A Voyage to Arcturus

by David Lindsay

  Chapter 21. MUSPEL

  The fog thickened so that the two suns wholly disappeared, and all grewas black as night. Nightspore could no longer see his companion. Thewater lapped gently against the side of the island raft.

  “You say the night is past,” said Nightspore. “But the night is stillhere. Am I dead, or alive?”

  “You are still in Crystalman’s world, but you belong to it no more. Weare approaching Muspel.”

  Nightspore felt a strong, silent throbbing of the air—a rhythmicalpulsation, in four-four time. “There is the drumming,” he exclaimed.

  “Do you understand it, or have you forgotten?”

  “I half understand it, but I’m all confused.”

  “It’s evident Crystalman has dug his claws into you pretty deeply,” saidKrag. “The sound comes from Muspel, but the rhythm is caused by itstravelling through Crystalman’s atmosphere. His nature is rhythm as heloves to call it—or dull, deadly repetition, as I name it.”

  “I remember,” said Nightspore, biting his nails in the dark.

  The throbbing became audible; it now sounded like a distant drum. Asmall patch of strange light in the far distance, straight ahead ofthem, began faintly to illuminate the floating island and the glassy seaaround it.

  “Do all men escape from that ghastly world, or only I, and a few likeme?” asked Nightspore.

  “If all escaped, I shouldn’t sweat, my friend... There’s hard work, andanguish, and the risk of total death, waiting for us yonder.”

  Nightspore’s heart sank. “Have I not yet finished, then?”

  “If you wish it. You have got through. But will you wish it?”

  The drumming grew loud and painful. The light resolved itself into atiny oblong of mysterious brightness in a huge wall of night. Krag’sgrim and rocklike features were revealed.

  “I can’t face rebirth,” said Nightspore. “The horror of death is nothingto it.”

  “You will choose.”

  “I can do nothing. Crystalman is too powerful. I barely escaped with myown soul.”

  “You are still stupid with Earth fumes, and see nothing straight,” saidKrag.

  Nightspore made no reply, but seemed to be trying to recall something.The water around them was so still, colourless, and transparent, thatthey scarcely seemed to be borne up by liquid matter at all. Maskull’scorpse had disappeared.

  The drumming was now like the clanging of iron. The oblong patch oflight grew much bigger; it burned, fierce and wild. The darkness above,below, and on either side of it, began to shape itself into thesemblance of a huge, black wall, without bounds.

  “Is that really a wall we are coming to?”

  “You will soon find out. What you see is Muspel, and that light is thegate you have to enter.”

  Nightspore’s heart beat wildly.

  “Shall I remember?” he muttered.

  “Yes, you’ll remember.”

  “Accompany me, Krag, or I shall be lost.”

  “There is nothing for me to do in there. I shall wait outside for you.”

  “You are returning to the struggle?” demanded Nightspore, gnawing hisfingertips.

  “Yes.”

  “I dare not.”

  The thunderous clangor of the rhythmical beats struck on his head likeactual blows. The light glared so vividly that he was no longer able tolook at it. It had the startling irregularity of continuous lightning,but it possessed this further peculiarity—that it seemed somehow to giveout not actual light, but emotion, seen as light. They continued toapproach the wall of darkness, straight toward the door. The glasslikewater flowed right against it, its surface reaching up almost to thethreshold.

  They could not speak any more; the noise was too deafening.

  In a few minutes they were before the gateway. Nightspore turned hisback and hid his eyes in his two hands, but even then he was blinded bythe light. So passionate were his feelings that his body seemed toenlarge itself. At every frightful beat of sound, he quivered violently.

  The entrance was doorless. Krag jumped onto the rocky platform andpulled Nightspore after him.

  Once through the gateway, the light vanished. The rhythmical sound—blowstotally ceased. Nightspore dropped his hands.... All was dark and quietas an opened tomb. But the air was filled with grim, burning passion,which was to light and sound what light itself is to opaque colour.

  Nightspore pressed his hand to his heart. “I don’t know if I can endureit,” he said, looking toward Krag. He felt his person far more vividlyand distinctly than if he had been able to see him.

