Lord of Light (23 page)

Yama nodded, yawned, lit another cigarette.

"By the way," said Sam, "what is the latest vogue in celestial executions? I ask purely for informational purposes."

"Executions are not held in Heaven," said Yama, opening a cabinet and removing a chessboard.

From Hellwell to Heaven he went, there to commune with the gods. The Celestial City holds many mysteries, including some of the keys to his own past. Not all that transpired during the time he dwelled there is known. It is known, however, that he petitioned the gods on behalf of the world, obtaining the sympathy of some, the enmity of others. Had he chosen to betray humanity and accept the proffers of the gods, it is said by some that he might have dwelled forever as a Lord of the City and not have met his death beneath the claws of the phantom cats of Kaniburrha. It is said by his detractors, though, that he did accept these proffers, but was later betrayed himself, so giving his sympathies back to suffering mankind for the rest of his days, which were few. . . .

Girt about with lightnings, standard-bearer, armed with the sword, the wheel, the bow,

devourer, sustainer. Kali, night of destruction at Worldsend, who walketh the world by night,

protectress, deceiver, serene one, loved and lovely, Brahmani, Mother of the Vedas, dweller in the silent and most secret places,

well-omened, and gentle, all-knowing, swift as thought, wearer of skulls, possessed of power, the twilight, invincible leader, pitiful one,

opener of the way before those lost, granter of favors, teacher, valor in the form of woman,

chameleon-hearted, practitioner of austerities, magician, pariah, deathless and eternal. . ..

Âryatârâbhattârikânâmâshtottarásatakastotra (36-40)

Then, as so often in the past, her snowy fur was sleeked by the wind.

She walked where the lemon-colored grasses stirred. She walked a winding track under dark trees and jungle flowers, crags of jasper rising to her right, veins of milk-white rock, shot through with orange streaks, open about her.

Then, as so often before, she moved on the great cushions of her feet, the wind sleeking her fur, white as marble, and the ten thousand fragrances of the jungle and the plain stirring about her; there, in the twilight of the place that only half existed.

Alone, she followed the ageless trail through the jungle that was part illusion. The white tiger is a solitary hunter. If others moved along a similar course, none cared for company.

Then, as so often before, she looked up at the smooth, gray shell of the sky and the stars that glistened there like shards of ice. Her crescent eyes widened, and she stopped and sat upon her haunches, staring upward.

What was it she was hunting?

A deep sound, like a chuckle ending in a cough, came from her throat. She sprang then suddenly to the top of a high rock, and sat there licking her shoulders. When a moon moved into view, she watched it. She seemed a figure molded of unmelting snow, topaz flames gleaming beneath her brows.

Then, as before, she wondered whether this was the true jungle of Kaniburrha in which she sat. She felt that she was still within the confines of the actual forest. But she could not really know.

What was it she was hunting?

Heaven exists upon a plateau that was once a range of mountains. These mountains were fused and smoothed to provide a level base. Topsoil was transported from the verdant south, to give it the growth that fleshed over this bony structure. Cupping the entire area is a transparent dome, protecting it against the polar cold and anything else unwanted within.

Heaven stands high and temperate and enjoys a long twilight and long, lazy days. Fresh airs, warmed as they are drawn within, circulate through the City and the forest. Within the dome itself, clouds can be generated. From within the clouds rains can be called forth, to fall upon almost any area. A snowfall could even be brought down in this manner, although this thing has never been done. It has always been summer in Heaven.

Within the summer of Heaven stands the Celestial City.

The Celestial City did not grow up as the cities of men grow up, about a port or near to good farmland, pasturage, hunting country, trade routes or a region rich in some natural resource that men desired and so settled beside. The Celestial City sprang from a conception in the minds of its first dwellers. Its growth was not slow and haphazard, a building added here, a thoroughfare rerouted there, one structure torn down to make way for another, and all parts coming together into an irregular and unseemly whole. No. Every demand of utility was considered and every inch of magnificence calculated by the first planners and the design-augmentation machines. These plans were coordinated and brought to fruition by an architectural artist without peer. Vishnu, the Preserver, held the entire Celestial City within his mind, until the day he circled Milehigh Spire on the back of the Garuda Bird, stared downward and the City was captured perfect in a drop of perspiration on his brow.

