The Black Throne

XI

To the few who have loved me and whom I love—to those who feel rather than to those who think—to the dreamers and those who put their faith in dreams as in the only realities—I offer this Book of Truths, not in its character of Truth-Teller, but for the Beauty that abounds in its Truth; constituting it true. To these I present the composition as an Art-Product alone:—

let us say a romance; or, if I be not urging too lofty a claim, as a Poem.

Eureka Edgar Allan Poe

Clinging to the ancient lines, one foot upon a spar, I watched as the two vessels separated. I found that I still clutched the knife I had been using, and I resheathed it against future need. If only there were one more roll bringing our rigging near again I felt that I might spring back to my former perch. Alas, the strange vessel's momentum carried it far beyond the Eidolon before it rolled again. Odd as it seemed, looking back and looking down, I saw that neither gave evidence of having suffered damage in the collision; and the Eidolon was still afloat when she vanished from sight.

Slowly, I worked my way down from the rigging, those great sails bellied and booming about me like Titanic instruments of music, my course directed toward the swinging lanterns far below.

The first thing I realized when I set foot upon the deck was that things seemed more stable here below.

From above, I'd seemed to see a lot of pitching and rolling; but at this level, the sensations were somehow minimized, possibly because of the greater ballast of something on this scale. Also, the sounds of the storm seemed somehow muffled here below.

I fully expected some crewman to rush up to me momentarily, inquiring after my well-being, and offer succor of any sort needed. But it was as if I were not present. They went about their business of shifting several cases from stern to stem and lashing them into new positions without directing any attention my way. For a moment, I thought it rudeness. But only for a moment. I moved to stand immediately before a man who carried a coiled line over his shoulder. As he came on, weak-kneed and wheezing, his gaze seemed to pass right through me. He veered slightly and passed about me as if I were some fixture. I moved to another, engaged in a bit of caulking about what looked a loose board inside the port gunwale.

I fluttered my hand before his eyes but he paid it no heed. Puzzled, I regarded a number of the others in turn. They were uniformly age-worn, decrepit, thin of hair, shaky.

I drew away then from the men and moved nearer the side, as if the demon wind might offer some explanation should I pay them sufficient heed. They screamed, they buffeted, but the ship plowed on. No explanation, however, was forthcoming. What did come forth, some time later (ah, Time!—how twisted and dreamlike it seemed here!—burning in the green fires which clung like fungoid growths), was an ancient man I took immediately to be the vessel's captain. His knees tottered with his load of years, his entire frame quivering with the burden. Yet he bore with him various instruments, and he chose a spot well forward, produced a curious telescope of venerable appearance and put it to his eye while the lightnings danced before him and screens of rain were shaken from out the tormented sky. Nodding then as if satisfied, he recased the instrument and opened another. He proceeded to regard compass and sextant, as if there were actually something for him to fix upon. Then, muttering to himself in some language I could not understand, in a low and broken tone, he recased these instruments, also, after recording some observations in a log he bore, then turned and headed back toward the companionway from which he had come.

I made haste to follow him, strangely attracted by this weak yet, paradoxically, powerful individual. I entered his cabin behind him, stood near its door and regarded the place as he moved around in it. The floor was thickly strewn with navigation charts, iron-clasped folios and moldering instruments of science. The captain seized one of the charts, spread it upon a table and pored over it. His head bowed down upon his hands then, he stared.

I cleared my throat. There came no reaction.

"Uh— Sir?" I said.

Nothing.

It could simply be that he was hard of hearing, but I knew somehow that this was not the real reason. I made my way forward carefully, repeating my queried salutation and attempting to place my hand upon his shoulder. A bit of the green fire seemed to bloom between us as I did, and my hand slid off as if I had trailed it in a waterfall. The old man did not even look up. I continued to stare at him, not knowing what to do.

Abruptly then, he rose to his feet. In stature, he was nearly my own height—that is, about five feet eight inches. He was of a well-knit and compact frame and body. His ancient eyes were gray. I was suddenly stricken with feelings of awe, reverence and wonder as I regarded him, his manner a wild mixture of childlike peevishness and godlike dignity. Following him, I saw him take up a paper which I took to be a commission, and though I peered intently over his shoulder I could not make out the name upon it, though it appeared to be a short one. It did seem to bear the seal and signature of some monarch, however... .

"Yes," I heard what seemed Annie's voice say. "Yes... ."

