The Wombflash Forest
: A Voyage To ArcturusHe awoke to his third day on Tormance. His limbs ached. He lay on his
side, looking stupidly at his surroundings. The forest was like night,
but that period of the night when the grey dawn is about to break and
objects begin to be guessed at, rather than seen. Two or three amazing
shadowy shapes, as broad as houses, loomed up out of the twilight. He
did not realise that they were trees, until he turned over on his back
not calculate the height, he saw their tops glittering in the sunlight,
against a tiny patch of blue sky.
Clouds of mist, rolling over the floor of the forest, kept interrupting
his view. In their silent passage they were like phantoms flitting among
the trees. The leaves underneath him were sodden, and heavy drops of
moisture splashed onto his head from time to time.
He continued lying there, trying to reconstruct the events of the
preceding day. His brain was lethargic and confused. Something terrible
had happened, but what it was he could not for a long time recollect.
Then suddenly there came before his eyes that ghastly closing scene at
dusk on the Sant plateau--Spadevil's crushed and bloody features and
Tydomin's dying sighs.... He shuddered convulsively, and felt sick.
The peculiar moral outlook that had dictated these brutal murders had
departed from him during the night, and now he recognised what he
had done! During the whole of the previous day he seemed to have
been labouring under a series of heavy enchantments. First Oceaxe had
enslaved him, then Tydomin, then Spadevil, and lastly Catice. They
had forced him to murder and violate; he had guessed nothing, but had
imagined that he was travelling as a free and enlightened stranger.
What was this nightmare journey for--and would it continue, in the same
way?...
The silence of the forest was so intense that he heard no sound except
the pumping of blood through his arteries.
Putting his hand to his face, he found that his remaining probe had
disappeared and that he was in possession of three eyes. The third eye
was on his forehead, where the old sorb had been. He could not guess its
use. He still had his third arm, but it was nerveless.
Now he puzzled his head for a long time, trying unsuccessfully to recall
that name which had been the last word spoken by Catice.
He got up, with the intention of resuming his journey. He had no toilet
to make, and no meal to prepare. The forest was tremendous. The nearest
tree appeared to him to have a circumference of at least a hundred feet.
Other dim boles looked equally large. But what gave the scene its aspect
of immensity was the vast spaces separating tree from tree. It was
like some gigantic, supernatural hall in a life after death. The
lowest branches were fifty yards or more from the ground. There was
no underbrush; the soil was carpeted only by the dead, wet leaves. He
looked all around him, to find his direction, but the cliffs of Sant,
which he had descended, were invisible--every way was like every other
way, he had no idea which quarter to attack. He grew frightened, and
muttered to himself. Craning his neck back, he stared upward and
tried to discover the points of the compass from the direction of the
sunlight, but it was impossible.
While he was standing there, anxious and hesitating, he heard the drum
taps. The rhythmical beats proceeded from some distance off. The unseen
drummer seemed to be marching through the forest, away from him.
"Surtur!" he said, under his breath. The next moment he marvelled at
himself for uttering the name. That mysterious being had not been in his
thoughts, nor was there any ostensible connection between him and the
drumming.
He began to reflect--but in the meantime the sounds were travelling
away. Automatically he started walking in the same direction. The drum
beats had this peculiarity--though odd and mystical, there was nothing
awe-inspiring in them, but on the contrary they reminded him of some
place and some life with which he was perfectly familiar. Once again
they caused all his other sense impressions to appear false.
The sounds were intermittent. They would go on for a minute, or for
five minutes, and then cease for perhaps a quarter of an hour. Maskull
followed them as well as he could. He walked hard among the huge,
indistinct trees, in the attempt to come up with the origin of the
noise, but the same distance always seemed to separate them. The forest
from now onward descended. The gradient was mostly gentle--about one
foot in ten--but in some places it was much steeper, and in other parts
again it was practically level ground for quite long stretches. There
were great swampy marshes, through which Maskull was obliged to splash.
It was a matter of indifference to him how wet he became--if only he
could catch sight of that individual with the drum. Mile after mile was
covered, and still he was no nearer to doing so.
The gloom of the forest settled down upon his spirits. He felt
despondent, tired, and savage. He had not heard the drum beats for some
while, and was half inclined to discontinue the pursuit.
Passing around a great, columnar tree trunk, he almost stumbled against
a man who was standing on the farther side. He was leaning against
the trunk with one hand, in an attitude of repose. His other hand was
resting on a staff. Maskull stopped short and started at him.
