The Wall of Darkness
Introduction
The opening sentence of “The Wall of Darkness” has been quoted recently in papers on cosmology, because some theoretical physicists now think it is literally true. The story (now reprinted in my collection The Other Side of the Sky) reflects a longstanding curiosity of mine about higher dimensions and the nature of space and time—although I’ve long since given up trying to follow modern developments in this field.
“The Wall of Darkness” is really based on two ideas. One: the Mobius strip, simple though it appears, contains more than meets the eye. Two: the universe is even stranger than we can possibly imagine (Haldane’s hypothesis).
Within a few hours of writing the above, I came across this passage in Sky and Telescope: “The laws of low-energy physics and even the dimensionality of space-time may be different in each of these mini-universes . . . the quantum field that gives birth to the Universe is not smooth on a microscopic scale, but instead resembles an inhomogeneous ‘chaotic’ space-time foam.” (“The Self-Reproducing Universe” by Eugene F. Mallove; September, 1988 pp. 253–56.)
See what I mean?
Many and strange are the universes that drift like bubbles in the foam upon the River of Time. Some—a very few—move against or athwart its current; and fewer still are those that lie forever beyond its reach, knowing nothing of the future or the past. Shervane’s tiny cosmos was not one of these: its strangeness was of a different order. It held one world only—the planet of Shervane’s race—and a single star, the great sun Trilorne that brought it life and light.
Shervane knew nothing of night, for Trilorne was always high above the horizon, dipping near it only in the long months of winter. Beyond the borders of the Shadow Land, it was true, there came a season when Trilorne disappeared below the edge of the world, and a darkness fell in which nothing could live. But even then the darkness was not absolute, though there were no stars to relieve it.
Alone in its little cosmos, turning the same face always toward its solitary sun, Shervane’s world was the last and the strangest jest of the Maker of the Stars.
Yet as he looked across his father’s lands, the thoughts that filled Shervane’s mind were those that any human child might have known. He felt awe, and curiosity, and a little fear, and above all a longing to go out into the great world before him. These things he was still too young to do, but the ancient house was on the highest ground for many miles and he could look far out over the land that would one day be his. When he turned to the north, with Trilorne shining full upon his face, he could see many miles away the long line of mountains that curved around to the right, rising higher and higher, until they disappeared behind him in the direction of the Shadow Land. One day, when he was older, he would go through those mountains along the pass that led to the great lands of the east.
On his left was the ocean, only a few miles away, and sometimes Shervane could hear the thunder of the waves as they fought and tumbled on the gently sloping sands. No one knew how far the ocean reached. Ships had set out across it, sailing northward while Trilorne rose higher and higher in the sky and the heat of its rays grew ever more intense. Long before the great sun had reached the zenith, they had been forced to return. If the mythical Fire Lands did indeed exist, no man could ever hope to reach their burning shores—unless the legends were really true. Once, it was said, there had been swift metal ships that could cross the ocean despite the heat of Trilorne, and so come to the land on the other side of the world. Now these countries could be reached only by a tedious journey over land and sea, which could be shortened no more than a little by traveling as far north as one dared.
All the inhabited countries of Shervane’s world lay in the narrow belt between burning heat and unsufferable cold. In every land, the far north was an unapproachable region smitten by the fury of Trilorne. And to the south of all countries lay the vast and gloomy Shadow Land, where Trilorne was never more than a pale disk on the horizon, and often was not visible at all.
These things Shervane learned in the years of his childhood, and in those years he had no wish to leave the wide lands between the mountains and the sea. Since the dawn of time his ancestors and the races before them had toiled to make these lands the fairest in the world; if they had failed, it was by a narrow margin. There were gardens bright with strange flowers, there were streams that trickled gently between moss-grown rocks to be lost in the pure waters of the tideless sea. There were fields of grain that rustled continually in the wind, as if the generations of seeds yet unborn were talking one to the other. In the wide meadows and beneath the trees the friendly cattle wandered aimlessly with foolish cries. And there was the great house, with its enormous rooms and its endless corridors, vast enough in reality but huger still to the mind of a child. This was the world he knew and loved. As yet, what lay beyond its borders had not concerned his mind.
But Shervane’s universe was not one of those free from the domination of time. The harvest ripened and was gathered into the granaries; Trilorne rocked slowly through its little arc of sky, and with the passing seasons Shervane’s mind and body grew. His land seemed smaller now: the mountains were nearer and the sea was only a brief walk from the great house. He began to learn of the world in which he lived, and to be made ready for the part he must play in its shaping.
Some of these things he learned from his father, Sherval, but most he was taught by Grayle, who had come across the mountains in the days of his father’s father, and had now been tutor to three generations of Shervane’s family. He was fond of Grayle, though the old man taught him many things he had no wish to learn, and the years of his boyhood passed pleasantly enough until the time came for him to go through the mountains into the lands beyond. Ages ago his family had come from the great countries of the east, and in every generation since, the eldest son had made that pilgrimage again to spend a year of his youth among his cousins. It was a wise custom, for beyond the mountains much of the knowledge of the past still lingered, and there one could meet men from other lands and study their ways.
