CROFT DECIDES
And, now, despite all these things, despite the scene in the room
of the Gayana, the shock of surprise attendant upon his waking--the
first startled comprehension of what had happened wearing off ever so
slightly, Croft's future course became to him more clear.
Since the commanding part remained to him yet, it was his to command,
not to question or advise. He stalked across the sunlighted vastness
of the region of the Gayanas where the chatter of the maidens sank to
silence as he passed, bade the vestal who had taken him to Naia send
some of the women to attend her and passed through the silver door.
Stern of lip, utterly composed in outward seeming once more, giving no
outward sign of the tempest of black despair, of heart-sick and baffled
yearning which raged within him, he made his way down three of the
angling flights of the pyramid stairs and flung back into its masonry
sockets the high priest's door.
Never perhaps in the history of the nation has so unceremonious an
entrance of those chambers in the sacred structure been made. Yet Croft
had deliberately planned on the effect and a quiver of satisfaction
filled him, as Zud, seated at a table of the wine-red wood so much used
for furnishings in Tamarizia, refreshing himself with some cakes of
beaten grain and wine, and fruit, glanced up sharply with an expression
of surprised resentment and then started to his feet.
"Sit, man of Zitu," he directed bruskly, and watched the high priest
comply as he himself advanced and occupied a richly upholstered couch
close to where Zud sat. Then as the priest dipped his hands into a
crystal bowl of water and dried them on a square of cloth reserved for
the purpose, he went on. "It were well to consider the form of this
proclamation concerning the Mouthpiece of Zitu, I think."
Zud eyed him. Plainly the high priest was ill at ease. Croft's whole
manner had altered strangely since he had left him at the door of the
Gayana, and he must have sensed it. The thing was in his intonation,
the settled lines of his face, his eyes. "I--give ear, lord," he began,
after a momentary pause. "What suggestions are there--"
"Suggestions?" The Mouthpiece of Zitu caught the last word from his
mouth. "Think you that I shall offer suggestions, priest of Zitu? Does
Zitu suggest when he speaks?"
"Nay." Zud's expression grew troubled. "Hold not my words against me,
lord. I seek not thy displeasure. Yours is the speaking, mine it is
to--obey."
"That is well," said Croft in a milder voice. "Listen then, Zud. It is
my will that neither you, nor the brothers of the priesthood, nor any
other man in Tamarizia, bend the knee to me again. Render unto Zitu
that obeisance as heretofore--to Ga and Azil--not to me. Those things
are of the spirit, Zud, not of the flesh. In Tamarizia after fourteen
days men walk equal in Zitu's sight. Let thy word go forth to this
effect."
A tremor shook the high priest's hand as he stretched it forth. "I hear
and obey, O lord; yet was it to thy spirit the knee was bent, not to
Jasor of Nodhur's flesh."
"My spirit is what Zitu by his grace has made it," Croft returned.
"What I am lies between me and Zitu himself."
"Yet how then shall the Mouthpiece of Zitu be proclaimed?" Zud
quavered. Suddenly, despite his priestly trappings, the sumptuous
quarters in which he sat, he seemed no more than a shaken old man.
"It is of that I would give you counsel," Croft replied. "Were I minded
I could forbid this proclamation altogether, Zud, and compel you to
hang your head, admitting that you had meddled to bring about those
things Zitu had not ordained. Think you he needs any man's assistance
in working out his plan? Yet because I have watched closely since I
awakened, and find your act inspired by no evil intent, but by lack
of understanding, because to discredit your words were to strike not
only thee, but at the very foundation itself of each man's belief, I am
minded to let what you have decreed take place.
"You shall proclaim me thus. Not as a spirit, but as a man, a teacher,
one to whom Zitu permits certain things to be known; one by whom the
welfare of the nation is considered, through whom shall be given to
Tamarizia's people much for their own good; through whom those things
Zitu permits for them shall be transmitted to them, and in so much
Zitu's mouthpiece still." Abruptly he broke off as a sudden conception
seized him. For a time he considered a startlingly daring plan before
he spoke again in a tone of musing: "Zud--Zud, if you only knew the
truth."
