Looking back, if our God were to make us feel this way, then called it Hell, we would be a race of loyal Christians, Muslims, Jews – whatever He chose, and we would serve Him without question.
It worked for me. I would do whatever it took to not feel that way again.
I do not enjoy My will being questioned.
No, Lord.
You will live your life, apply yourself, grow and do well.
I will, I promise.
You will fulfill your destiny – it is inevitable. You are the One.
I couldn’t think of anything to say, so I said nothing. I can’t describe the fear I felt. Even though I couldn’t feel a scrap of the pain I had been subjected to, the memory of it grew like a shadow across my mind. Knowing that I could be made to feel that way again I would have killed myself if I could have.
I will deliver you – but one last thing: tell no one your name.
My name? So, I should make up a name?
Even that is dangerous. Change names – a name is power, knowing it is power over you. Let no one have power over you for long. That is for Me. Take common names that will identify others besides you.
I will, I promise.
Be gone, then.
A blinding light washed over me. My eyes felt the pain, but nothing compared to that one brief moment. I think it was Nietchze who said, “What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.” I welcomed this new pain because it proved in my mind that something could hurt less than that one experience.
I would like to say I woke up, but I hadn’t slept. I simply had my body again and could feel it. I lay on my back, sand in my hair, dampness seeping up through my clothes from the ground. I felt something hard in my hand, like a small can with knobs. I opened my eyes up to a blue, blue sky and a few white clouds. I smelled salt water. I looked to my left, my scalp grinding on the sand, and saw stark, gray mountains, then to my right, and saw a wide lake. It must be salt water, I thought. I looked at my right hand and saw what it held: a long, polished sword, double-edged, glistening and new, its handle wrapped in braided leather. The blade was about four feet long. I stood in one motion, my legs wobbly, and hefted it.
It felt right somehow – like it belonged in my hand.
I hadn’t learned to be a “swordsman.” In fact, the closest I had ever come was sparring on the mock battlefields of a Renaissance Fair. I had shown some talent at that – although I never became a “knight” or anything similar, I had stood toe to toe with some of their better fighters, and once in a while beat them.
If swords were the weapons of choice here, though, I had to assume that I would be meeting people who used them for a living, and who were a lot better with them than I. If I wanted to be safe here I would need to train.
I knew as well that this would take money. I took stock of my possessions. I wore what must be a homespun shirt, made of a cotton-like fiber, off-white, only two seams in it, running under the arms and down the sides. My head came up through a bunched collar; just a hole cut and stitched once the shirt had been made. The pants I wore were brown leather, thick, already pinching my skin. I wore what looked like thick, black motorcycle boots, including the chain across the instep.
I found a thin leather pouch on my belt and, inside, some kind of wafers wrapped in broad, green leaves. I didn’t feel hungry so I didn’t taste them – no point in starting off by wasting food. I didn’t have a single coin or anything that looked like a coin or anything valuable on me. Food wouldn’t be a coin of the realm. Societies wanted to trade in tough, physical objects, like livestock or precious metals or such. You wouldn’t want to go from rich to poor because the weather changed and your food rotted – unless you were a farmer.
I saw no grass, no village, nothing to eat. Far to the north there seemed to be a wide plain on the horizon, but no road and nothing to indicate that there were people there. The sun was directly overhead, not that it mattered. I had no idea if civilization, should there even be one, lay to the north, south, east or west. In fact, I might be the only one here – Adam looking for his Eve.
Unlikely. Why would I need a sword? Swords are made for killing other people and are inefficient for hunting. I looked at it again and touched the blade with my thumb, nicking it immediately. Wow, sharp – a tough edge.
I had been told to seek my destiny – I didn’t know how aggressive my God would be with me now, but I didn’t want to test Him. I tucked the pouch in my belt and started walking along the lake right then and, as an afterthought, began to jog. My leather pants seated themselves comfortably to my form and my boots creaked. The sword grew heavy quickly, and I had no sheath to carry it. I tried resting the blade in my free hand and cut the heel of my palm. I walked and ran alternately for hours, winding myself as I tried to adjust my running. The sun crossed the sky to my left behind me. Because it felt warm and these were mountains, I assumed that this season was summer and from the direction of the sun I was moving south.
