The Destruction of Faena

Epilogue THE TALKING BEAST

Av had not yet reached maturity and still bore his father’s abbreviated name, but his younger brother still went by the child’s name of Avik.

Av was a strong, graceful boy and resembled his father, from whom he had inherited the long, powerful neck, like a tree-trunk, the curly head and the firm, dimpled chin. The slightly uplifted eyebrows and the clear gaze made his face calm and quizzical. He loved wearing the skin of a spotted predator, slinging its fanged head over his shoulder onto his chest.

Av became first helper to his father, who was finding it increasingly difficult to feed his big family by hunting.

Av was a skilful archer, able to pierce any branch on a tree without missing. The boy made himself a sharp stone knife which was in no way worse than his father’s metal one. He taught himself to wield a spear with a sharp stone head that he had fashioned himself. He also had a replaceable metal spear-point with a silvery blade and brown prickles. He didn’t know where his father had obtained such a strange spear-point and he kept it for exceptionally difficult duels when he had to fell his dangerous enemy with a dexterous blow. His mother cautioned him against these fights and could not in any way get used to the idea that her son was in constant danger when hunting in the forest.

The boy merely laughed, which threw Ma, his sister, into raptures.

One day, an enormous reptile with a powerful long body but no legs fell onto him from a tree. It coiled itself round the boy several times, crushing him in a deadly embrace. Av was out hunting alone, a long way from his father. It was no use crying and it was impossible anyway—he couldn’t even gasp for breath. Then he acted as his father had taught him: he tensed all his muscles, not letting the serpent crush his ribs in its coils.

It was a silent struggle. The boy realised that he was doomed. He had often watched from the undergrowth as a serpent crushed its victim to death. The boy didn’t know how much longer he could hold out. There was a crack as the spear, pressed against his side with his arm, snapped in two.

The fanged head of the spotted predator slung over his shoulder was used by Av as a kind of pocket or bag. A spare spear-point was kept between the jaws. If only he could get at it!

The serpent, its coils wound round his body, was rolling over the ground with him.

The boy was still alive, straining muscles that were on the verge of giving way. He was also watching out for a moment when the maw of the spotted predator was facing the ground.

Fortunately, the serpent itself was rolling its victim over in order to exhaust him completely. Ave’s hope was justified: the spare spear-point fell out.

He could see it quite near him, but could not reach it with his hand pinned to his side.

From time to time, the serpent loosened its coils to deceive its victim, let him relax and then squeeze him with renewed force.

Av waited for the moment when he could move his wrist and snatched up the spear-point with the sharp prickles on its end.

At this moment, the serpent evidently decided to finish off its obdurate prey once and for all; it tightened its coils so hard that Av fainted.

When he came round, he felt that he was being crushed as before by a long, muscular body, but it was not throbbing as it had done during the struggle. There was indeed something dead about its death-grip. It turned out that even when unconscious, Av had continued straining his body to resist being crushed. Now he relaxed, trying to make himself as thin as possible and began gradually crawling out of the dead serpent’s rigid coils.

And so, after surviving and beating in single combat a terrible serpent, Av could receive on coming of age a name associated with his victory.

But he was still just a brave, agile boy for whom manhood was yet to come. He used to dream about this time, developing his own courage and strength.

Although he had become a hunter, he grew up to be kind-hearted nevertheless and he never killed animals except out of dire necessity.

He enjoyed watching from a tree as the little animals frolicked about near their lair.

They were four-footed beasts with mouths full of teeth and they could not climb trees. They had long muzzles, erect ears and bushy tails. They only attacked small animals. In case of need, however, they could hunt in packs and set upon the big denizens of the forest.

Av thought it might be a good idea to train these little animals. His father, after all, had mentioned the domesticated lizards on Faena, which Av imagined to have been a faraway, fabulous land from which his parents had flown like birds.

The little animals were playing on the glade, in full view of Av up in a tree-top.

The little grey balls of fur were rolling over the grass, somersaulting, growling and fighting endlessly with one another. Or they chased one another tirelessly across the glade.

Av saw a cub he liked the look of. He jumped down from his tree no less nimbly than a serpent and seized hold of the terrified little animal. It clawed and bit him, but Av clutched it to his chest and ran off, stuffing its sharp-toothed little muzzle into the spotted predator’s skin that he wore for camouflage.

He took his prize home—it had been quietened down by the warmth of his body-fed it and began training it.

His mother was very much surprised at his behaviour. His younger brothers and sisters were in raptures.

The little animal used to play with them. It grew up quickly and became attached to Av. It was evidently in no way inferior to the domesticated lizards of Faena.