  “Go in, and lose no time, Nightspore.... Time here is more precious thanon earth. We can’t squander the minutes. There are terrible and tragicaffairs to attend to, which won’t wait for us... Go in at once. Stop fornothing.”

  “Where shall I go to?” muttered Nightspore. “I have forgotteneverything.”

  “Enter, enter! There is only one way. You can’t mistake it.”

  “Why do you bid me go in, if I am to come out again?”

  “To have your wounds healed.”

  Almost before the words had left his mouth, Krag sprang back on to theisland raft. Nightspore involuntarily started after him, but at oncerecovered himself and remained standing where he was. Krag wascompletely invisible; everything outside was black night.

  The moment he had gone, a feeling shot up in Nightspore’s heart like athousand trumpets.

  *****

  Straight in front of him, almost at his feet, was the lower end of asteep, narrow, circular flight of stone steps. There was no other wayforward.

  He put his foot on the bottom stair, at the same time peering aloft. Hesaw nothing, yet as he proceeded upward every inch of the way wasperceptible to his inner feelings. The staircase was cold, dismal, anddeserted, but it seemed to him, in his exaltation of soul, like a ladderto heaven.

  After he had mounted a dozen steps or so, he paused to take breath. Eachstep was increasingly difficult to ascend; he felt as though he werecarrying a heavy man on his shoulders. It struck a familiar chord in hismind. He went on and, ten stairs higher up, came to a window set in ahigh embrasure.

  On to this he clambered, and looked through. The window was of a sort ofglass, but he could see nothing. Coming to him, however, from the worldoutside, a disturbance of the atmosphere struck his senses, causing hisblood to run cold. At one moment it resembled a low, mocking, vulgarlaugh, travelling from the ends of the earth; at the next it was like arhythmical vibration of the air—the silent, continuous throbbing of somemighty engine. The two sensations were identical, yet different. Theyseemed to be related in the same manner as soul and body. After feelingthem for a long time, Nightspore got down from the embrasure, andcontinued his ascent, having meanwhile grown very serious.

  The climbing became still more laborious, and he was forced to stop atevery third or fourth step, to rest his muscles and regain breath. Whenhe had mounted another twenty stairs in this way, he came to a secondwindow. Again he saw nothing. The laughing disturbance of the air, too,had ceased; but the atmospheric throb was now twice as distinct asbefore, and its rhythm had become _double_. There were two separatepulses; one was in the time of a march, the other in the time of awaltz. The first was bitter and petrifying to feel, but the second wasgay, enervating, and horrible.

  Nightspore spent little time at that window, for he felt that he was onthe eve of a great discovery, and that something far more importantawaited him higher up. He proceeded aloft. The ascent grew more and moreexhausting, so much so that he had frequently to sit down, utterlycrushed by his own dead weight. Still, he got to the third window.

  He climbed into the embrasure. His feelings translated themselves intovision, and he saw a sight that caused him to turn pale. A gigantic,self-luminous sphere was hanging in the sky, occupying nearly the wholeof it. This sphere was composed entirely of two kinds of active beings.There were a myriad of tiny green corpuscles, varying in size from thevery small to the almost indiscernible. They we
re not green, but hesomehow saw them so. They were all striving in one direction—towardhimself, toward Muspel, but were too feeble and miniature to make anyheadway. Their action produced the marching rhythm he had previouslyfelt, but this rhythm was not intrinsic in the corpuscles themselves,but was a consequence of the obstruction they met with. And, surroundingthese atoms of life and light, were far larger whirls of white lightthat gyrated hither and thither, carrying the green corpuscles with themwherever they desired. Their whirling motion was accompanied by thewaltzing rhythm. It seemed to Nightspore that the green atoms were notonly being danced about against their will but were sufferingexcruciating shame and degradation in consequence. The larger ones weresteadier than the extremely small, a few were even almost stationary,and one was advancing in the direction it wished to go.

  He turned his back to the window, buried his face in his hands, andsearched in the dim recesses of his memory for an explanation of what hehad just seen. Nothing came straight, but horror and wrath began to takepossession of him.

  On his way upward to the next window, invisible fingers seemed to him tobe squeezing his heart and twisting it about here and there; but henever dreamed of turning back. His mood was so grim that he did not oncepermit himself to pause. Such was his physical distress by the time thathe had clambered into the recess, that for several minutes he could seenothing at all—the world seemed to be spinning round him rapidly.

