CHAPTER XXVII. "THE DRUMS OF DESTINY"
Slowly we descended that mount of desolation; lingeringly, as though thebrooding eyes of Norhala were not yet sated with destruction. Of humanlife, of green life, of life of any kind there was none.
Man and tree, woman and flower, babe and bud, palace, temple andhome--Norhala had stamped flat. She had crushed them within therock--even as she had promised.
The tremendous tragedy had absorbed my every faculty; I had had no timeto think of my companions; I had forgotten them. Now in the painfulsurges of awakening realization, of full human understanding of thatinhuman annihilation, I turned to them for strength. Faintly I wonderedagain at Ruth's scantiness of garb, her more than half nudity; dweltcuriously upon the red brand across Ventnor's forehead.
In his eyes and in Drake's I saw reflected the horror I knew was inmy own. But in the eyes of Ruth was none of this--sternly, coldlytriumphant, indifferent to its piteousness as Norhala herself, shescanned the waste that less than an hour since had been a place ofliving beauty.
I felt a shock of repulsion. After all, those who had been destroyedso ruthlessly could not ALL have been wholly evil. Yet mother andblossoming maid, youth and oldster, all the pageant of humanity withinthe great walls were now but lines within the stone. According to theirdifferent lights, it came to me, there had been in Ruszark no greaternumber of the wicked than one could find in any great city of our owncivilization.
From Norhala, of course, I looked for no perception of any of this. Butfrom Ruth--
My reaction grew; the pity long withheld racing through me linked witha burning anger, a hatred for this woman who had been the directing soulof that catastrophe.
My gaze fell again upon the red brand. I saw that it was a deepindentation as though a thong had been twisted around Ventnor's headbiting the bone. There was dried blood on the edges, a double ring ofswollen white flesh rimming the cincture. It was the mark of--torture!
"Martin," I cried. "That ring? What did they do to you?"
"They waked me with that," he answered quietly. "I suppose I ought to begrateful--although their intentions were not exactly--therapeutic--"
"They tortured him," Ruth's voice was tense, bitter; she spoke inPersian--for Norhala's benefit I thought then, not guessing a deeperreason. "They tortured him. They gave him agony until he--returned. Andthey promised him other agonies that would make him pray long for death.
"And me--me"--she raised little clenched hands--"me they stripped like aslave. They led me through the city and the people mocked me. Theytook me before that swine Norhala has punished--and stripped mebefore him--like a slave. Before my eyes they tortured my brother.Norhala--they were evil, all evil! Norhala--you did well to slay them!"
She caught the woman's hands, pressed close to her. Norhala gazed at herfrom great gray eyes in which the wrath was dying, into which the oldtranquillity, the old serenity was flowing. And when she spoke thegolden voice held more than returning echoes of the far-away, faintchimings.
"It is done," she said. "And it was well done--sister. Now you and Ishall dwell together in peace--sister. Or if there be those in the worldfrom which you came that you would have slain, then you and I shall goforth with our companies and stamp them out--even as I did these."
My heart stopped beating--for from the depths of Ruth's eyes shiningshadows were rising, wraiths answering Norhala's calling; and, as theyrose, steadily they drew life from the clear radiance summoning--drewcloser to the semblance of that tranquil spirit which her vengeancehad banished but that had now returned to its twin thrones of Norhala'seyes.
And at last it was twin sister of Norhala who looked upon her from theface of Ruth!
The white arms of the woman encircled her; the glorious head bent overher; flaming tresses mingled with tender brown curls.
"Sister!" she whispered. "Little sister! These men you shall have aslong as it pleases you--to do with as you will. Or if it is your wishthey shall go back to their world and I will guard them to its gates.
"But you and I, little sister, will dwell together--in thevastnesses--in the peace. Shall it not be so?"
With no faltering, with no glance toward us three--lover, brother, oldfriend--Ruth crept closer to her, rested her head upon the virginal,royal breasts.
"It shall be so!" she murmured. "Sister--it shall be so. Norhala--I amtired. Norhala--I have seen enough of men."
An ecstasy of tenderness, a flame of unearthly rapture, trembled overthe woman's wondrous face. Hungrily, defiantly, she pressed the girl toher; the stars in the lucid heavens of her eyes were soft and gentle andcaressing.
"Ruth!" cried Drake--and sprang toward them. She paid no heed; and evenas he leaped he was caught, whirled back against us.
