It lay in the crater it had dug for itself, a rounded arc visible about
the brown earth. Already sumac and vines were mending the broken soil.
Warm fall sunlight slanted down through the trees as Douglas O'Brien
and Steve Arnsen plodded toward the distant gurgling of the stream,
thoughts intent on catching the limit. No fingering tendril of menace
thrust out to warn them.
"Mind your step," Arnsen said, seeing the pit. He detoured around it
and turned, realizing that O'Brien had not followed. "Come on, Doug.
It's getting late."
O'Brien's tanned young face was intent as he peered down into the
hollow. "Wait a bit," he said absently. "This looks--say! I'll bet
there's a meteor down there!"
"So there's a meteor. We're not fishing for meteors, professor. They're
mostly iron, anyway. Gold, now, would be a different matter."
O'Brien dropped lightly into the hole, scraping at the dirt with his
fingers. "Wonder how long it's been here? You run along, Steve. I'll
catch up with you."
Arnsen sighed. O'Brien, with his vast enthusiasm for everything under
the sun, was off again. There would be no stopping him now till he had
satisfied his curiosity about the meteorite. Well, Arnsen had a new fly
he was anxious to use, and it would soon be too late for good fishing.
With a grunt he turned and pushed on toward the stream.
The fly proved excellent. In a surprisingly short time Arnsen had
bagged the limit. There was no sign of O'Brien, and hunger made itself
evident. Arnsen retraced his steps.
The younger man was sitting cross-legged beside the crater, holding
something in his cupped hands and staring down at it. A swift glance
showed Arnsen that the meteorite had been uncovered, and, apparently,
cracked in two, each piece the size of a football. He stepped closer,
to see what O'Brien held.
It was a gray crystal, egg-sized, filled with cloudy, frozen mists. It
had been cut into a diamond-shaped, multifaced gem.
"Where'd you get that?" Arnsen asked.
O'Brien jumped, turning up a startled face. "Oh--hello, Steve. It was
in the meteorite. Damnedest thing I ever saw. I saw the meteorite had
a line of fission all around it, so I smacked the thing with a rock. It
fell apart, and this was in the middle. Impossible, isn't it?"
"Let's see." Arnsen reached for the jewel. O'Brien showed an odd
reluctance in giving it up, but finally dropped it into the other's
outstretched hand.
The gem was cold, and yet not unpleasantly so. A tingling raced up
Arnsen's arm to his shoulder. He felt an abrupt, tiny shock.
O'Brien snatched the jewel. Arnsen stared at him.
"I'm not going to eat it. What--"
The boy grinned. "It's my luck piece, Steve. My lucky charm. I'm going
to have it pierced."
"Better take it to a jeweler first," Arnsen suggested. "It may be
valuable."
"No--I'll keep it." He slipped the gem into his pocket. "Any luck?"
"The limit, and I'm starving. Let's get back to camp."
* * * * *
Over their meal of fried trout, O'Brien fingered the find, staring into
the cloudy depths of the gem as though he expected to find something
there. Arnsen could sense a strange air of withdrawal about him. That
night O'Brien fell asleep holding the jewel in his hand.
His sleep was troubled. O'Brien watched the boy, the vaguest hint of
worry in his blue eyes. Once Doug lifted his hand and let it fall
reluctantly. And once a flash of light seemed to lance out from the
gem, brief and vivid as lightning. Imagination, perhaps....
The moon sank. O'Brien stirred and sat up. Arnsen felt the other's eyes
upon him. He said softly, "Doug?"
"Yes. I wondered if you were awake."
"Anything wrong?"
"There's a girl...." O'Brien said, and fell silent. After what seemed a
long time, he went on: "Remember you said once that I'd never find a
girl perfect enough to love?"
"I remember."
"You were wrong. She's like Deirdre of the Tuatha Dé, like Freya, like
Ran of the northern seas. She has red hair, red as dying suns are red,
and she's a goddess like Deirdre, too. The Song of Solomon was made for
her. 'Thou art all fair, my love; there is no spot in thee.... I sleep,
but my heart waketh; it is the voice of my beloved that knocketh.'
Steve," he said, and his voice broke sharply. "It wasn't a dream. I
know it wasn't. She exists, somewhere." He stirred; Arnsen guessed that
he was peering at the gray jewel.
There was nothing to say. The frosty brilliance of the stars gleamed
through the laced branches above. A curious breath of the unearthly
seemed to drop down from the vast abyss of the sky, chilling Arnsen's
heart.
In that moment he knew that his friend was ensorcelled.
Superstition--foolishness! He shook the thought away. But all the blood
of his Northern ancestors rose up in him, the Vikings who had believed
in Queen Ran of Ocean, in trolls and warlocks and the water-maidens who
guard sunken gold.
"You're dreaming," he said stubbornly, more loudly than he thought.
"It's time we got back to the city. We've been here long enough."
To his surprise, O'Brien agreed. "I think so. I've an idea I want to
work on." And the boy shut up like a clam, relaxing almost instantly
into peaceful slumber.
But Arnsen did not sleep for a long time. The stars seemed too close
and, somehow, menacing. From the black void, eyes watched--not human
eyes, for all their loveliness. They were pools of darkest night, and
stars glimmered within them.
He wished that O'Brien had not found the meteorite.