When the animal had grown up a little, Av decided to train it to go hunting with him. His father smiled condescendingly at the idea, but in no way interfered with his son’s experiments.

Av called his future helper Ding.

The disaster occurred after a domestic ceremony at which Av had been awarded his new name. Serpent, in honour of his victory over that creature.

Serpent insisted that his mother should let Avik go hunting with him. It was time he became an assistant provider.

His younger brother was beside himself with joy and ready to follow Av anywhere.

Ding, of course, had to go with them. Gifted with an amazing nose, he could scent game even before Serpent had noticed it.

…Serpent came back from the hunt alone.

His mother tore her hair and screamed frantically at him:

“You’ve killed him, you’ve killed my Avik!”

Serpent turned pale at these words. They were unfair. Serpent could not have been accused of such a crime, although he was partly to blame.

The brothers were walking through the forest. Ding was running ahead. Suddenly, he stopped and growled. His fur bristled.

Just at that moment, a huge shaggy body fell on him from above. Serpent had heard from his father about the Faetoids which had carried him off as a baby.

Now a beast like one of those described by his father had seized Ding, who yelped, went hoarse and then was silent.

The shaggy beast rushed off with its prey.

Without thinking of his brother (and this was where he was terribly at fault!), he ran after the Faetoid.

The beast was, however, more agile. But Serpent had a determined nature, however. He neither wanted to nor was he capable of backing out, any more than his mother, the young Mada Jupi.

With his keen hunter’s instinct, he noticed which way the beast had run. Although slower than the beast, he was unerringly following in its tracks.

Serpent found it under a wide-branching tree where it imagined itself to be safe and was devouring the luckless Ding.

Serpent went mad with rage. He did not even shoot an arrow. Blind with fury, incapable of containing himself, he hurled himself at the beast and caught it unawares.

The Faetoid proved smaller than Serpent had imagined at first. He was much stronger and, above all, much more experienced than his opponent. Moreover, he knew his father’s fighting tricks.

Serpent overthrew the creature; it lay helpless beside the mangled corpse of Ding which it had not yet finished eating. Serpent was just about to finish the creature off, when it said:

“Do r-rationals kill those who are lying down?”

Serpent jumped back and asked in horror:

“Who are you, a talking beast?”

“I am a r-rational amid Terrans.”

The creature was talking in Serpent’s native Faetian, but with an unfamiliar burr. Even so, it was talking. The flabbergasted Serpent let go of it. He wanted to ask where it came from and who had taught it Faetian.

But the beast, which called itself rational and was able to speak, was cunning into the bargain.

No sooner had Serpent relaxed his hold, prepared to carry on with the conversation, than his shaggy opponent sprang on to its hind-legs and jumped up onto the lowest branch of the tree. A moment later, it vanished into the foliage.

The dismayed Serpent rushed in pursuit of the Faetoid, but then stopped, deep in thought.

Only then did he fear for his brother Avik. What had happened to him? The little boy must have been left behind while he chased after the talking beast.

Stifling his alarm. Serpent ran back over the scarcely noticeable tracks that had brought him to the spot. Serpent could run for great distances without losing his breath. But this time he felt short of air, his lungs were ready to burst and his heart seemed about to jump out of his breast. Even so, he did not slow down until he reached the ill-fated spot where poor Ding had been carried off.

His experienced hunter’s eye immediately pictured the drama that had been enacted there.

Avik had proved himself to be a true Faetian, although still a small boy. Judging by the traces of the fight, he had put up a desperate resistance.

But there had been many attackers and they had overpowered the little lad. Serpent found the route by which they had carried him off. For a long time he pursued the kidnappers until he realised that he had lost too much time and it would be impossible to overtake them.

Dusk had fallen on the forest as, stumbling over the tree-roots, Serpent made his way back home in utter despair. His arms dangled helplessly down by his sides, his head was bowed on his breast.

Thus he returned home alone on that tragic day and told his mother everything.

…Mada went crazy with grief and screamed that he had killed Avik. She meant that he was responsible for his brother’s death, but the proud Serpent flared up. Perhaps it was his grandfather’s blood in him, not just his mother’s. He was stung by the accusation she hurled at him. If his mother was capable of such a reproach, then he would go away to the caves and would live there on his own.

Mada was too crushed by grief to recollect herself and restrain her son.

She lay on the threshold with her hair unloosed and, through a veil of tears and the evening mist that reminded her of the lost Faena, she saw her beloved firstborn disappear behind the trees.

But she was threatened by yet another loss.

The lissom form of Ma, her elder daughter, slipped past her. Without a second thought, the girl had gone to follow Serpent.

When he came back that night from the hunt, Ave was shaken by the despondency with which he was met at home.