"The truth, O lord!" said the high priest slowly. "Have I not sought it
all my life?"
Croft nodded. "Aye, priest of Zitu, I think you have. Wouldst hear the
truth of those things Abbu told you from my mouth?"
Zud leaned forward somewhat quickly. For an instant an eager light
gleamed in his eyes before they met Croft's steadily watching, and then
wavered.
"Lord!" he faltered, "lord!"
Croft told him the tale.
For that was the plan which had filled his mind--to tell it; to narrate
to Zud the truth; to explain those things which had been done, and the
how of each act so fully as he could inside the other's comprehension,
to convince him by word of mouth if he might, or, failing that, to win
his consent to a practical test.
* * * * *
While he talked time dragged on, and by degrees Zud relaxed his pose,
of something like overborne embarrassment.
His attitude now became that of an amazed and eager attention. His eyes
lighted and his breathing quickened, and now and then he moistened his
lips with his tongue. By degrees his excitement increased, until he was
gripping the arms of his chair and leaning toward Croft, in a posture
which seemed no more than physical reflex of his mental determination
to miss no single word.
"Thou--thou sayest a man may leave his body at will?" he stammered as
Croft paused.
"Yes, if he knows the method of controlling his spirit to affect his
object," Croft replied.
"May go to other places while his body remains where he leaves it--and
see and know, and return again?" Zud said. His eagerness struck Croft
as almost pathetic. It was like that of a child.
"Yes," he repeated again.
"It is hard to believe," said Zud.
"Would you like to have proof?" Croft decided to convince the high
priest now and at once.
"Proof?" Zud queried.
"Yes. Would you like to leave this body of yours, Zud of Zitra, under
my direction, learn I have spoken the truth?"
His words were followed by a widening of the high priest's eyes. In
them waked something like a startled desire, combined with a cautious
hesitation. His whole expression was that of one who falters on the
brink of the unknown, longing to dare it yet deterred by the very fact
that it _is_ the unknown.
"Thou canst bring that about?" he questioned at length.
"Yes, if you obey me wholly." Croft held him with a steady regard. To
him that which he meant to do was no more than play. To cast this old
man into a cataleptic sleep by his own consent and project his astral
consciousness, whither he willed, was naught for one who by his own
volition had spanned the gap of interstellar space. Yet to Zud the
venture seemed to appear very vast, and he hesitated yet a moment
briefly before:
"My obedience is yours, O lord," he gasped.
"Then," said Croft, summoning all the powers of his trained will to his
aid, "fasten thy eyes on me, O man of Zitu, and fix thy mind on sleep,
for this leaving of the body begins indeed with a something approaching
sleep in its nature. Think therefore of sleep, O Zud--of sleep, of only
sleep!"
Fastening his gaze upon him in complete attention, until by degrees his
lids, at first wide, began to droop above his eyes, Zud obeyed.
"So then," Croft droned on as he noted the change, "your eyes are
closing, Zud; the lids grow heavy; sleep creeps now upon thee; sleep,
a deep sleep. Zud, thou art asleep, yet sleeping thou canst hear my
voice. Speak I not the truth?"
"Aye"--a muffled murmur from the high priest's mouth.
"And hearing me, Zud, even in your sleep you will render obedience to
my words. Hence, listen closely and obey. Do you know where Lakkon and
Jadgor and Robur lodge?"
"Aye," quavered the high priest.
"Then shall you go there, Zud, on my command. In the name of Zitu I
command you to leave your body--now."
For a moment he gave over speaking and waited while the form of the
high priest relaxed and sagged down in the chair of ruddy wood. Then
abruptly he resumed:
"Have you obeyed me, Zud?"
"Aye," no more than a whisper from the lips of the body in the chair.
"What do you see?" Croft demanded.
"A strange sight, indeed. My own form, as in a reflecting water-pool,
seated with downcast head, as wrapped in sleep."
