Михаэль Энде - The Neverending Story

The lion was silent for a while. Then he said: “Only the Childlike Empress can tell you that. It is she who has given you everything.”

He arose.

“Master, it’s time we went back to my palace. The sun is low in the sky and we have a long way to go.”

That night Grograman lay down again on the black rock, and this time Bastian stayed with him. Few words passed between them. Bastian brought food and drink from the bedchamber, where once again the little table had been laid by an unseen hand. He seated himself on the steps leading to the lion’s rock, and there he ate his supper.

When the light of the lamps grew dim and began to pulsate like a faltering heartbeat, he stood up and threw his arms around the lion’s neck. The mane was hard and looked like congealed lava. Then the gruesome sound was repeated. Bastian was no longer afraid, but again he wept at the thought of Grograman’s sufferings, for now he knew they would endure for all time.

Later that night Bastian groped his way into the open and stood for a long while watching the soundless growth of the night plants. Then he went back into the cave and again lay down to sleep between the petrified lion’s paws.

He stayed with Grograman for many days and nights, and they became friends. They spent many hours in the desert, playing wild games. Bastian would hide among the sand dunes, but Grograman always found him. They ran races, but the lion was a thousand times swifter than Bastian. They wrestled and there Bastian was the lion’s equal. Though of course it was only in fun, Grograman needed all his strength to hold his own. Neither could defeat the other.

Once, after they had been wrestling and tumbling, Bastian sat down, somewhat out of breath, and said: “Couldn’t I stay with you forever?”

The lion shook his mane. “No, master.”

“Why not?”

“Here there is only life and death, only Perilin and Goab, but no story. You must live your story. You cannot remain here.”

“But how can I leave?” Bastian asked. “The desert is much too big, I’d never get to the end of it. And you can’t carry me out of it, because you take the desert with you.”

“Only your wishes can guide you over the pathways of Fantastica,” said Grograman. “You must go from wish to wish. What you don’t wish for will always be beyond your reach. That is what the words “far” and “near” mean in Fantastica. And wishing to leave a place is not enough. You must wish to go somewhere else and let your wishes guide you.”

“But I can’t wish to leave here,” said Bastian.

“You must find your next wish,” said Grograman almost sternly.

“And when I find it,” Bastian asked, “how will I be able to leave here?”

“I will tell you,” said Grograman gravely. “There is in Fantastica a certain place from which one can go anywhere and which can be reached from anywhere. We call it the Temple of a Thousand Doors. No one has ever seen it from outside. The inside is a maze of doors. Anyone wishing to know it must dare to enter it.”

“But how is that possible if it can’t be approached from outside?”

“Every door in Fantastica,” said the lion, “even the most ordinary stable, kitchen, or cupboard door, can become the entrance to the Temple of a Thousand Doors at the right moment. And none of these thousand doors leads back to where one came from. There is no return.”

“And once someone is inside,” Bastian asked, “can he get out and go somewhere?”

“Yes,” said the lion. “But it’s not as simple as in other buildings. Only a genuine wish can lead you through the maze of the thousand doors. Without a genuine wish, you just have to wander around until you know what you really want. And that can take a long time.”

“How will I find the entrance?”

“You’ve got to wish it.”

Bastian pondered a long while. Then he said: “It seems strange that we can’t just wish what we please. Where do our wishes come from? What is a wish anyway?”

Grograman gave the boy a long, earnest look, but made no answer.

Some days later they had another serious talk.

Bastian had shown the lion the inscription on the reverse side of the Gem. “What do you suppose it means?” he asked. “ ‘DO WHAT YOU WISH.’ That must mean I can do anything I feel like. Don’t you think so?”

All at once Grograman’s face looked alarmingly grave, and his eyes glowed.

“No,” he said in his deep, rumbling voice. “It means that you must do what you really and truly want. And nothing is more difficult.”

“What I really and truly want? What do you mean by that?”

“It’s your own deepest secret and you yourself don’t know it.”

“How can I find out?”

“By going the way of your wishes, from one to another, from first to last. It will take you to what you really and truly want.”

“That doesn’t sound so hard,” said Bastian.

“It is the most dangerous of all journeys.”

“Why?” Bastian asked. “I’m not afraid.”

“That isn’t it,” Grograman rumbled. “It requires the greatest honesty and vigilance, because there’s no other journey on which it’s so easy to lose yourself forever.”

“Do you mean because our wishes aren’t always good?” Bastian asked.

The lion lashed the sand he was lying on with his tail. His ears lay flat, he screwed up his nose, and his eyes flashed fire. Involuntarily Bastian ducked when Grograman’s voice once again made the earth tremble: “What do you know about wishes? How would you know what’s good and what isn’t?”

In the days that followed Bastian thought a good deal about what the Many-Colored Death had said. There are some things, however, that we cannot fathom by thinking about them, but only by experience. So it was not until much later, after all manner of adventures, that he thought back on Grograman’s words and began to understand them.

At this time another change took place in Bastian. Since his meeting with Moon Child he had received many gifts. Now he was favored with a new one: courage. And again something was taken away from him, namely, the memory of his past timidity.

Since he was no longer afraid of anything, a new wish began, imperceptibly at first, then more distinctly, to take shape within him: the wish to be alone no longer. Even in the company of the Many-Colored Death he was alone in a way. He wanted to exhibit his talents to others, to be admired and to become famous.

And one night as he was watching Perilin grow, it suddenly came to him that he was doing so for the last time, that he would have to bid the grandiose Night Forest goodbye. An inner voice was calling him away.

He cast a last glance at the magnificently glowing colors. Then he descended to the darkness of Grograman’s palace and tomb, and sat down on the steps. He couldn’t have said what he was waiting for, but he knew that he could not sleep that night.

He must have dozed a little, for suddenly he started as if someone had called his name.

The door leading to the bedchamber had opened. Through the cleft a long strip of reddish light shone into the dark cave.

Bastian stood up. Had the door been transformed for this moment into the entrance of the Temple of a Thousand Doors? Hesitantly he approached the cleft and tried to peer through. He couldn’t see a thing. Then slowly the cleft began to close. In a moment his only chance would pass.

He turned back to Grograman, who lay motionless, with eyes of dead stone, on his pedestal. The strip of light from the door fell full on him.

“Goodbye, Grograman, and thanks for everything,” he said softly. “I’ll come again, I promise, I’ll come again.”

Then he slipped through the cleft, and instantly the door closed behind him.