In the last spring before his son’s departure, Sherval collected three of his servants and certain animals it is convenient to call horses, and took Shervane to see those parts of the land he had never visited before. They rode west to the sea, and followed it for many days, until Trilorne was noticeably nearer the horizon. Still they went south, their shadows lengthening before them, turning again to the east only when the rays of the sun seemed to have lost all their power. They were now well within the limits of the Shadow Land, and it would not be wise to go farther south until the summer was at its height.
Shervane was riding beside his father, watching the changing landscape with all the eager curiosity of a boy seeing a new country for the first time. His father was talking about the soil, describing the crops that could be grown here and those that would fail if the attempt were made. But Shervane’s attention was elsewhere: he was staring out across the desolate Shadow Land, wondering how far it stretched and what mysteries it held.
“Father,” he said presently, “if you went south in a straight line, right across the Shadow Land, would you reach the other side of the world?”
His father smiled.
“Men have asked that question for centuries,” he said, “but there are two reasons why they will never know the answer.”
“What are they?”
“The first, of course, is the darkness and the cold. Even here, nothing can live during the winter months. But there is a better reason, though I see that Grayle has not spoken of it.”
“I don’t think he has: at least, I do not remember.”
For a moment Sherval did not reply. He stood up in his stirrups and surveyed the land to the south.
“Once I knew this place well,” he said to Shervane. “Come—I have something to show you.”
They turned away from the path they had been following, and for several hours rode once more with their backs to the su
n. The land was rising slowly now, and Shervane saw that they were climbing a great ridge of rock that pointed like a dagger into the heart of the Shadow Land. They came presently to a hill too steep for the horses to ascend, and here they dismounted and left the animals in the servants’ charge.
“There is a way around,” said Sherval, “but it is quicker for us to climb than to take the horses to the other side.”
The hill, though steep, was only a small one, and they reached its summit in a few minutes. At first Shervane could see nothing he had not met before; there was only the same undulating wilderness, which seemed to become darker and more forbidding with every yard that its distance from Trilorne increased.
He turned to his father with some bewilderment, but Sherval pointed to the far south and drew a careful line along the horizon.
“It is not easy to see,” he said quietly. “My father showed it to me from this same spot, many years before you were born.”
Shervane stared into the dusk. The southern sky was so dark as to be almost black, and it came down to meet the edge of the world. But not quite, for along the horizon, in a great curve dividing land from sky yet seeming to belong to neither, was a band of deeper darkness, black as the night which Shervane had never known.
He looked at it steadfastly for a long time, and perhaps some hint of the future may have crept into his soul, for the darkling land seemed suddenly alive and waiting. When at last he tore his eyes away, he knew that nothing would ever be the same again, though he was still too young to recognize the challenge for what it was.
And so, for the first time in his life, Shervane saw the Wall.
In the early spring he said farewell to his people, and went with one servant over the mountains into the great lands of the eastern world. Here he met the men who shared his ancestry, and here he studied the history of his race, the arts that had grown from ancient times, and the sciences that ruled the lives of men. In the places of learning he made friends with boys who had come from lands even farther to the east: few of these was he likely to see again, but one was to play a greater part in his life than either could have imagined. Brayldon’s father was a famous architect, but his son intended to eclipse him. He was traveling from land to land, always learning, watching, asking questions. Though he was only a few years older than Shervane, his knowledge of the world was infinitely greater—or so it seemed to the younger boy.
Between them they took the world to pieces and rebuilt it according to their desires. Brayldon dreamed of cities whose great avenues and stately towers would shame even the wonders of the past, but Shervane’s interests lay more with the people who would dwell in those cities, and the way they ordered their lives.
They often spoke of the Wall, which Brayldon knew from the stories of his own people, though he himself had never seen it. Far to the south of every country, as Shervane had learned, it lay like a great barrier athwart the Shadow Land. In high summer it could be reached, though only with difficulty, but nowhere was there any way of passing it, and none knew what lay beyond. An entire world, never pausing even when it reached a hundred times the height of a man, it encircled the wintry sea that washed the shores of the Shadow Land. Travelers had stood upon those lonely beaches, scarcely warmed by the last thin rays of Trilorne, and had seen how the dark shadow of the Wall marched out to sea contemptuous of the waves beneath its feet. And on the far shores, other travelers had watched it come striding in across the ocean, to sweep past them on its journey round the world.
“One of my uncles,” said Brayldon, “once reached the Wall when he was a young man. He did it for a wager, and he rode for ten days before he came beneath it. I think it frightened him—it was so huge and cold. He could not tell whether it was made of metal or of stone, and when he shouted, there was no echo at all, but his voice died away quickly as if the Wall were swallowing the sound. My people believe it is the end of the world, and there is nothing beyond.”
