The Halfling and Other Stories

by Leigh Brackett

  He turned his head to snarl at her. And he realized then that the Numi was very still in his arms, that there was no slightest movement between his straining thighs.

  “Let him go, Fenn. He’s dead. He’s been dead for minutes. Oh Fenn, wake up and let him go!”

  Very slowly, Fenn relaxed. The body of the Numi slipped heavily away from him. He watched it. After awhile he tried to rise. His muscles were palsied with tremors like the muscles of an old man. Dark streams of blood ran from his tom wrists and down his thighs and his bones ached.

  Arika helped him. She looked at him now with a kind of awe, mingled with something else that he was too tired to read. Doubt, perhaps, or even fear—a shrewd calculating something he did not like. It occurred to him to wonder again why she was so bent on his escape from the Numi.

  The dead priest wore a gown of fine white linen under his robe. Working very swiftly Arika ripped it and gave the worst of Fenn’s wounds a hasty binding.

  “You’d leave a trail a blind man could follow,” she explained. “Now come!”

  She led him out of the tomb into the glare of the sullen copper Sun that never moved. A strong wind blew. It smelled of heat and dust and the edges of the world were veiled in crimson.

  High above him Fenn could see the half-monolithic temple crowning the cliff. It looked an evil place to be prisoned in. Why had the Numi had him there? What did they want with him?

  What did Arika want with him? He was glad to be free of the temple.

  He stumbled after Arika down a slope clothed in tall trees that thrashed in the wind. The tomb of the kings was built on a ledge of the cliff itself and almost beneath it the city began. It must still be night for no one was stirring in the streets.

  Again that word “night” evoked a sense of wrongness and Fenn glanced at the burning sky and shook his head.

  Halfway down the slope Arika stopped and brought forth from its hiding place in a thicket a bundle of cloth. “Here,” she said, “wrap this around you. Over your head, Fenn! Keep your face hidden.”

  He struggled clumsily with the garment—a large shapeless length of cotton much smeared with dust and grey ash. Arika draped her own around her and helped him impatiently with his.

  “What are these?” he asked her.

  “Mourners’ cloaks. Since humans are allowed to visit their burying grounds only at night no one will pay any attention to us if we’re seen in the streets.” She added wryly, “There are always mourners!”

  “But why only at night?”

  “Would you have them go by day and waste the time they should be working? The Numi don’t keep humans just for pets!” She led off down the slope again, going almost at a run. Fenn could not keep up with her. A number of times she came back to him and urged him on, snapping at him, cursing him in an agony of worry. Now and again she glanced upward at the temple and as the angle changed Fenn could see the cause of her apprehension—a great gong as tall as several men, glinting dully in the sunlight upon the temple roof.

  They entered the city, slowing their pace to a walk. These were the mean quarters, the vast huddle of huts that girdled the magnificence of the palace and the opulent dwellings of the Numi like a muddy sea. Here were refuse and filth and the scuttering feet of rats. Here were twisting lanes and the ancient smells of humanity crowded and unwashed. Fenn snorted in disgust and Arika shot him a smoldering glance from under her ash-smeared hood.

  “The air was cleaner in the cell, Fenn, but you’ll live to breathe this longer!”

  They did not speak again. The crumbling mud-brick houses slept under the dusty wind, their windows covered with bits of cloth or hide. Here and there a child cried and an occasional cur-dog barked. They did not pass anyone in the bewildering tangle of lanes and if anyone saw them there was no sign of it. Arika’s face was drawn and anxious and Fenn knew that she held herself from running only by the greatest restraint. She was cursing the old queen under her breath.

  Up on the temple roof two black-robed priests appeared, tiny dolls in the distance.

  Arika turned into an even narrower way, hardly more than a crack between the walls. Here she risked a faster pace, dragging Fenn without pity.

  The distant priests bent and a second later a great hammer swung on counterweights and the day-gong sent its first harsh sonorous stroke echoing over the land.

  A low doorway curtained with greasy cloth appeared on Fenn’s right. Arika thrust him through it, into a stifling dusk that was blinding after the light.

