If only he could sleep . . . he awoke with the opening of the great doors and the thumping of the huge feet of entering Neshgai. And then he ate breakfast and took a shower (his people abstaining) and used his knife to scrape off his few whiskers. He only had to shave about every third day and this task took only a minute. He did not know if his Indian genes were responsible for this hairlessness or if there were also other factors.
He shed his clothes, which were too dirty and torn to wear, and gave them to Awina to wash and repair. He stuck his knife into the pocket on the side of the kilt a slave gave him, put on new sandals, and followed Gooshgoozh out of the room. The others were not invited; the big doors closed in their faces.
The interior of the enormous four-story building was as ornately carved and as brightly painted as the exterior. There were many human slaves in the wide and lofty corridors but very few soldiers. Most of the guards were twelve-foot high Neshgai with leather helmets wrapped in brilliant scarlet turbans and holding spears that looked like young pine trees and shields on which were painted X's inside broken circles. They came to attention when Gooshgoozh neared them and ground the butts of the spears with a resounding noise into the marble floors.
Gooshgoozh led Ulysses down many halls and up two flights of winding marble stairs with exquisitely carved handrails and then down more corridors which opened onto vast rooms with massive bejewelled furniture and painted bejewelled statuary. He saw a great number of Neshgai females. These were between eight and nine feet tall and totally lacked the little tusks. They wore kilts and long jewelled earrings and, occasionally, a ring or ornament inserted into the skin on the side of their proboscises. Their breasts were below their chests and were, like those of all the sentient females he had seen, fully developed whether the female was nursing or not. They emanated a powerful and pleasing perfume, and the young ones painted their faces.
At last they paused before a door of some rich red colour and dense grain. It bore a number of figures and symbols in alto-relief. The guards before it saluted Gooshgoozh. One opened the doors, and Ulysses was led into a cavernous room which had many shelves with books and a few chairs in front of a gigantic desk and chair. A Neshgai, wearing rimless glasses and a conical tall cap of paper painted with a number of symbols, sat behind the desk.
This was Shegnif, the Grand Vizier.
A moment later, Ghlikh was ushered into the room by an officer. He was grinning, and part of this pleasure undoubtedly originated in relief at the unbinding of his wings. Part of his pleasure also came from anticipation of humiliation, and worse, for Ulysses.
Shegnif asked Ulysses some questions in a voice deep even for the thunderous-throated Neshgai. Ulysses answered them without hesitation and truthfully. They were mainly requests for his name, where he came from, were there others like him, and so on. But when he said that he came from another time, perhaps ten million years ago, and that a lightning stroke had "depetrified" him, and that he had come here through The Tree itself, Shegnif seemed to be struck with a lightning bolt himself. Ghlikh did not like this reaction; he lost his grin and began to shift uneasily on his big bony feet.
After a long silence broken only by the stomach rumblings of the three Neshgai, Shegnif removed his great round spectacles and polished them with a cloth the size of a large throw rug. He put them back on and bent over his desk to look at the human standing before him.
"Either you are a liar," he said, "or an agent of The Tree. Or, just possibly, you are telling the truth."
He spoke to Ghlikh. "Tell me, Batwings. Is he telling the truth?"
Ghlikh seemed to shrink within himself. He looked at Ulysses and then back to Shegnif. It was obvious that he could not make up his mind whether to denounce Ulysses as a liar or to admit that his story was true. He would want to discredit the human, but if he tried and failed, then he would be discredited. Perhaps being discredited among the Neshgai meant death, which would account for the sweat over his body in this cool morning.
"Well?" Shegnif said.
The advantage lay with Ghlikh, since he was known to Shegnif. On the other hand, Shegnif may have had his suspicions about Ghlikh and his kind.
His remark about "an agent of The Tree" must mean that he considered The Tree to be an entity, a hostile one. If this were so, then he must have his ideas about Ghlikh's motives, since he must also know that the bat-people lived in The Tree. Or did he know that? The Dhulhulikh could have told him they came from the other side of The Tree, and he would have had no way of checking up on them. At least not until Ulysses showed up.
"I do not know if he lies or not," Ghlikh said. "He told me that he was the stone god come to life, but I did not see him come to life."
"Have you seen the stone god of the Wufea?"
"Yes."
"And did you see the stone god after this man appeared?"
"No," Ghlikh said hesitantly. "But then I did not look in the temple to see if he was still there. I took his word for it, though I should not have done so."
"I can question the cat-people about him. They will know whether or not he is the stone god," Shegnif said. "Since they acknowledge him as the god come to life, I do not believe that they will call him a liar. Let us assume that his story is true."
"That he is, indeed, a god?" Ghlikh said, unable to suppress all the scorn he felt.
"There is but one god," Shegnif said, eyeing Ghlikh closely. "Only one. Or would you deny that? Those who live on The Tree say that The Tree is the only god. What do you say?"