“If that were true,” Shervane replied, with irrefutable logic, “the ocean would have poured over the edge before the Wall was built.”
“Not if Kyrone built it when He made the world.”
Shervane did not agree.
“My people believe it is the work of man—perhaps the engineers of the First Dynasty, who made so many wonderful things. If they really had ships that could reach the Fire Lands—and even ships that could fly—they might have possessed enough wisdom to build the Wall.”
Brayldon shrugged.
“They must have had a very good reason,” he said. “We can never know the answer, so why worry about it?”
This eminently practical advice, as Shervane had discovered, was all that the ordinary man ever gave him. Only philosophers were interested in unanswerable questions: to most people, the enigma of the Wall, like the problem of existence itself, was something that scarcely concerned their minds. And all the philosophers he had met had given him different answers.
First there had been Grayle, whom he had questioned on his return from the Shadow Land. The old man had looked at him quietly and said:
“There is only one thing behind the Wall, so I have heard. And that is madness.”
Then there had been Artex, who was so old that he could scarcely hear Shervane’s nervous questioning. He gazed at the boy through eyelids that seemed too tired to open fully, and had replied after a long time:
“Kyrone built the Wall in the third day of the making of the world. What is beyond, we shall discover when we die—for there go the souls of all the dead.”
Yet Irgan who lived in the same city, had flatly contradicted this.
“Only memory can answer your question, my son. For behind the Wall is the land in which we lived before our births.”
Whom could he believe? The truth was that no one knew: if the knowledge had ever been possessed, it had been lost ages since.
Though this quest was unsuccessful, Shervane had learned many things in his year of study. With the returning spring he said farewell to Brayldon and the other friends he had known for such a little while, and set out along the ancient road that led him back to his own country. Once again he made the perilous journey through the great pass between the mountains, where walls of ice hung threatening against the sky. He came to the place where the road curved down once more toward the world of men, where there was warmth and running water and the breath no longer labored in the freezing air. Here, on the last rise of the road before it descended into the valley, one could see far out across the land to the distant gleam of the ocean. And there, almost lost in the mist at the edge of the world, Shervane could see the line of shadow that was his own country.
He went on down the great ribbon of stone until he came to the bridge that men had built across the cataract in the ancient days when the only other way had been destroyed by earthquake. But the bridge was gone: the storms and avalanches of early spring had swept away one of the mighty piers, and the beautiful metal rainbow lay a twisted ruin in the spray and foam a thousand feet below. The summer would have come and gone before the road could be opened once more: as Shervane sadly returned he knew that another year must pass ere he would see his home again.
He paused for many minutes on the last curve of the road, looking back toward the unattainable land that held all the things he loved. But the mists had closed over it, and he saw it no more. Resolutely he turned back along the road until the open lands had vanished and the mountains enfolded him again.
Brayldon was still in the city when Shervane returned. He was surprised and pleased to see his friend, and together they discussed what should be done in the year ahead. Shervane’s cousins, who had grown fond of their guest, were not sorry to see him again, but their kindly suggestion that he should devote another year to study was not well received.
Shervane’s plan matured slowly, in the face of considerable opposition. Even Brayldon was not enthusiastic at first, and much argument was needed before he would co-operate. Thereafter, the agreement of ev
eryone else who mattered was only a question of time.
Summer was approaching when the two boys set out toward Brayldon’s country. They rode swiftly, for the journey was a long one and must be completed before Trilorne began its winter fall. When they reached the lands that Brayldon knew, they made certain inquiries which caused much shaking of heads. But the answers they obtained were accurate, and soon the Shadow Land was all around them, and presently for the second time in his life Shervane saw the Wall.
It seemed not far away when they first came upon it, rising from a bleak and lonely plain. Yet they rode endlessly across that plain before the Wall grew any nearer—and then they had almost reached its base before they realized how close they were, for there was no way of judging its distance until one could reach out and touch it.
When Shervane gazed up at the monstrous ebony sheet that had so troubled his mind, it seemed to be overhanging and about to crush him beneath its falling weight. With dificulty, he tore his eyes away from the hypnotic sight, and went nearer to examine the material of which the Wall was built.
It was true, as Brayldon had told him, that it felt cold to the touch—colder than it had any right to be even in this sun-starved land. It felt neither hard nor soft, for its texture eluded the hand in a way that was difficult to analyze. Shervane had the impression that something was preventing him from actual contact with the surface, yet he could see no space between the Wall and his fingers when he forced them against it. Strangest of all was the uncanny silence of which Brayldon’s uncle had spoken: every word was deadened and all sounds died away with unnatural swiftness.
Brayldon had unloaded some tools and instruments from the pack horses, and had begun to examine the Wall’s surface. He found very quickly that no drills or cutters would mark it in any way, and presently he came to the conclusion Shervane had already reached. The Wall was not merely adamant: it was unapproachable.