The Final Encyclopedia

Chapter Twenty-one

In the morning they moved on, and by afternoon they were into rolling, nearly level country squared off into farmlands, the fields black from the fresh tilling of spring. It was like coming on an oasis after some long trek through a desert; and the sense of sorrow and loss that had held the Command nearly silent since the attack of the Militia began to lift. Even those who had been wounded cheered up, raising themselves on their elbows in their litters, slung between pairs of the remaining donkeys. Looking about, they breathed the warmer air of the lowlands, occasionally laughed softly as they talked with those carrying packs and walking beside them, as if they had just come into a kinder and better land.

In fact, as Hal had learned in his studies, years before, this area of Harmony came close to being a rich spot on the two impoverished Friendly Worlds. Here, the soil was black and thick and the farms produced a surplus which went to feed hungry mouths in large nearby cities; cities of a size that otherwise could be supported only on Harmony's continental coasts, with their access to the food sources of the oceans.

As soon as they reached the farmlands proper, the Command began to disintegrate. The wounded were taken into the homes of local farmers, to be nursed back to health; and both the remaining beasts and the healthy Command members were organized into small units which would make their way openly on foot to the rendezvous, near their target of the fertilizer plant, at a small city several hundred kilometers in from the mountains.

Hal found himself separated from Jason and assigned to a group of ten headed up by Child. They had been chosen, as had the other small units the Command was now divided into, with an eye to giving the appearance of a single large family, with the ages of its members ranging from grandfather to grown grandchildren. The farms of the central North Continent of Harmony were farmed with donkey and human power alone; and the cultural pattern of the farmers was one of large, compound families, in which sons and daughters married and brought their new mates home so that groups of twenty to sixty people living on a single farm were not unusual.

When such families, or portions of them, travelled they had the appearance of a small clan on the road; and consequently the ten Command members with Child as their family elder were not conspicuous when at last they set out. Dressed in jackets and slacks or skirts of gray, dark blue or black, with white shirts, string ties and black berets, all furnished by local partisan farmers they had encountered, the ten could not be told from ordinary travellers on these interior roads.

With the change of scene, Hal found a change of attitude taking him over. Walking the roads, lifting his beret with the others when they encountered another family group walking in the opposite direction, he discovered that with the change he had both gained and lost something. As the fields and houses had closed about him, the wide-ranging sense of freedom he had sensed in the mountains was gone. He was held close again - not as close as he had felt himself held on Coby, but close enough so that his mind seemed once more on a leash.

The urge to write poetry had once more left him. In its place was an urgency and a responsibility he was not yet able to define. In an odd way, it was as if he had been on vacation when they were in the mountains, and now he was back at work in a universe where the practical aspects of life had to be considered.

The Militia attack in the pass, the intimate moment with Rukh and the encounter with Child that had preceded it had made him look again at what was around him. He had become closer to these people - all of them, even in this short time, than he had to those on Coby - even including Sost and Tonina and John Heikkila. It was not just that they had fought the Militia together. These in the Command had a dedication and a purpose that echoed to some urge to dedication and purpose in him. In the long run, on Coby, he had needed Tonina, Sost and John, but they had no real need of him. It was as if he had taken a step closer to the whole human race, here on Harmony. At the same time he was even more aware of the distance separating him from each of them. He found he wanted Rukh desperately and at the same time he did not see how he could ever have her. Also, he was unhappy about Child-of-God. The older man was cut of the same cloth as Obadiah had been; and Hal had loved Obadiah. He should, he thought, be able to at least like Child. He wanted to like Child; and he found he did not.

It was more than a simple desire in him to like the older man. As Obadiah had, Child personified the very heart and core of the Friendly Splinter Culture. Hal had responded to the Friendlies, as he had also responded to the Exotic and Dorsai Splinter Cultures. Responded to and felt sad for, because Walter had taught him that, in the long run, all three must disappear.

