The Elder Gods Page 35

  “There aren’t really that many women in our tribe, Chief Old-Bear,” Red-Beard reminded him.

  “Then perhaps those who are not women should help.”

  Red-Beard laughed. “That might just be the quickest way for me to get out from under something I didn’t want in the first place,” he said. “If I order the men of the tribe to do women’s work, they’ll find themselves a different chief almost immediately.”

  “I am not familiar with the customs of your tribe, Chief Red-Beard,” Old-Bear admitted, “but in my tribe, the building of lodges is men’s work. Is it also men’s work in your tribe?”

  “It’s customary,” Red-Beard conceded. “Where are we going with this?”

  “When I was much younger and adventurous, I traveled far to the north into the Domain of Zelana’s older brother Dahlaine, and I came upon a place where there were no trees. It was a land of grass only. The region had much game—large deer and wild cows—for there was much grass for them to eat. The hunting was very good, but the absence of trees made the building of lodges very hard. The people of the place with no trees gave the matter much consideration, and a very clever young man had a thought. Since there were no trees, the tribe would be obliged to build the lodges from something that was not trees.”

  “I don’t think a lodge made of grass would be very good in the wintertime,” Red-Beard said dubiously.

  “It seemed that way to me also,” Old-Bear said, “but I was wrong. The clever young man saw that grass is not stems only, but it is also roots, and the roots of grass cling quite firmly to the dirt from which the grass grows. The result is that which we call sod, and it was sod which the clever young man used to build his lodge. The other men of his tribe saw the wisdom of what he had done, and they also built their lodges of sod. I visited several of those lodges and found that no wind, however strong, can blow into a lodge made of sod, and the winter cold cannot penetrate such a wall. The lodges were strong and warm in the coldest of winters, and the people of the tribe were content. It is my thought that if the men of your tribe were told to build their lodges of sod, they would clear much ground for planting without feeling shame that they were doing women’s work.”

  “You are fortunate to have so wise a chief, Longbow,” Planter said with a broad smile.

  “The next problem is how to persuade the men of the tribe that sod will make better lodges than tree limbs and bushes,” Red-Beard said a bit dubiously.

  “As I remember, the beach near that river was very windy,” Longbow mused.

  “It seemed that way to me, too,” Red-Beard agreed.

  “A lodge made of tree limbs might not be a good idea in such a windy place. It would be very embarrassing to have one’s lodge blown down in the middle of winter, wouldn’t you say?”

  “‘Embarrassing’ might not be the right word, Longbow,” Red-Beard said. “I think it might go quite a bit past that. Winter winds are much stronger than summer winds, though. If we want the men of the tribe to start cutting sod now to clear the meadow for planting, I don’t think we should depend on the summer wind to persuade them that it’s the best thing to do.”

  “You and I might need to help the summer wind just a bit, friend Red-Beard,” Longbow replied. “I’m sure she’d appreciate that. If every lodge the men of your tribe have built collapses some breezy night, sod should start to look very attractive, wouldn’t you say?”

  “You people of Old-Bear’s tribe are very devious, aren’t you?” Planter suggested.

  “Indeed they are, Planter,” Old-Bear said with a broad grin, “and that makes life much, much easier for me.”

  “There’s something I’ve been meaning to ask you, Chief Old-Bear,” Red-Beard said a bit hesitantly, after Planter had left the lodge.

  “I will answer you as best I can, Chief Red-Beard.”

  “Is it really necessary for a chief to speak so formally?”

  “It’s a part of the pose that goes with the position, Chief Red-Beard,” Old-Bear responded in a somewhat more relaxed manner. “Formal speech makes a chief sound as if he knows what he’s doing. When you speak formally, the men of your tribe will usually do what you tell them to do. Formal speech will make you sound wiser.”

  “But it’s so tedious to talk like that,” Red-Beard complained.

