E. Tubb - The Winds of Gath

Sound which contained within itself the sum total of every noise that had been made or could be made in the lifetime of the universe.

That was the unique attraction of Gath.

He shifted, a little restlessly, conscious of the sound without actually being able to hear it. Coldly his mind evaluated the incident. There was nothing mysterious about it. There were only so many cycles to the range of the human ear. There were only so many combinations of sound possible within that range. Given enough time, each of those combinations must be played.

He made a slight adjustment to the recorder.

Dumarest gritted his teeth and clamped his hands over his ears. It made little difference. The blast of the wind was not so easily beaten; the voices refused to be silenced.

He felt that he stood in the center of a shouting crowd, all yelling against the thunder of music, the accumulated roar of factories. He heard the hissing whine of rocket engines, the rolling crescendo of atomic destruction, the thudding blast of endless cannon. He heard the screams of burning men, the shrieks of ravaged women. The wail of tormented children made a threnody of pain laced with hymns, paeans, the shanties of drunken seamen. The creak of ropes blended with the sullen throb of engines.

"No!"

His shout was lost in the wind. The storm was too strong, the wind too powerful, human resistance too low. Lightning cast its garish light over the plain. He could see a musician beating time, his eyes glazed with madness. A tourist ran recklessly toward the sea. A traveler ripped at his clothes, his nails raking his flesh. Voices drummed within his skull.

" Blessed are the meek for they shall inherit. . "

" E equals MC squared …."

" The Curfew tolls the knell of parting …"

"No, Harry! For God's sake …"

"Two drops and…"

A million voices in a thousand tongues merging with the natural sounds, the factory noises, the music and songs and sounds of peace and war so that they, like the mingled colors of the spectrum, formed a "white," a composite noise.

Dumarest groaned with the pain of his ears.

Rational thought was impossible. It was hard to concentrate: words formed themselves to follow the trend of thought; mental images flocked to dull logical sequence.

He stooped and grabbed handfuls of wet dirt. He lifted the mud and slammed it over his ears, piling it high, adding to the sticky stuff until the impact of the wind had fallen to a low murmur. The dead man watched him from where he lay.

Waiting for Dumarest to join him in the mud.

He turned barely in time, catching a glimpse of naked metal, the afterglow of a lightning flash on polished steel. He jerked sideways, his skin crawling to the fear of poison. A small shape hit him as he grabbed at the wrist. He missed and doubled as a foot drove into his groin. Half blinded with pain he backed and fell over the body of the dead man.

The glare of lightning showed him the figure of the crone, eyes wild, ears muffled, the heavy needle poised over his eyes.

He grabbed, rolling as the light died, managing to wrench the sliver of steel from her hand. The mud fell from his ears and his head ached to the windborne hammer of sound. He felt a lithe body and gripped it, hands searching for the throat. He missed, felt metal instead and ripped the muffs from her ears.

And lost her in the darkness.

He sprang to his feet as the next flash lighted the sky. He saw her running away from him, heading toward the cliffs and the sea below. He followed, slipping in the mud, retching from the pain in his groin. He saw her once more, a ragged figure silhouetted against the sky, then she vanished as the light died.

She was gone when the next flash came.

Slowly Dumarest walked back toward the mountains. He scooped up fresh mud to cover his ears, wondering how long the storm would last, how intense it would grow. The limit must be very close. Sheer sound, alone, could not kill but the accompanying ultrasonics could, if there were ultrasonics. From the pain in his ears he knew that the possibility was high.

He reached the dead man, passed him, and continued toward the tents of the Matriarch. He was close to the area, heading to where Sime had rested his coffin, when the storm reached its climax.

The wind fell, the lightning flared raggedly in the sky and nature seemed to hold its breath. Things took on a peculiar clarity in the electric illumination, somehow unreal caught as they were in the stroboscopic effect of the lightning.

Then, as if it had merely paused to gather strength, the wind returned in a savage gust which surpassed all that had gone before.

And, in the eerie flicker of the lightning, Dumarest saw the lid of Sime's coffin rise, tilting, falling aside from the rising figure below.

Dumarest groaned and opened his eyes. He looked at a clear sky dotted with stars, the pale crescents of two moons close to the horizon. He was cold, shivering, his head throbbing to a dull, monotonous ache. He lifted a hand and felt his temple. It was swollen and sticky with congealed blood. He winced as he pressed the wound, feeling relief in the discovery that it was only superficial.

A shape stooped over him, the face suddenly springing to life in the light of a torch held to one side, fading as it was carried further away. Megan stooped lower, his breathing rapid, hands reaching to touch Dumarest in the region of the heart. They halted as he caught the gleam of open eyes.

"What happened?"

"The rafts tore free from their moorings," said Megan quickly. "One of them must have hit you. I tripped over you and thought you might be dead." He looked pale, his face ghastly in the thin light. "There was a dead man lying close to where I found you."

"I know."

"There's a lot of dead." Megan leaned forward to help as Dumarest sat upright. "Too many dead, tourists as well as travelers." He shuddered. "God! What a storm! I've never seen one like it and hope never to see it again."

He shuddered again, pulling sodden rags tight across his chest. The air was frigid with nightside chill and the ground felt crusty as if coated with ice. Dumarest rose to his feet and looked around.

The plain resembled a battlefield. Only the tents of the Matriarch and those of the Prince of Emmened had withstood the final gusts. The rafts had been blown out to sea. The remains of the church lay a tatter of plastic on the ground. The two monks moved from figure to figure, their torches centering them in pools of light, narrowing as they knelt. Sometimes they called for others to help them move a man in which they had found life. They did not call often.

"The ultrasonics," said Megan quietly. "They didn't know enough to take care of themselves-or were too far gone to care." He scratched at the sides of his head and caked mud fell from the region of his ears. His teeth chattered from the biting cold.

"We need shelter and warmth," said Dumarest. He looked at the tents of the Matriarch; they blazed with light and seemed ringed with guards. He looked toward those of the prince: the lights were few, the guards invisible. "Get the men and follow me."

"To the tents of the prince?" Megan blanched with recent memory. "He's not going to like that."

"I don't care what he likes. If those men want to freeze they can stay here. If not they'd better follow."

The tents seemed deserted. Dumarest slowed as he approached, half expecting the challenge of a guard, the searing blast of a laser. But nothing happened, no one stirred, no one snapped an order. He reached the tents and cautiously pressed open the vent of the outer vestibule. He stepped inside. A solitary torch glowed from a bracket. The place was empty.

He found Crowder in the second room.