But still he could not bring himself to like or admire Child. Looked at dispassionately, the other seemed to be little more than an opinionated, unyielding individual with no virtues in him beyond his military skills and the fact that chance had placed him in opposition to the Others, and therefore on the same side as Hal himself in the conflict.

And that brought another matter to mind. He could not simply continue to run blindly as one of Rukh's Command, with the hope of always keeping out of the Others' way. There had to be more to life than that. He needed to make some kind of long range plans. But what plans? He was deep in thought about this for perhaps the hundredth time when an unexpected hail brought him out of it.

It was the end of the third day since they had started out to tramp the road in their small group on their way to rendezvous. They had just topped the crest of a small hill and were headed down into a hollow of land perhaps five kilometers across, filled with the familiar plowed Fields and several widely-separated farmhouse complexes surrounded by trees planted for windbreak. Coming toward them up the slope of the road from the nearest of these building clumps was a round-bodied man of close to Child's age, waving and calling to them.

They met him a minute or so later and stopped to talk. His face was rosy with the effort of the fast walk; and he took off his beret, fanning himself with it as he spoke.

"You're Child-of-God and these are the soldiers of the Lord from Rukh Tamani's Command? We just got word you were coming. Will you stop at my farm tonight? It'd be a pleasure under the hand of the Lord to have you; and I've wanted to talk to someone from one of the Commands for some time."

"We thank God who sent thee," said Child. "We will be thy guests."

His harsh voice made his words on the soft, late afternoon air more like a command than a polite acceptance; but the farmer did not seem offended. He fanned himself twice more and put the beret back on his head.

"Come along," he said; and he led the way down the slope, talking with Child as he went, unquenched by the short, sharp answers he got in reply.

The farm he led them to was clearly one housing a larger than usual family. The living quarters consisted of at least a dozen interconnected buildings. As they walked into the central yard of this complex, enclosed on three sides by the buildings, thin notes of what sounded like some sort of recorder or flute came from the open doorway of the largest building, to which they were heading.

"Forgive me!" said their host.

He darted ahead, into the dark rectangle of the doorway. The sound of the notes cut off abruptly, and in a moment he was back outside, his face rosy again, as he confronted them where they had stopped.

"I'm sorry." He spoke again, this time particularly to Child. "These children - but he's a good boy. He just doesn't realize… please excuse it."

"Praise not the Lord with instruments and other idle toys, for He Himself is not idle, neither will He suffer the same before Him," said Child, grimly.

"I know, I know. It's the times… things are changing so fast, and they don't understand. But come in, come in!"

They followed him into a large, airy room, dark after the still-bright day outside. As Hal's eyes adjusted, he saw a number of chairs and benches scattered around a room with a highly-polished wooden floor and an enormous fireplace at one end of it. An opening in the end opposite the fireplace showed another room, long rather than wide, with a table running the length of it that looked as if it could seat half a hundred people.

"Sit down, sit down," said their host. "Excuse me, I should introduce myself. My name's Godlun Amjak; and this is my household. Elder Child-of-God, will you do us the honor of speaking to us at evening service in a few minutes?"

"I am no Elder, nor have I ever sought to be. I am a Warrior of God, and that is sufficient," said Child. "Yes, I will speak."

"Thank you."

"Thank thy God and mine, rather."

"Of course, of course. I do. I thank God. You're quite right."

Younger men and women in the customary dress, white above and dark below, were coming shyly into the room, bringing pitchers of cold water and plates of small dark cakes. Child refused cake but accepted the water. They sat for a short time with food and drink, and then were led back through the house and into a rectangular interior courtyard with a stone floor and white-painted walls, unadorned except for the thin black cross as tall as Hal himself, painted on one of the end walls. In front of the cross was a small platform of dark wood and lectern before it; with, however, nothing on the lectern.