  “Tell me about it,” Old-Bear replied sardonically. “It’s tiresome and pompous, and about half the time you’ll forget what you’re trying to tell them before you finish talking. The important thing’s that it makes you sound wise—even when you’re telling them to do something that’s foolish.” The old chief paused. “If I were you, Red-Beard, I’d sort of keep that to myself. It’s one of the secrets of the trade. If you pay close attention to the outlander chieftains, you’ll notice that they do things in more or less the same way. If you sound like you know what you’re doing, the men of your tribe will believe that you do, even when you don’t.”

  “It’s all just a deception, then?” Red-Beard demanded.

  “I thought I just said that,” Old-Bear replied.

  “It’s not nearly as well protected as the old village was,” Sorgan Hook-Beak observed as the Seagull approached the beach at the new village site a week or so later.

  “There aren’t any fire mountains nearby, though,” Longbow reminded him. “White-Braid’s tribe can stand a bit of wind and weather. It’s much better than trying to wade through melted rock.”

  “That’s true, I suppose,” Sorgan conceded. “What have the people we brought here last week been doing? They haven’t even started building huts yet.”

  “They’re back a short way from the beach,” Red-Beard explained. “The men are gathering sod, and the women are planting beans.”

  “What do you need with sod?”

  “We’re going to build our lodges with it.”

  “Why not use tree limbs, like you did back in Lattash?”

  “Several of the young men tried that when they first arrived,” Red-Beard said. “A wind came up one night, though, and their lodges fell down.”

  “That must have been some wind,” Rabbit said.

  “Longbow and I helped it just a bit,” Red-Beard admitted. “If you know where to push, it isn’t too hard to make a lodge collapse.”

  “What did you do that for?” Rabbit asked curiously.

  “We needed to persuade the young men that sod would be much stronger than tree limbs.” Red-Beard made a sour face. “Actually, it was just a deception. The young men think they’re digging up sod for building lodges, but all they’re really doing is opening up the dirt below the sod so that the women can plant beans and yams. We’ll need that food when winter comes, so it’s important to get the seeds into the ground.”

  “Why did you have to lie to them?” Rabbit sounded a little baffled.

  “Planting is women’s work. Young men feel insulted if you tell them to plant. Building lodges is men’s work, though, so when all the lodges the first ones who came here built just ‘happened’ to fall down one gusty night, Longbow and I suggested sod houses instead. Now they’re out in the meadow doing what they think is men’s work. Everybody’s happy, and the tribe will have plenty to eat when winter comes along.”

  “You people have a very complicated set of rules,” Sorgan observed.

  “It makes life more interesting, Sorgan,” Longbow said. “Dancing around the rules gives us something to do when the fish aren’t biting.”

  4

  Veltan’s little sloop came through the inlet a few days later, and Zelana’s younger brother seemed to be just a bit upset. “What are you people doing?” he shouted as he beached his sloop near the new village.

  “Moving,” Red-Beard explained. “We didn’t think Lattash would be safe anymore, so we’re setting up a new village.”

  “Where’s Narasan?”

  “Probably on his boat out there in the bay.”

  “He’s supposed to be on his way down to my Domain,” Veltan fumed.

  “I think
he might be waiting,” Red-Beard replied. “Something that was supposed to happen hasn’t happened yet, and I think Narasan’s going to stay here until it does.”

  “What’s this all about, Red-Beard?”

  “Your sister promised to give Sorgan a big pile of those yellow blocks for helping us up there in the ravine. She hasn’t done it yet, and I think Narasan wants to find out if your family keeps its promises.”

  “Well, of course we do!”

  “You’d better find your sister and remind her about it, then,” Red-Beard advised. “I don’t think Narasan will move until he sees Sorgan getting paid. That’s up to you, though. I’ve got enough problems of my own to keep me busy.”

  “Where’s Longbow right now?” Veltan asked with a slightly worried look.

  “The last time I saw him, he was showing the young men of my tribe how to cut sod. The sod blocks need to be all the same size, and the young men weren’t cutting them right.”

  “What do your people need sod for?”

  “It’d take much too long to explain,” Red-Beard said with a weary sigh.

  “Just exactly where is this place?” Red-Beard asked Veltan as the sloop sailed out through the inlet that led into the bay of Lattash.

