Legend of Lost Earth, page 1
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Legend of Lost Earth by G. McDonald Wallis
For Christopher One of the Children
AUTHORS NOTE
In my search for the translators and publishers of the Celtic works from which I have drawn, I have made every attempt to ascertain and acknowledge all rights. If I have unknowingly and unintentionally transgressed in any way, I hope that I may be forgiven, particularly by those few whom, after long and wide efforts I have failed to locate. I especially wish to express my sincere thanks to the translators and publishers who have generously given me permission to use copyright material.
To E. P. Dutton and Co., Inc., Routledge & Kegan Paul Ltd., and to Charles W. Kennedy, grateful acknowledgement for the use of excerpts from "The Phoenix" from his translation of The Poems of Cynewulf. To Oliver & Boyd Ltd. and Alexander Charmichael for his translation of "The Rune of the Peat Fire" and "A Highland Invocation for Protection" from Carmina Gadelica. Rune used by the Islanders of Aran in Galway asking the intervention of Mary and Brigit. Translation by Douglas Hyde. "The Song of Amergin." Translated by Professor John MacNeill. "The Mystery of Amergin." Translated by Elizabeth A. Sharp from Lyra Celtica.
I
To Giles Chulainn, night in Niflhel was a somber, depressing experience. For years he had felt it like this, with the keenness of a knife slicing to the bone and stripping him of all pleasure. He frowned and tried not to look up as he walked a little faster through the hard streets of the city. But even staring down at the pavement it was impossible to escape the pervasive smoke that hung like a heavy cloud over the low black buildings. His feet made crunching noises as they ground into the layer of soot that carpeted the walks. Sometimes it wasn't this bad—sometimes it was more like a blanket of ash that curled up in small puffs and vanished as one walked along. But tonight the red glow from the Eastern Factories lit the far sky like an inferno and particles of grit floated through the streets with the annoyance of microscopic insects.
Giles gave it up and stopped walking. He raised his head and stood there, on a corner of Niflhel, looking around him. There weren't many people about. Most of them would have, sensibly, taken the Underground straight home to the periphery of the city and avoided being caught in the rain of industrial waste. Momentarily he considered doing the same. His intention, after all, of how to spend the evening was without doubt the maddest scheme that had occurred to him in all his twenty eight years. Perhaps he should forget it and go home. But the picture of home that rose before him was as equally bleak and depressing as the streets of Niflhel. A squat round black "hut" rising out of the flat sandy plains that stretched endlessly to the horizon on all sides of Niflhel. A squat hut among thousands of others arranged in un-deviating, symmetrical rows, only broken here and there by the gaunt black elevator shafts that rose from the Underground. No, he wouldn't go home.
He looked at the street number and turned right' into a smaller lane, his black cape and hood flapping behind him in a sudden gust of wind. Giles swore as an eddy of soot flew into his eyes, pulled his visor down and drew his cape firmly around him. The building should be near. He peered up at the grilled back windows that lined the alley. Why did he have to come in through the rear, he wondered. Why all the secrecy about this meeting? This madness, a part of him said.
There was an echo of footsteps behind him. Giles whirled around and ducked into a doorway, flattening himself against the side, surprised at his sudden furtiveness. Two hooded figures walked slowly and silently by, not glancing in his direction. Giles returned to the street and watched as they strolled in the same measured pace several yards ahead of him up the alley. Then they disappeared. He breathed deeply, amazed at the sudden apprehension that had seized him. These groups were all right—everyone knew about them—it wasn't contrary to attend, so why this sudden lurch in the pit of his stomach? He closed his eyes, trying to analyze it and remembered that he himself had called it madness a few moments ago. He remembered also that he knew no one who had ever actually attended. All right, it was simply the newness then. Simply the strangeness. He stared ahead to the spot where the two figures had disappeared and then slowly started walking.
A green light. A round green light shining in a second story loft in store number 63, about halfway down the building compound. A dim green light, shaped like a ball. "When you see it, ascend the stairway quietly, please. We have no wish for advertisement."
They hadn't said enter surreptitiously, however, and that was exactly how Giles felt as he neared the building and saw, faintly glowing, the translucent green sphere. It gave him an eerie sensation. He had an uncomfortable desire to turn back. Irritated at his reaction, he quickly entered the dim doorway and began to climb the stairs. He stopped at the second landing, further annoyed to find that he was suddenly and inexplicably nervous.
One door at the landing was slightly ajar and Giles pushed it open, finding the shower room. He removed his cape and hung it up, then stepped into a cubicle that sealed behind him. It wasn't a bad jet—the air pressure was fairly strong and Giles was relieved when the last particle of grime was sucked off and blown away and the door opened. The shower had relaxed his uneasiness, he noticed, as he found himself thinking again of how much more effective it would be for the city if the soot waste from the air showers could somehow be distributed under the ground rather than released back into the air.