He was nearly naked, and of gigantic build. He over-topped Maskull by a
head. His face and body were faintly phosphorescent. His eyes--three in
number--were pale green and luminous, shining like lamps. His skin was
hairless, but the hair of his head was piled up in thick, black coils,
and fastened like a woman's. His features were absolutely tranquil, but
a terrible, quiet energy seemed to lie just underneath the surface.
Maskull addressed him. "Did the drumming come from you?"
The man shook his head.
"What is your name?"
He replied in a strange, strained, twisted voice. Maskull gathered that
the name he gave was "Dreamsinter."
"What is that drumming?"
"Surtur," said Dreamsinter.
"Is it advisable for me to follow it?"
"Why?"
"Perhaps he intends me to. He brought me here from Earth."
Dreamsinter caught hold of him, bent down, and peered into his face.
"Not you, but Nightspore."
This was the first time that Maskull had heard Nightspore's name since
his arrival on the planet. He was so astonished that he could frame no
more questions.
"Eat this," said Dreamsinter. "Then we will chase the sound together."
He picked something up from the ground and handed it to Maskull. He
could not see distinctly, but it felt like a hard, round nut, of the
size of a fist.
"I can't crack it."
Dreamsinter took it between his hands, and broke it into pieces. Maskull
then ate some of the pulpy interior, which was intensely disagreeable.
"What am I doing in Tormance, then?" he asked.
"You came to steal Muspel-fire, to give a deeper life to men--never
doubting if your soul could endure that burning."
Maskull could hardly decipher the strangled words.
"Muspel.... That's the name I've been trying to remember ever since I
awoke."
Dreamsinter suddenly turned his head sideways, and appeared to listen
for something. He motioned with his hand to Maskull to keep quiet.
"Is it the drumming?"
"Hush! They come."
He was looking toward the upper forest. The now familiar drum rhythm was
heard--this time accompanied by the tramp of marching feet.
Maskull saw, marching through the trees and heading toward them, three
men in single file separated from one another by only a yard or so. They
were travelling down hill at a swift pace, and looked neither to left
nor right. They were naked. Their figures were shining against the black
background of the forest with a pale, supernatural light--green and
ghostly. When they were abreast of him, about twenty feet off, he
perceived who they were. The first man was himself--Maskull. The second
was Krag. The third man was Nightspore. Their faces were grim and set.
The source of the drumming was out of sight. The sound appeared to come
from some point in front of them. Maskull and Dreamsinter put themselves
in motion, to keep up with the swiftly moving marchers. At the same time
a low, faint music began.
Its rhythm stepped with the drum beats, but, unlike the latter, it
did not seem to proceed from any particular quarter of the forest. It
resembled the subjective music heard in dreams, which accompanies the
dreamer everywhere, as a sort of natural atmosphere, rendering all his
experiences emotional. It seemed to issue from an unearthly orchestra,
and was strongly troubled, pathetic and tragic. Maskull marched, and
listened; and as he listened, it grew louder and stormier. But the pulse
of the drum interpenetrated all the other sounds, like the quiet beating
of reality.
His emotion deepened. He could not have said if minutes or hours were
passing. The spectral procession marched on, a little way ahead, on
a path parallel with his own and Dreamsinter's. The music pulsated
violently. Krag lifted his arm, and displayed a long, murderous-looking
knife. He sprang forward and, raising it over the phantom Maskull's
back, stabbed him twice, leaving the knife in the wound the second time.
Maskull threw up his arms, and fell down dead. Krag leaped into the
forest and vanished from sight. Nightspore marched on alone, stern and
unmoved.
The music rose to crescendo. The whole dim, gigantic forest was roaring
with sound. The tones came from all sides, from above, from the ground
under their feet. It was so grandly passionate that Maskull felt his
soul loosening from its bodily envelope.
He continued to follow Nightspore. A strange brightness began to glow in
front of them. It was not daylight, but a radiance such as he had never
seen before, and such as he could not have imagined to be possible.
Nightspore moved straight toward it. Maskull felt his chest bursting.
The light flashed higher. The awful harmonies of the music followed hard
one upon another, like the waves of a wild, magic ocean.... His body was
incapable of enduring such shocks, and all of a sudden he tumbled over
in a faint that resembled death.
More
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