Paragaea

by Chris Roberson

  The Nagas agreed on one point, at least. They had, of course, heard of the existence of portals between Paragaea and the plane known as Earth—no culture of their great age could have avoided the knowledge—but they knew of no way to predict where and when such portals would occur

  Finally, Oshunmare called for silence. It was clear that none of those present had a sufficiently advanced conception to address Leena's questions. Their only option was to take her before the Aevum.

  “I was promised food and rest after all those damnable questions,” Balam rumbled as they climbed the steps to the upper reaches of the temple-city. “And now I have to go along and listen to you ask even more?”

  Leena did not answer, but continued to mount the deep steps to the summit.

  “I've not talked so much about the great god Thun since I was a cub taking my maturation examinations,” Balam said, “and perhaps not even then.”

  “I quite enjoyed the interview, actually,” Hieronymus said, smiling. “I confess that I'm scarcely qualified to speak to the religion of my own people, since while I was ostensibly raised in the Church of England, I only attended service a handful of times in my whole childhood. Instead, I spoke with Vasuki at length about Greek myths and legends, which I learned from my mother, who, if nominally a Dutch Protestant, would more likely have worshipped at the altar of Zeus, or at least of Homer, had she been able.”

  With Oshunmare guiding them, the three were led to a wide, open-air pavilion at the top of the temple-city, with stone pillars surmounted by carved representations of the sun, moon, planets, and stars.

  Seated cross-legged on a low, wide pillar at the center of the stone floor was an ancient snake man. The sun's last rays bore down from the west, and the snake man's head was tilted back, a look of quiet contentment on his alien features.

  “Here, please.” Oshunmare motioned the trio to sit, indicating the sandy ground at the base of the pillar.

  Leena, Hieronymus, and Balam sat in the sand at the feet of the Aevum. His mottled scales, once the brilliant green of the young snake men, had faded in hue until they were nearly gray, and they hung loose and flaking upon his slender frame. He drew a heavy breath through his double-slit nose, lids drawing shut over his enormous, yellow eyes, and then he began to speak.

  “I like to spend my days here in the uppermost pavilion of Patala,” the Aevum said, in a voice as ancient as the stone walls of the temple-city, “soaking in as much of the sun's life-giving rays as I am able in my final hours.” He prodded at the dry, sagging scales on his rib cage with an outstretched claw. “I will likely not live to molt again, but will return to the dust which birthed me, to rejoin the All until the cycle of creation turns again, and it is my time once more to be instantiated.” He turned his attention to the trio. “I am Sesha, the Aevum, leader of the Nagas.”

  “These outsiders,” Oshunmare explained, “having been fully interrogated by the interlocutors, have questions of their own which the assembled wisdom of Patala cannot address. It is hoped that the Aevum will have answers for their ears to hear.”

  “Repeat your questions,” the Aevum said, his huge eyes on the trio.

  Hieronymus and Balam turned towards Leena, and after taking a deep breath, she answered.

  “Like Hero, my companion”—Leena indicated Hieronymus with a wave of her hand—“I am originally from Earth, another world. I need to learn how to locate the gates that periodically open between the worlds, and further how to locate one that will return me to my own place and time.”

  The Aevum was silent for a span, his alien expression unreadable, and at length he slowly shook his head.

  “Our conception of the All allows for other worlds besides our own, and we have from time to time interrogated those who claimed to originate on worlds other than this, but our conception, I'm afraid, does not include the knowledge of how to move from one world to another.”

  Leena deflated visibly, a feeling of despair flooding the pit of her stomach. If this most ancient of cultures did not have the answers she sought, what hope was there?

  The Aevum, though, was not yet done speaking.