"Wait," said Ventnor, and caught him by the arm as wrathfully,blindedly, he strove against the force that held him. "Wait. Nouse--now."
There was a curious understanding in his voice--a curious sympathy,too, in the patient, untroubled gaze that dwelt upon his sister and thisweirdly exquisite woman who held her.
"Wait!" exclaimed Drake. "Wait--hell! The damned witch is stealing heraway from us!"
Again he threw himself forward; recoiled as though swept back by aninvisible arm; fell against us and was clasped and held by Ventnor. Andas he struggled the Thing we rode halted. Like metal waves back into itrushed the enigmatic billows that had washed over the fragments of thecity.
We were lifted; between us and the woman and girl a cleft appeared; itwidened into a rift. It was as though Norhala had decreed it as a symbolof this her second victory--or had set it between us as a barrier.
Wider grew the rift. Save for the bridge of our voices it separated usfrom Ruth as though she stood upon another world.
Higher we rose; the three of us now upon the flat top of a tower uponwhose counterpart fifty feet away and facing the homeward path, Ruth andNorhala stood with white arms interlaced.
The serpent shape flashed toward us; it vanished beneath, merging intothe waiting Thing.
Then slowly the Thing began to move; quietly it glided to the chasm ithad blasted in the cliff wall. The shadow of those walls fell upon us.As one we looked back; as one we searched out the patch of blue with theblack blot at its breast.
We found it; then the precipices hid it. Silently we streamed throughthe chasm, through the canyon and the tunnel--speaking no word, Drake'seyes fixed with bitter hatred upon Norhala, Ventnor brooding upon heralways with that enigmatic sympathy. We passed between the walls of thefurther cleft; stood for an instant at the brink of the green forest.
There came to us as though from immeasurable distances, a faint,sustained thrumming--like the beating of countless muffled drums. TheThing that carried us trembled--the sound died away. The Thing quieted;it began its steady, effortless striding through the crowding trees--butnow with none of that speed with which it had come, spurred forward byNorhala's awakened hate.
Ventnor stirred; broke the silence. And now I saw how wasted was hisbody, how sharpened his face; almost ethereal; purged not only bysuffering but by, it came to me, some strange knowledge.
"No use, Drake," he said dreamily. "All this is now on the knees of thegods. And whether those gods are humanity's or whether they are--Gods ofMetal--I do not know.
"But this I do know--only one way or another can the balance fall; andif it be one way, then you and we shall have Ruth back. And if it fallsthe other way--then there will be little need for us to care. For manwill be done!"
"Martin! What do you mean?"
"It is the crisis," he answered. "We can do nothing, Goodwin--nothing.Whatever is to be steps forth now from the womb of Destiny."
Again there came that distant rolling--louder, now. Again the Thingtrembled.
"The drums," whispered Ventnor. "The drums of destiny. What is it theyare heralding? A new birth of Earth and the passing of man? A new childto whom shall be given dominion--nay, to whom has been given dominion?Or is it--taps--for Them?"
The dr
umming died as I listened--fearfully. About us was only theswishing, the sighing of the falling trees beneath the tread of theThing. Motionless stood Norhala; and as motionless Ruth.
"Martin," I cried once more, a dreadful doubt upon me. "Martin--what doyou mean?"
"Whence did--They--come?" His voice was clear and calm, the eyes beneaththe red brand clear and quiet, too. "Whence did They come--these Thingsthat carry us? That strode like destroying angels over Cherkis'scity? Are they spawn of Earth--as we are? Or are they fosterchildren--changelings from another star?
"These creatures that when many still are one--that when one still aremany. Whence did They come? What are They?"
He looked down upon the cubes that held us; their hosts of tiny eyesshone up at him, enigmatically--as though they heard and understood.
"I do not forget," he said. "At least not all do I forget of what I sawduring that time when I seemed an atom outside space--as I told you,or think I told you, speaking with unthinkable effort through lips thatseemed eternities away from me, the atom, who strove to open them.
"There were three--visions, revelations--I know not what to call them.And though each seemed equally real, of two of them, only one, I think,can be true; and of the third--that may some time be true but surely isnot yet."
Through the air came a louder drum roll--in it something ominous,something sinister. It swelled to a crescendo; abruptly ceased. And nowI saw Norhala raise her head; listen.
"I saw a world, a vast world, Goodwin, marching stately through space.It was no globe--it was a world of many facets, of smooth and polishedplanes; a huge blue jewel world, dimly luminous; a crystal world cutout from Aether. A geometric thought of the Great Cause, of God, if youwill, made material. It was airless, waterless, sunless.
