Avram Davidson - The Kar-Chee Reign

At one point upon the surface of the chart the outline altered as they watched. Shifted… flowed… was still.

“What? Liam? What …? ”

He said, with a kind of fierce joy in knowledge, “The ancients spoke of things, of measures, which they called dimensions . Length. Width. Depth. Time. Most of their maps showed only two of them: length and width. Some, as they called them, relief maps , these showed depth as well.” His fingers, scrabbling hastily in the dirt, tried to give evidence of what he was trying to explain and convey. “But none of these ancient maps ever showed or could ever show time! If an area changed, the map became obsolete… outdated… useless. It was necessary to make a new one. But — somehow — I don’t know how and it doesn’t matter now — somehow this Devil-map does show time!”

And his finger stabbed the surface of the chart. “And here we have the proof! Just now, this moment before, we heard and we felt another portion of the land go sliding into the sea — no doubt another link in the chain of reactions from the first shock — and when we heard this and felt this, we saw it, too! This map never becomes obsolete or ancient, for it is somehow a mirror reflecting every aspect of the earth-sea surface— and responding to every change in the earth-sea surface!”

There was brief silence. Some implication of what he was trying to imply came through; more confusion than enlightenment remained. But the conversation now shifted, and abruptly, for the third time, as Fateem said, in a dreamy, stifled voice, “But the Devils have Rickar, and we know what they will do with him…”

Gaspar would not listen. That is, they spoke to him, and they refused to stop speaking until they had told him in complete detail just what they had seen the Kar-chee and the dragons doing to the captives there in the cavern; and in a physical sense he could not have helped but hear them. Once or twice his eyes blinked very rapidly, but there was not a tear in them, and he neither replied nor even stopped in his moving from one place to another nor in his giving ceaseless orders and directions. His ears must have heard. But his mind would not listen. It was entirely possible that after they had done with talking he could not have repeated a single thing they had told him, even if he had wished to.

In his own way, certainly, he had loved his son — and from any ordinary danger he would certainly have risked his own life and the resources of his community in order to try to save his son’s life. But his commitment to the axioms and principles of the Knowers was total: Manifest Nature made certain demands of mankind, not capriciously but of necessity; if these were flouted the inevitable result was the punishment consisting of the double-Devils; the double-Devils were produced by unjust and sinful conduct; to resist them was to square the transgression, and — certainly — an attempt to aid one caught in doing so would be (at least) to cube it. Therefore Gaspar did not, would not, dared not, could not, allow his mind to consider what Liam and Fateem or anyone else was trying to tell him — that it was possible for Rickar still to be saved, perhaps — that it might well be that, in the shock of the quakes, no man-baiting had been held — and that, if Rickar were still living, it might be possible… somehow… somehow… to save him.

In which case it was imperative to try.

But Gaspar, clearly, would not try.

He would not even try.

Nor would any Knower.

What then?

While all those who followed Gaspar, whether of his original following, or the converts from the raft people, or those of the island’s people who had been persuaded that there was no hope or answer save in the arks — while all these toiled and troubled and swarmed like ants to bring their departure to as soon a moment as possible, Liam spoke his mind aloud to those few who followed him and who looked to him for hope and answer.

“He came with me because he trusted in me, and he trusted in me because I had once been in arms against the Kar-chee. He himself had never even seen them — to him they were just part of what the older people nagged on and on about. Probably he didn’t fully realize how dangerous they really are. But I did. And I let him come with me. Why? I wasn’t trying to defy people who had always been telling me what to do… No, it wasn’t mere rebellion with me. I wanted to know more about the two Devils, and I wanted to know more so that the next time I resisted them I would feel that something more than flight or slaughter would be the result.

“And he trusted and he followed. Now, the trip wasn’t for nothing. We’ve learned a few things. We know what they use to make the thunder that splits the rocks apart — and we’ve got much of it with us, too. And we know that what we saw in the cavern isn’t all that there is to see about the Kar-chee. There’s something more, much more, and it lies below — deep below. Well—

“Easy to say he was taken because of his own act. His act was based on my words and my words were meant to save the blue thunderheads. He did his best for them… for us… me…

“Shouldn’t we do our best for him? Should we? We saw something of the risk. Are we to take it? And if we aren’t, then what are we to do in place of it which justifies anything we’ve already done? — and particularly Rickar’s capture—”

His voice broke off. Not more than a few paces away three men trotted by, driving a group of llamas en route to the arks. The men’s face were grimed with the sweat of their haste and the dust of the path which rose and swirled around them. They did not notice the others; the others, intent upon Liam and on Liam’s questions, did not notice them. But Liam noticed them. And as he did, there welled up in him the thought that here was his answer—

But when he sought words to frame the answer he could not find them, and when he tried to resolve his thoughts he realized that he had no clear pictures of them. Yet the certainty persisted. The brown and white fleeces of the llamas, then, aboard the older ark… the newer ones, too, if they were readied in time, presumably… And then the answer, like a bubble, welled up and broke upon the surface of his mind.

He saw the relief mingled with excitement on the faces of his friends as they saw the change on his face. They listened, intent, undoubting, willing, absorbed, as he told them what was to be done. Their numbers were to be divided — thus and thus and thus — and, with them, the quantity of thunderheads; immediately the blue points were carefully separated. A few more directions were given, places appointed, hands shaken and withdrawn regretfully, caresses briefly exchanged.

On all sides sweating people streamed like ants to and from carrying provisions and material to the arks. Liam, Lors, and Duro walked, rapidly, apart, bound upon this mission of their own. The others watched out of sight, then parted upon their own assigned tasks. They had made their decisions. There was to be no room for them in the arks.

The two tall, gaunt dusty-black forms lay where they had fallen. Either the Kar-chee felt no impulse toward retrieving their dead for burial, or else the necessities of their present condition had allowed them no time to come back for this purpose. Still, the men had no way of knowing that the Devil-things might not come back at any moment. Prudently, Lors and Duro stood on different rises of ground, standing watch — but, equally prudently, they first pulled out the fatal bolts with their obsidian points and vanes and replaced them in their ammunition pouches.

Liam and Tom had in their time flayed and flensed many a carcass, but neither had ever dismembered a Kar-chee carcass. The task was inherently unpleasant, and was made more so by the bitter reek. Tom, his mouth twisted, said, “They have no bones, then… okh! ”