  Something large stirred in the shadows and a man’s voice whispered, “All right?”

  Arika said, “He killed a priest.” And then to Fenn, “Stay here!”

  The curtain rose and fell again. Fenn turned, reaching out for her. But the mourner’s cloak lay on the earthen floor, and Arika was gone.

  Again the large bulk moved, very lightly for its size. The shadow of a man came between Fenn and the curtain. He bent slowly and picked up the fallen cloak and as he straightened Fenn caught a glimpse of his face in the dusty gloom.

  It was the face of a Numi.

  CHAPTER IV Remembered Doom

  A kind of bleak fury came over Fenn. He had had it in the back of his mind that Arika was engineering some treachery but this he had not expected. His two hands reached and encircled a corded throat, and under the vast booming of the gong he said the one word:

  “Numi!”

  The voice of the man said harshly, “Wait!” The curtain was lifted to admit a single beam of light. Gasping against Fenn’s grip the man said, “Look again!”

  Fenn looked. Uncertainly his fingers loosened. The man was beardless, his cheeks shaven close to smooth skin. His hair was cropped and his body, naked except for a twist of cloth, showed only a fine down and not the silken fur of the New Men.

  And yet in the eyes, the shape of the head, the unmistakable cast of die features…

  The man lifted his arms and struck Fenn’s hands away. “I’m Malech. I’m Arika’s brother.”

  “Arika’s brother? And who is Arika? What does she want with me?” Fenn’s hands were still raised, and hungrily curved. “What do you want with me, Malech? And why do you look like a Numi, a Numi plucked and stripped?”

  “I’m a half-blood,” Malech said sourly. “So is Arika. I can assure you we have no love for our fathers, who give us their blood and then despise us for it. As for the rest of it, it will have to wait until tonight.

  “I’m a slave. I work in the palace gardens. If I don’t go there at once I shall be flogged, with ten stripes extra because I’m half the breed of the masters. Arika has the same problems at the temple. Besides, she might draw suspicion by her absence. So…”

  He thrust Fenn ahead of him, into another room. It was not large but it was clean. There was a hearth, two box-beds filled with straw, a table, three or four rough benches.

  “This is the house,” said Malech. “All of it. Stay in it. Don’t even look out the window. You’ll find water, wine and food. Be quiet and trust us if you can. If you can’t, after all we’ve risked to get you free—why, the priests will be delighted to have you back.”

  He swung on his heel to go, and then paused, turning to look again at Fenn as though he found in him something of special interest.

  “So you killed a priest.” Malech’s eyes, which were lighter than Arika’s, almost tawny, gleamed with an evil joy. “With a knife? A strangling cord? How?”

  Fenn shook his head slowly. “I had no weapons.”

  “With your hands? Don’t tell me with just your hands!” Malech’s smile was the feral grin of a tiger. “May the gods of the humans beam upon you, my friend!”

  At the door into the lean-to he said over his shoulder, almost casually, “As half-blood Numi, my sister and I—particularly my sister—share some of the mental peculiarities of our illustrious fathers. It’s quite possible, if you do decide to trust us, that we can restore the memory Arika tells me you have lost.”

  He was gone before the other
could speak.

  Fenn stood where he was for some time without moving, his gaze fixed upon the doorway. The mighty voice of the gong was stilled and in its place came the numberless tongues of the waking city, jarring, clattering, settling at last to a steady beehive drone, punctuated by the shrill cries of children.

  But Fenn was conscious of nothing except those words of Malech’s that were still ringing in his ears. “… we can restore the memory Arika tells me you have lost.”

  He sat down and tried to think but he was very weary. His wounds were stiffening and his body ached beyond endurance. He did not like Malech. He did not trust Arika. He understood nothing—why he had been imprisoned, why he was free. But whatever else happened he did not want to be taken back to the temple. And—if he could remember again, if he could have a name he knew was his own and a past that was longer than yesterday…

  If Malech had been a homed demon and Arika his sister Fenn would not have left that place.