"'Tis well," Croft spoke in answer and direction. "Await my company,
Zud." He threw himself prone upon the couch and freed his own astral
shell from Jasor's body by the effort of his will. An instant later
he floated midway between the floor and ceiling at Zud's side. Below
them, sat and reclined each body. There stood the table, still bearing
food for the material body midway between couch and chair. Croft turned
to his companion. And now all communication was on the astral plane,
without sound, yet by a none less evident diffusion of conscious
vibration.
"Thou seest?" he queried with a smile.
"Aye," the answer came to him from Zud's wraith--that strange replica
of his earthly form, implacable, invisible to any save Croft's and his
own eyes, which hung there between the floor of the apartment and the
burnished roof, weaving to and fro, in each intangible current of the
air, swaying and billowing, like a wind-stirred effigy in smoke. "Aye,
lord, I see, and am filled with amazement."
"Thou seest but the first step as yet," Croft told him. "Come!"
* * * * *
There was an open embrasure in the pyramid wall. Through it Croft
willed himself, and seizing the thin arm of the weird form beside him,
dragged it along. They shot out and up through a sun-filled air--out
and up and up. The pyramid lay beneath them, the snow-white temple of
Zitu glinting in dazzling fashion on its top. East, west, north and
south Zitra lay spread to their sight, with its houses, its palaces
and hovels, the ringing circumference of its mighty walls. Its harbor
studded with sails was all asparkle in the sunlight, and beyond that
the bosom of the central ocean rose and fell slowly like the breast of
a woman asleep.
"Lord! Lord!" Croft sensed that the high priest gasped again in his
emotions at least.
"Behold!" Croft returned and swept an arm in the gesture of a circle.
"Priest of Zitu, behold! And, now, in which direction do the men I
mentioned lodge?"
"In the palace of Tamhys himself, as his guests," Zud replied, and
pointed with a spectral arm.
"Will thyself to their presence, even as you were in the flesh. Think
only that you desire immediate nearness to them. So shall you come upon
them, Zud."
"Aye, lord," Zud knit his astral brows as though in mental effort.
The sunlight vanished in a flash. With it went out the far-flung view
of the Tamarizian landscape--the city, the waves of the central sea.
Suddenly vast walls appeared on every hand--a tessellated floor inlaid
in white and gold and silver, stretched out beneath a roof of silver
inlaid beams, supporting frames containing varicolored glass.
This was the interior court of the Zitran palace as Croft knew. It
swept past quickly. He had the impression of the balcony surrounding
it on all four sides in Tamarizian style, of the supporting arches, of
the groups of statuary between them, of the ascending stairways, and
then they vanished, too, and he found himself in a smaller apartment,
its sliding doorway covered by a scarlet curtain, its floor in part
concealed by gorgeous rugs, its windows draped with other scarlet
tissues through which the outer light shone redly--a room equipped with
couches and chairs and tables, adorned between the doors and windows
with frescoes and groups of sculpture done in the customary translucent
stone, and supported on pedestals of copper, silver and gold. So much
he saw at a glance before he fastened his attention on the figures of
three men grouped about a table in front of a scarlet-curtained window
in the outer end of the room.
These men he knew, had met and known and conversed with before this in
the flesh. Jadgor, of Aphur, heavy set, dark of eyes and complexion,
grizzled of hair, his nose high and somewhat bent in the middle, his
whole appearance that of a man of driving purpose, sat there now clad
in leg-cases, shirt and metal cuirass, with Aphur's rayed sun on his
breast. And close beside him on the table reposed his helmet with its
nodding scarlet plumes.
Opposite him sat Lakkon, noble of Aphur and adviser to the king,
heavy set like his brother-in-law, strong of feature, with iron-gray
poll, dressed like to Jadgor in every essential detail, though in a
fashion less royal. By the end of the table stood Robur, Jadgor's son,
clean-limbed, strong-featured, with well-formed jaw and mouth, about
which lurked often a hint of humor, as Croft knew. In a fleeting glance
he recognized its absence now. The face of the crown prince was set
into almost stubborn lines, its cheeks a trifle flushed.