  “The wizard-kings of the citadel city of Atla, perhaps, might have had the answers you seek, had they not sealed themselves away behind an impenetrable barrier in the far, frigid south. Or the heresiarch of Pentexoire, who was whispered to hold all of nature's secrets, before vanishing centuries ago into the annals of history. There is another, though. Our legends tell of an ancient man, a human, who once every thousand years comes to the temple of the forgotten god in the dense jungle. A year later, a young man emerges, and goes off into the world. There are legends that this man is the forgotten god of the temple himself, who survived long past the death of his last worshipper. He makes his weary way around the whole circuit of lands, stopping once every millennium to be rejuvenated at the seat of his former glory. The man is said to wear a rare jewel around his neck that is the source of his knowledge and power. If one were to wrest this jewel from him at his weakest moment, one could force him to reveal his secrets, and to answer any question or riddle put to him.” The Aevum paused, and leaned forward on his perch, his gaze bearing down on Leena. “The time of this ancient man's return to the jungle is upon us, and if the legends are true, he can even now be found in the forgotten god's temple. If any on the face of this world has the answers you seek, it would be this man.”

  Leena, Hero, and Balam passed one night in the city of Patala, which was more than enough for Balam. With the morning's first light, they were back in the forests heading to the east, in the direction in which the Aevum had told them that they would find the temple of the forgotten god. They found themselves in much the same twilit world through which they'd passed in the stretches south of Patala, the canopy overhead blocking out the sun and sky.

  “The food and drink of the Nagas is not fit for a Sinaa to consume,” Balam insisted as they struggled through the undergrowth. “I do not know if humans of your variety can stomach such weak fare, but the more delicate, sophisticated palate of the jaguar men could not abide it for another meal.”

  “I was surprised,” Leena answered, “that beings descended from reptiles, themselves meat-eaters, would have evolved into strict vegetarians.”

  Hieronymus hacked at thick brambles with his saber. “The diet of the Nagas is one of culture, one inculcated by nurturing, not by nature. My interlocutor told me a bit about it, during our interview. The Nagas view every living creature as an embodiment of the All, seeing consciousness as the means through which the universe deigns to experience itself. To interfere with the experiential journeys of any consciousness, whether the elevated mind of a jaguar man”—he prodded Balam jokingly—“or the minor, flickering intellect of a hummingbird, is to offend the All itself.”

  “But they eat plants, yes?” Leena said. “Isn't it true that some hold that plants themselves have some level of mind? Don't they turn towards the sun's rays as it moves across the sky, suggesting some rudimentary level of awareness?”

  “I asked the Naga interlocutor Vasuki the same question myself,” Hieronymus said.

  “And what did he say?” Balam asked.

  “The interlocutor allowed that they might be giving some small offense to the All by consuming roots and tubers, but he responded by asking whether it wouldn't be a greater offense to allow the collective minds of the Nagas to be extinguished by failing to properly nourish their bodies?”

  Balam shrugged, and growled appreciatively. “Well, perhaps there's hope for them, yet.”

  A day into their journey from Patala to the hidden temple, the three travelers crouched around a flickering fire in a small clearing, sharing their meal and their thoughts.

  “So what question will you ask, Balam,” Hieronymus asked, “if this figure out of legends should prove real? What one answer do you cherish?”

  Balam scratched the underside of his leonine chin with a half-sheathed claw and rumbled thoughtfully.

  “I
suppose, if I could have any answer, I would want to know whether I will ever regain my throne, and again lead the nation of the Sinaa.” He paused, taking a leisurely bite of the piece of grilled meat skewered on his knife, checking the progress of the other portions sizzling on a spit above the flames. “Yes, that would be it, I think. And you?”

  Hieronymus chewed his lip in contemplation.

  “To be entirely honest, I don't know,” he said. “You've known me long enough to realize I have little curiosity at all. All I want from life is a comfortable bed; clean, dry clothes; a little coin in my pocket; and a bit of excitement from time to time. All that I can secure for myself without terrible difficulty without peeling back the secrets of the universe. Why should I meddle with perfection?”

  Leena snorted, and shook her head.

  “You never cease to amaze me, Bonaventure,” she said, a mocking smile on her lips.