When it began getting dark I stopped and looked for a place to sleep. There were no trees or bushes – the salt water would kill any plants near it. The mountains were about an hour from me to the east. I saw no point in getting sidetracked going there.
The plains were no longer visible to the north. Maybe that would have been the right way to go. I’d be more likely to find game there, though predators knew that too. I shook my head as I prepared myself to sleep out in the open with no protection from the elements. This would be acceptable right now until my new God decided to send some Providence my way.
I lay on my back, looking up at the foreign stars as the sky darkened. So many! I used to love the nights at sea, away from the lights and smells and noise of cities. I would sneak out onto my cruiser’s flight deck after ‘lights out’ and lay on my back, feeling the rough non-skid that coated the steel deck on my shoulders. At first I would see nothing as my eyes adjusted, just feel the ship rocking on the ocean beneath me. After a few minutes I would see all the stars, all of the millions of tiny dots of light, a wash of white across the sky. Then the constellations really looked like constellations. City lights blot out ninety percent of them for miles. Only deep in the mountains or at sea now can you see them.
Then, like now, I would feel alone, one being adrift like a leaf on a pond, not going anywhere, accomplishing nothing. Life in Naval nuclear power came like an imperative – we always had more work to do, things to get done, or another project. I felt some of that now, this destiny of which I knew nothing. Apply myself, but to what?
I felt so thirsty! I would try the water in the morning if it didn’t rain, though rain came with its own problems. For primitive man, a cold could kill if fever set in. At 22 I could be middle-aged, pushing old. I wondered at what useful skills I had. I could make rough furniture, doubtless there were many better. I could fight – I had a sword – but, again, there must be many better. Somehow I doubted they would need a mechanic, much less a nuclear reactor mechanic. My construction experience might be useful.
Who knows, maybe they needed a famous architect?
I thought these thoughts as I fell into a dreamless sleep. I would have thought that my dreams would be disturbed by so many traumas, but I had exhausted myself and fell right asleep. I awoke famished, a mouth full of grit, sand in my clothes where I had tossed and turned all night, still clutching the sword which, somehow, had not cut me while I slept. I stood and resisted rubbing my eyes, knowing that my hands must be dirtier than they felt. I looked around and saw mostly what I had seen when I had fallen asleep. A light fog hung around me, and the air felt chilly.
Oh, for the love of god, I had no coffee! I had always been a three-cup-in-the-morning, two-during-the-day and a-couple-cans-of-soda caffeine junkie with no desire to change. I dreaded the caffeine deprivation headache that I knew would be coming.
I went to the lake and stuck my fingers into it. It felt warm. I rubbed my hands together and felt no foreign objects in it. I couldn’t see any fish, nothing living in it. If it
was foul, it could make me sick, even kill me. It made no sense that there would be absolutely nothing living in it. Yet why would my God leave me to die on my first day? Without water I wouldn’t last until nightfall.
I touched the water to my lips and the end of my tongue. I tried to taste an acid, or a salt, or a sting or bitterness. It surprised me that it tasted salty, but not terribly so. It reminded me, on tasting it again, of tears.
Yes, I thought. Tears. The water tasted like tears. I drank again and, though I felt thirsty, I didn’t want any more. Drinking what tasted like tears made for a sickening experience.
I ate one of the wafers instead. It refreshed me and I felt neither hungry nor thirsty. I smiled. Maybe my God had not forsaken me after all! I immediately shied from the thought and waited a breathless second for that pain to return. It didn’t and I sighed, almost embarrassed to have felt this way, though at the same time, grateful.
