The Very Best of F & SF v1 (26 page)

He laughed. At
sixty-five, both legs gone, what remained of her left side paralyzed, the
cancer spreading like deadly jelly toward her heart, she was still the
matriarch. “You can’t have a cigarette, so forget it.”

“Then why don’t
you use that hypo and let me out of here.”

“Shut up, Mother.”

“Oh, for Christ’s
sake, Nathan. It’s hours if I’m lucky. Months if I’m not. We’ve had this
conversation before. You know I always win.”

“Did I ever tell
you you were a bitchy old lady?”

“Many times, but
I love you anyhow.”

He got up and
walked to the wall. He could not walk through it, so he went around the inside
of the room.

“You can’t get
away from it.”

“Mother, Jesus!
Please!”

“All right. Let’s
talk about the business.”

“I couldn’t care
less about the business right now.”

“Then what
should we talk about? The lofty uses to which an old lady can put her last
moments?”

. “You know, you’re
really ghoulish. I think you’re
enjoying
this in some sick way.”

“What other way
is there to enjoy it.”

“An adventure.”

“The biggest. A
pity your father never had the chance to savor it.”

“I hardly think
he’d have savored the feeling of being stamped to death in a hydraulic press.”

Then he thought
about it, because that little smile was on her lips again. “Okay, he probably
would have. The two of you were so unreal, you’d have sat there and discussed
it and analyzed the pulp.”

“And you’re our
son.”

He was, and he
was. And he could not deny it, nor had he ever. He was hard and gentle and wild
just like them, and he remembered the days in the jungle beyond Brasilia, and
the hunt in the Cayman Trench, and the other days working in the mills
alongside his father, and he knew when his moment came he would savor death as
she did.

“Tell me
something. I’ve always wanted to know.
Did
Dad kill Tom Golden?”

“Use the needle
and I’ll tell you.”

“I’m a Stack. I
don’t bribe.”

“I’m
a Stack, and I know what a killing curiosity you’ve got. Use the
needle and I’ll tell you.”

He walked
widdershins around the room. She watched him, eyes bright as the mill vats.

“You old bitch.”

“Shame, Nathan.
You know you’re not the son of a bitch. Which is more than your sister can say.
Did I ever tell you she wasn’t your father’s child?”

“No, but I knew.”

“You’d have
liked her father. He was Swedish.
Your
father liked him.”

“Is that why Dad
broke both his arms?”

“Probably. But I
never heard the Swede complain. One night in bed with me in those days was
worth a couple of broken arms. Use the needle.”

Finally, while
the family was between the entree and the dessert, he filled the syringe and
injected her. Her eyes widened as the stuff smacked her heart, and just before
she died she rallied all her strength and said, “A deal’s a deal. Your father
didn’t kill Tom Golden, I did. You’re a hell of a man, Nathan, and you fought
us the way we wanted, and we both loved you more than you could know. Except,
dammit, you cunning s.o.b., you
do
know, don’t you?”

“I know,” he
said, and she died; and he cried; and that was the extent of the poetry in it.

16

He
knows we are coming.

They were
climbing the northern face of the onyx mountain. Snake had coated Nathan Stack’s
feet with the thick glue and, though it was hardly a country walk, he was able
to keep a foothold and pull himself up. Now they had paused to rest on a spiral
ledge, and Snake had spoken for the first time of what waited for them where
they were going.

“He?”

Snake did not
answer. Stack slumped against the wall of the ledge. At the lower slopes of the
mountain they had encountered sluglike creatures that had tried to attach
themselves to Stack’s flesh, but when Snake had driven them off they had
returned to sucking the rocks. They had not come near the shadow creature.
Farther up, Stack could see the lights that flickered at the summit; he had
felt fear that crawled up from his stomach. A short time before they had come
to this ledge, they had stumbled past a cave in the mountain where the bat creatures
slept. They had gone mad at the presence of the man and the Snake, and the
sounds they had made sent waves of nausea through Stack. Snake had helped him
and they had gotten past. Now they had stopped and Snake would not answer Stack’s
questions.

We must
keep climbing.

“Because he
knows we’re here.” There was a sarcastic rise in Stack’s voice.

Snake started
moving. Stack closed his eyes. Snake stopped and came back to him. Stack looked
up at the one-eyed shadow.

“Not another
step.”

There
is no reason why you should not know.

“Except, friend,
I have the feeling you aren’t going to tell me anything.”

It is
not yet time for you to know.

“Look: just
because I haven’t asked, doesn’t mean I don’t want to know. You’ve told me
things I shouldn’t be able to handle... all kinds of crazy things... I’m as old
as, as... I don’t know
how
old, but I get the feeling you’ve been trying to tell me I’m Adam...”

That
is so.

“...uh.” He
stopped rattling and stared back at the shadow creature. Then, very softly,
accepting even more than he had thought possible, he said, “Snake.” He was
silent again. After a time he asked, “Give me another dream and let me know the
rest of it?”

You
must be patient. The one who lives at the top knows we are coming but I have
been able to keep him from perceiving your danger to him only because you do
not know yourself.

“Tell me this,
then: does he
want
us to come up... the one on the top?”

He
allows it. Because he doesn’t know.

Stack nodded,
resigned to following Snake’s lead. He got to his feet and performed an
elaborate butler’s motion: after you, Snake.

