by D G Rose
And she led us on. She led us to an opening in the wall, a cave within a cave. Outside the opening was a barrel with torches and a small brazier of fire. Christabel took a torch and lit it, indicating that we should do the same. “Watch your heads.” She said and disappeared within.
We followed her into what turned out to be a tunnel. Its narrow walls and low ceiling were completely at odds with the scale of the Caverns without. The floor was a steeply inclined plane sloping downward. Happily some cracks, abrasures of the soil, and other irregularities, served the place of steps; and we descended slowly.
But that which served as steps under our feet became in other places stalactites. The lava, very porous in certain places, took the form of little round blisters. Crystals of opaque quartz, adorned with limpid drops of natural glass suspended to the roof like lusters, seemed to take fire as we passed beneath them. One would have fancied that the genii of romance were illuminating their underground palaces to receive the sons of men.
"Magnificent, glorious!" I cried in a moment of involuntary enthusiasm, "What a spectacle, Amy! Do you not admire these variegated shades of lava, which run through a whole series of colors, from reddish brown to pale yellow—by the most insensible degrees? And these crystals, they appear like luminous globes."
"You are beginning to see the charms of travel, Nicky," cried Christabel. "Wait a bit, until we advance farther. What we have as yet discovered is nothing—onwards, onwards!"
It seemed that Christabel and Amy both shared my atypical enthusiasm and we pressed onwards with greater speed.
After some hours, Christabel stretched out her arms at a bend in the tunnel to touch the rocky wall on either side, stopping our progress. “Put out your torches.” She said, extinguishing hers in a barrel of sand which must have been just for that purpose. We did likewise and once the flames were out we could clearly see dim light illuminating one wall of the tunnel. Christabel took us by the hands and led us around the bend. “Behold the Caves of Ice!” She proclaimed, dropping our hands to make a sweeping gesture.
We stood on a gentle mountainside overlooking a peaceful valley. There was abundant sunlight, colorful birds filled the air and a sparkling river winked at us from the valley floor. At the far end of the valley was a little village. It looked like a long walk, but the clean air and the sunlight filled us with energy. Just then three little mountain ponies equipped with colorful blankets and saddles came into view.
Amy stepped out of the cave mouth into the sunshine and stretched, arching her back and jumping a little as if she was trying to shake off the dust and gloom of the Caverns Measureless to Man.
As Christabel mounted her pony she looked at the sky and said, “Perfect, we should reach the village just about tea time.”
The ride down the mountain was peaceful. The gentle swaying of the ponies, the idle chatter of the birds. It felt more like a homecoming than a visit to someplace new. Like a memory that was unfolding in the present.
“So.” Amy interrupted the silence. “I notice that the Caves of Ice lack any ice. I would know, I’m something of an ice expert and I would say that the Caves of Ice lack ice in spades.”
Christabel nodded her head. “Caves of Ice is more poetic than frozen caves, and you know how we like poetic.”
“But,” Said Amy. “They’re not frozen either. Frozen would require ice and I’m still an expert in ice and I still don’t see any ice.”
Christabel nodded again. “Not all frozen requires ice. When the gears of a machine are frozen, there’s no ice. And these caves are more like a frozen machine than frozen water.” Christabel could see that Amy was about to object, so she added. “Time! For the fuck’s sakes! The Caves of Ice are frozen in time.” And she swept her arm in the direction of the valley below us. “Look! Nothing is moving. It’s all frozen in time.”
I chimed in. “The river is moving. I can see it reflecting the light.”
Christabel shrugged. “Well, the river is sacred, so… you know.”
Of course, we didn’t know, but what are you going to do?
“Also,” I continued, because what I was going to do was keep pumping Christabel for some kind of answer. “No cave. The Caves of Ice have neither ice nor a cave, let alone multiple caves that would require a plural! I mean, it’s a valley. And look, the sun!”
Christabel just said, “Do your dreams all make sense? It’s an allegory or a metaphor or, maybe, both of those things. Now shut the fuck hell up and let me enjoy the sunlight and fresh air.”
