they bare? Is the work unfinished?”

“Yes, in spite of all my centuries with the
Ferrabrinth,” admitted Tebreega. “Those rocks are for carvings of the human
soul. Many times we have talked of it, but they do not yet understand.”

“They have no souls?” The Forgite's voice
was sharp with curiosity.

“There is no such word in their language,”
said Tebreega with her lopsided smile.

“And their gods?” asked Kerish.

“In the youth of their people, “ began the
sorceress, “they had deities and you have trodden two of their sanctuaries: the
island of Vethnar and your father's garden. They say that they have grown out
of deities as children do out of toys.”

“I see now why they were not afraid to
create life,” said Kerish thoughtfully.

Tebreega nodded. “Perhaps they have lost
the gift of fear. All my attempts to describe what we understand by a soul have
failed. I need help. Perhaps it would take the voices of all the humans who
have ever lived in Zindar, or perhaps only one new voice. I do not know and my
very immortality makes me the worst suited of all mankind to attempt such a
task,” Tebreega sighed. “The Ferrabrinth will not leave their seclusion and
share their knowledge till the carvings are completed and they have understood
the whole of  humanity.”

“Then they must wait forever,” said
Gidjabolgo harshly. “Like all who seek perfection.”

“It may be so,” agreed Tebreega, “but I
will do my uttermost, even to the extent of exposing the Ferrabrinth to you.”
She smiled absently. “This is my meeting-place with them and this is our time.
Will you stay?”

They both nodded.

“Then I will begin my summoning.” From the
folds of her cloak she took a bone pipe, worn by centuries of her fingering. “Keep
very still.” Pursing her full lips she began to play.

At first the travelers could hear nothing,
but their skin prickled and their limbs swayed to a silent rhythm. The jungle
seemed to move with them as if the whole earth was rocking. Kerish was gripped
with the idea that the firm ground he had always walked on was an illusion.
This was the reality: constant, violent movement and how could he ever have
hoped to keep a footing? Slowly the music became audible - high and piercing,
full of juddering discords and unexpected pauses, as if they were still not
hearing all of it, or were incapable of supplying the necessary response.

Kerish became conscious of his heartbeat
quickening as if it was anxious to escape the alien rhythm. Yet there was
something familiar in the sound. His eyes met Gidjabolgo's and they remembered.
Long before, as they camped beyond the Forbidden Hill, they had both been drawn
by such music. No, not music. It was the speech of the Ferrabrinth and Kerish
wondered what the ghosts of Vashordek had cried out to them that night.

Tebreega's fingers were still but the
sounds continued. She was answered and suddenly a Ferrabrinthin was with them.
Its furled wings were all the colors of the sunset, like the feathered crest
that streamed from its head. Kerish hardly noticed the rest of its tall body -
the slender, eight-fingered hands, the grey skin with its labyrinth of delicate
veins - the face held him. At first, it was turned sideways, contemplating him
with a bright black eye; the extraordinary profile, with its long fretted bill,
startlingly clear. Then the head swiveled round on the narrow shoulders and the
huge eye in its forehead burned into him with a different kind of sight.

Tebreega played something on her pipe and
the Ferrabrinthin replied. Kerish tried to fit words to the image of the
creature in front of him and could not describe it even to himself. His vision
blurred as his mind retreated from a strangeness too complete for it to
struggle with. Through the haze, the third eye still burned and Kerish felt as
if he was being drawn forward and minutely examined. He tried to see himself as
the Ferrabrinthin must - wingless, short, heavy-boned, thick-skinned,
flat-faced, half blind - yet neither hideous nor beautiful, simply alien.

The presence withdrew and forcing himself
to move, Kerish bowed in the Galkian fashion with his hand over his heart.
Suddenly the wings were unfurled, dazzling with a red such as he had never
seen, even in the hottest fire or the richest sunset. The many-fingered hands
moved, striking the Ferrabrinthin's chest with a note like a drum. As suddenly
as it had appeared, the creature was gone.

Gidjabolgo dropped to his knees, his eyes
still reflecting the glory of the Ferrabrinthin's wings. The world rocked
gently, as if it were trying to lull them back to sleep. Kerish realized that
the sorceress was putting away her pipe and speaking to him.

“You are honored, sweetheart. He greeted
you as an equal and be assured you startled him as much as he did you.
Gidjabolgo, are you happy now?”

The Forgite did not seem to find the
question odd. He grunted in reluctant assent as Kerish helped him to his feet.

“We can all go home then,” said Tebreega.

*****

There was no feasting in Tir-Jenac that
night, only a simple meal beside the pool which they prepared themselves. While
Tebreega murmured to her birds, Kerish had the task of gathering a basketful of
fruit from the edges of the glade. He was guided by two monkeys who screeched
disapprovingly or chattered encouragement beneath each tree. Gidjabolgo was
given a rather blunt knife and a pile of knobbly roots. He attacked them with
gusto, peeling his own fingers as often as the thick green skins.

“We've spice enough without your language,”
remarked Tebreega, coming out of her tent with a bowl of creamy sauce.” And
that will do. There's enough there to feed even me three times over. Besides,
you must not spoil your fingers for the zildar. The Ferrabrinth do not really
understand our distinction between speech and music. To them, all forms of
communication are art.”

“And how long do they take to cry for help?”
asked Gidjabolgo. “A chorus and twelve verses?”

Tebreega laughed as she squatted down
beside him. “Almost. It was a very long time before I realized that their need
for me was as great as mine for them. I would enjoy translating some of your
remarks to them. Surprise is considered inelegant among the Ferrabrinth but I
have learned to know the signs.” She chuckled. “Perhaps I could make them laugh
at last.”

“How would you know amongst that cacophony?”
asked Gidjabolgo.

“How indeed? An interesting problem. Their
speech sounded full of discord to me too, at first,” said Tebreega, “but they
have their own sense of harmony. As a musician you would find it interesting
and the pipe is easy enough to play though the human voice cannot encompass
their language. Kerish, I didn't see you standing there. Sit down.”

They began their simple supper.

“Sweetheart, you're not eating,” said
Tebreega after a minute, “and your eyes are bright enough to drive all the
questions in Zindar out of the shadows. I warn you, Kerish, I cannot betray my
trust by telling you more about the Ferrabrinth than you need to know.”

“There is one thing. It's not really a
question, just a guess. You don't have to say anything. In the caves of Gultim
there were pictures of men dwelling in trees and in the Five Kingdoms they seem
to preserve the memory without understanding it. Now the Ferrabrinth are winged
and live chiefly in forests and jungles . . .” Kerish's voice trailed away and
he looked expectantly at the sorceress.