The yard was already full of people - obviously the members of the household of Godlun Amjak standing in two ranked and ordered groups on either side of a central aisle-space. Godlun led the ten from the Command down this aisle to a space which had been left for them in front of the right-hand group and only a few steps from the cross and the lectern. Once they were placed, Godlun mounted the platform and looked down at all of them. The courtyard was deep in shadow from the buildings surrounding it; but in contrast the visible patch of sky above them was still a startlingly bright blue without clouds.

There was a moment's hush, as if everyone in the courtyard was holding his breath. Then Godlun spoke.

"We are privileged before the Lord," he said, "in that we have as our guests ten Warriors of God, one of whom is an officer, from the Command of Rukh Tamani. These are those who combat the limbs and demons of Satan himself, the Other People, and their minions - those who would teach us to put our faith and our Lord in second place to them. We are further privileged in that the officer of whom I spoke, Child-of-God, will speak to us at this time of worship. It is a great honor for our family and we will remember it as long as the family lasts."

He got down from the platform and looked at Child, who left the first row of worshippers and came to the platform. His lean face looked down at them all; and his voice rang out like clashed iron over their heads.

" '… And I saw three unclean spirits like frogs come out of the mouth of the dragon, and out of the mouth of the beast, and out of the mouth of the false prophet.

" 'For they are the spirits of devils, working miracles, which go forth unto the kings of the earth and of the whole world, to gather them to the battle of that great day of God Almighty…' "

He broke off, looking at them all.

"Ye know that passage from the Book of Revelations?"

"We know." The soft chorus was unanimous from the listeners standing around Hal.

" 'And he gathered them together into a place called in the Hebrew tongue Armageddon.' " He paused again.

"Ye also know," he said, "that that beast and that false prophet, whose coming was foretold in Revelations, are now among us. Think not that to thou, and thou, and thou, their presence maketh a difference; because to one who testifies for the Living God there is never a difference from that which always was and always will be. There is only one day, the Day of the Lord's; and what hour of that day it is, is of no matter to ye who are known to Him, or chosen to be His servants. Other than such as ye, there are only those who will be cast out in the final hour. But among those not to be cast out, none of ye need ask - 'What is the hour and the moment in which I will testify for my God?' For all who serve the Lord will be called upon to testify and it matters not when."

He paused once more, this time for so long a moment that Hal began to think that he was done and about to step down from the lectern. But he went on.

"Nor does the manner of that testifying matter. Especially wrong is he who hopes that his testimony will be easily given, and he who dreams of a martyr's testimony. It is not the manner of giving but the giving itself, that matters. Remember that for thee, by night or day, waking or sleeping, alone or in the sight of multitudes, when thy testimony is required, only one thing is important and that is whether thou givest it or not. For he who is part of the Living God cannot fail to lift the banner of his faith in that moment; and he who is not will have no strength to do so."

There was a little sigh from the audience, so faint that it was just barely audible to Hal's ears.

"All are doomed who are not of the Lord. But those who testify do not do so only that they may exist eternally. For thy duty to thy God and His works is beyond thyself. If the Lord should come to thee before the moment of thy testifying and say, 'Servant and warrior of mine art thou. But yet for my purposes, thou shalt be cast out with those others who know me not' - then, only if thou art truly of the faith will you answer correctly - 'If it be thy will, Lord, so be it. For that I testify is all I ask …' "

His voice had dropped on the last sentence almost to a whisper, but it was a whisper that reached every wall of the courtyard.

" 'For Thou my Lord hast been with me all my days and will be with me forever, nor can that which Thou art be taken from me - ' " and once more, for three words, his voice dropped to that hoarse, penetrating near-whisper - " 'Even by Thee, my God. For as Thou art in me, so am I in Thee, forever and ever, beyond all time and universes; for Thou wert before those things and will be after them; and with Thy people may not be slain, but shall live beyond eternity.' "

He stopped speaking, at the last so quietly and so naturally that not only Hal, but the rest of those listening, were unprepared for the fact that he was finished. It was only when he stepped down from the lectern and returned to his place in the front ranks of those standing that they all realized it was over. Godlun went forward, stepped up and turned to face them.

