Roger Zelazny - Donnerjack

“But you appreciate my dilemma?”

“Of course. Life is sweet.”

“Exactly. I’m tempted just to take a walk, find another herd, and start over again. I might, too, if I thought you’d be good for the herd. I do care about them, you know.”

“I’ve never led a herd into real trouble. I’d leave myself rather than bring something bad down on them.”

“May I have your word on that?”

“You have my word.”

“That makes it a little easier then. Move on into that little grove where I used to hang out, tonight. Let them find you there in the morning.”

“I will.”

“Goodbye, Tranto.”

“Goodbye, Scarco.”

The dark form turned and moved away as silently as it had come.

Ayradyss D’Arcy Donnerjack, but late returned from the realms that describe an eccentric orbit about Deep Fields, gazed thoughtfully upon the hotel room’s simple furnishings, upon her sleeping husband, upon the pinkish-grey light of the early dawn, and sighed softly to herself. She still felt disoriented, although she thought it ungrateful to bring this to John’s attention, and Verite was strange to her. She was a creature of change from ancient Virtu and something in her rebelled at the stability that she felt within the very cells of her reborn body.

Strolling to the double glass doors, she parted the sheer curtains, pushed the doors open, and went out onto the balcony to look down at the blue waters of the Caribbean Sea.

The morning air was uncomfortably chill for she was clad in only a light robe of gauzy white silk, but she remained outside, letting the chill wash over her. A small smile played about her lovely mouth as she meditated on the paradox that at one and the same time she could crave the fluidity of her Virtu home locus, a place where she could sprout angel wings from her shoulders and fly, or dive beneath the sea, as finny-tailed as the best mermaid, and yet find herself seeking cold or heat or hunger or any physical sensation strong enough to chase away the terrible fear that she was still dead.

The rising sun had washed the last of the grey from the sky, replacing it with more pink, with orange, with red, with yellow. Clouds were visible now: long, wind-sculpted shapes that in Virtu could quite well have been aerial creatures, but here were merely the workings of wind on water, water that had been pulled into the sky only to fall again to the land and thus be drawn up again in a ceaseless cycle that nonetheless had something of chaos in it. Meteorology was still more art than science for all that chaos theory and fractal geometries had added to science’s comprehension.

Science. Her Donnerjack’s religion for all he denied it. He was a practical man, a hard man, and yet there was a poet in him, a poet that had been drawn to Ayradyss: Nymph of Verite, Mermaid Beneath the Seven Dancing Moons, Angel of the Forsaken Hope. In Virtu, she had fallen in love with her poet, and after the moire had touched her, her poet had drawn her from the lands about Deep Fields. At first she had followed as little more than an automaton, but as the Trails of Bones, Stars, Rainbows, and other exotic things had taken them farther and farther from entropy’s hold, she had followed John with eagerness, finally raising her voice to join his in song to cross the bridges over the obstacles that Death had set before them as any good opponent must— pro forma obstacles, almost—for John D’Arcy Donnerjack had abided by the rules that Death had set and had brought Ayradyss safely from Deep Fields into the living lands, from Virtu into Verite.

No, John D’Arcy Donnerjack had not failed to bring forth his Ayradyss—as Orpheus had failed to bring forth his Eurydice—but something in her wondered at the cold, practical man with whom she shared a bed. Often he was loving enough, attentive, possessive, but now that she knew him in the larger context of his life she wondered that he had striven so hard to take her back from Death, for he often had little time for her outside of the hours that were spent making love or engaging in lover’s chatter.

She wondered if she bored him: clipped-winged angel, tailless mermaid, nymph-no-more, merely woman. A woman possessed of unique, curious knowledge, true; a program crafted for Virtu now residing as a woman of flesh and blood in Verite, but still nothing more than a woman.

Ayradyss, returned so recently from the realms orbiting Deep Fields, heard her new husband stir in his sleep, turned and saw through the window curtain how his arms reached for her and did not find her, saw how he woke to greater awareness and to horrible fear.

“Ayra!” he called and his voice carried the bone-shivering terror that only one who has lost a lover to Death can know.

Ayradyss pushed apart the curtains and hurried to his side, saw the relief that flooded his blanched, anxious face with blood. Sliding into the bed at his side, she felt his burly arms clasp her to him, heard his murmured endearments, felt the rapid beating of his heart begin to slow as he assured himself that she was indeed with him once more, doubted no longer his love, wondered only at the odd shapes that love can take even in Verite where no human is a shapeshifter.

“A problem?”

Abel Hazzard and his wife Carla regarded the imaged tour executive, a Mr. Chalmers, in their family virt space.

“What sort of problem?” Abel asked him. “Lydia is all right, isn’t she?”

“Oh, yes. Quite all right,” Mr. Chalmers assured him. “What we seem to be faced with is a small—retrieval problem.”

“Retrieval? You mean you can’t bring her back?”

“Well, when her time was up the recall sequence was initiated after a small grace period to allow her to finish whatever she was about. So far, she has not responded to the signal.”

“Why not?”

“It seems she is still—occupied. The grace period has run into a number of extensions.”

“Occupied?” Carla asked. “How?”

“Indications are that she is with a lover.”

“Oh. Well, she is there to enjoy herself. Let Lydia have her fun. If there is no physiological danger in extending it a little longer, let her stay on. She’ll tire of it in a while, and we can let her spend some extra time recuperating before she goes back.”

“Thank you,” Chalmers said, smiling. “It is not without precedent, of course, but we are required to keep parents and guardians aware of these matters. Half a day is hardly serious. We’ll notify you as soon as she is returned.”

“Thank you.”

Arthur Eden wore the garment of the lowest grade initiate—a red-and-gold patterned dashikilike affair—though he had not achieved this status. He waited in the courtyard before the temple with a small group of other, similarly clad individuals, both of Virtu and Verite. A service was currently in progress beneath a star-filled sky, which also bore two signs and several portents shining brightly at midheaven.

Slowly, a light descended from the sky, taking on the form of a silver sailing ship, passing overhead, entering through some hidden opening in the roof of the temple. A small ensemble at the left hand of the priest began to play then, a thing of strings and flute. A sigh rose from the congregation, and the priest intoned, “The god has arrived, to oversee the lesser initiation. Let any who are unready speak now and save yourself a profaner’s damnation.”

None responded.

There followed an intoned prayer, then—as in the rehearsal earlier in the week—the musicians moved to a position near the temple doors. The initiation candidates turned in that direction and advanced with slow, measured steps. As they did, the doors were swung open with matching deliberation.