"I seemed to draw closer to it. And then I saw that over every facetpatterns were traced; gigantic symmetrical designs; mathematicalhieroglyphs. In them I read unthinkable calculations, formulas ofinterwoven universes, arithmetical progressions of armies of stars,pandects of the motions of the suns. In the patterns was an appallingharmony--as though all the laws from those which guide the atom to thosewhich direct the cosmos were there resolved into completeness--totalled.
"The faceted world was like a cosmic abacist, tallying as it marched theerrors of the infinite.
"The patterned symbols constantly changed form. I drew nearer--thesymbols were alive. They were, in untold numbers--These!"
He pointed to the Thing that bore us.
"I was swept back; looked again upon it from afar. And a fantasticnotion came to me--fantasy it was, of course, yet built I know arounda nucleus of strange truth. It was"--his tone was half whimsical,half apologetic--"it was that this jeweled world was ridden by somemathematical god, driving it through space, noting occasionally withamused tolerance the very bad arithmetic of another Deity the reverseof mathematical--a more or less haphazard Deity, the god, in fact, of usand the things we call living.
"It had no mission; it wasn't at all out to do any reforming; it wasn'tin the least concerned in rectifying any of the inaccuracies of theOther. Only now and then it took note of the deplorable differencesbetween the worlds it saw and its own impeccably ordered and tidy templewith its equally tidy servitors.
"Just an itinerant demiurge of supergeometry riding along through spaceon its perfectly summed-up world; master of all celestial mechanics;its people independent of all that complex chemistry and labor forequilibrium by which we live; needing neither air nor water, heedingneither heat nor cold; fed with the magnetism of interstellar space andstopping now and then to banquet off the energy of some great sun."
A thrill of amazement passed through me; fantasy all this might bebut--how, if so, had he gotten that last thought? He had not seen, aswe had, the orgy in the Hall of the Cones, the prodigious feeding of theMetal Monster upon our sun.
"That passed," he went on, unnoticing. "I saw vast caverns filled withthe Things; working, growing, multiplying. In caverns of our Earth--thefruit of some unguessed womb? I do not know.
"But in those caverns, under countless orbs of many coloredlights"--again the thrill of amaze shook me--"they grew. It came to methat they were reaching out toward sunlight and the open. They burstinto it--into yellow, glowing sunlight. Ours? I do not know. And thatpicture passed."
His voice deepened.
"There came a third vision. I saw our Earth--I knew, Goodwin,indisputably, unmistakably that it was our earth. But its rollinghills were leveled, its mountains were ground and shaped into cold andpolished symbols--geometric, fashioned.
"The seas were fettered, gleaming like immense jewels in patternedsettings of crystal shores. The very Polar ice was chiseled. On theordered plains were traced the hieroglyphs of the faceted world. And onall Earth, Goodwin, there was no green life, no city, no trace of man.On this Earth that had been ours were only--These.
"Visioning!" he said. "Don't think that I accept them in their entirety.Part truth, part illusion--the groping mind dazzled with light ofunfamiliar truths and making pictures from half light and half shadow tohelp it understand.
"But still--SOME truth in them. How much I do not know. But this Ido know--that last vision was of a cataclysm whose beginnings we facenow--this very instant."
The picture flashed behind my own eyes--of the walled city, itsthronging people, its groves and gardens, its science and its art; ofthe Destroying Shapes trampling it flat--and then the dreadful, desolatemount.
And suddenly I saw that mount as Earth--the city as Earth's cities--itsgardens and groves as Earth's fields and forests--and the vanishedpeople of Cherkis seemed to expand into all humanity.
"But Martin," I stammered, fighting against choking, intolerable terror,"there was something else. Something of the Keeper of the Cones and ofour striking through the sun to destroy the Things--something of thembeing governed by the same laws that govern us and that if they brokethem they must fall. A hope--a PROMISE, that they would NOT conquer."
"I remember," he replied, "but not clearly. There WAS something--ashadow upon them, a menace. It was a shadow that seemed to be born ofour own world--some threatening spirit of earth hovering over them.
"I cannot remember; it eludes me. Yet it is because I remember but alittle of it that I say those drums may not be--taps--for us."
As though his words had been a cue, the sounds again burst forth--nolonger muffled nor faint. They roared; they seemed to pelt through airand drop upon us; they beat about our ears with thunderous tattoo likecovered caverns drummed upon by Titans with trunks of great trees.