"We will sing Soldier, Ask Not," he said.

They began to sing, without accompaniment but with the harmonious blending of voices long used to sounding together, and Hal sang with them; for this - originally a military hymn of the Friendly mercenary forces drafted to fight on other worlds - was one of those he had learned from Obadiah so early that he could not remember a time when he did not know it.

"Soldier, ask not - now, or ever -

Where to war your banners go…"

They sang it to the end, standing there quietly in their ordinary, everyday clothes, with the peaceful walls of their home buildings surrounding them; and when they were done Godlun stepped down from the platform. The evening service was over; and above them the sky, still cloudless, had darkened with the fading of the light to a deep, cobalt blue in which it was still too early to see the pinprick lights of the stars.

"Come with me," Godlun said to Child; and led his guests back inside to seat them in the chairs by the top end of the long dining table. His own seat was the one of two at the very end itself. The other seat remained empty.

"My wife, Meah," he said to Child, in the first chair at his right, once they were all seated. He nodded his head toward the empty chair as if introducing a ghost to the other man.

"May the Lord keep her always," said Child.

"In His hands," said Godlun. "It's sixteen years now since her death. This large house where we all meet was planned by her."

Child nodded again, but said nothing.

"You are not married?" Godlun asked him.

"My wife and I lived under God's blessing for two years and five days," said Child, "before she was killed by Militia."

Godlun stared at him and blinked.

"How terrible!"

"God chose it so."

Godlun turned abruptly to shout back over his shoulder through a farther doorway from which came the noise and odors of a kitchen.

"Come now! Hurry, hurry!"

With that, the adult members of the family flooded in to fill the rest of the seats at the table as far as seats still remained available; and others of them appeared with burdened serving trays from the kitchen.

The meal was remarkable. Hal counted over fifteen separate dishes. Even in comparison with the way they had been fed by the other farm families that had entertained them since they had come down out of the mountains, this was a banquet. Godlun was evidently exerting himself and his resources to the utmost. In particular, there were an unusual number of vegetable dishes prepared in accordance with the strictures that governed what someone like Child-of-God might allow himself to eat. Hal had never seen the older man dine so heartily; and it had the effect of making him unusually sociable. He answered Godlun's questions at greater and greater length; until, at last, when they had all moved to the large sitting "room and the two were sitting together, close to the fireplace, painted by he light of the flames of the blaze there that had been raised against the chill of the spring evening, Child was all but conducting a monologue, with only an occasional question from Godlun thrown in from time to time.

"… There is no doubt," he was telling the farmer, "that the numbers of the Militia grow daily as the ranks of those seduced by the Belial-spawn increase. This is a fact we must face; and it is as God wills."

"But…" Godlun hesitated. "You yourself - you have hope."

"Hope?" In the firelight the time-carved, lean face of Child stared into the round, anxious one of the other man.

"Hope that eventually the Militia and all other hounds of the Belial-spawn must be conquered, and cleansed from our world."

"It's not my duty to hope," said Child. "What is, is what God wills."

"But He can't will that all we've built here over generations, and on Association as well, should be conquered by such as these? That our churches should be closed, our worshipping voices be silenced and all that we've done go down to dust?" said Godlun.

"Knoweth thou the will of the Lord?" said Child. "It may be just that which is his wish; and if so, who are we to question? Only an hour since did I not hear thee sing with me - Soldier, ask not, now or ever, where to war your banners go!"

Godlun shook his head slowly.

"I can't believe He would - "

"Thou art concerned for thy children, and for thy children's children," said Child, less harshly. "But remember that even these are not thine. They are only lent thee for a little while by the Lord; and He will use them as He requires."