  When at last he looked, he saw the same sphere as before, but now allwas changed on it. It was a world of rocks, minerals, water, plants,animals, and men. He saw the whole world at one view, yet everything wasso magnified that he could distinguish the smallest details of life. Inthe interior of every individual, of every aggregate of individuals, ofevery chemical atom, he clearly perceived the presence of the greencorpuscles. But, according to the degree of dignity of the life form,they were fragmentary or comparatively large. In the crystal, forexample, the green, imprisoned life was so minute as to be scarcelyvisible; in some men it was hardly bigger; but in other men and women itwas twenty or a hundred times greater. But, great or small, it played animportant part in every individual. It appeared as if the whirls ofwhite light, which were the individuals, and plainly showed themselvesbeneath the enveloping bodies, were delighted with existence and wishedonly to enjoy it, but the green corpuscles were in a condition ofeternal discontent, yet, blind and not knowing which way to turn forliberation, kept changing form, as though breaking a new path, by way ofexperiment. Whenever the old grotesque became metamorphosed into the newgrotesque, it was in every case the direct work of the green atoms,trying to escape toward Muspel, but encountering immediate opposition.These subdivided sparks of living, fiery spirit were hopelesslyimprisoned in a ghastly mush of soft pleasure. They were beingeffeminated and corrupted—that is to say, absorbed in the foul, sicklyenveloping forms.

  Nightspore felt a sickening shame in his soul as he looked on at thatspectacle. His exaltation had long since vanished. He bit his nails, andunderstood why Krag was waiting for him below.

  He mounted slowly to the fifth window. The pressure of air against himwas as strong as a full gale, divested of violence and irregularity, sothat he was not for an instant suffered to relax his efforts.Nevertheless, not a breath stirred.

  Looking through the window, he was startled by a new sight. The spherewas still there, but between it and the Muspel-world in which he wasstanding he perceived a dim, vast shadow, without any distinguishableshape, but somehow throwing out a scent of disgusting sweetness.Nightspore knew that it was Crystalman. A flood of fierce light—but itwas not light, but passion—was streaming all the time from Muspel to theShadow, and through it. When, however, it emerged on the other side,which was the sphere, the light was altered in character. It becamesplit, as by a prism, into the two forms of life which he had previouslyseen—the green corpuscles and the whirls. What had been fiery spirit buta moment ago was now a disgusting mass of crawling, wrigglingindividuals, each whirl of pleasure-seeking will having, as nucleus, afragmentary spark of living green fire. Nightspore recollected the backrays of Starkness, and it flashed across him with the certainty of truththat the green sparks were the back rays, and the whirls the forwardrays, of Muspel. The former were trying desperately to return to theirplace of origin, but were overpowered by the brute force of the latter,which wished only to remain where they were. The individual whirls werejostling and fighting with, and even devouring, each other. This createdpain, but, whatever pain they felt, it was always pleasure that theysought. Sometimes the green sparks were strong enough for a moment tomove a little way in the direction of Muspel; the whirls would thenaccept the movement, not only without demur, but with pride andpleasure, as if it were their own handiwork—but they never saw beyondthe Shadow, they thought that they were travelling toward it. Theinstant the direct movement wearied them, as contrary to their whirlingnature, they fell again to killing, dancing, and loving.

  Nightspore had a foreknowledge that the sixth window would prove to bethe last. Nothing would have kept him from ascending to it, for heguessed that the nature of Crystalman himself would there becomemanifest. Every step upward was like a bloody life-and-death struggle.The stairs nailed him to the ground; the air pressure caused blood togush from his nose and ears; his head clanged like an iron bell. When hehad fought his way up a dozen steps, he found himself suddenly at thetop; the staircase terminated in a small, bare chamber of cold stone,possessing a single window. On the other side of the apartment anothershort flight of stairs mounted through a trap, apparently to the roof ofthe building. Before ascending these stairs, Nightspore hastened to thewindow and stared out.