And even as Croft perceived the attitude and expression of the several
occupants of the apartment, Jadgor hit the table with one fist a
resounding crash, whose vibration eddied out and set Zud to drunkenly
rocking in their whorl close by Croft's side.
"By Zitu, and by Zitu!" He swore a double oath. "I like not this
delay in an understanding. Thrice in as many days have we visited the
pyramid, and Zud has said he sleeps. Much has he done for Tamarizia,
as I shall last deny; nor did he tell us to remain in Zitra at the
last. Yet if Zud be right, as he should, being high priest, my brother,
Lakkon, finds himself in difficult case."
* * * * *
Lakkon's visage darkened. "Yet was the pledge given of his seeking," he
broke out in querulous fashion. "Jadgor knows that Jasor, be he spirit,
as Zud saith, or man, sought it of me ere he entered the armored car
to lead into the conflict wherein Helmor, of Zollaria, was overthrown.
And Jadgor himself did sponsor my words wherein Naia, my daughter,
was promised him to wife. Wherefore, she hath permitted his arms, and
yielded him her mouth, as none save an unclean woman doth to any save
the men of her own family or him to whom she is betrothed."
"Aye," said Jadgor, frowning. "Yet shall a spirit mate with the flesh.
Continence is no less a vow of the priesthood than of the Gayana.
Were a spirit sent by Zitu to do his work, even though to that end he
employs the body of one whom Azil has recalled, is he to be considered
as man or priest?"
"Think you Zitu wouldst choose a rebellious spirit for his
mouthpiece?" Robur broke in with considerable heat. "Jadgor, my father,
who are we to judge?"
"Robur seems minded to attempt it," Jadgor rejoined with a sarcasm he
plainly did not wish to conceal.
"Aye." The color deepened in the crown prince's cheeks. "For by
Jadgor's command I labored beside this Jasor, of Nodhur, as he then
was known, for the better part of a cycle, toward the end of making
Tamarizia safe against what Helmor did intend, and in nothing did I
find him other save steadfast and just. Man he was in every seeming,
save that his knowledge surpassed the knowledge of all other men, and
for these sleeps such as holds him now. We became as brothers in our
common purpose, whereby Jadgor now bids fair to attain his ends."
Croft's heart warmed swiftly to Robur's defense, though it was no
more than from his knowledge of the crown prince he had felt he might
expect. As Robur said the bond between them in their year of mutual
endeavor in the shops of Himyra and Ladhra, where the motors and rifles
used in the war were made, had become exceedingly close. Indeed, so
intimate had they grown that he had addressed Robur as "Rob."
They had been as brothers, indeed, and he felt new confidence now,
knowing Gaya would reflect the attitude of her husband rather than
any one else. And Gaya in the past had been at one time the means
of communication between Naia and himself, when Lakkon had felt
himself bound by a pledge to Cathur, to discourage Croft's suit. Now,
therefore, he waited eagerly to see what response Jadgor might make to
his son's final sentence which was no more than an allusion to those
plans of mounting the Zitran throne that had held Jadgor's mind when
Croft came to Palos first, toward which, by a marriage with Cathur's
profligate prince, Naia was to aid.
And that Jadgor sensed the half-veiled rebuke, he saw at once, since
the Aphurian's frown but deepened before he spoke. "Man in seeming
is he, I admit, yet to Abbu he confessed that he was not Jasor but
another. This thing I do not understand, nor doth Zud. Yet were he an
agent of Zitu, then were the end of which you speak of Zitu's willing
for Tamarizia's good, which, as my son knows, lies nearest Jadgor's
heart. Zud, as you know also, I have questioned, and he holds that
none save a mortal may know a woman, save only by Zitu's will, as Azil
was conceived of Ga."
"Then why question Zitu's will, as expressed by Zitu's Mouthpiece?"
said Robur quickly, and paused with a gasp.
"What mean you?" Jadgor half rose from his seat.