The captain glanced suddenly in the direction from which the words seemed to come, and I did the same. There was no one there. Our gazes swinging away then, they met for a brief electrical moment and we stared into each other. Then he shook his head and turned away.

"Good riddance," he growled.

I heard something like a muffled sob from what had seemed the direction of Annie's invisible presence.

"The banishment is almost complete," I heard or felt her say.

The old man looked up, his features softening. His pale lips moved soundlessly as he stared in that direction. It looked as if they formed the name "Annie."

"I must leave you, Perry," I heard her say.

"No!" I responded.

"I must, for now," she said sadly. "If I am to keep a doorway open to Poe."

"Don't leave me. There's never been anyone else who really mattered."

"I have to. I've no choice. You are a good man, Perry, a strong man. You can deal with this world or any other. Poe can't. But what will our world be like without him in it? I must stay near him if I can. Forgive me."

And then she was gone.

Tears blinding my eyes I tore out of that accursed cabin. I wandered. It didn't matter where I went. There was no need for concealment in a place where I was effectively nonexistent.

Timeless and haggard I went, snatching pieces of moldy bread and draughts of tepid tea from the galleys. I paced the boards of that ancient stranger, its elder crew tottering about the business of its mysterious voyage. They took not the least notice of my presence, and the green fires of St. Elmo flickered at the edges of everything important.

Again, after what might have been days, did I feel myself addressed.

"Eddie."

"Annie? You've come back?"

"No. You are so far away, Eddie. I can scarce reach you."

"Ligeia?"

"Yes. Better. That's better. You must return to us."

"How? I've no idea where I am or why. I've just lost the most important thing in my life."

"You must try. Try, Eddie. The decision is more important than the means."

"I don't even know how to try."

"Find a way."

I stalked the decks, I cursed the ship, its captain, the crew, the weather. A chaos of foamless water boiled in the blackness about us, though through it occasionally passed floes and mountains of ice. At one time, to either hand, rose immense ramparts of cold whiteness, towering into the darkness like the walls of the universe. Onward, we rushed always onward.

Neither prayers nor curses seemed to avail me. I believe that I was mad for a time, from the loss of Annie, trapped in an environment which did little to improve one's state of mind.

The winds blew cold, out of the blackness, among the icy pillars. I watched the captain come and go, about the business of his observations, but I never approached him again. I noticed by degrees, over what might have been a long span of time, that our speed seemed to be increasing. We still carried a full load of sail and the wind had come to roar with an even greater fury.

The first time the vessel was lifted bodily out of the sea I was frightened, though it was a long while before it happened again. But there came a time when this was occurring at regular intervals. I saw the old man, knowing him now, somehow, as some version of Poe, once more, in the distance. This time, he was not taking measurements or doing calculations, but merely watching as the ice mounts raced round and round about us, his expression one of pain, loss, and beatitude—whether in succession or simultaneously, I do not know (such the consumption of Time in this place, like a green flame ...)—and even as I apprehended our circumstance—that we must be spinning, plunging into the mouth of a whirlpool—I felt again for him that kinship I had known in days of old, and I wanted to go to him, take him in my arms, rescue him, bear him away from this place. Only I knew that I could not; and even if I could, I knew that he would not desire it.

And so I looked inward upon our dizzy whirling about the borders of our gigantic amphitheater of ice, and I saw that our circles were growing smaller, amid a roaring, a bellowing, a thundering. Suddenly, I knew what Poe was feeling, in icy eminence with an eye so close to Death's that he beheld Life with full clarity. I saw as he saw and knew that I could ride as he rode into the final globe of globes, clearminded, pure, to perfect unity—

Saw, but did not wish it. Once we had almost been the same man. He was an artist, and I almost his creation. I mourned him in that instant of his exaltation. Now I remembered Ligeia's words, "Find a way" and I turned from him.

The world had been opened, was totally devouring. What could a man do?

I tried.

A dark unfathom'd tide Of interminable pride—

A mystery, and a dream, Should my early life seem: I say that dream was fraught With a wild, and waking thought Of beings that have been, Which my spirit hath not seen, Had I let them pass me by, With a dreaming eye!

Let none of earth inherit That vision of my spirit; Those thoughts I would control, As a spell upon his soul: For that bright hope at last And that light time have past, And my worldly rest hath gone With a sigh as it passed on: I care not tho' it perish With a thought I then did cherish.

Imitation Edgar Allan Poe