"Oh, I agree with you that there is only one god," Ghlikh said quickly.
"And that is Nesh," Shegnif said. "Right?"
"Nesh is truly the only god of the Neshgai," Ghlikh said.
"That is not the same thing as saying that there is only one god, the god of the Neshgai," Shegnif said. He smiled, exposing a white-walled mouth, white gums and the four molars. He lifted a big glass of water in which was a glass tube and sucked water through the tube. Ulysses was surprised; he had seen the Neshgai suck water up their prehensile trunks and blow it into their mouths. But this was the first time he had seen one use a straw tube. Later, he saw them drink directly from glasses which had narrow mouths designed to go between their tusks.
Shegnif put the glass down and said, "Never mind. We do not require that non-Neshgai worship Nesh, since his concern is only with the worship of his sons and he would refuse to be worshiped by any but them. I find you to be rather shifty, Ghlikh. Be more direct in the future. Leave it to us slow-moving, slow-thinking Neshgai to be circuitous!"
He smiled again. Ulysses began to think that he could like the Grand Vizier.
Shegnif asked Ulysses more detailed questions. Finally, he told them that they could sit down, and the officers let themselves down gently into the chairs. Ulysses sat on the edge of one, his feet dangling. He did not look as small and pitiful as Ghlikh, however, who resembled a small bird squatting at the entrance to a large cave.
Shegnif put the tips of his banana-sized fingers together and frowned as much as an eyebrowless person could frown.
"I am amazed," he said. "You must be the living source of a myth which originated unguessable millennia ago. Although I should not say myth, since your story seems to be true.
"The Wufea found you at the bottom of a lake which had been in existence for many thousands of years. There is not much doubt that they found a stone statue which looked like you. Even the evasive bat-man here confirms that. But did you know that you have been above ground many times before the Wufea found you? And lost or stolen many times?"
Ulysses shook his head.
The Grand Vizier said, "You have been the god, or the central focus, of more than one religion. You have been the god of a little primitive village of one species or another, and have sat on your chair, petrified, while the little village became the great metropolis, the capital, of a highly civilised empire. And still sat there while the empire was shattered, and the civilisation crumbled, and the people died, and t
here were only ruins inhabited by lizards and owls around you."
"My name is Ozymandias," Ulysses murmured in English. For the first time, his English sounded foreign to him.
"What?" Shegnif said, looking over his spectacles and down his proboscis at him.
"I was only talking to myself in a language that has been dead for millions of years, Your Viziership," Ulysses said.
"Ah, yes?" Shegnif said, his small greenish eyes lighting up. "We'll see that it's recorded by our scholars. In fact, we plan on keeping you very busy for some time. Our scientists have been informed about you, and they cannot restrain their eagerness."
"That is interesting," Ulysses said. Was he going to be nothing but a laboratory specimen to these people? "But I have much more to contribute than recordings of the past. I have a very definite present and future use. I may be the key to the survival of the Neshgai."
Ghlikh looked strangely at him. Shegnif, lifting his trunk, said, "Our survival? Indeed? Tell me more!"
"I would prefer to speak when the Dhulhulikh is not present."
Ghlikh shrilled, "Your Viziership, I protest! I have remained silent, as you wished, while this human told his lying story of his purported adventures in The Tree! But I can keep silent no longer! This is very serious! He is imputing sinister motives to us Dhulhulikh, who only want to live in peace with everybody and to engage in a business profitable for everybody!"
"No judgement has been delivered," Shegnif said. "We will hear the statements of everybody, including your colleague, Khyuks. In fact, the others are being interviewed even now, and I will read summaries of the interviews later today. By the way, and this will interest you, too, bat-man, we have records which indicate the stone god was once here. He certainly looks like the stone god. And he is just as certainly not one of our humans. You have noticed the full head of straight hair and the five toes, I presume?"
"I did not say he was a slave or a Vroomaw, Your Viziership," Ghlikh said.
"Well for you that you did not," Shegnif said.
He spoke into an orange wooden box before him, and the big doors swung open. Ulysses wondered if they had a form of radio. He had not noticed any antennas when he was in the city, but then it had been night.
Shegnif stood up and said, "We will continue this tomorrow. I have more urgent business to attend to. However, if you can prove what you said about your being the key to our survival, I will listen to every word. I can arrange a special interview with you late this evening. But you had better not be wasting my time, which is very valuable."
"I will speak with you this evening," Ulysses said.
"Am I to have no chance to defend myself?"
Ghlikh wailed.
"Every chance, as you well know," Shegnif said. "Don't ask questions which do not need asking. You know I am busy."
Ulysses was led back to the barracks room but Ghlikh was taken to another room where, apparently, Khyuks was also kept. The last of the interviewers, teams of humans and Neshgai, were leaving just as Ulysses returned.
Awina hurried to him, saying, "How did it go, Lord?"
"We are not in the power of altogether unreasonable beings," he answered. "I have hopes that we will become the allies of these people."