  Hieronymus shrugged, and turned his attention back to the meat and the fire. Neither he nor Balam asked the cosmonaut what question she would ask.

  Silence fell over their little camp, and the night wore on.

  The trio passed the night, sleeping fitfully, and in the morning pressed on. They traveled throughout the day, swatting away flies the size of hummingbirds, and enormous spiders that depended from webs stretching several meters on a side. They passed skeletons picked clean, the molds and lichens of the forest floor reclaiming what was left of the bones. Though the trees here were not as high as those under which they'd passed before reaching Patala, they were even more closely packed together, and so the light at the forest floor was even darker than before, closer to midnight than twilight.

  At one point they encountered a group of apelike men, or menlike apes, who stood on the other side of a snaking river from them and hooted and jeered. But the hairy creatures had no means to cross the river, and the trio had no reason to do so, and so the encounter ended as it began, with the trio continuing on through the trackless jungle.

  That night they reached a small clearing and decided to stop for the night. They huddled around another campfire, but their journey through the thick undergrowth of the forest had tired them, and conversation was limited to the essentials: asking for food, for drink, for quiet. The closest they came to exchanging thoughts was when Balam expressed a longing for his home in the Western Jungles. There was something to the deeply forested Altrusian woods that unsettled him. Leena, having spent only a short while in either place, was forced to agree.

  They slept, the stars overhead just visible through the boughs of the trees, and dreamt uneasy dreams.

  They were off at dawn, and after a short while, found daylight. They had at last reached the edge of the deep forest, and though the undergrowth was still as thick as iron grating, the trees stood fractionally farther apart, so that more light reached the ground. In a few steps they passed from midnight, to twilight, to full daylight, the clear blue skies overhead tantalizingly close as they tore their way through the clinging vines and barbed branches. They continued on, trying to shake the funereal sense that had clung to them throughout the midnight woods.

  They reached the ruined temple by midmorning, hacking their way through the thick undergrowth with sword, knife, and claw. The ancient structure was almost completely obscured by the dense foliage, the stones of the walls stained a deep green by the centuries' accumulation of lichens and mosses growing on them. This was a temple without a name, dedicated to some forgotten god, raised by some forgotten race, to which no road, track, or path led.

  Over the archway into the temple was a statue representing a beast raised on its hind legs with its head thrown back, but time and the elements had erased any distinguishing characteristics. The three wayfarers rested in the hazy shadow of the statue, their backs against the cool, damp stones of the temple wall, catching their breath before venturing inwards.

  “What do you suppose it is, Balam?” Hieronymus asked, wiping his forehead with his sleeve and indicating the statue with a jerk of his head.

  The jaguar man rumbled contemplatively, deep in his chest, his amber eyes narrowed at the indistinct figure above them.

  “A tiger, I would think,” Balam answered, trying to smooth the matted fur of his shoulders and chest with his hands, his claws safely retracted.

  “Then you would think wrong,” Hieronymus said with a sly grin, “because it is obviously a horse.”

  “A horse?” the jaguar man replied, black lips curling back over saber-teeth in a wicked smile. “This jungle heat has gotten to you. You've lost all sense of reason.”

  “Budet!” Leena snapped in Russian, and then quickly translated into English. “Enough! We came here for answers, not to indulge your appetites for foolish games.”

  She turned to the arched entrance, which was skeined with creeping vines, and began hacking at the vegetation with her short sword. Within a few moments she'd carved an opening large enough to squeeze through. Then she tucked the sword back into her belt, drew her chrome-plated Makarov semiautomatic pistol from its nylon holster, and slipped through the curtain of severed vines into the cool darkness of the temple beyond.

  Hieronymus and Balam glanced at each other, shrugged, and followed her in, drawing unlit torches and flints from their packs as they went.

  Though outside it was broad daylight, inside the dank, cool interior of the temple it was dark as night. The three travelers carried torches, which sputtered and popped in the still air, and made their way through the labyrinthine corridors of the temple.

