The wings were bone and membrane, the ends attached to the mound of muscle on the back. He had six limbs, the first six-limbed mammal Ulysses had ever seen. But it might not be the last. This planet—or this Earth—had to have many strange things in store for him.
The face was triangular. The head was bulging, round and totally bald. The ears were so big they looked like auxiliary wings. The eyes were large for the face and from a distance looked pale.
There did not seem to be a hair on the naked creature.
The man was smiling as he swept down and half-folded his wings and dropped onto his skinny legs and broad feet. He waddled toward them, having lost all grace the moment he touched ground. He lifted a thin arm and spoke in a piping child-like voice in Ayrata.
“Greetings, god of stone! Ghlikh greets you and wishes you a long godhood!”
Ulysses understood him well enough, but he could not speak the trade language with any fluency as yet. He said, “Can you speak Wufea?”
“Easily. One of my favorite languages,” Ghlikh said. “We Dhulhulikh speak many tongues, of which Wufea is one of the least difficult.”
Ulysses said, “What news do you bring, Ghlikh?”
“Much to amuse and inform. But with your permission, my Lord, we will put that off until later. At the moment, I am empowered by the Wagarondit to speak first with you. They wish you well, which they should, since you are also their god—they think.”
The bat-man’s tone was slightly sarcastic. Ulysses looked hard at him, but Ghlikh only smiled, exposing long yellowish teeth.
Ulysses said, “They think?”
“Well,” Ghlikh answered, “they cannot understand why you took the part of the Wufea when they were only intent on bringing you to this village where you could be properly honored, or what they think is such.”
Ulysses wanted to push on and ignore the creature, who was making him somewhat queasy. But Awina had told him that the batpeople were the couriers, the representatives, the gossipers, and the functionaries of many things. It was protocol that a bat-man act as arbitrator between two parties who wished to make arrangements for peace, trade or sometimes for a limited war. In addition, the batmen sometimes became traders themselves, flying in with small, lightweight, but much desired goods from some unknown country, perhaps their own.
“You tell them that I was attacked by two of their number. And for this I punished all of them,” Ulysses said.
“I will tell them so,” Ghlikh said. “And do you plan any more punishment?”
“Not unless they do something to deserve it.” Ghlikh hesitated and swallowed audibly, his craggy Adam’s apple jumping like a monkey on a stick. Evidently he was not as superior as he pretended to be. Or perhaps he knew that he was vulnerable while on the ground, however lofty his opinion of himself was.
“The Wagarondit say that it is only fair that they should ask even a god to prove that he is a god.”
Awina, standing behind Ulysses, whispered, “Lord, forgive me. But a word of advice might help. These arrogant Wagarondit need a lesson, and if you let them push you around…”
Ulysses agreed with her, but he did not want advice unless he asked for it. He held up his hand to indicate that she should be quiet. To Ghlikh he said, “I do not have to prove anything, but I can be petitioned.”
Ghlikh smiled as if he had guessed that Ulysses would say that. The sun struck pale flames in his cat-yellow eyes, He said, “The Wagarondit, then, beg you to kill The Old Being With The Long Hand. The monster has been ravaging the fields and even the villages for many years. He has destroyed many crops and storehouses and sometimes puts entire villages close to starvation. The Old Being has killed many warriors sent out against him, crippled others, and always conquered. Or he has run away, eluding whole hunting parties, only to show up elsewhere and tromp down and eat whole fields of corn or crush houses and push over great palisades of heavy logs.”
“I will consider their petition,” Ulysses said, “and I will answer in the next few days. Meanwhile, unless there is something else to talk about, let us go on.”
“There is only trivia, news and gossip I bring from many villages of many tribes of different peoples,” Ghlikh said. “You may find some of it entertaining or even instructive, my Lord.”