  “Not too far from here,” Veltan replied a bit evasively.

  “We’ve both seen the sort of things the members of your family can do when it’s necessary, Veltan,” Longbow said. “I think we might be just a little pressed for time, so Red-Beard and I won’t be particularly upset if you cheat.”

  “We don’t really look upon it as cheating, Longbow,” Veltan replied almost apologetically. “We try to avoid waving certain capabilities in the faces of the outlanders, that’s all. It gets to be a habit, I guess. You and Red-Beard are both natives of the Land of Dhrall, though, so I don’t really need to be secretive. We’ll go around the southern end of the Isle of Thurn. Zelana’s grotto’s not too far up on the west side.” He gave the two of them a sly look. “If you think that speed’s really essential, I suppose I could call my pet. She could take us there in the blink of an eye. She’s terribly noisy, though.”

  “So that was how you came popping out of nowhere up in the ravine when you came to warn us about the fire mountains, wasn’t it?” Red-Beard suggested.

  Veltan nodded. “I didn’t really have much in the way of alternatives. Yaltar’s dream took us all by surprise, and we had to get our friends out of that ravine in a hurry.”

  “What causes mountains to do that?” Red-Beard asked curiously.

  “That particular eruption was the result of Yaltar’s dream,” Veltan replied. “The Dreamers can break all sorts of rules when they think it’s necessary.”

  “But sometimes that sort of thing happens even when there isn’t a Dreamer around to make it happen, doesn’t it?”

  Veltan nodded. “It’s a natural phenomenon,” he said. “The core of the world is molten rock, and it’s under enormous pressure. Every so often, it breaks through the crust, and the pressure sends it spurting up into the sky for miles.” He pointed toward the west. “There’s the coast of Zelana’s isle,” he told them.

  “How far have we really come from the inlet?” Longbow asked.

  “Oh,” Veltan replied, squinting thoughtfully, “about half as far as it is from Lattash to the head of the ravine. It won’t take us too much longer to reach Zelana’s grotto.” He scratched his chin thoughtfully. “I think that maybe the best way for us to do this would be to speak with Eleria first. She knows Zelana even better than I do, and she can manipulate my sister in ways I couldn’t even imagine. Balacenia’s always been the most devious of the younger ones.”

  “Who’s Balacenia?” Red-Beard asked curiously.

  “That’s Eleria’s real name.” Veltan paused. “I wouldn’t spread that around if I were you,” he told them. “Our big brother Dahlaine came up with the idea when we realized that the Vlagh had decided to annex our Domains. The Dreamers look like children, but they really aren’t children. They’re our alternates, and they’ll take over when our cycle reaches its end. That’s something else you don’t need to mention to the outlanders. They don’t really need to know about the cycles. Actually, the less they know about what’s really happening, the better. If they find out who and what we’re facing here, they’ll probably turn and run.”

  “I’ve heard a few of the old stories,” Red-Beard said, “but they’ve never really made very much sense to me. Every now and then somebody mentions something called the overmind. Just exactly what is that?”

  “Red-Beard’s the chief of his tribe now,” Longbow reminded Veltan. “It might not be a bad thing for him to know a bit more about the thing out in the Wasteland.”

  “You could be right, Longbow,” Veltan agreed. Then he looked at Red-Beard. “How much do you know about bugs?” he asked.

  “They have more legs than we have, and some of them can fly. That’s about all I’ve managed to pick up. I’ve always concentrated on things that I can eat, and I don’t think I’d really care to eat a bug.”

  “This may take a while,” Veltan mused. “All right, then. Some bugs are solitary. They have very little contact with others of their species, except at mating time. Spiders are about the best example of those particular bugs. There are other kinds, though—various bees and ants, for the most part. As individuals, they’re almost totally mindless. They’re too stupid to even be afraid. You probably noticed that up in the ravine.”

  “They didn’t really seem very clever,” Red-Beard agreed.

  “They don’t need to be clever, Red-Beard. It’s that overmind you’ve heard about that does the thinking.”