And I couldn’t argue what that and, I guess, neither could Amy, since we both did shut the fuck hell up and we all enjoyed the sunlight and the fresh air.
As we got closer to the valley and the little road that led to the village, I could see that Christabel was right. Nothing was moving. On a hillside, a herd of grazing goats stood motionless and a flock of birds hung suspended in mid-air with nary a flap.
“That’s so weird.” Amy whispered to me, maneuvering her pony alongside mine and hooking her thumb around my thumb.
“I know, right?” I answered and gave her thumb a squeeze.
Christabel stopped a little further up the trail. “Ok. We’re about to enter the Caves of Ice proper.” And I could see that just ahead of us everything was motionless. Christabel continued, “I’m just going to explain this once so that you don’t freak out. Over here, time moves regular and once we pass into the Caves of Ice, time will feel like it’s moving regular but it’s not.”
I started to interrupt, because that makes no sense. I mean if time also moves regular or feels like it moves regular in the Caves of Ice, how could it possibly be frozen from outside? But, Christabel gave me the look which I had learned to interpret as Q.E.D., so I Q.E.D.ed.
“So.” She went on. “On the one hand, as we cross into the Caves, it’s going to be like nothing happens, but on the other hand, something will happen. The important thing from our perspective is that we can relax while in the Caves of Ice, because no matter how long we are there, no time will pass out here. That is, we will exit out the far side at the exact moment we enter this side. In a real sense as soon as we enter we exit and nothing really happens while we’re inside.”
It made no sense, but nothing ever did, so Amy and I just shrugged. Christabel dismounted from her pony and we did likewise. “The ponies belong out here. They’ll find their way home once we enter. I have to warn you; it might get a little weird.” And before I had a chance to remind her that it was already a little weird, she grabbed Amy and me by the hand and pulled us forward into the Caves of Ice.
CHAPTER 21 - Who DOESN’T want a cricket!?
There was a moment of silence and a bit of resistance and then I was in the valley and the sun was still shining and there were insects buzzing and a cool wind blowing and the goats on the hillside were in motion, grazing and making goat noises, and the birds were no longer suspended in the air, but flying under their own power. In short, everything was just as it should be. I took a deep breath. I was still enjoying the feel of fresh air and sun after so many days or months in the Caverns Measureless to Man. Then I took a step forward and fell flat on my face. As I pushed myself up and moved to staunch the blood that was flowing from my nose, I noticed my hand looked funny. So, I let the blood drip down my chin as I examined my hand and then my hands. They were funny. So were my arms. Funny in a way that frightened me. Funny in a way that made me think that Christabel had underspoken when she’d said it might get a little weird. Here was the thing about my hands: They were tiny. Like the hands of a child. Sitting on tiny arms. Hands that had never wielded a wrench. Hands that had never boosted a car. Arms that had never been in prison. Arms that had never lost a sister.
At first, I thought I had become a child again, and I admit that the idea filled me with a mixture of pleasure and revulsion. Pleasure; because who wouldn’t want to be a kid again. Revulsion; because it hadn’t worked out for me so well the first time that I was incli
ned to do it again. But as I looked myself over, I realized that I had never worn these kinds of open sandals, made from some sort of woven plant. And I had never worn these pant or this shirt, both of which looked homemade.
Instead of becoming a kid again, I had become some other kid. And as I realized it, I felt my mind fill with all the details of his/my life. My home and family and my childish hopes and dreams. And my old life, my me, seemed to be pressed into the background and I felt like a passenger, or maybe more like a stowaway, in somebody else’s body. Here is the strangest thing about my new body, stranger than the little hands or the little feet: My new nose was longer and it protruded further into my field of vision than my old nose. My old nose hovered as a ghostly image, only barely visible if I focused on it. But this nose was a distraction. At least for a little while. Eventually it, too, faded from perception.
