Jack Chalker - Priam's Lens

It was a long time until morning.

Morning, in fact, brought little relief and not much comfort, except that he’d determined that this was as far as he would or could come. Today he would observe as Father Alex had asked him to do, even with a pounding headache and feeling a little dizzy, and then he’d make his way down as fast as he safely could. He found his body was covered with small bites, most of which itched something fierce but none of which seemed to have a poison that might cause him any long-term harm. Some clearly couldn’t get through his tough, leathery skin.

Emerging from the warm, moist cave, though, he found himself suddenly in a dawn only a few degrees above freezing, and this made him feel frozen all over. He ate two of the bars, tried to rub some circulation back into his limbs, and then found a ledge that seemed designed for the purpose Father Alex had in mind. In fact, it absolutely looked as if somebody had built it, probably the ancients who had used this trail in those faraway times. They wanted a place to stop and relax and view the spectacular panorama in front of them. He had the same objective, but while the beauty wasn’t lost on him, he wasn’t wearing what they almost certainly had been, and that made a lot of difference in landscape appreciation. All he wanted now was down, but until he got what he came for, that was a direction he could not go.

The valley that had been so vast when they’d camped in it seemed almost like a small crack, with a series of waterfalls going off the sides of the mountain and feeding, perhaps creating, the river that in turn had carved it. He could follow the river, which tradition named the Styx, from its meandering reflection in the rapidly rising sunshine.

The plain was also smaller than it seemed, although certainly it stretched far enough. He could see the larger rivers and other basic landmarks, including the rock where the ghost might still wait, although it looked like a tiny speck, and then way beyond.

The grasslands spread out in all directions. There were a few groves of trees here and there, but mostly the plain was treeless. Grass and grains much taller than a man covered it all. When the wind came in, the grass blew and seemed like a vast sea—not grass at all but water whose waves gently traversed the horizon, were in constant motion. He knew that down in those grasses were bushes and small trees that got no direct sun energy but produced various fruits and vegetables. Others were all over in between the grasses just growing wild in the ground, but they were evident only as slightly darker patches on the grassland quilt.

In the center of the plain, in the one area where people did not go, were the demon flowers. They were certainly pretty, particularly from up here, and as tall as the grasses, and with enormous flowers of golds and purples and reds and even silvers. They too, moved in unison, as if pushed by the winds, but, curiously, not as the grasses nearby moved. Rather, it was almost as if those flowers were blown by a different wind, a demon wind only they could feel.

He realized that the three Families that the plain supported had a system wherein they went round and round the demon garden in a series of overlapping circles until they reached common outer boundaries like the valley, after which they began to spiral back. Each of the three Families met the two others at some point without ever traversing the center or the same groves. It struck him that the so-called randomness of Family movements was anything but. They were as predictable as the times of the moons. If the demons were not stupid, which they certainly were not, and the Hunters were in any way competent, which they certainly were, then at any time at all the Families were, in fact, vulnerable targets. They hid well, but what is the good of hiding if your enemies know exactly where you are?

And with that it struck him that the Families had to be something different than they thought they were. If the demons and the Hunters, the forces of evil, could get them at any time, then they were being allowed to survive. Or, perhaps, they were simply ignored unless they got in the way of whatever the others happened to be doing.

The grassland plain was vast, but, off in the distance on both sides, he could see other mountain ranges, and he understood then that it was actually a kind of bowl. Only a three-sided bowl, though, for directly in front of him, almost at the horizon even at this height, was the great ocean, and to the far western side, probably where the distant ranges met the sea, was the city of the demons.

You couldn’t miss it. Even from this far away, countless kilometers if he’d had any way to measure or truly under-stand the measurement, the eerie and huge place throbbed and radiated with energy and light. Unlike the sun, you could look at it, but what you saw made little sense. Bright, throbbing, an elongated egg shape from the look of it, with a single dark line dividing it into two equal halves horizontally. Smaller versions flanked it, and in back two bloblike towers rose.

Father Alex had said not to look, but it was difficult not to, even though the danger was most certainly there. How could they, so very far away, possibly know if one little man was staring at their city?

But they did know. They, or something of them. As he stared, finding it harder and harder to take his eyes off the distant alien-looking city, which had to be enormous to be so clear from this vantage point, he found himself almost going into a trance; the chill and the lack of oxygen and the fatigue just seemed to drain away. Not that they were gone—they just didn’t seem to matter anymore.

And suddenly he saw that there was far more out there than had ever been apparent. Thin lines that looked to be made of nothing solid, of nothing he could comprehend, all over the sky, above him, below him, creating a complex but highly geometric three-dimensional grid that linked up with the distant city on the one hand and with certain points in the high mountains on either side and behind him somewhere. He had never seen them before, and did not understand why he had not, nor what they could possibly be, but they covered everything, the whole of creation.

He didn’t actually feel their presence, either; nothing rummaged in his mind, possibly because it already knew that there was nothing of interest to it there. But, slowly, without his even realizing it, it was as if a part of him was being drawn out, as if scum were skimmed off the top of standing water, or more like the wisps of cloud that made Littlefeet who he was just breaking off and lazily drifting out over the edge and above the plain toward that distant strange sight.

As if something cared not about his body but was skimming off his soul.

A thick cloud broke off and away behind him and slowly drifted overhead, darkening the lookout and dropping the temperature. It continued on, sinking as it went until he suddenly found himself in a chill fog unable to see the distant place. It felt like a connection had been broken, and at once the discomfort was all too real.

Still, he felt not fear or anger but confusion. It was odd; he couldn’t seem to remember who he was, or where he was, or why he was there. It was as if the humanity had been drained from him, leaving him only basic animal reasoning. He was tired and he was cold. He carefully made his way back toward the trail, which some remaining instinct said was the safe way to go, and then he started down, just wanting out of there, down from there, and out of the cold, wet cloud.

He had no idea then or later how he got down; everything was a total blur. When they found him, wandering near the base of the mountain near the entrance to the valley, he was dazed, confused, and didn’t seem to recognize anyone.