So Heaven sprang from the mind of a god, its conception stimulated by the desires of his fellows. It was laid by choice, rather than necessity, in a wilderness of ice and snow and rock, at the timeless Pole of the world, where only the mighty might make their home.

(What was it she was hunting?)

Beneath the dome of Heaven there stood, beside the Celestial City, the great forest of Kaniburrha. Vishnu, in his wisdom, had seen that there must be a balance between the metropolis and the wilderness. While wilderness can exist independent of cities, that which dwells within a city requires more than the tamed plants of a pleasance. If the world were all city, he had reasoned, the dwellers within it would turn a portion of it into a wilderness, for there is that within them all which desires that somewhere there be an end to order and a beginning of chaos. So, within his mind there had grown up a forest, pumping forth streams and the smells of growth and decay, uttering the cries of the uncitied creatures who dwelled within its shadows, shrugging in the wind and glistening in the rain, falling down and growing up again.

The wilderness came to the edge of the City and stopped. It was forbidden to enter there, just as the City kept to its bounds.

But of the creatures who dwelled within the forest, some were predators; these knew no boundaries of limits, coming and going as they chose. Chief among these were the albino tigers. So it was written by the gods that the phantom cats might not look upon the Celestial City; and so it was laid upon their eyes, through the nervous systems that lay behind them, that there was no City. Within their white-cat brains, the world was only the forest of Kaniburrha. They walked the streets of Heaven, and it was a jungle trail they trod. If the gods stroked their fur as they passed them by, it was as the wind laying hands upon them. Should they climb a broad stairway, it was a rocky slope they mounted. The buildings were cliffs and the statues were trees; the passers-by were invisible.

Should one from the City enter the true forest, however, cat and god then dwelled upon the same plane of existence—the wilderness, the balancer.

She coughed again, as she had so often before, and her snowy fur was sleeked by the wind. She was a phantom cat, who for three days had stalked about the wilderness of Kaniburrha, slaying and eating the raw red flesh of her kill, crying out her great-throated cat-challenge, licking her fur with her broad, pink tongue, feeling the rain fall down upon her back, dripping from off the high, hanging fronds, coming in torrents down from the clouds, which coalesced, miraculously, in the center of the sky; moving with fire in her loins, having mated the night before with an avalanche of death-colored fur, whose claws had raked her shoulders, the smell of the blood driving them both into a great frenzy; purring, as the cool twilight came over her, bringing with it the moons, like the changing crescents of her eyes, golden and silver and dun. She sat upon the rock, licking her paws and wondering what it was she had hunted.

Lakshmi, in the Garden of the Lokapalas, lay with Kubera, fourth keeper of the world, upon a scented couch set beside the pool in which the Apsarases played. The other three of the Lokapalas were absent this evening. . . . Giggling, the Apsarases splashed the perfumed waters toward the couch. Lord Krishna the Dark, however, chose that moment to blow upon his pipes. The girls then turned away from Kubera the Fat and Lakshmi the Lovely, to rest their elbows upon the edges of the pool and stare at him, there beneath the flowering tree where he lay sprawled amid wineskins and the remains of several meals.

He ran up and down the scale and produced one long wailing note and a series of goatlike bleats. Guari the Fair, whom he had spent an hour undressing and then had apparently forgotten, rose up from his side, dove into the pool and vanished into one of the many subaquaean caves. He hiccupped, began a tune, stopped, began another.

"Is it true what they say about Kali?" asked Lakshmi.

"What do they say?" grunted Kubera, reaching for a bowl of soma.

She took the bowl from his hands, sipped at it, returned it to him. He quaffed it, and a servant refilled it as he placed it back upon the tray.

"That she wants a human sacrifice, to celebrate her wedding?"

"Probably," said Kubera. "Wouldn't put it past her. Bloodthirsty bitch, that one. Always transmigrating into some vicious animal for a holiday. Became a fire-hen once and clawed Sitala's face over something she'd said."

