Roger Zelazny: Lord of Light

"Yes."

"They are creatures of energy, rather than matter. Their own traditions have it that once they wore bodies, lived in cities. Their quest for personal immortality, however, led them along a different path from that which Man followed. They found a way to perpetuate themselves as stable fields of energy. They abandoned their bodies to live forever as vortices of force. But pure intellect they are not. They carried with them their complete egos, and born of matter they do ever lust after the flesh. Though they can assume its appearance for a time, they cannot return to it unassisted. For ages they did drift aimlessly about this world. Then the arrival of Man stirred them from their quiescence. They took on the shapes of his nightmares to devil him. This is why they had to be defeated and bound, far beneath the Ratnagaris. We could not destroy them all. We could not permit them to continue their attempts to possess the machines of incarnation and the bodies of men. So they were trapped and contained in great magnetic bottles."

"Yet Sam freed many to do his will," said Tak.

"Aye. He made and kept a nightmare pact, so that some of them do still walk the world. Of all men, they respect perhaps only Siddhartha. And with all men do they share one great vice."

"That being. . .?"

"They do dearly love to gamble. . . . They will make game for any stakes, and gambling debts are their only point of honor. This must be so, or they would not hold the confidence of other gamesters and would so lose that which is perhaps their only pleasure. Their powers being great, even princes will make game with them, hoping to win their services. Kingdoms have been lost in this fashion."

"If," said Tak, "as you feel, Sam was playing one of the ancient games with Raltariki, what could the stakes have been?"

Yama finished his wine, refilled the glass. "Sam is a fool. No, he is not. He is a gambler. There is a difference. The Rakasha do control lesser orders of energy beings. Sam, through that ring he wears, does now command a guard of fire elementals, which he won from Raltariki. These are deadly, mindless creatures—and each bears the force of a thunderbolt."

Tak finished his wine. "But what stakes could Sam have brought to the game?"

Yama sighed. "All my work, all our efforts for over half a century."

"You mean—his body?"

Yama nodded. "A human body is the highest inducement any demon might be offered."

"Why should Sam risk such a venture?"

Yama stared at Tak, not seeing him. "It must have been the only way he could call upon his life-will, to bind him again to his task — by placing himself in jeopardy, by casting his very existence with each roll of the dice."

Tak poured himself another glass of wine and gulped it. " That is unknowable to me," he said.

But Yama shook his head. "Unknown, only," he told him. "Sam is not quite a saint, nor is he a fool."

"Almost, though," Yama decided, and that night he squirted demon repellent about the monastery.

The following morning, a small man approached the monastery and seated himself before its front entrance, placing a begging bowl on the ground at his feet. He wore a single, threadbare garment of coarse, brown cloth, which reached to his ankles. A black patch covered his left eye. What remained of his hair was dark and very long. His sharp nose, small chin, and high, flat ears gave to his face a foxlike appearance. His skin was tight-drawn and well-weathered. His single, green eye seemed never to blink.

He sat there for perhaps twenty minutes before one of Sam's monks noticed him and mentioned the fact to one of Ratri's dark-robed Order. This monk located a priest and passed the information to him. The priest, anxious to impress the goddess with the virtues of her followers, sent for the beggar to be brought in and fed, offered new garments and given a cell in which to sleep for as long as he chose to remain.

The beggar accepted the food with the courtesies of a Brahmin, but declined to eat anything other than bread and fruit. He accepted, too, the dark garment of Ratri's Order, casting aside his begrimed smock. Then he looked upon the cell and the fresh sleeping mat that had been laid for him.

"I do thank you, worthy priest," he said, in a voice rich and resonant, and altogether larger than his person. "I do thank you, and pray your goddess smile upon you for your kindness and generosity in her name."

The priest smiled at this himself, and still hoped that Ratri might pass along the hall at that moment, to witness his kindness and generosity in her name. She did not, however. Few of her Order had actually seen her, even on the night when she put on her power and walked among them: for only those of the saffron robe had attended Sam's awakening and were certain as to his identity. She generally moved about the monastery while her followers were at prayer or after they had retired for the evening. She slept mainly during the day; when she did cross their sight she was well-muffled and cloaked; her wishes and orders she communicated directly to Gandhiji, the head of the Order, who was ninety-three years old this cycle, and more than half blind.

Consequently, both her monks and those of the saffron robe wondered as to her appearance and sought to gain possible favor in her eyes. It was said that her blessing would ensure one's being incarnated as a Brahmin. Only Gandhiji did not care, for he had accepted the way of the real death.

Since she did not pass along the hall as they stood there, the priest prolonged the conversation, "I am Balarma," he stated. "May I inquire as to your name, good sir, and perhaps your destination?"

"I am Aram," said the beggar, "who has taken upon himself a ten-year vow of poverty, and of silence for seven. Fortunately, the seven have elapsed, that I may now speak to thank my benefactors and answer their questions. I am heading up into the mountains to find me a cave where I may meditate and pray. I may, perhaps, accept your kindly hospitality for a few days, before proceeding on with my journey."

"Indeed," said Balarma, "we should be honored if a holy one were to see fit to bless our monastery with his presence. We will make you welcome. If there is anything you wish to assist you along your path, and we may be able to grant this thing, please name it to us."

Aram fixed him with his unblinking green eye and said, "The monk who first observed me did not wear the robe of your Order." He touched the dark garment as he said it. "Instead, I believe my poor eye did behold one of another color."

"Yes," said Balarma, "for the followers of the Buddha do shelter here among us, resting awhile from their wanderings."

"That is truly interesting," said Aram, "for I should like to speak with them and perhaps learn more of their Way."

"You should have ample opportunity if you choose to remain among us for a time."

"This then shall I do. For how long will they remain?"

"I do not know."

Aram nodded. "When might I speak with them?"

"This evening there will be an hour when all the monks are gathered together and free to speak as they would, save for those who have taken vows of silence."

"I shall pass the interval till then in prayer," said Aram. "Thank you."

Each bowed slightly, and Aram entered his room.

That evening, Aram attended the community hour of the monks. Those of both Orders did mingle at this time and engage in conversation. Sam did not attend it himself, nor did Tak; and Yama never attended it in person.

Aram seated himself at the long table in the refectory, across from several of the Buddha's monks. He talked for some time with these, discoursing on doctrine and practice, caste and creed, weather and the affairs of the day.

"It seems strange," he said after a while, "that those of your Order have come so far to the south and the west so suddenly."