The boxes which held the bombs had not been taken away from them. In fact, they still had all their weapons. If they were allowed to keep them because the Neshgai were contemptuous of them, they might yet show the Neshgai that they should not take some things for granted. One bomb should blast open the locked doors to this room, and a few more might kill and shake enough of the elephantine creatures to allow the party to get to the harbour. And there they could seize a galley, which should be relatively easy to operate. Or, if they wanted to get far away, they could seize a sailing ship, of which there were plenty in the harbour. And which, he suspected, had auxiliary vegetable engines.
But there was no sense in doing this except as a last resort. If the Neshgai intended to kill or enslave them, they would surely have seized their weapons. He would issue orders that his men should resist if they were asked to surrender their arms. And he would tell them his plans for escaping if this happened.
In the meantime, he would see what developed with the Neshgai. He needed them as much as they needed him. He had the knowledge and the drive, and they had the materials and the personnel. Together, they could attack The Tree. Or the bat-people, whom he believed were the powers behind The Tree.
That evening, an officer who introduced himself as Tarshkrat came for him. He followed the billowing cloak of the giant into the office of Shegnif. The Grand Vizier asked Ulysses to sit down and offered him a dark winy liquid. Ulysses accepted it with thanks but did not drink much. Even that little made his veins sing.
Shegnif snuffed the stuff up his trunk and squirted it into his mouth while tears of pleasure, or pain, ran down his cheeks. The stone container before him held more than two gallons of the liquor, but he did not drink much. He just tried to give the impression that he did. While listening to Ulysses' speech, he dipped the trunk frequently into the stone vessel. But he was probably just stirring the liquid with the tip of his trunk.
Finally, he held up a hand for Ulysses to stop talking, and he rumbled, "So you think that The Tree is not an intelligent entity?"
"No, I do not think it is," Ulysses said. "I think the Dhulhulikh would like everybody to believe that it is."
"You are probably sincere in your belief," the Grand Vizier thundered. "But I know that you are wrong. I know that The Tree is a single sentient being!"
Ulysses sat even more upright, and said, "How do you know?"
"The Book of Tiznak has told us that," Shegnif said. "Rather, it has told some of us that. I cannot read the Book except here and there. But I believe those who claim they can read about The Tree."
"I do not know what you mean."
"Nor do I expect you to know. But you will know. I'll see to that."
"Whether or not The Tree is sentient, it grows," Ulysses said. "It will cover this land in about fifty years at its present rate of growth. And where will you Neshgai go then?"
"The Tree seems to be limited in its growth near the seacoast," the Grand Vizier said. "Otherwise it would have covered us up long ago. It is growing northward and will eventually shadow all the land to the north. Except near the coast. It is not the growth of The Tree itself that we fear. We fear the peoples of The Tree. The Tree has been sending them against us, and it will not stop until it has exterminated us or forced us to go live with it."
"You really believe that?" Ulysses said.
"I know that!"
"What about the Dhulhulikh?"
"I did not know, until you told me, that they lived in The Tree. They had always claimed they came from the north. If your story is true, then they are our enemy. They are, you might say, the eyes of The Tree. Just as the other peoples, the Vignoom and so forth, are the hands of The Tree."
Ulysses said, "If The Tree is an entity with intelligence, then it should have a central brain. And this brain, once located, could be destroyed. If The Tree is just a mindless vegetable entity which the Dhulhulikh control, then the Dhulhulikh can be located and destroyed."
Shegnif pondered this for a few minutes. Ulysses watched him over the top of his tall glass and took a sip of the strong stuff. How strange, he thought, to be sitting in a Brobdingnagian chair and talking to a being descended from elephants, talking about little winged men and a plant that might have a brain or many brains.
Shegnif curled his trunk up and back and rubbed his forehead with its double-tendriled tip. He said, "How would killing the central brain of The Tree or killing all the Dhulhulikh stop The Tree from growing?"
"If you kill the brain of an animal, you kill the entire animal," Ulysses said. "This may hold true for a complex vegetable entity, in which case The Tree will die. And the Neshgai will have enough firewood to last them a thousand years," he added.
Shegnif did not smile. Perhaps the Neshgai sense
of humour was not that of humans.
"If the brain is dead but The Tree still lives, The Tree is at least not organising its people to attack you. They are primitives, relatively few in number, who would be warring against each other if The Tree, or the batpeople, did not prevent it.
"If The Tree is only a means for the Dhulhulikh to control this land, then killing the Dhulhulikh will disorganise the other peoples who live on it. And then we may attack the problem of killing The Tree itself. I would suggest poisoning it."
"That would take much poison," Shegnif said.
"I have much knowledge of poisons."
Shegnif ridged his skin where his eyebrows would have been if he had them. "Indeed? Well, poisons aside, how could you possibly locate the Dhulhulikh? Or attack them? They have all the advantages."
The Stone God Awakens Page 16