On learning about the double disaster— the loss of Avik and the departure of the elder children—Ave’s face darkened and he thrust his hand into his thick, greying beard.

“Even if I’m in the wrong, and I am in the wrong, of course,” said Mada to her husband, “how will Serpent and Ma be able to live on their own? You must bring them back.”

“That’s got to be done!” replied Ave. “On their own, they won’t be able to beat off attacks by the Faetoids, who have resumed the war with us. Their first catch, our poor Avik, will only make them even more fierce and determined.”

“I refuse to believe it!” protested Mada. “If Gor Terr lived for so long with them and taught them a thing or two, they could have kidnapped our Avik so that he could teach them too. But you’ve got to bring Serpent and Ma back.”

“I’ll find them,” promised Ave, and he added thoughtfully, “It’ll be a good thing if you’re right about Avik.”

Like a truly courageous Faetian, he was trying not to let his wife see how shattered he was by it all.

“I’m worried about that talking beast.”

“All my hopes are on him!” intervened Mada. “According to what Serpent told me, he talks like our beloved friend, Gor Terr.”

“That’s just what’s bothering me.”

“But I’m delighted. Even Dzin had a feeling of gratitude. The talking beast, whoever he may be, could save Avik.”

“He must be a pupil of Gor Terr’s. You were saying yourself that when Gor Terr became a leader, he hoped to teach the beasts a great deal.”

“But why have they come back? Perhaps Gor Terr isn’t alive… Either he wouldn’t have let them come here, or he would have come to us.”

“Who knows what’s happened to our friend after all these years?” sighed Ave Mar.

“Perhaps they need another leader and they came for a Faetian,” said Mada.

“I’ll find Serpent and we’ll look for the new lair of the Faetoids together. Perhaps we’ll meet Gor Terr or even find Avik still alive. Anyway, we’ll catch one of the talking beasts and question him.”

Ave did not manage to carry out his plan, however. Serpent and Ma had gone somewhere a long way away. They weren’t to be found in the nearby caves. He could only hope that they hadn’t fallen victim to the Faetoids.

Perhaps in another forest they had founded a new station for the descendants of the Faetians on Terr. The offended hunter hadn’t forgiven his mother for her reproach, although he had deserved it to some extent.

Nothing was known of Avik either.

Life continued for Ave and Mada with their family. As if to take over from the lost Avik and the runaway children, Mada gave birth to twins, a boy and a girl, and their mother was fully occupied in caring for them. As if she hadn’t enough cares already.

She cooked for the whole family, treated hides with her younger daughters so as to sew, with the aid of tendons, primitive clothing and footwear for the growing children, herself and Ave. They had to gather medicinal herbs, about which Mada knew a great deal, and not just because she had once been a Sister of Health. She had been attending to all the members of her big family. She hadn’t time to help Ave with the hunting.

After the working day, when darkness had fallen, keeping the fire going in the hearth and grinding the day’s harvest of com in a stone mortar with a stone pestle, Mada would tell her children fairy tales.

She didn’t invent anything, she simply recalled her life on Faena. But for the little Terrans, living in the dense forest, stories about houses as high as the clouds, or about rooms that moved about and even went up into the air like birds, and even of the piloted star on which her parents landed on Terr, all sounded like an amazing, unattainable and incredible fairy tale.

Ave Mar also used to listen to these stories about the irrevocable past as he dozed on his couch after an exhausting day.

He would listen and could never understand whether he was having fantastic dreams or whether he was remembering long-forgotten pictures from the words of the now white-haired but still beautiful Mada.

And, to the rhythmic murmur of her infinitely beloved voice, the first Faetian on Terr wondered what lay in store for his children and grandchildren.

Would the Faetoids return? Surely the talking beast that Serpent had let go would feel duly grateful and would not only save Avik, but would lead the Faetoids away, as Gor Terr had done in his time? Or were neither Gor Terr nor Avik still alive, and was the war with the Faetoids about to begin again? And who would survive in that conflict? Who would settle the planet with a race of rational beings: the descendants of the Faetians or those of the Faetoids? In the process of development, they would begin to resemble the present-day Faetians. Otherwise the law of development of all living creatures would have to be seen in a wider perspective than had been thought of on Faena. It must be extended from one planet to all inhabited worlds! Rational beings could appear everywhere and could migrate to those planets where rational beings had not yet appeared. They would enter into conflict with the less developed. Was this not the meaning of the all-embracing law of the struggle for existence in which Reason must come out on top.

Ave decided to carve the history of his family on a cliff in the mountains where he went hunting.

One day, his rational descendants would read the inscription.

But what would they be like?