Ulysses did not know if that last was a sneer at the supposed omniscience of a god, but he decided to let it pass. However, if it became necessary, he would grab hold of the skinny little monster and wring his neck as an object lesson. The batpeople might be sacred, or at least privileged, but if this fellow became too insulting, he could damage Ulysses’ image as a god.
They walked down the hill and across the floor of the valley, passing over a wooden bridge over a creek about three hundred feet wide. On the other side were fields of corn and other plants and also meadows on which a red-wooled sheep with three crumpled horns chomped on the long blue-green grass. The number of stone and wooden hoes and scythes left in the fields showed that the women and children had been working up to the last moment.
To the beat of the drums, the Wufea marched up to the gates, and here Ulysses confronted the chiefs and the priests. The bat-man had launched himself from the hillside and had flown above them as they had marched across the valley. Now he glided in and landed a few feet away from Ulysses, running a little distance after coming to earth. He came back, waddling on his bowed legs, his leathery bone-ribbed wings half-open.
There was more talk, conducted with Ghlikh as go-between. Then the overchief, Djiidaumokh, sank to his knees and rubbed Ulysses’ hand on his forehead. The other chiefs and priests followed, and Ulysses and his band entered the village.
There were several days of feasting and speech-making before Ulysses continued his march. He visited ten Wagarondit villages in all. Ulysses was curious about what payment Ghlikh got for his services. Ghlikh by now rode with them on the back of a Wagarondit brave, his bandy legs wrapped around the thick furry neck.
“My payment!” he said, waving his hand airily. “Oh, I am fed and lodged and a few other of my needs are taken care of. I am a simple person. I only want to talk to many different peoples, to converse, to satisfy my curiosity and theirs, to be of service. I derive my greatest joy from being of service.”
“That is all you ask?”
“Oh, sometimes I accept a few baubles, some gemstones or excellently carved figurines or objects like that. But my main item of trade is information.”
Ulysses did not comment, but he felt that there was more to Ghlikh’s business than he said.
On the way back to the first Wagarondit village, the chief, Djiidaumokh, asked him what he meant to do about The Old Being With The Long Hand.
“The people of Nisheymanakh, the third village we visited, have sent a messenger saying that The Old Being has ravaged one of their fields again. He killed two warriors who went after him.”
Ulysses sighed. Noblesse oblige could not be put off.
He said, “Let us go after this creature at once.”
He called Ghlikh to him and said, “Have the Wagarondit ever used you to locate The Old Being With The Long Hand?”
“Never,” Ghlikh said.
“Why not?”
“They never thought of it, I suppose.”
“And you never thought of telling them how valuable you could be?”
“No. I suppose that The Old Being is more valuable to me alive than dead. If he is dead, then I have just that much less exciting news.”
“You will locate The Old Being,” Ulysses said.
Ghlikh’s eyes narrowed, and his thin lips became a thread. But he said, “Of course, my Lord.”
Ulysses knew from conversations he had overheard that at least four generations of Wagarondit had known The Old Being. But he was not always in Wagarondit territory. Sometimes he disappeared for years, and he must then be ravaging the unknown peoples to the north, the west and perhaps in the great forest to the east. He was a huge animal and he had a big territory to cover.<
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From the description he had pieced together, Ulysses knew that The Old Being had to be an elephant of some sort. But what an elephant! He must be twenty feet high at the shoulder and he had four tusks! The upper tusks curved upward and the lower tusks curved down and back. The Long Hand was the proboscis.
The Old Being’s wiliness, his avoidance of traps, his deadly ambushes, his ability to disappear, were legendary.
“He has far more intelligence than you would expect from a nonsentient,” Ulysses said to Ghlikh. Awina stood near them.
“Who said he was one who had no speech?” Ghlikh said.
Ulysses was surprised. “You mean, he can talk?”
Ghlikh’s eyelids lowered. He said, “I would not know, of course. I was merely pointing out that no one actually knows whether or not he can talk.”
“Is he the only one of his kind?” Ulysses said.