  The Aevum had mentioned that the legends spoke of perils, and of guardians in the temple of the forgotten god. After an hour of making slow progress through the temple passageways, sometimes reaching dead-ends or switchbacks, forced to retrace their steps and choose other branching paths, the trio had nearly decided that any such perils were the province of legends alone.

  When they first heard the skittering, like the sound of hundreds of claws striking stone, again and again, they realized they had been entirely too quick to dismiss the stuff of myths. Hieronymus drew his heavy cavalry saber from his belt, leaving his Mauser C96 pistol holstered at his hip. His torch held high in one hand, the saber at the ready in his other, he slowly advanced forward. Balam drew his knives from their sheaths on the leather harness crisscrossing his broad chest, while Leena tightened her grip on her chrome-plated Makarov.

  “Don't waste ammunition, little sister,” Hieronymus reminded her, motioning to the short sword in her belt. “Use the blade if possible.”

  Leena shook her head, her expression taut.

  “I'll use what seems appropriate,” she said, “and from the sounds of whatever's coming, I'd rather be in firing range than at arm's reach.”

  In the next instant, a sickly white wave surged around the bend in the passageway. Dozens, perhaps hundreds of strange creatures, all rushing towards the three wayfarers. A horde of lizard-rats, an unnatural amalgam, they were each about a foot long, with four limbs terminating in vicious claws. Their red eyes glinted evilly in the flickering torchlight, and their pale, hairless hides shimmered sickly like oil on water. Each had a wide mouth lined with double rows of serrated teeth, and a spiny ridge ran from the base of their triangular skulls to the tip of their whiplike tails.

  “Der’mo!” Leena swore, swinging the pistol up.

  “Wait,” Balam said, raising a hand to stop her.

  The jaguar man stepped forward, and held his torch out to Leena. The lizard-rats were almost upon them.

  “To train the royal children in the arts of defense, the warmasters of the Sinaa drop them into pits full of creatures like these,” Balam explained casually, taking a long, wicked knife in each hand, their blades pointed at the ground. “It's been a while since I had any real exercise.”

  Hieronymus gave a slight bow, and then stepped out of the way as the jaguar man rushed forward, roaring a blood-chilling war-cry, teeth bared. Balam threw himself into the midst of the creatures, laying about on all sides with h
is twin knives, meeting the seemingly endless waves as they came. In a rain of gore, the foul creatures began to pile at his feet, some twitching their last, some already lifeless, as the jaguar man dealt with their remaining brethren, a vicious smile curling his black lips.

  Once Balam had seen to the last of the lizard-rats, they came to a gallery of bronze statues made viridescent with age, easily a dozen of them. Each was of a warrior, each from a different culture or time period. They were tall, the shortest of them easily a foot taller than Balam, who himself towered over Leena. Some of the statues wielded swords, some spears, some war-axes, but all were armed.

  The three wayfarers had made it halfway through the gallery, their torchlights casting shifting shadows on the statues, when Leena drew up short.

  “Did you hear that?” she asked.

  Her two companions stopped in their tracks, their attention sharpened.

  “A kind of creaking?” Balam said, his ears twitching.

  “Yes,” Leena answered.

  “Then no,” Balam said unconvincingly. “I didn't hear a thing.”

  All around them, the statues began to move, slowly at first, and then with more speed and grace.

  “Brilliant!” Hieronymus said with a laugh. “Clockwork soldiers. This is going to be fun.” As he brought his saber to the en garde position, he glanced over at Leena. “Promise me, little sister, that the next time you two are inflicted by curiosity, I'm not to talk you out of it!”

  In the end, it was Hieronymus who dealt with the majority of the clockwork soldiers. He was much more adept at swordplay than Leena, and his saber was of a sufficient length to keep the animated statues at bay. Balam, with his claws and knives, was forced to get in too close in the melee, allowing one of the statues nearly to crush him between bronze arms at one stage.