"But things aren't that bad," said Godlun. "The Militia are a trouble to us, yes; and it's true that, in the cities, those who fawn on the Others have things their own way. But the core of our land, our people and our religion, continues here in the countryside, untouched. We - "

"In thy small corner, thou wouldst say, there is still peace," interrupted Child. "But look beyond that corner. When thou art wanted, when thy children and thy fields are desired for purposes of the Others, will they not come and take all these, too, from thee, at their whim? Look not merely at the cities of this world, but at all the cities on all worlds. Everywhere the Belial-spawn move almost without check or hindrance. Those of us who are strong in the Faith they cannot touch; but almost all others see them once, and ever after pant at their heels, following without question for one pat on the head, one word of praise from these, their new, false and painted idols. The beast and the false prophet of which Revelation speaks are already among us, gathering their forces for Armageddon across the face of all the worlds."

"But God will conquer when Armageddon comes!"

"In His own way."

Godlun shook his head, and looked away, helplessly into the fire.

"I don't believe this," he said, low-voiced, to the flames. "I've heard many say this, but I couldn't believe it; and that was why I had to talk to someone like you. How can you, who've given your life to fighting His enemies, talk as if the final battle might be lost?"

"Man of plows and peace," said Child, almost sadly, "look outward at the universe. The battle you talk of is already lost. The times are already changed. Even if these whom God has cursed were to be swept away tomorrow, still the old ways are already gone, and not by their doing - but by ours. All the centuries since Mankind first had life breathed into him are coming now to their end, and all that has been built is crumbling. Did not I hear the lascivious and idle sound of a musical instrument in thy own house, as I came up? Yet, he who played - whoever that may be - is still beneath thy roof. He was without doubt at worship with the rest of us, an hour since. If thy own household be so fallen into the gutters and alleyways of sin, how canst thou hope for the redemption of the worlds of men, when within thy own walls there is none?"

Godlun raised his head from the flames and stared at Child. The tendons in his throat moved and stood out, but he made only a small sound that was not even a word.

"Nay," said Child, with real gentleness. "Who am I to blame thee? I only show thee what is. For thousands of years the Earth endured as the cradle of God's children, until it came upon evil ways with the luxury of many tools and instruments. Then might the end have come, at that time. But God gave Man one more chance, and opened these further worlds to him. And all went out, each together with those he thought of as his or her own kind, and tried to build again as they thought best, under different suns. But out of all those efforts were made only three peoples which had never been before; we of Faith, those we called the Deniers of God but who call themselves the Exotics, and those of War known as the Dorsai. And, as time hath shown, none of these were God's answer, however much they might be their own; and from their failure has now come these of mixed breeding whom we call the Others, who would make all the worlds their pleasure garden and all other men and women into slaves. Canst thou look at all this and not see that once more we have thrown away the chance given us; so that nothing now remains but for Him to let us reap the harvest we have sowed; and for all who call themselves Mankind to go down finally into darkness and silence, forever?"

Godlun stared at him.

"But you keep fighting !"

"Of course!" said Child. "I am of God, whatever or whoever else is not. I must testify to Him by placing my body against the enemy while that body lasts; and by protecting those that my small strength may protect, until my personal end. What is it to me that all the peoples of all the worlds choose to march toward the nether pit? What they do in their sins is no concern of mine. Mine only is concern for God, and the way of God's people of whom I am one. In the end, all those who march pitward will be forgotten; but I and those like me who have lived their faith will be remembered by the Lord - other than that I want nothing and I need nothing."

Godlun dropped his face into his hands and sat for a moment. When he took his hands away again and raised his head, Hal saw that the skin of his face was drawn and he looked very old.

"It's all right for you," he whispered.

"It is fleshly loves that concern thee," said Child, nearly as softly. "I know, for I remember how it was in the little time I had with my wife; and I remember the children unborn that she and I dreamed of together. It is thy children thou wouldst protect in these dark days to come; and it was thy hope that I could give you reason to think thou couldst do so. But I have no such hope to give. All that thou lovest will perish. The Others will make a foul garden of the worlds of humankind and there will be none to stop them. Turn thee to God, my brother, for nowhere else shalt thou find comfort."