_The Brown Virgin_
Bram Forest moved from unconscious into a dark half-world of pain and
frustration. He felt his flame-seared body to be hanging upon the edge
of a black abyss into which he could neither fall nor draw away from.
At times, it seemed, gentle hands reached out to explore but were
without the strength to draw him back from the perilous precipice upon
which he hung.
There was an endless time of balance in this dark half-world and then
the thick blackness faded to a gray, the precipice seemed to draw away
of its own volition, and the pain within him lessened.
He opened his eyes.
He was lying on a bed of soft, cool moss in a semi-dark cavern with
the sound of tinkling water in the distance. He lay staring at the
ceiling for a long time, wondering into what manner of place he had
come and how. Then his keen ears caught the sound of breathing other
than his own; a soft breathing that fell gently upon his senses and
calmed rather than alerted him.
He turned his head and saw a beautiful, naked brown-skinned girl
kneeling nearby but beyond his reach. He was struck first by the
beauty of her face and form and then by the fact that she was not as
completely brown as his first impression had given him to believe. Her
breasts and loins were of pure white and droplets of shining water ran
down her body.
She was in the act of replacing a sort of leather harness upon her
person and Bram Forest realized she had just returned from bathing at
whatever place the unseen water gurgled and laughed and that she was
now dressing herself.
He held his peace until the act was completed, not wishing to
embarrass her by making his consciousness known while she was nude.
After a few moments, the harness was in place and she rose to stand
erect and shake out her dark shining hair. Bram Forest chose this time
to speak. "I do not know who you are, but I am obviously in your debt.
My gratitude."
The girl reacted like a startled fawn and drew back several paces.
"You have regained consciousness?"
"It seems so. Where is this place and how came I here?"
"We brought you."
Bram Forest's brow furrowed in thought. "Oh, yes. Now I remember.
There were a group of people such as you at the place I tried to fight
the dark swordsman with his own weapons." Bram Forest chuckled
ruefully. "It seems I did not fare so well."
"When we discovered you were not our god, the others wanted to leave
you there to die but I resisted this as being inhuman and made them
bring you here."
"Where are the rest?"
"They have returned."
"Returned whence?"
The girl lowered her beautiful head sadly. "That I cannot tell you."
* * * * *
Bram Forest smiled. "Be not so sad. The fact that you prefer to keep
the information to yourself is no reason for near-tears."
"I am not sad for that reason, sire."
"Then why?"
"Because you asked the question and are even more surely therefore,
not our god."
Bram Forest was deeply curious and half-amused at the trend of this
conversation. "Tell me this, then. Why does my asking the question
eliminate all possibility of my being your god?"
"Because if you were the god we seek and yearn for, you would not have
to ask where my people went. You would know."
"Instead of clarifying the situation," Bram Forest mused, "each
question sends me deeper and deeper into a mental labyrinth."
"We risked our lives in going to the place you found us. It was
forbidden to credit the ancient legend of our people. Therefore--"
"What legend?"
"That upon this day and at that place our god would appear to deliver
us."
* * * * *
Bram Forest, now desperately seeking a question that would clarify
rather than further befuddle, held up his hand. "Wait. If you expected
a god to appear and I arrived on schedule, how can you be so sure that
I am not he?"
"We thought so when you advanced upon the hideous Abarian and took his
throat in your great hands. But when you not only allowed him to live
but also suffered him to take up his whip-sword and come within an
eyelash of killing you, we knew you were not our god."
Bram Forest nodded with understanding. "I can see now how stupid that
act was. Certainly not a manner in which a genuine god would conduct
himself." He glanced at the girl and smiled. "Please come closer that
I may see you better."
She moved her head in the negative, reluctantly, Bram Forest thought,
and replied, "If you were our god I would gladly place myself in your
power to do with me as you would, but as you are mortal, I must remain
away from you."
Bram Forest frowned. "Again things get murky."
"I am a virgin," the beautiful girl explained simply and with no
self-consciousness whatever. "I must remain so until my time is
ordained. If I lost my virginity, even through violation that I
resist, I would immediately be delivered into the Golden Ape."
Bram Forest came upright, causing the girl to retreat a step further
in alarm. "The Golden Ape, did you say?"
"Yes."
"And you are a virgin--"
This last was a statement rather than a question as Bram Forest sank
back, his eyes misty with thought. "An ape, a boar, a stallion--" he
pondered. "A virgin's feast--"
The girl eyed him with concern. "Are you sure that your wound has not
caused--"
"It is not that," he said, switching his mind back to things of the
moment. "I'm just wondering--might you tell me your name without
breaking any rules of reticence?"
