He smiled an amused little smile. Not derisive—that wasn’t his style—just surprised and disbelieving. “No,” he said.
“Look again, then. Always people are reaching for something, for someone, searching. Talk, Talent, love, sex, it’s all part of the same thing, the same search. And gods, too. Man invents gods because he’s afraid of being alone, scared of an empty universe, scared of the darkling plain. That’s why your men are converting, Dino, that’s why people are going over. They’ve found God, or as much of a God as they’re ever likely to find. The Union is a mass-mind, an immortal mass-mind, many in one, all love. The Shkeen don’t die, dammit. No wonder they don’t have the concept of an afterlife. They know there’s a God. Maybe it didn’t create the universe, but it’s love, pure love, and they say that God is love, don’t they? Or maybe what we call love is a tiny piece of God. I don’t care, whatever it is, the Union is it. The end of the search for the Shkeen, and for Man too. We’re alike after all, we’re so alike it hurts.”
Valcarenghi gave his exaggerated sigh. “Robb, you’re overwrought. You sound like one of the Joined.”
“Maybe that’s just what I should be. Lya is. She’s part of the Union now.”
He blinked. “How do you know that?”
“She came to me last night in a dream.”
“Oh. A dream.”
“It was true, dammit. It’s all true.”
Valcarenghi stood, and smiled. “I believe you,” he said. “That is, I believe that the Greeshka uses a psi-lure, a love lure if you will, to draw in its prey, something so powerful that it convinces men—even you—that it’s God. Dangerous, of course. I’ll have to think about this before taking action. We could guard the caves to keep humans out, but there are too many caves. And sealing off the Greeshka wouldn’t help our relations with the Shkeen. But now it’s my problem. You’ve done your job.”
I waited until he was through. “You’re wrong, Dino. This is real, no trick, no illusion. I felt it, and Lya too, The Greeshka hasn’t even a yes-I-live, let alone a psi-lure strong enough to bring in Shkeen and men.”
“You expect me to believe that God is an animal who lives in the caves of Shkea?”
“Yes.”
“Robb, that’s absurd, and you know it. You think the Shkeen have found the answer to the mysteries of creation. But look at them. The oldest civilized race in known space, but they’ve been stuck in the Bronze Age for fourteen thousand years. We came to them. Where are their spaceships? Where are their towers?”
“Where are our bells?” I said. “And our joy? They’re happy, Dino. Are we? Maybe they’ve found what we’re still looking for. Why the hell is man so driven, anyway? Why is he out to conquer the galaxy, the universe, whatever? Looking for God, maybe . . . ? Maybe. He can’t find him anywhere, though, so on he goes, on and on, always looking. But always back to the same darkling plain in the end.”
“Compare the accomplishments. I’ll take humanity’s record.”
“Is it worth it?”
“I think so.” He went to the window, and looked out. “We’ve got the only Tower on their world,” he said, smiling, as he looked down through the clouds.
“They’ve got the only God in our universe,” I told him. But he only smiled.
“All right, Robb,” he said, when he finally turned from the window. “I’ll keep all this in mind. And we’ll find Lyanna for you.”
My voice softened. “Lya is lost,” I said. “I know that now. I will be too, if I wait. I’m leaving tonight. I’ll book passage on the first ship out to Baldur.”
He nodded. “If you like. I’ll have your money ready.” He grinned. “And we’ll send Lya after you, when we find her. I imagine she’ll be a little miffed, but that’s your worry.”
I didn’t answer. Instead I shrugged, and headed for the tube. I was almost there when he stopped me.
“Wait,” he said. “How about dinner tonight? You’ve done a good job for us. We’re having a farewell party anyway, Laurie and me. She’s leaving too.”
“I’m sorry,” I said.
His turn to shrug. “What for? Laurie’s a beautiful person, and I’ll miss her. But it’s no tragedy. There are other beautiful people. I think she was getting restless with Shkea, anyway.”
I’d almost forgotten my Talent, in my heat and the pain of my loss. I remembered it now. I read him. There was no sorrow, no pain, just a vague disappointment. And below that, his wall. Always the wall, keeping him apart, this man who was a first-name friend to everyone and an intimate to none. And on it, it was almost as if there were a sign that read, THIS FAR YOU GO, AND NO FARTHER.
“Come up,” he said. “It should be fun.” I nodded.
* * *
I asked myself, when my ship lifted off, why I was leaving. Maybe to return home. We have a house on Baldur, away from the cities, on one of the undeveloped continents with only wilderness for a neighbor. It stands on a cliff, above a high waterfall that tumbles endlessly down into a shaded green pool. Lya and I swam there often, in the sunlit days between assignments. And afterwards we’d lie down nude in the shade of the orangespice trees, and make love on a carpet of silver moss. Maybe I’m returning to that. But it won’t be the same without Lya, lost Lya . . .
Lya whom I still could have. Whom I could have now. It would be easy, so easy. A slow stroll into a darkened cave, a short sleep. Then Lya with me for eternity, in me, sharing me, being me, and I her. Loving and knowing more of each other than men can ever do. Union and joy, and no darkness again, ever. God. If I believed that, what I told Valcarenghi, then why did I tell Lya no?
Maybe because I’m not sure. Maybe I still hope, for something still greater and more loving than the Union, for the God they told me of so long ago. Maybe I’m taking a risk, because part of me still believes. But if I’m wrong . . . then the darkness, and the plain . . .
But maybe it’s something else, something I saw in Valcarenghi, something that made me doubt what I had said. For man is more than Shkeen, somehow; there are men like Dino and Gourlay as well as Lya and Gustaffson, men who fear love and Union as much as they crave it. A dichotomy, then. Man has two primal urges, and the Shkeen only one? If so, perhaps there is a human answer, to reach and join and not be alone, and yet to still be men.
I do not envy Valcarenghi. He cries behind his wall, I think, and no one knows, not even he. And no one will ever know, and in the end he’ll always be alone in smiling pain. No, I do not envy Dino.
Yet there is something of him in me, Lya, as well as much of you. And that is why I ran, though I loved you.
Laurie Blackburn was on the ship with me. I ate with her after liftoff, and we spent the evening talking over wine. Not a happy conversation, maybe, but a human one. Both of us needed someone, and we reached out.
Afterwards, I took her back to my cabin, and made love to her as fiercely as I could. Then, the darkness softened, we held each other and talked away the night.
Chicago
January–February, 1973
Other Short Fiction by George R. R. Martin
“The Glass Flower”
Locus Award Nominee, Best Novelette (1987)
Asimov’s Reader Poll Nominee, Best Novelette (1987)
“In the House of the Worm”
“Portraits of His Children”
Nebula Award, Best Novelette (1986)
Science Fiction Chronicle Reader Award, Best Novelette (1986)
“The Lonely Songs of Laren Dorr”
Other Ebooks from ElectricStory
Tony Daniel
The Robot’s Twilight Companion
Paul Park
Soldiers of Paradise (Starbridge Chronicles 1)
Sugar Rain (Starbridge Chronicles 2)
The Cult of Loving Kindness (Starbridge Chronicles 3)
Lucius Shepard
Green Eyes
Howard Waldrop
Dream Factories and Radio Pictures
George R. R. Martin, A Song for Lya: And Other Stories
(Series: # )
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