I stretched and tried to work some of the kinks out of my back. I considered bathing in the lake and reconsidered immediately. It would be better to stay dirty, at least for now. I picked up the sword and swung it experimentally in a figure eight. It felt very natural, like an extension of my arm. Again I marveled at the balance. It made a whirring sound in the air that felt reassuring, telling me that the blade was true.
The nickering in the air behind me took me by surprise. I turned to see a huge white stallion watching me. It wore no saddle or bridle and its mane and hooves were long. It must be wild, I thought. It came alone, no herd of mares near, which made it a rogue, either driven off by an even larger stallion or separated from its herd by predators. I had a hard time imagining a larger stallion; the brute stood at the height of a Clydesdale, but had a body more like an Arabian, noble and strong, a cheek like a saucer and a nose like teacup. He watched me, pawing the sand, unafraid.
If I could tame him I would make better time. I had never broken a horse in my life, however. He didn’t look like he would give up easily.
I had no rope, and I didn’t see myself running him down or trapping him against anything. Even if I did, one huge hoof would likely brain me. Because I had nothing else, I took out one of my wafers and held it in my hand toward him. I could see him trying to smell it. He took a cautious step toward me but when I leaned forward he shied, stepping back several more feet.
“So you are hungry,” I said to him. He pricked up his ears. I spoke more to him, saying nonsense things, letting him hear my voice. Even though he didn’t run he drew no closer.
I sighed. “Well, big man, I can’t stay all day. If you are hungry you will come around, and if not, there is nothing I can do to catch you.” With that I turned my back on him and started walking.
I walked about three hundred yards before I heard his hooves on the ground behind me. I turned and saw him several yards back, his ears pinned back, telling me to come no closer. I continued walking and he kept following. For the rest of the morning we played this game, me talking to him, him trying to figure out how to get the wafer. I watched him try to get a drink of water but he shied from the lake after barely dipping his lips and shook his mane with no less distaste than I had.
“Fit for neither man nor beast, hmmm?” I asked him. He nickered angrily. I could see he felt thirsty. I had started to feel the same, and took a bite of the wafer. This got his immediate attention. He came almost close enough for me to touch him then, craning his neck to the wafer, but he still didn’t trust me.
On a whim I backed away from him. He arched his proud neck and stepped up after me. I retreated further and he pressed me. I backpedaled now; sword in one hand, wafer in the other, retreating as quickly as I could. I had him almost trotting when I turned and ran as fast as I could, the giant, white stallion beside me. We ran together side by side, the wafer half-forgotten, just running.
I put my hand tentatively on his shoulder. His skin flickered and he watched me from his left eye, but he kept running. I already felt winded, the sword putting me off balance and making it hard to run, but I had made my point. Finally, before I left myself so winded that I would have to sit down, I slowed to a walk. It worked; he slowed with me. I fed him the wafer, fingers back and palm open, then dropped the sword so I could stroke his mane as he ate. He had a fine, powerful neck and a huge muscled barrel; he would have to have a saddle specially made to fit him. That is, unless stallions were normally this size on this world.
I continued to rub his neck and shoulders, or whithers, scratching him behind his ears and at the base of his neck as he watched me. He had long since finished eating, so I assumed that he must be waiting to see if there was more. When he stomped his front hoof, making me believe that he had finished with me, I held out the leather pouch and let him smell it. He bit at it immediately and I had to pull it away before I lost it. Clever animal – he had almost robbed me of my food! I smiled as he pushed his nose after it, tucking it back into my belt, and ran again.
This time he ran right next to me, going for the food source. We ran farther this time. My hand on his shoulder let me lean for balance and got him used to my touch. I could run farther with him, when he could share some of my weight. We ran and walked as before, going much farther than I had the previous day. By the time dark came this time, I felt thoroughly winded and, from what I could tell, I hadn’t impressed him, not even left him lathered. I fed him another of the wafers. Seeing that I had about ten left, I also ate one. He licked the crumbs from my hand with a rough tongue. I knew to keep my fingers from his teeth, having read once of a woman who had lost all of her fingers that way to a Clydesdale.