The boy that was me, the boy that I occupied, stood up. He looked down at his shirt and seeing the blood knew that he would be in trouble for staining the cloth. His mother would be mad because it would mean more work washing the shirt and his father, his father would be mad because… Because he hadn’t caught any crickets!
The boy that was me remembered, wistfully, how happy he had been when his father had told him that instead of his other chores he would have to go cricket hunting. He hated chores and while he’d never been cricket hunting before, any kind of hunting sounded like fun and it had to be better than chores. Chores like drawing water from the well, like sweeping the yard to keep it clean and neat, like taking up the grass mats from the house and beating them clean, like feeding the chickens, like… Well, the boy that was me had a long list of chores that he hated.
However, it turned out that he would have to add cricket hunting to the list of things that his parents obligated him to do that he would, given his druthers, not do. He wondered if cricket hunting was better than studying the classics and decided it was not. Or at any rate, they were equally unfun.
The thing was: cricket hunting should have been fun! He liked to be outside. He liked to collect rocks and leaves and all sorts of bugs and, when he could find them, frogs. So cricket hunting was exactly the kind of thing that he liked. But. But. But. There were no crickets. And he knew, he knew, that he couldn’t go home without a cricket. And not just any cricket, he needed a champion cricket. And now, his knees were sore from kneeling in the grass (and his mother was not going to be happy about the state of his pants, either) and his hands were cut from, well, from a lot of things, and he had looked and looked and all he had found were a few rocks (which were very fine rocks, nice and smooth with a good heft and perfect for throwing) and an old worm (at least it was sluggish and slow and barely wriggled anymore, so it seemed old now, if not when he had first found it). And his father would not be pleased to see the rocks (even if they were perfect for throwing) or the worm (for which he couldn’t blame his father, as it was an old and slow and sluggish worm and not much good for anything and maybe he should just drop the worm, but somehow he didn’t want to drop it, because it was his and he had found it and he still kind of liked it.).
And his father, who had never before shown any interest in anything interesting, all of a sudden wanted a cricket. Which the boy had to admit, raised the old man a few notches in his opinion. But it was one thing to want a cricket. I mean, who DOESN’T want a cricket!? But it was another thing altogether to DEMAND a cricket, especially when there were no crickets to be found!
And the boy, who was me, knew that his father didn’t really WANT a cricket (which dropped the old man a few notches in his opinion, right back down to where he started, if not lower). No, his father wanted the cricket to give to the Emperor (who, apparently, DID want a cricket, which raised the Emperor a few notches. Although, since the boy almost never thought about the Emperor, he still didn’t rank very high.). The boy knew that cricket fighting had become all the rage in the capital and at the imperial court (his father had told him, or the boy who also never thought much about the capital or the imperial court, would have remained in ignorance). And the Emperor had sent word to all the corners of his empire that he would reward the man who found him the best cricket. A champion cricket. Of course, the Emperor hadn’t said any of this to his father. The Emperor had told some extremely high officials who had told some very high officials who had told some high officials who had told some medium officials who had told some low officials and so on until someone, who probably wasn’t an official of any kind, had told his father, no ordered his father, to find some crickets. And his father had, in turn, ordered him to find some crickets. Adding that he had better find a champion cricket.
So there we were, the boy who was me and I, looking for crickets. Hands cut, knees sore, blood dripping from our nose (that one was on me) and nary a cricket to be found. We were also tired and hungry and bored, but we thought, no we knew, that we would find no rest and no food and no entertainment at home, if there was also no cricket. So we kept looking, and we kept not finding. The sun was setting and it was starting to get cold. We wished that we had brought our jacket, but we had never expected to be out looking for so long and it had been a nice sunny day when we had started. And the sun set, and the moon rose and it got colder and our hands, sore and cut, began to go numb from the cold. But we were still afraid to go home. Finally, we were too exhausted to go on looking. And we settled down with our back to an old willow and we shivered and watched the moon through a veil of leaves.