There were three others in the cloak room when he stepped out of the shower. He looked at them carefully, noting with relief that the types were not too distant from his own, and that the girl among them must certainly belong to the same economic and social level, if she wasn't indeed part of his own family branch. Her hair was a deep, midnight black, but she had the same hazel-green eyes and small features, and as she removed her cape Giles saw that her skin was faintly freckled like his own… usually the sure sign of connection.
He smiled at her easily, sure of himself now, as he usually was with women. "Is your name Chulainn?" he asked softly.
Something in his voice caused the two men to turn sharply and glance at him. Giles wasn't aware of it, but he had a tendency to address all women in a hauntingly familiar way, as if he had already had intimate contact with them.
The girl stared at him—oddly, Giles thought—and without answering entered a shower cubicle. Giles raised his eyebrows, looked at the men, smiled and shrugged. He didn't realize that he was expecting a sympathetic response until he received none. Their faces remained expressionless, and ignoring his gesture, they stepped into the other showers. For a moment Giles felt uneasy again. What was he getting into? Who were these serious people who displayed none of the social mannerisms of Niflhel? He must be crazy to come here, he decided, and then with characteristic stubbornness he stepped swiftly out of the cloak room to the landing where a faint green light shimmered out beneath the other door. He stepped up to it, about to push it open with his customary force, and then inexplicably slowed down, finding the handle, trying it softly and then nudging it open a speck gently.
The green light seemed to fill the room. Actually it came only from the round green globe that hung before the window. But there was no other illumination, so the effect was like being plunged into a limpid green sea. Giles caught his breath. There was something immediately startling about the effect of that green light, so different from the murky black buildings of Niflhel and the humid red sky. It was like balm, so unexpectedly soothing that he felt the shock through his whole system. So this is why people come here, he thought. That was his first impression.
The room itself was nothing more than a long bare loft. It took a few moments to discern the rows of seats, well filled with people patiently waiting. Or were they just waiting? There was another quality in the air that Giles couldn't quite fathom. He had the distinct impression that these people were doing something, but what it was he couldn't tell. He found a seat about halfway back and sat down. Scanning the faces around him he was surprised to find that many were from the top city strata. They were all very quiet and seemed to have their attention fixed on the globe. Nobody returned his glance. Giles looked at it, too, narrowing his eyes as he tried to sense the impressions the others were receiving, but he saw nothing except the formation of a halo if he stared hard enough, and a slight hypnotic tendency in the ball if his eyes remained too fixed.
All of a sudden the whole thing struck him as being extraordinarily silly and he had a wild impulse to laugh, as much at himself as anything else. Just what did he imagine he was doing here!
A man walked from the back of the room up one of the side aisles and turned to face his audience from the globe. Giles had never seen him before, but the man's face surprised him, removing all humor from the situation. Surely this was one of the Dagdas, the oldest and most venerated branch of Giles' own family. A remote branch, to be sure, but still a strain that even the Chulainns regarded with respect. And he must be one of the oldest of the lot, Giles decided, studying him carefully. He seemed tired, and as he spoke his voice carried a definite trace of weariness—or illness. Giles couldn't determine which. He wasted no time on a preliminary opening but jumped right to the heart of the matter.
"Of course there's no mystery about why you all feel more tranquil here. We have very little green in Niflhel and what there is of it is chemically produced. So is the globe. But the meaning behind the globe attracts you emotionally and therefore the color has
Giles winced at the words, even if the man was a Dagda.
"… However, now the situation is a little different. Our ideas have been so thoroughly despised by Authority, our groups have been so effectively eliminated by mass psychology pressure that I now feel it only fair to warn you that it is probably only a matter of time before we will be Classified'as Contrary."
There was a chorus of gasps from a group of women sitting in one corner. The Dagda looked at them coldly and con-tinued without changing tone. "There is no longer room for those who aren't serious, and since consequences will undoubtedly fall on those attending these meetings who are unlucky enough to get caught, I strongly advise most of you to regard this as your last meeting." He walked to a desk against one wall in the front of the room and began looking through a stack of papers.
Giles watched him closely, fascinated. Until now he had no idea that Classification might be so imminent, or that he might be putting himself in some danger and no small embarrassment by being here. That information was completely new. In a way it made him glad he had come. He might never have another opportunity to witness a meeting. And regardless of the idea behind all this, there was something about this man, the Dagda…
The Dagda reached for a tall frame that was leaning against the wall beside the desk, and one of the men in the front row jumped up and helped him move it to the center of the room in front of the glode. They attached a light and the Dagda placed a huge map of some sort in the frame. The man, who seemed to be an assistant, sat down, and the Dagda stood to one side of the map, looking at it as if he, too, were seeing it for the first time.
Then he said, very softly, "This is a picture of Tir na nOc… or, if you prefer, and as some have called it, this is a map of Earth."
Giles felt a sudden constriction in his chest as he heard the word. The word so long forgotten, the word so nearly forbidden—the word that lived in him as it did in most of the citizens of Niflhel, in an obscure echo chamber of his being. Had he truly ever heard it before?