“I would not know. There are those who say that there are many of his kind many marches to the north. I do not know.”
“You should,” Ulysses said. “You get around a lot. You fly far, and even if you do not go north, surely there are others of your people who do.”
“I do not know,” Ghlikh said, but Ulysses thought he detected a barely repressed amusement on his face.
He shoved down his anger, however, and said, “Tell me, Ghlikh, have you ever seen…?” and then he halted. There was no word for metal in the Wufea speech. Not as far as he knew, anyway. He proceeded to describe metal. Then, remembering his knife, he brought it out and unfolded it. Ghlikh, his eyes wide, breathing harder than he should, asked permission to handle the blade. Ulysses watched him while the long skinny fingers felt the steel, gently ran the edge of his thumb over the edge, tasted it with his warty tongue, and held it flat against the vellum cheek. Finally, Ghlikh handed the knife back.
The Neshgai, he continued in response to Ulysses’ questioning, were a race of giants who lived in a giant village of giant houses made of some strange material. Their city was on the southern coast of this land. On the other side of Wurutana. The Neshgai walked on two legs, and their tusks were only two and very tiny compared to those of The Old Being. But they had big ears and a long nose that fell to their waists. They looked as if they were descended from a creature something like The Old Being.
Ulysses was so full of questions he did not know which to ask first.
“What is your idea of Wurutana?” he said.
His question was phrased thus because he did not want Ghlikh to know how ignorant he was of his ancient enemy.
Ghlikh, startled, said, “What do you mean? My idea?”
“What is Wurutana to you?”
“To me?”
“Yes. What would you call him?”
“The Great Devourer. The All-Powerful. He Who Grows.”
“Yes, I know, but what does he look like? To you?”
Ghlikh must have guessed that Ulysses was trying to get, a description of something which he did not know. Ghlikh smiled so sarcastically that Ulysses wanted to smash that thin skull.
“Wurutana is so vast that I cannot find words to describe him.”
“You chatterbox!” Ulysses said. “You runner-off-at-the-mouth! Winged monkey-face! You cannot find words?”
Ghlikh looked sullen but did not say anything. Ulysses then said, “Very well! Tell me! Are there beings like me anywhere on this land?”
Ghlikh said, “Oh, yes, some!”
“Well, where are they?”
“On the other side of Wurutana. On the seacoast, many marches west of the Neshgai.”
“Why didn’t you tell me about them?” Ulysses cried.
Ghlikh looked astonished. He said, “Why should I? You did not ask me about them. It is true that they look much like you, but they are no gods. They are just another race of sentients to me.”
So now he had the most urgent of reasons to go south. He would have to confront Wurutana, whether he wanted to or not. If the Wufea and Ghlikh were to be believed, Wurutana covered the land except on the north and south seacoasts.
Ghlikh drew a rough map of the land’s outlines in the mud of a creek bank.
North was land marked Unknown. Below that was a crude triangle with the northern part forming the broad base. There was ocean or sea on all parts except the northern unknown. Ghlikh said rumors were that the sea was there too.
Ulysses wondered if the land was all that was left of the eastern part of the United States. The level of the ocean could be much higher. Thus, the Midwest and the Atlantic coastal plain would be submerged. This land might be all of what was left of the former Appalachian Mountain Range. Of course, while he was in his “petrified” state, he could have been taken to other continents and this might be all that was left of a certain part of Eurasia. Or he could be on another planet of another star. He did not think so, but it was possible.
If only he could find something that would identify this place. But after many millions of years, everything would be gone. The bones of men would have perished, except for a few fossilized skeletons, and how many humans had a chance to become fossilized? The steel would have rusted away, the plastic would have deteriorated, the cement would have crumbled, the stone of the pyramids and the Sphinx, of the marble statues of the Greeks and the Americans, all would have been eroded to dust long ago. Nothing of man’s would remain, except possibly for some flint tools made by Stone Age men. These might survive long after man’s history had perished with his books, machines, cities and bones.