  He washed his cuts with wine and then drank off a good bit of what remained. He was seized with a desire to go after Malech, to drag him back and force him to do his magic now. He felt he could not wait for night. But he realized that was folly speaking. He lay down in one of the straw-filled beds but he could not sleep.

  To remember! To be again a man with a whole mind, a whole life!

  What kind of memories would they be? How would he appear to himself after he remembered? What stains would he find upon his hands?

  Even evil memories would be better than none, better than his terrible groping into nothingness.

  Suppose that Malech lied?

  It was hot and the fumes of the wine were clouding his thoughts. His body wanted rest even if his mind did not. The world began to slip away from him. He thought how strange it was that Arika was half Numi—such a handsome girl for all he did not trust her. Very handsome…

  He slept and in his dreams ghostly towers brightened against a dusky sky and the word “night” returned to plague him.

  Twice he spoke aloud, saying, “I am Fenway.”

  Arika woke him. He had not heard the gong that marked off night from day nor had he heard the others return. Yet they must have been here for some time. A pot bubbled fragrantly on the hearth and the cloth was laid for supper. Outside the wind howled in the alleys, filling the air with dust.

  He rose, feeling stiff and sore but otherwise normal and ravenously hungry. Yet he hardly thought of food. He was shaken with an eager half-fearful excitement. He told Arika what Malech had said and demanded, “Is that true? Can you do it?”

  “Not all at once perhaps—but I can try. You must eat now, Fenn. Otherwise the body will disturb the mind.”

  That seemed reasonable and he curbed his impatience. He watched the others for awhile in silence, trying to judge them, but there was something about their strange breed that was beyond his grasp.

  He demanded abruptly, “Why did you rescue me?”

  “As I told you,” answered Arika. “You were human and a captive of the Numi. This isn’t the first time a human has vanished out of the Numi dungeons—though not, I’ll admit, out of the temple. That was a brilliant feat, Fenn. You should appreciate it.”

  “I’d still like to know why.”

  “Does there have to be a reason?” asked Malech. “Haven’t you ever done anything without a reason except that it was a good thing to do?”

  Fenn shot him a hard glance. “You don’t have to remind me that I don’t know the answer to that. However, I won’t quarrel with your motives—not now.” He turned to Arika again. “What did the priests want of me? Why was I there?”

  She shook her head. “I couldn’t find out. RhamSin—he was your special jailor, Fenn—is a very brilliant man. He rules in the temple as the king rules in the palace and there is great rivalry between them.

  “Whatever purpose he had with you, it was something of great importance to him, something he wanted to keep secret from the king and even from the other priests. Else you would not have been hidden away in that cell. The Numi are free to use humans in any way they wish, just as we use cattle, so there could be no other reason.”

  She met Fenn’s gaze directly. “Perhaps that’s why I rescued you, Fenn. I hate RhamSin. Remember, I’ve been a temple slave since I was old enough to climb there. Perhaps I wanted simply to cheat him of whatever success he was after just to make him sweat.”

  An expression of such diabolical hatred crossed her face that Fenn was convinced she had told at least a part of the truth.

  Suddenly she smiled. “All that being so—have you wondered why RhamSin hasn’t searched the city for you?”

  “Perhaps it’s easier just to get another human.”

  “Maybe. But I made sure—partly, of course, to clear myself. Only the priests and the royal family and some of the nobles are supposed to know about those temple passages. So on the stair I dropped a girdle belonging to a man of the royal house—which Malech managed to steal for me. Therefore it will appear to RhamSin that he stole you away and took you directly to the palace. So I am safe and you are safe—at least for a while.”

  “You’re a clever girl,’’ said Fenn admiringly. “Very clever indeed.” Arika’s smile broadened. And Fenn wondered silently, Just how clever are you, Arika? Too clever to trust? In one thing he was forced to trust, whether he would or not.

  He got up with sudden violence. “I can’t wait any longer! Get to work, blast you, do your magic—I can’t wait any longer!”