  “The Vlagh, you mean? I’ve always sort of wondered how anybody ever managed to find out what that thing’s name was. Bugs don’t usually have names, do they?”

  “Vlagh isn’t exactly a name, Red-beard,” Veltan explained. “It’s more in the nature of a title. The creatures of the Wasteland refer to it as ‘the Vlagh,’ sort of in the same way that the people of your tribe call you ‘the chief.’ The Vlagh has certain advantages, though. The creatures that serve it know exactly what it’s thinking all the time, because they all share the awareness of what’s called the overmind. Every one of them is aware of what any of the others has seen or heard, and all of that information lies in the mind of the Vlagh.”

  “That would be sort of useful, I suppose,” Red-Beard conceded. “That Vlagh thing doesn’t have to give orders, because everybody in the tribe knows exactly what he’s thinking every minute of the day.”

  “The Vlagh isn’t a ‘he,’ Red-Beard,” Veltan corrected. “Actually, it’s a ‘she.’ It lays eggs, and anything called a ‘he’ doesn’t do that.”

  “We’re at war with a woman?” Red-Beard exclaimed.

  “I wouldn’t really think of the Vlagh as a woman, Red-Beard. Laying eggs is only part of what the Vlagh does. What it’s doing right now is attempting to expand its territory. It wants more food for its servants. The more food that’s available, the more eggs it can produce, and the more servants it has, the more complex the overmind becomes. For now, it wants the entire Land of Dhrall, but that’s only a start. The ultimate goal of the Vlagh is the entire world. If it has the world, there won’t be any limits on the overmind.”

  “Are you saying that it wants to rule people as well as bugs?” Red-Beard demanded incredulously.

  “Probably not,” Veltan replied. “Most likely, people will just be something to eat. More food; more eggs. That’s the way the overmind works.”

  “We have to kill that thing!” Red-Beard exploded.

  “I rather thought you might see it that way,” Veltan agreed. “The outlanders think that they’re working for gold, but what they’re really working for is survival. If we don’t win, the servants of the Vlagh will have us all for lunch.”

  It was about midmorning when Veltan’s sloop rounded the southern tip of the Isle of Thurn. Red-Beard had been keeping a close eye on the coast of the Isle,
and it didn’t seem that the sloop was moving all that fast.

  “Don’t think about it, Red-Beard,” Veltan told him. “I’m tampering just a bit. If you happened to see what’s really happening, it might disturb you. Time and distance aren’t quite as rigid as they might seem to be.”

  “I think I’d be more comfortable if you didn’t tell me what you’re really doing, Veltan,” Red-Beard agreed.

  “We’ll do it that way, then. Zelana’s grotto’s just ahead. Excuse me for a moment, gentlemen. I want to let Eleria know that we’re here.” He frowned slightly, and then he smiled. “She’s coming out,” he advised.

  “Out of where?” Red-Beard asked, looking around.

  “The grotto.” Veltan pointed at the surface of the water. “The entrance is down there.”

  “Under the water?” Red-Beard demanded incredulously.

  “Actually, it’s a cave, but it’s not much like those caves we came across up in the ravine to the east of Lattash.” Veltan laughed. “Dahlaine went wild when Zelana told him that Eleria was swimming up out of the grotto to play with the pink dolphins when she was only about five years old.”

  Just then the beautiful child Eleria rose to the surface and swam to Veltan’s sloop. “Is there something wrong?” she asked.

  “Well, sort of,” Veltan replied. “Is my sister all right?”

  “Not really,” Eleria replied. “The Beloved’s having a lot of trouble with some of the things that happened up there in the ravine. I don’t think she realized exactly what the word war really means. Killing things and people by the thousands seems to be something she didn’t completely understand.”

  “It was sort of necessary, little one,” Longbow reminded her.

  “Well, maybe, but the Beloved didn’t really expect it to go quite so far. She absolutely had to get away and come back home.”

  “Is she settling down at all?”

  “Well, a little bit, maybe. Just being back home in the grotto helps her.”

  “She shouldn’t have left quite so fast,” Veltan said. “She forgot something that was fairly important.”