"Nay--" Suddenly Robur faltered, he seemed disturbed, abashed. He
lowered his eyes. "Nay, my father, I spoke in haste. What says the
maiden herself? Did not my uncle speak with her the prior sun?"
"She holds to her promise as she has held since the beginning," Jadgor
replied. "She refuses to leave the Gayana until she has speech with the
sleeper himself."
"Nor will she leave ever, should Abbu's words and Zud's judgment
prove true," Lakkon said with a twitching face. "Virgin is she in all
save the love she has given to him she knew as Jasor. Failing its
consummation, she becomes Gayana herself."
"Nay, by Zitu!" Robur cried a savage protest. "My father and uncle, of
this thing there lies some explanation. He who I, too, knew as Jasor,
won not the full love of my cousin for any such sterile fate. Himself,
he told me that all he did was by Zitu's grace; and of _all_ that he
did was not this too a part?"
A part--rather the all--the motive, the object of what he had done,
thought Croft, as he once more thrilled to the sturdy, unyielding
quality of Robur's partizanship.
Then as Jadgor made no immediate answer, and Lakkon sat with troubled
countenance, lost as it appeared in the prospective fate of the
daughter whom he loved with an almost adoring devotion, and now saw
embrace the life of a vestal as escape from what, by Tamarizian
custom, must otherwise amount to a technical disgrace, Robur went on.
"Wherefore, as said before, who are we to judge the Hupor Jasor or
the Mouthpiece of Zitu, be he what he may, ere he awakes? Like to my
cousin, Naia, I would ask him to speak for himself."
Jadgor gave him a glance. "For that waking we have waited many suns."
"Yet, perhaps he wakes even now," Lakkon suggested quickly, his manner
that of a man who grasps at straws.
"Aye," said Jadgor, "perhaps. And--since we are met for the purpose,
rather than useless discussion, let us seek the pyramid at once. He
rose, a commanding figure in his glistening cuirass and moved toward
the curtained door.
"Back!" Croft commanded Zud. "Desire the return to thy body."
He suited his own act to the word, and an instant later opened his
physical eyes to find Zud sitting tensely erect, regarding him out of
staring, startled eyes.
He sat up. "You saw, O Zud," he questioned. "You heard?"
"Aye," said Zud a trifle hoarsely. "This passes understanding."
"Only until understood," Croft told him. "Art any less yourself for
having left your flesh?"
Zud dropped his eyes. "Nay, not so," he said at last.
"And had you entered this body upon the couch, rather than that in the
chair?" Croft pressed him closely. "Think you, Zud, you would have been
any less yourself, any less Zud, the--priest of Zitu, and--a _man_?"
"Zitu!" Zud breathed sharply. Plainly he caught Croft's drift. "In such
a fashion then you have visited other places, even to the stars, and
seen strange things, and brought back what you deemed good?"
"Aye," said Croft with a smile. "In the spirit, Zud, you have seen your
body lie sleeping, even as in the flesh you have seen my body lie. Yet
are you Zud in the spirit or in the flesh; for with each man it is the
spirit commands the flesh; that acts, and the spirit, Zud of Zitra, is
of Zitu, breathed from his nostrils, into the flesh, to give the body
life."
"Man then is a spirit?" Zud began slowly. He seemed shaken, yet in some
subtle way exalted, despite the fact that he was pallid to the lips.
"Aye, Zud, priest of Zitu. There were no man else."
A rap fell on the door of the apartment. It slid back, revealing a lay
brother in bare feet and cord-belted robe. He advanced, bending before
Zud from the waist, his arms extended in the sign of the horizontal
cross.
"Jadgor of Aphur, and Lakkon, and Robur, son of Jadgor, await audience
with Zud of Zitra," he announced.
"Admit them," Zud glanced at Croft as the brother withdrew. "Thou art
as thou hast said, a teacher not only of all men, but of Zitu's priest.
I would speak with thee more of this."
For the second time the door slid back. Jadgor, Lakkon, and Robur filed
in.