  The shadow form of Crystalman had drawn much closer to him, and filledthe whole sky, but it was not a shadow of darkness, but a bright shadow.It had neither shape, nor colour, yet it in some way suggested thedelicate tints of early morning. It was so nebulous that the spherecould be clearly distinguished through it; in extension, however, it wasthick. The sweet smell emanating from it was strong, loathsome, andterrible; it seemed to spring from a sort of loose, mocking slimeinexpressibly vulgar and ignorant.

  The spirit stream from Muspel flashed with complexity and variety. Itwas not below individuality, but above it. It was not the One, or theMany, but something else far beyond either. It approached Crystalman,and entered his body—if that bright mist could be called a body. Itpassed right through him, and the passage caused him the most exquisitepleasure. _The Muspel-stream was Crystalman’s food_. The stream emergedfrom the other side on to the sphere, in a double condition. Part of itreappeared intrinsically unaltered, but shivered into a millionfragments. These were the green corpuscles. In passing throughCrystalman they had escaped absorption by reason of their extrememinuteness. The other part of the stream had not escaped. Its fire hadbeen abstracted, its cement was withdrawn, and, after being fouled andsoftened by the horrible sweetness of the host, it broke intoindividuals, which were the whirls of living will.

  Nightspore shuddered. He comprehended at last how the whole world ofwill was doomed to eternal anguish in order that one Being might feeljoy.

  Presently he set foot on the final flight leading to the roof; for heremembered vaguely that now only that remained.

  Halfway up, he fainted—but when he recovered consciousness he persistedas though nothing had happened to him. As soon as his head was above thetrap, breathing the free air, he had the same physical sensation as aman stepping out of water. He pulled his body up, and stood expectantlyon the stone-floored roof, looking round for his first glimpse ofMuspel.

  There was nothing.

  He was standing upon the top of a tower, measuring not above fifteenfeet each way. Darkness was all around him. He sat down on the stoneparapet, with a sinking heart; a heavy foreboding possessed him.

  Suddenly, without seeing or hearing anything, he had the distinctimpression that the darkness around him, on all four sides, wasgrinning.... As soon as that happened, he understood that he was whollysurrounded by
Crystalman’s world, and that Muspel consisted of himselfand the stone tower on which he was sitting.

  Fire flashed in his heart.... Millions upon millions of grotesque,vulgar, ridiculous, sweetened individuals—once Spirit—were calling outfrom their degradation and agony for salvation from Muspel.... To answerthat cry there was only himself... and Krag waiting below... andSurtur—But where was Surtur?

  The truth forced itself on him in all its cold, brutal reality. Muspelwas no all-powerful Universe, tolerating from pure indifference theexistence side by side with it of another false world, which had noright to be. Muspel was fighting for its life—against all that is mostshameful and frightful—against sin masquerading as eternal beauty,against baseness masquerading as Nature, against the Devil masqueradingas God....

  Now he understood everything. The moral combat was no mock one, noValhalla, where warriors are cut to pieces by day and feast by night;but a grim death struggle in which what is worse than death—namely,spiritual death—inevitably awaited the vanquished of Muspel.... By whatmeans could he hold back from this horrible war!

  During those moments of anguish, all thoughts of Self—the corruption ofhis life on Earth—were scorched out of Nightspore’s soul, perhaps notfor the first time.

  After sitting a long time, he prepared to descend. Without warning, astrange, wailing cry swept over the face of the world. Starting in awfulmystery, it ended with such a note of low and sordid mockery that hecould not doubt for a moment whence it originated. It was the voice ofCrystalman.

  *****

  Krag was waiting for him on the island raft. He threw astern glance at Nightspore.

  “Have you seen everything?”

  “The struggle is hopeless,” muttered Nightspore.

  “Did I not say I am the stronger?”

  “You may be the stronger, but he is the mightier.”

  “I am the stronger and the mightier. Crystalman’s Empire is but a shadowon the face of Muspel. But nothing will be done without the bloodiestblows.... What do you mean to do?”

  Nightspore looked at him strangely. “Are you not Surtur, Krag?”

  “Yes.”

  “Yes,” said Nightspore in a slow voice, without surprise. “But what isyour name on Earth?”

  “It is pain.”

  “That, too, I must have known.”

  He was silent for a few minutes; then he stepped quietly onto the raft.Krag pushed off, and they proceeded into the darkness.