"When?"

"Oh, ten—eleven avatars back. Sitala wore a veil for a devilish long time, till her new body was ready."

"A strange pair," said Lakshmi into his ear, which she was biting. "Your friend Yama is probably the only one would live with her. Supposing she grew angry with a lover and cast her deadly look upon him? Who else could bear that gaze?"

"Jest not," said Kubera. "Thus did we lose Kartikeya, Lord of the Battles."

"Oh?"

"Aye. She's a strange one. Like Yama, yet not like him. He is deathgod, true. But his is the way of the quick, clean kill. Kali is rather like a cat."

"Does Yama ever speak of this fascination she holds for him?"

"Did you come here to gather gossip or to become some?"

"Both," she replied.

At that moment, Krishna took his Aspect upon him, raising up the Attribute of divine drunkenness. From his pipes there poured the bitter-dark sour-sweet melody contagious. The drunkenness within him expanded across the garden, in alternating waves of joy and sadness. He rose upon his lithe, dark legs and began to dance. His flat features were expressionless. His wet, dark hair lay in tight rings, like wire; even his beard was so curled. As he moved, the Apsarases came forth from the pool to follow him. His pipes wandered along the trails of the ancient melodies, growing more and more frenzied as he moved faster and faster, until finally he broke into the Rasa-lila, the Dance of Lust, and his retinue, hands on their hips, followed him with increasing speed through its gyrating movements.

Kubera's grip upon Lakshmi tightened.

"Now
there
is an Attribute," she said.

Rudra the Grim bent his bow and sent an arrow flying. The arrow sped on and on and finally came to rest in the center of a distant target. At his side. Lord Murugan chuckled and lowered his bow.

"You win again," he said. "I can't beat that."

They unbraced their bows and moved toward the target after the arrows.

"Have you met him yet?" asked Murugan.

"I knew him a long time ago," said Rudra.

"Accelerationist?"

"He wasn't then. Wasn't much of anything, politically. He was one of the First, though, one of those who had looked upon Urath."

"Oh?"

"He distinguished himself in the wars against the People-of-the-Sea and against the Mothers of the Terrible Glow." Here, Rudra made a sign in the air. "Later," he continued, "this was remembered, and he was given charge of the northern marches in the wars against the demons. He was known as Kalkin in those days, and it was there that he came to be called Binder. He developed an Attribute which he could use against the demons. With it, he destroyed most of the Yakshas and bound the Rakasha. When Yama and Kali captured him at Hellwell in Malwa, he had already succeeded in freeing these latter. Thus, the Rakasha are again abroad in the world."

"Why did he do this thing?"

"Yama and Agni say that he had made a pact with their leader. They suspect he offered this one a lease on his body in return for the promise of demon troops to war against us."

"May we be attacked?"

"I doubt it. The demons are not stupid. If they could not defeat four of us in Hellwell, I doubt they would attack us all here in Heaven. And even now, Yama is in the Vasty Hall of Death designing special weapons."

"And where is his bride-to-be?"

"Who knows?" said Rudra. "And who cares?"

Murugan smiled.

"I once thought you more than passing fond of her yourself."

"Too cold, too mocking," said Rudra,

"She repulsed you?"

Rudra turned his dark face, which never smiled, upon the fair god of youth.

"You fertility deities are worse than Marxists," he said. "You think that's all that goes on between people. We were just friends for a time, but she is too hard on her friends and so loses them."

"She did repulse you?"

"I suppose so."

"And when she took Morgan, the poet of the plains, as her lover — he who one day incarnated as a jackbird and flew away—you then hunted jackbirds, until inside a month with your arrows you had slain near every one in Heaven."

"And I still hunt jackbirds."

"Why is that?"

"I do not care for their singing."

"She is too cold, too mocking," agreed Murugan.

"I do not like being mocked by
anyone
, youthgod. Could you outrun the arrows of Rudra?"

Murugan smiled again. "No," said he, "nor could my friends the Lokapalas—nor would they need to."