* * * * *
"I am Ylia," she said with a childlike solemnity that touched Bram
Forest.
"And does Ylia never smile?"
It seemed to him she made an effort to do this but was so unfamiliar
with the expression that she could not manage it.
He extended a hand, not disconcerted that she did not come close and
take it. He said, "Ylia, I would not again ask a question you did not
wish to answer before. But I am mightily puzzled about the life you
must have led--about that manner of males you have had contact with.
They are certainly a miserable lot if a female of their race must look
to her virtue every waking moment.
"As for me, Ylia--and please believe--I would no more touch you in
desire than I would knowingly injure a child. You are safe in my
presence as in the most guarded room of a nunnery."
If he expected gratitude or a pat on the back for his nobility, he was
rudely surprised. Ylia straightened, her young breasts protruding
gracefully and if she did not react with anger, her face mirrored
something close to it.
"Then I am not desirable?"
Bram Forest blinked. "I did not say that. You are one of the fairest I
have ever set eyes upon."
This puzzled Ylia completely. "Then in the name of the Golden Ape,
why--?"
Bram Forest raised his hand with a gesture of both interruption and
surrender. "Please! Let us pursue this subject no further. The waters
grow deep and I suspect quicksand at their bottom. There are questions
in my mind. Allow me to bring them forth with the understanding that
you do not have to answer any you do not wish to."
It was evident that Ylia's mind was also a bag of conundrums relative
to this late candidate for godhood who had insulted her desirability
and yet complimented her upon it at the same time. She moved forward
and sat gracefully down near the moss resting place of her patient.
Bram Forest was aware of her tenseness. She was like a beautiful
animal ready to spring away at the first sign of hostile movement on
his part. But he also got the impression that coming within reach of
his arms thrilled her. He believed this even while knowing that she
would have fought like a tigress against any advance upon his part.
He said, "Ylia, you are indeed a strange child. You remained here
after your people left and brought me back from the brink of death
even with the fear that I would rise up and violate you as soon as I
acquired the strength to do so. Your thought processes are difficult
to understand."
Ylia lowered her eyes. "You wished to ask some questions, sire."
"My name is Bram Forest. The _sire_ ill-becomes you."
"Bram--Forest," she murmured experimentally. Then she raised her eyes
and there dawned upon her face the most brilliant of smiles. Her look
was one of both dignity and gratitude. "You do me much honor, Bram
Forest!"
"Honor? I fail to understand."
Ylia's eyes glowed proudly. "Why, you treat me with such respect that
I could be even Volna herself!"
"And who is this Volna?"
* * * * *
Ylia was startled at this strange man's ignorance. "Why, everyone on
Tarth knows of Volna, Princess of Nadia, sister of Bontarc, who is
Prince of Nadia and ruler of that great nation. She is the most
exquisitely beautiful woman ever to be born on Tarth."
"Fancy that," Bram Forest said with a lack of enthusiasm that proved
marked disinterest. "I'm afraid I've never had the pleasure of the
lady's acquaintance, nor of her illustrious brother, either."
Ylia lowered her eyes in sadness. "She was also the sister of Jlomec."
"And who, pray is Jlomec?"
"I thought you knew since you tried to avenge his death. He was the
Nadian the cruel Abarian Retoc slew under your very eyes."
"I'm sorry to hear that," Bram Forest said. But the cowardly death had
been accomplished and Bram Forest's mind did not dwell upon it as he
could not see where it affected him one way or another.
"Ylia," he said, "take it as a supposition that I was born this very
moment and know nothing of this world or its customs. With that in
mind, tell me of it--the things you would tell a wondering child."
She glanced at him strangely. "I will tell you all that I am not bound
to hold secret."
"I would not wish to know more."
The beautiful Ylia leaned forward, so preoccupied with the task she
had set herself that all her reserve and wariness left her. Her action
brought her lowered head close to Bram Forest's face and the sweet
smell of her newly washed and shining hair was in his nostrils. Then
he also became preoccupied with the map Ylia was drawing on the floor
of the cavern.
Long they sat thus, Ylia enjoying her task and Bram Forest's facile
mind drawing in each syllable she spoke and committing it to memory.
Finally the sun lowered and the interior of the cavern darkened until
they could no longer see each other. The most important conviction
Bram Forest arrived at from Ylia's discourse was indeed a startling
one. He was certain that this Tarth was a twin planet to Earth of
which there was complete knowledge in his mind. He could hardly escape
the fact that Tarth swung in an orbit exactly opposite to that of its
more familiar counterpart, thus remaining invisible from it.
This conviction came to him through several things Ylia said and it
was buttressed by a bit of Tarthan mythology she chanced to mention.