Mountain ranges had been born, lifted up and fallen again. Continents had split and the islands drifted away from each other. Ocean beds had been emptied, new lands risen, old lands become oceans. What was rough and elevated was smooth and level. What was smooth and level was crumpled and raised. Great masses of stone ground against each other and rubbed man’s remains to dust. Billions of tons of water roared into suddenly opened valleys and swept everything out or buried it in mud.
Nothing except the land and the sea was left, water and earth in new shapes, new containers. Only life had gone on, and life had taken some new shapes, though there were still old forms around.
But—if Ghlikh could be believed—humankind still survived!
Man was no longer lord of life, but he still lived.
Ulysses would go south.
First, he had to kill The Old Being With The Long Hand to prove his godhood.
He questioned the bat-man more. Ghlikh became uneasy and even irritated at times, but he did not become openly angry. Finally, Ulysses said, “Then there are volcanoes and hot springs up north which give out a strong and sickening stench?”
“Yes,” Ghlikh said.
Ghlikh knew more about the north than he had intended to reveal, but Ulysses did not wish to delve into the reasons for his reticence at this time. All he wanted was information.
“How far to the north?”
“Ten days’ march.”
About two hundred miles, Ulysses reckoned.
“You will guide us there.”
Ghlikh opened his mouth as if to protest but then shut it.
Ulysses called in the chiefs and priests of the Wufea and the Wagarondit and told them what he wanted done while he was gone.
The officials were puzzled about his instructions for the collection and treatment of excrement and the making of charcoal. He told them that he would reveal the reasons later.
In addition, he wanted as big a war party and as many juvenile males as could be spared to go with him to the north. On the way they would look for The Old Being, although this party was not primarily to track him down. But it was very much involved with the killing of The Old Being.
The chiefs were not happy about his demands, but they went ahead and put them into effect. A week later a big party of a hundred adult warriors, two hundred juvenile males, several priests, Awina and Ulysses set out for the north. Ghlikh was of them, though not always with them. He flew ahead and scouted the territory, and many times spotted game
for them and three times hostile scouts. The hostiles were a people who seemed to be a variety of the Wagarondit. Their fur was black and they had auburn bars across their eyes and cheeks but otherwise were the same as their southern cousins.
The Alkunquib gathered a big war party and tried to ambush Ulysses’ party. Ghlikh reported on their location, and so the ambushers became ambushees. The surprise, plus the arrows, with which the Alkunquib were totally unfamiliar, plus the appearance of the giant Ulysses, plus the story which the Alkunquib must have heard of his godhood, turned the battle into a massacre. Ulysses did not lead any charges, nor did the chiefs expect him to. He was happy about that. Was a god supposed to be able to be wounded? He did not like to ask anybody, of course. It was possible that they expected even gods to have to endure wounds. After all, the Greeks and other peoples had thought their gods immortal but not invulnerable.
As it was, he stood to one side and used his great bow with deadly effect. He thanked his God that he had taken archery in high school and then continued it as a hobby in his post-graduate days. He was a good shot, and his bow was far stronger than those of the Wufea. Though they were wiry and strong, despite their small size, he was too big for them. His arms pulled the bow—the “mighty bow of Odysseus,” that other Ulysses, he thought—and the arrows went true enough to kill twelve of the Alkunquib and severely wound five others. The enemy broke and ran after six minutes of battle, and many of them were speared or tomahawked in the back. The survivors were brave, however. On reaching their village, where the females, children and old warriors were waiting in terror, all the males able to hold a weapon, including six-year-olds, stood before the gates, which were closed. With a yell, the Wufea and the Wagarondit, blooded brothers, as it were, rushed the defenders. They did so in an unorganized manner and so got beat back with heavy casualties. Ulysses took advantage of a lull to tell them that they were to leave the Alkunquib and march on.