I took off my shirt and rubbed him with it, which he seemed to enjoy. I then dipped the shirt in the lake to get the horsehair out and left it out to dry. I immediately noticed that he wouldn’t go near it and hoped that the smell of the lake would be out of it by morning. Though I didn’t think it would hurt me to walk or run with no shirt (the day felt warm) I didn’t want to have to abandon it completely.
I sat and the stallion nosed me, wanting me to keep scratching him. I did, talking softly to him. He behaved too friendly for an entirely wild horse, and yet I saw no evidence of him ever having worn a saddle or felt a bit. He could just be hungry or lonely. My knowledge of horses came from shoveling out their stalls for two dollars an hour at age fourteen. That meant I knew how to keep them and I knew a few of the breeds. Likely that had nothing to do with those of this planet. As darkness fell and he stood out as a glimmering, white monster against the starlight, I wondered if he would be there in the morning. I really didn’t dare hobble or picket him, not that I had anything to do that with, anyway. Stretching out on my back, the sand digging into my shoulders, I watched him standing still as a statue over me.
I awoke after another dreamless sleep and found him still there. He had also relieved me of both my store of wafers and a good portion of the bag they were in. I swore to myself but I didn’t want to explode at the stallion. All that would accomplish would be to scare him off, and now I had no leverage on him.
I stood and he sniffed me and rubbed on me from top to bottom. His coat quivered with energy as I scratched his ears and the back of his jowls.
He had screwed me now, of course. I didn’t think he would let me ride him yet, though I would have to try. If he threw me and bolted I would be dead if I didn’t find food or water in about two days, and from the look of the terrain, people were nowhere near here. I held his head and looked into his brown eyes.
“Well, big man, you came into my life, and you were my friend for a few hours, and you robbed me,” I told him. He looked at me and batted his eyelashes. “Now, are you still going to be my buddy, and let me sit on your back long enough to go someplace where people are? And when we get there, are you going to turn people-shy and refuse to go further?”
He didn’t say anything, and on my third day in this strange place I half-expected him to. I continued to rub him down his neck and to his barrel, moving my hands to his shoulders. The top of my head ros
e even with the top of his withers, meaning that I couldn’t just leap onto his back from right next to him if I meant to hang on. I gently guided him to a natural low-point in the beach by the lake, where I could see over his back, and I took a breath. When he didn’t move away from me, I took a fist full of his mane and leaped up onto his back, kicking high to get a leg over him. I held him tight with my thighs, and curled the fingers of my left hand into his mane as I balanced the sword in my right.
He turned and looked at me. I saw his wide, right eye regard me with something between surprise and indignation, and I thought for a moment: “Oh, he is left brained. I think that means he is creative.” Then he took off.
No horse born on Earth ever galloped so fast. I clung for dear life, my thighs on his barrel with my knees bent, my fingers in his mane, my back as straight as I could keep it and my heels back against the softness of his stomach. I tried to balance the sword I had been forbidden to lose in one hand. I’d ridden bareback before (thank God, which one I don’t know) so I knew how to adjust my weight to the moving animal. The sword must have made me look like a charging knight or a complete idiot.
His muscles rippled like snakes under a bed sheet beneath me. The stallion’s power almost radiated from him. His hooves beat the sand like a drum. I wondered after several minutes of just trying to stay alive that he hadn’t tried to buck or roll on me. I had all I could do to keep my breathing adjusted so that I could catch gulps of the passing wind as he ran on.
It had to be over an hour later before he slowed even marginally, switching from an all-out gallop to a loping canter. Still he pounded on, following the shoreline. My legs were cramping from holding onto him, my groin and stomach aching, my fingers stiff on the sword and in his mane and losing their hold on both, my shoulders burning. Because I had no way to stop him I tried to tune it out, watching the terrain, looking for some change or indication of civilization, but I saw none.
Indomitus Est (The Fovean Chronicles) Page 4