And Snake
turned, his flat hands sticking to the wall of the ledge, and they climbed
higher, spiraling upward toward the summit.

The Deathbird
swooped, then rose toward the Moon. There was still time.

17

Dira came to
Nathan Stack near sunset, appearing in the board room of the industrial
consortium Stack had built from the empire left by his family.

Stack sat in the
pneumatic chair that dominated the conversation pit where top-level decisions
were made. He was alone. The others had left hours before and the room was dim
with only the barest glow of light from hidden banks that shone through the
soft walls.

The shadow
creature passed through the walls—and at his passage they became rose quartz,
then returned to what they had been. He stood staring at Nathan Stack, and for
long moments the man was unaware of any other presence in the room.

You
have to go now
, Snake said.

Stack looked up,
his eyes widened in horror, and through his mind flitted the unmistakable image
of Satan, fanged mouth smiling, horns gleaming with scintillas of light as
though seen through crosstar filters, rope tail with its spade-shaped appendage
thrashing, cloven hoofs leaving burning imprints in the carpet, eyes as deep as
pools of oil, the pitchfork, the satin-lined cape, the hairy legs of a goat,
talons. He tried to scream but the sound dammed up in his throat.

No,
Snake said,
that is not so.
Come with me, and you will understand.

There was a tone
of sadness in the voice. As though Satan had been sorely wronged. Stack shook
his head violently.

There was no
time for argument. The moment had come, and Dira could not hesitate. He
gestured and Nathan Stack rose from the pneumatic chair, leaving behind
something that looked like Nathan Stack asleep, and he walked to Dira and Snake
took him by the hand and they passed through rose quartz and went away from
there.

Down and down
Snake took him.

The Mother was
in pain. She had been sick for eons, but it had reached the point where Snake knew
it would be terminal, and the Mother knew it, too. But she would hide her
child, she would intercede in her own behalf and hide him away, deep in her
bosom where no one, not even the mad one, could find him.

Dira took Stack
to Hell.

It was a fine
place.

Warm and safe
and far from the probing of mad ones.

And the sickness
raged on unchecked. Nations crumbled, the oceans boiled and then grew cold and
filmed over with scum, the air became thick with dust and killing vapors, flesh
ran like oil, the skies grew dark, the sun blurred and became dull. The Earth
moaned.

The plants
suffered and consumed themselves, beasts became crippled and went mad, trees
burst into flame and from their ashes rose glass shapes that shattered in the
wind. The Earth was dying; a long, slow, painful death.

In the center of
the Earth, in the fine place, Nathan Stack slept.
Don’t leave me with strangers.

Overhead, far
away against the stars, the Deathbird circled and circled, waiting for the
word.

18

When they
reached the highest peak, Nathan Stack looked across through the terrible
burning cold and the ferocious grittiness of the demon wind and saw the
sanctuary of always, the cathedral of forever, the pillar of remembrance, the
haven of perfection, the pyramid of blessings, the toyshop of creation, the
vault of deliverance, the monument of longing, the receptacle of thoughts, the
maze of wonder, the catafalque of despair, the podium of pronouncements and the
kiln of last attempts.

On a slope that
rose to a star pinnacle, he saw the home of the one who dwelled here—lights
flashing and flickering, lights that could be seen far off across the deserted
face of the planet—and he began to suspect the name of the resident.

Suddenly
everything went red for Nathan Stack. As though a filter had been dropped over
his eyes, the black sky, the flickering lights, the rocks that formed the great
plateau on which they stood, even Snake became red, and with the color came
pain. Terrible pain that burned through every channel of Stack’s body, as though
his blood had been set afire. He screamed and fell to his knees, the pain
crackling through his brain, following every nerve and blood vessel and
ganglion and neural track. His skull flamed.

Fight
him,
Snake said.
Fight him!

I can’t,
screamed silently through Stack’s mind, the pain too great even to speak. Fire
licked and leaped, and he felt the delicate tissue of thought shriveling. He
tried to focus his thoughts on ice. He clutched for salvation at ice, chunks of
ice, mountains of ice, swimming icebergs of ice half-buried in frozen water,
even as his soul smoked and smoldered.
Ice!
He thought of millions of particles of hail rushing, falling,
thundering against the firestorm eating his mind, and there was a spit of
steam, a flame that went out, a corner that grew cool... and he took his stand
in that corner, thinking ice, thinking blocks and chunks and monuments of ice,
edging them out to widen the circle of coolness and safety. Then the flames
began to retreat, to slide back down the channels, and he sent ice after them,
snuffing them, burying them in ice and chill waters that raced after the flames
and drove them out.

When he opened
his eyes, he was still on his knees, but he could think again, and the red
surfaces had become normal again.

He
will try again. You must be ready.

“Tell me
everything!
I can’t go
through this without knowing, I need help! Tell me, Snake, tell me now!”

You
can help yourself. You have the strength. I gave you the spark.

... and the
second derangement struck!

The air turned
shaverasse and he held dripping chunks of unclean rova in his jowls, the taste
making him weak with nausea. His pods withered and drew up into his shell and
as the bones cracked he howled with strings of pain that came so fast they were
almost one. He tried to scuttle away, but his eyes magnified the shatter of
light that beat against him. Facets of his eyes cracked and the juice began to
bubble out. The pain was unbelievable.