The Dagda repeated, chanting ritually, "This is a picture of Earth."
Giles was suddenly dizzy and the map swam before him. Earth… Earth. The magic, mystic, forbidden word… and the Dagda said it so freely… Earth…
Behind the map the sphere was raised, elevated so that it hung directly above, and the light cast a green glow over the outlines of continents. Giles made an effort to bring his eyes into focus and saw that the ball began to rotate, disclosing in dimension what was flat on the picture below. The continents revolved slowly, the huge one, the tremendous land mass flanked with islands, the oceans between the other continents separated by a finger of land, swooping and tapering to nothing by the pole below. The poles were flaked with white and Giles shivered—could they be colder than the poles of Niflhel?
The Dagda faced his audience fiercely, his voice ringing as he cried, "Tir na nOc! AsgardI OlmypusI Eden! It is all that… it is Earth!"
The women in the corner began to moan and the Dagda turned to face them. "Yes, weep! For your homeland, for the country of your ancestors. Mourn for it well and suffer yourselves that you shall never see it! Not in this picture or that globe or in any way that man can devise. For if Earth was lost before, she is truly lost now. We have turned from our beginnings so completely that we now deny our origin. Weep well, and remember for what you weep!"
In spite of himself, Giles shivered. This mythical land— this planet that never was—somehow, in some strange way, attracted him. The Dagda took a long pointer and ran it swiftly over the face of the map, calling out names that rang like ghost cries in the hushed loft.
"Asia, Europe, America… and here, the lovely islands from which our ancestors embarked… but was that their only homeland?" He paused and scanned the audience like a teacher waiting for a pupil to answer. Giles looked around, astonished at the solemn, almost reverent way in which the group faced this man, breathless, open-mouthed, hanging on every word. At the end of the row in which he sat someone began to speak. Giles leaned over to look and saw the girl he had met in the shower room. But she didn't appear reverent, only terribly intent and serious, and her voice was low and matter of fact.
"No," she said, "the homeland was in many places, even far across the sea in the place called America."
The Dagda nodded. "And the name of the islands from which we left?"
"Tir na nOc," the girl smiled, "or, as it was once called, Eire, or Britain."
Britain, Eire, America, strange names, haunted names out of a mythical, imaginary past. Giles frowned, wondering why they rang so oddly, so familiarly in his ear. Could anyone have told him stories once about the mythical land of Earth? More than one child in Niflhel had been corrupted by ancient fairy tales, held on the wrinkled knees of old grandmothers and rocked to sleep by feeble voices singing forbidden songs. Had he ever looked into the dim, watery eyes of his grandmother and seen shining there a dream of Earth?
Sitting there in that row of hushed, attentive people, with the voice of the Dagda droning like music, Giles had a sudden, swift impression of his childhood. It was as if the room and the green globe vanished, and he was there again, standing outside the doorway of his hut, waving goodbye to the bent, unsteady figure that walked down the path of ashes to cross with painfully slow steps to her own hut a few yards away. And she had paused, Giles remembered. She had turned around to look at him, a small blond boy squinting in the red glare, who had forgotten to wear his cloak and hood so that his hair, within seconds, was covered with a layer of fine black soot. She had paused to look back and seeing him there without cover had removed her own hood in a gesture almost like defiance, and had held up her hands to the particles that fell relentlessly on them both. She had greedily held up her hands and in a stronger voice than Giles could recall her ever having used, she said, nodding her head fiercely, "That's right… it all comes from the same source. But if we were on Earth we could be standing in the rain! You must pretend it is rain, Giles. Pretend it is rain!"
And then she had walked on to her lonely hut, still bareheaded, the sparse gray a jet black by the time she stepped inside. And Giles had stood there, not minding the ash that fell over his head, fell into his eyes and parched his lips—he stood there wondering what was rain. And what was the difference between that 'rain', whatever it was, and this horrid black substance that curled up from the ground and fell from the sky? Rain! He had no idea what it was, but the very word made him suddenly dissatisfied and uncomfortable, and he had run inside to the air shower and then immersed himself in a bucket of water, using up almost all of his family's supply for the week. His parents had been terribly angry when they returned, but Giles had somehow known to keep his grandmother's words a secret. The haunted word Earth he had put away somewhere and tried to forget. But the word rain he had never forgotten and never mentioned. It remained with him like a touchstone—a magical symbol that expressed all that could be beautiful in the universe and all that was utterly unattainable.
It wasn't until years later that he learned what rain actually was and that it did fall in Niflhel, at the poles only, during certain periods of the year. It was from this sparse supply of rainfall that the entire water supply of Niflhel was drawn… his parents had reason to be angry.
"… from one of the books of Earth!" The change in the Dagda's voice brought Giles back to the meeting with a start, and the words that followed fell on him curiously like the word rain had fallen from his grandmother's lips. He sat there bemused, catching only snatches of the reading that seemed to swirl around the green globe and cause it almost to seem alive.