  “Softly, Fenn,” said Arika. “All right.” She pointed to the bed. “Lie down. Let your body relax. You’ll have to help me, Fenn. I’m not like the Numi, who can do what they want to with the minds of men and beasts. You’ll have to open the way for me, Fenn. Don’t fight me. Let your mind be easy.”

  He stretched out. He tried to do as she said, to relax his limbs and let his mind go free. Her face hovered above him, white in the shrouded light from the windows. She was handsome. Her eyes had strange dark fires in them. Her voice spoke to him softly.

  “You’ll have to trust me, Fenn, if you want to remember.” Malech handed her a drinking cup and she held it to Fenn’s lips. “There is a drug in this wine. It will not hurt you. It only makes the way easier and the time shorter. Drink it, Fenn.”

  He would not drink it. His muscles tensed again and he looked at her with narrow-eyed suspicion, almost ready to strike her aside and run. But she only took the cup away and said, “It’s up to you. Your memory is your loss, not mine.”

  After a minute he said, “Give me the cup.”

  He drank it. Again he lay still, listening to her voice, and now it was easier to relax. Gradually he lost all sense of time. Arika’s eyes were huge and dark and full of little dancing lights. They drew him. They compelled him. Soft folds of colorless mist slowly blotted out the face of Malech in the background, the mud-brick walls, the roof, Arika herself—all except her eyes.

  Just at the last he felt the power that lay behind them but it was too late. They willed him into the final darkness and he could not but go.

  Deep, deep, timeless dark.

  A voice…

  Under the prodding of that voice he roused a bit as though from slumber. Another voice had spoken once, asking, asking—but this time it was easier to answer.

  “My name is Fenway,” he told the voice. “I am in New York.”

  Yes, it was much easier to answer. He told about Times Square on a summer night, the blaze of light and the crowd. He told about Central Park in the morning after rain.

  “And pretty soon it will all be gone,” he said. “All the buildings and the subways and the people—gone, erased, forgotten.”

  He laughed. “They’re working on the Citadel. They’re burying it deep in the rock above the Palisades. It’s almost finished—and for what? What good is a citadel without men?”

  He laughed again, dreadful laughter. “‘Repent ye, for the end is at hand!’ I repent me that I had a son. I repent me, I repent me
that I begot him just for death!”

  “Fenway—Fenway!” The voice shook him, brought him to himself. “You must remember—yourself, New York, the Palisades. Draw it, Fenway. Draw the size and shape of New York, of the Palisades, so that when you wake you will remember.”

  Dully under the urging of the voice he began to draw. Whether he had pencil and paper he neither knew nor cared. He drew as one does in a dream, the familiar outlines, and as he did so he was filled with sadness and a sense of loss and he began to weep.

  “I will not draw,” he said. “What good is drawing on the evening of Destruction?”

  The voice called to him. It called again and again and he fled away from it. He was running beside the wide grey river. Night was closing down and from the darkling water the mist rose thick and cold, clinging around him, drowning out the world that was so soon to die.

  CHAPTER V Secret of Ages

  There was a drawing, done with charcoal on a slab of wood. It was lopsided and clumsy and unfinished, showing a long, narrow little island between two rivers near the sea.

  Fenn stared at it. His hand? trembled. Arika said softly, “You told me its name was New York. Do you remember?”

  “I—I don’t know.” His mouth was dry and it was difficult to talk. “My head feels queer. It’s full of smoke. Sometimes I see things and then they’re gone again.”

  He looked up, almost pleadingly, from Arika to Malech and back again. “Where is this place I called New York?”

  Malech shook his head. “I never heard of it.”

  There was an odd tone to his voice. Arika rose and removed two bricks from the wall above the bed. From the cavity behind them she drew a bundle of parchment scrolls. Even in his distress Fenn could see that she was laboring under some great excitement. She spread the scrolls beside him on the bed.

  “When the Numi came out of the Great Dark and into the human part of the world they made pictures of the lands they passed through. I stole these from the temple long ago. Let us see if the pictures of the Numi show your island.”