And then a strange thing happened. As we watched the moon, cold and hungry, the moon grew less bright, except for a small part in the center, which grew more bright, as if the moon were a lens and some giant hand were focusing it into a narrow beam. We had to admit we were curious. So, as tired as we were and as disheartened as we were and as inclined to keep our seat and freeze to death as we were, still we rose to our feet, sore knees aching and we walked to where the moonbeam fell. And where the moonbeam fell, was a piece of bamboo stalk. It was about as long as our foot (not very long because we were a fairly small child) and about as big around as a beer can (a comparison we were only half-capable of making). We looked at it for a while. The moonbeam fell right on it. There was nothing else of interest in the field of light. We touched it softly with our toe and it rocked gently a few times before it came to rest, exactly as it had been before. We pulled back our foot, prepared to give it a good kick, hoping to take out a little of our frustration and well, who doesn’t like to kick something every now and then, when it gave a soft chirp. We bent down, all thought of kicking gone, and took a closer look. Now we could see that the bamboo stalk, which was sealed at each knuckle, was open in the middle. But on even closer inspection we saw that the opening in the middle was covered with thin rods of split bamboo and the whole thing hinged and tied to a little bamboo ring, making a perfect little cage. A cage for a cricket. And sitting inside, softly chirping to keep warm, was a cricket. But not just any cricket, a giant cricket. A champion cricket!
We can’t remember when we last felt such excitement! Our father had sent us out on a hopeless task to find a non-existent champion cricket. Had we been daunted by the impossibility of the task? No, we had not! Had we complained about the hard ground? No, we had not! Had we been put off by the cold? No, we had not! And had we found a champion cricket? Yes, we had! A giant, mighty, champion, cannot be defeated, worthy of being presented to the Emperor, cricket!
We took the bamboo cricket cage carefully in our hands, holding it with both hands in front of our body carefully level, and started off to our house. Won’t our father be proud? We had only taken a few steps when we remembered the demands of politeness and stopped. “Thank you moon!” We called out and we were almost certain that the moon twinkled in acknowledgment.
After very few more steps we began to worry that the cold was so fierce that the cricket might not make it back to our house. So, we stopped and pulled off our shirt and wrapped the cage, being sure to leave enough open for air, but not so m
uch that the cold could get in. It didn’t even cross our mind that using the shirt as a blanket for the cricket might keep our mother from noticing the bloodstained fabric. Bare-chested and freezing we made our way home, stepping as softly and carefully as possible, lest any random bump frighten or discomfort the cricket, who was, after all, a champion who would be going to live and fight in the palace of the Emperor.
As we approached our house, the excitement did get the better of us and we did speed up just a little (OK we might have been running). We threw open the door, rather louder than strictly necessary, and stood panting in the room holding the bamboo tube with its prize cricket in front of us.
In retrospect, perhaps the scene would have been less clear to an outside observer than it was to us. To us, it was perfectly clear. We had been out hunting crickets and had arrived home holding a cage that, obviously, could only hold a cricket, a champion cricket.
To our mother, it might have been less clear. We had gone out cricket hunting; this she knew. And here we stood half naked, half frozen, and half caked in blood. I guess that she knew us rather better than we imagined because she came over, grabbed the wadded up bloody shirt (and the bamboo tube and the champion cricket), threw it to the floor, and grabbed us, hard, by the ear. We think she must have been saying something, but we didn’t hear, because all we could think about was the champion cricket that we had worked so hard to find and that our mother had just killed! We twisted away, hurting our ear terribly, and dove for the cricket tube. Thankfully our careful job of wrapping the tube in our shirt had protected the tube and the cricket, who sat within cheerfully chirping away as if nothing had happened at all. What a tough cricket! While our mother was trying to regain her hold on our ear, we quickly unwrapped the tube and holding it aloft we cried “A cricket! A champion cricket!”
Our mother was undeterred by the wonder of our find, but our father heard the word cricket and quickly came over. Our father grabbed our mother’s hand as she was about to deal us a vicious slap and just for a moment, as she turned away to give our father the slap she has intended for us, we thought we saw another face drawn over the face of our mother, like she was a woman possessed.