The drumming did not die; it grew louder, more vehement; defiant anddeafening. Within the Thing under us a mighty pulse began to throb,accelerating rapidly to the rhythm of that clamorous roll.
I saw Norhala draw herself up, sharply; stand listening and alert. Underme, the throbbing turned to an uneasy churning, a ferment.
"Drums?" muttered Drake. "THEY'RE no drums. It's drum fire. It's like adozen Marnes, a dozen Verduns. But where could batteries like those comefrom?"
"Drums," whispered Ventnor. "They ARE drums. The drums of Destiny!"
Louder the roaring grew. Now it was a tremendous rhythmic cannonading.The Thing halted. The tower that upheld Ruth and Norhala swayed, bentover the gap between us, touched the top on which we rode.
Gently the two were plucked up; swiftly they were set beside us.
Came a shrill, keen wailing--louder than ever I had heard before. Therewas an earthquake trembling; a maelstrom swirling in which we spun; aswift sinking.
The Thing split in two. Up before us rose a stupendous, stepped pyramid;little smaller it was than that which Cheops built to throw its shadowsacross holy Nile. Into it streamed, over it clicked, score upon score ofcubes, building it higher and higher. It lurched forward--away from us.
From Norhala came a single cry--resonant, blaring like a wrathful,golden trumpet.
The speeding shape halted, hesitated; it seemed about to return. Crasheddown upon us an abrupt c
rescendo of the distant drumming; peremptory,commanding. The shape darted forward; raced away crushing to straw thetrees beneath it in a full quarter-mile-wide swath.
Great gray eyes wide, filled with incredulous wonder, stunned disbelief,Norhala for an instant faltered. Then out of her white throat, throughher red lips pelted a tempest of staccato buglings.
Under them what was left of the Thing leaped, tore on. Norhala's flaminghair crackled and streamed; about her body of milk and pearl--aboutRuth's creamy skin--a radiant nimbus began to glow.
In the distance I saw a sapphire spark; knew it for Norhala's home. Notfar from it now was the rushing pyramid--and it came to me that withinthat shape was strangely neither globe nor pyramid. Nor except forthe trembling cubes that made the platform on which we stood, did theshrunken Thing carrying us hold any unit of the Metal Monster except itsspheres and tetrahedrons--at least within its visible bulk.
The sapphire spark had grown to a glimmering azure marble. Steadily wegained upon the pyramid. Never for an instant ceased that scourging hailof notes from Norhala--never for an instant lessened the drumming clamorthat seemed to try to smother them.
The sapphire marble became a sapphire ball, a great globe. I saw theThing we sought to join lift itself into a prodigious pillar; thepillar's base thrust forth stilts; upon them the Thing stepped over theblue dome of Norhala's house.
The blue bubble was close; now it curved below us. Gently we were lifteddown; were set before its portal. I looked up at the bulk that hadcarried us.
I had been right--built it was only of globe and pyramid; aninconceivably grotesque shape, it hung over us.
Throughout the towering Shape was awful movement; its units writhedwithin it. Then it was lost to sight in the mists through which theThing we had pursued had gone.
In Norhala's face as she watched it go was a dismay, a poignantuncertainty, that held in it something indescribably pitiful.
"I am afraid!" I heard her whisper.
She tightened her grasp upon dreaming Ruth; motioned us to go within.We passed, silently; behind us she came, followed by three of the greatglobes, by a pair of her tetrahedrons.
Beside a pile of the silken stuffs she halted. The girl's eyes dweltupon hers trustingly.
"I am afraid!" whispered Norhala again. "Afraid--for you!"
Tenderly she looked down upon her, the galaxies of stars in her eyessoft and tremulous.
"I am afraid, little sister," she whispered for the third time. "Not yetcan you go as I do--among the fires." She hesitated. "Rest here until Ireturn. I shall leave these to guard you and obey you."
She motioned to the five shapes. They ranged themselves about Ruth.Norhala kissed her upon both brown eyes.
"Sleep till I return," she murmured.
She swept from the chamber--with never a glance for us three. I heard alittle wailing chorus without, fast dying into silence.
Spheres and pyramids twinkled at us, guarding the silken pile whereonRuth lay asleep--like some enchanted princess.
Beat down upon the blue globe like hollow metal worlds, beaten andshrieking.
The drums of Destiny!
The drums of Doom!
Beating taps for the world of men?