The legend told of a flame-god, obviously the sun, which stood forth
in its wrath one long-distant day and hurled two great stones at a
demon who came from far away bent upon torment. This last Bram Forest
thought, was perhaps a comet of great size that tore both worlds from
the sun and set them upon their orbits. The existence of the
mythological legend indicated too, that civilization on Tarth was not
backward or at least had not been in ages gone.
In the more exact realm, Bram Forest learned that Tarth was far less
watery than its invisible sister, scarcely half its surface consisting
of ocean. It had two ice caps at the poles, known as the Outer Reaches
and an equator termed the Inner Belt.
* * * * *
There were no isolated continents according to Ylia's map, all the dry
surfaces being connected by wide passages of land through the
continuous ocean.
Ylia's description of the people interested Bram Forest most
intensely. On Tarth, he learned, there was no association of nations,
each mistrusting the others in a world where a state of continuous war
at some point of the globe was an accepted state of affairs which no
one sought to ameliorate.
Ylia herself was hazy upon the description and number of the nations.
She thought some two hundred existed but only the most important could
she describe.
* * * * *
The Abarians were the most successfully warlike, fearing only the
Nadians to the south. This because though the Nadians were not
aggressive and even treated other lesser nations in a kindly fashion,
they possessed an inherent fighting skill and a power potential that
had not been tested in recallable history. Though they had not fought
for centuries, their potential had not lessened because such a folly
would have been considered tantamount to national suicide on Tarth.
There were also the Utalians that Bram Forest visualized as some sort
of lizard men for the reason that they possessed the defensive
characteristics of the chameleon. There was also another intriguing
race, no member of which Ylia had ever seen. She referred to them as
the Twin People of Coom, an area near the north Outer Reach. Bram
Forest speculated upon what manner of people they would be and it came
to him that the evolutionary processes on Tarth had not corresponded
to those of Earth, where all members of the human race evolved into
practically the same form.
Then a name came into Bram Forest's mind; a name that rose out of that
mysterious well of knowledge in his subconscious; a well he could not
explain but had been forced to accept. He no longer questioned it.
"Tell me of the Ofridians."
Ylia started as though he had slapped her. The deep brown of her
beautiful face paled somewhat and her eyes grew very sad.
Bram Forest saw the sadness by the light of the moon, that had risen
and was sending wan light in through the cavern's entrance. He only
sensed the paleness from the tremor of Ylia's voice. "It grows late. I
must go and bring food. Your strength must be nurtured and
greatened."
With that, she hurried off in the direction of the sounding water,
leaving Bram Forest both bewildered and intrigued. Why had she reacted
so violently to his question? And for that matter, why had he been
able to ask the question in the first place? By what process did he
know the name _Ofrid_ and that it designated a nation on Tarth,
without knowing of that nation and already possessing the knowledge
for which he had begged the patient and beautiful Ylia?
Then he remembered that he had resolved not to wonder about these
things--and at the same instant, remembered something else.
The small, flat package that had fallen from the box back on Earth. It
had been his first thought upon regaining consciousness near the
Ofridian well but it had been pushed from his mind by subsequent
events.
How long ago had that been? He tried to assess the passage of time but
failed. The only indication of its length was the fact that he bore no
wound where the Abarian's blade had entered his body. That pointed to
a long span of unconsciousness but perhaps there were contributing
factors.
* * * * *
He had sensed that the mysterious Ylia had at her command something
that had healed him very swiftly but he had no proof of this.
At any rate, he had to retrieve the package if possible. But would it
be possible? Granted the strange disc had brought him somehow from
Earth to Tarth, would it repeat the process in the opposite direction?
He resolved to find out and began unbuckling the disc from its place
on his right wrist.
As he did this a sound manifested outside the cavern but he was so
intent upon his task that he gave little note. Quickly, he strapped
the disc into its potent position on his left wrist. Then he sat
tensely awaiting the reaction.
As he waited, the sound without became so pronounced he could no
longer ignore it. He raised his head and saw a tall, sinister form
outlined against the moonlight. He was unable to distinguish the
features, but the outline told a sickening truth. Also the drawn
whip-sword spoke eloquently of who this intruder was.
The Abarian of the Ofridian well in search of prey. The cowardly
assassin who would now enter and find a defenseless man and a
beautiful girl who would set him aflame with lust.
Rage threw a red curtain over Bram Forest's eyes as he struggled up to
meet the intruder. But the latter never saw him because at that moment
the now-familiar nausea seized Bram Forest's vitals, doubling him
over.
And when the Abarian had advanced into the cavern, he found only an
empty bed of moss, Bram Forest having been snatched up and whirled
into darkness by the relentless hand of time put into terrifying
motion.