“Would you say I’d have anything to gain if a monster kidnaped a Zivver?”
“Not personally, no.”
He told them about the invasion of the Upper Level by the two monsters.
“And why didn’t you say anything about this before?” Averyman asked somewhat indignantly after he had finished.
“For the same reason I’ve already given — I didn’t realize then that I wasn’t responsible for what was happening.”
After a moment Maxwell warned, “We certainly intend to check that story about the Zivver being carried off by monsters.”
“If you find out I’m lying, give me any length of sentence in the Punishment Pit.”
Averyman rose. “I think this hearing has taken up enough time for one period.”
“Hearing? Compost!” Jared swore. “Let’s quit sitting on our hands and go after the Prime Survivor!”
“Easy now,” Haverty soothed. “We don’t want to do anything rash. We may be dealing with Cobalt and Strontium themselves.”
“But they’ll be back!”
“At which time we’ll rely both on the Protectors we’ve posted at the entrance and on the Guardian for Exorcism.”
It was a stupid position born of deaf superstition. But Jared heard that he wouldn’t be able to budge them from it.
Later that period he withdrew to the Fenton Grotto to work on a formula for reallocating the remaining manna husk output among survivors and livestock. Hunched over the sandbox, he brushed the writing area smooth and began all over again with his stylus. But a violent sneeze swept the surface clean and he threw the instrument down in disgust.
He pushed the box aside and laid his head on the slab. Not only were the sniffles driving him out of his mind, but he also felt as though his head were stuffed with warm, moist wooL He’d had fever before, but not like this. Nor had he ever heard of anyone else being sick in this manner.
Leading his thoughts away from physical discomfort, he took cheer from the still unbelievable realization that no Divine Being stood in the way of his quest for Light. The monsters might resent his seeking Darkness and Light. But they could be resisted — if he could only find some way to get around their sleep-dealing powers.
It was tantalizing, too, how everything seemed to point toward some vast and incomprehensible pattern into which were woven so many material and immaterial things. What was the obscure relationship between the eyes and Light, Light and Darkness, Darkness and the Original World, the Original World and Radiation? The apparent linkage extended to the Twin Devils then, in a great circle, back again to the eyes and the Light-Darkness arrangement.
He found himself recalling Cyrus, the Thinker, who spent his time meditating in his grotto at the other end of the world. He remembered that gestations ago he had heard the old man express some novel ideas on Darkness. Perhaps it was those philosophic sessions that had suggested the search for Darkness — and Light — in the first place. And Jared knew he must talk with the Thinker again — soon.
The curtains parted, admitting Many, one of the new Survivors.
“For a P.S. of only a few heartbeats’ experience,” he chided, “you’ve sure carved out a chunk of trouble for yourself — popping off before the Elders about chasing after the monster.”
Jared laughed. “Guess I should have kept my mouth shut.”
Many perched on the slab beside him and sneezed. “The Guardian hit the dome when he heard about it. He says now he’s sure Romel would make a better P.S.”
“After I hear my way clear with this hot-springs emergency, I’ll straighten him out.”
“He’s saying the way you acted at the hearing proves you haven’t atoned. And he’s predicting more misfortune for the world.”
As though Many’s words had also been a cue for fulfillment of Guardian Philar’s prophesy, distressed voices began ifitering through the curtain.
Plunging outside, Jared snagged one of the men who were racing by. “What’s all the commotion?”
“The river! It’s running dry!”
Even before he reached the bank, the central caster’s clacks fetched a composite of the situation. The river had fallen so alarmingly below its normal level that the liquid softness of its reflected sound was completely hidden in the echo void of the bank. And there came only the enfeebled gurgling of water around rocks that had never before been exposed.
A terrified scream shrilled from the direction of the main entrance and, without breaking stride, Jared altered course.
With the central caster behind him, he began getting a better impression of what lay ahead. The Protectors stationed at the mouth of the passageway were in a state of agitated disorder.
“Monster! Monster!” someone over there was shouting.
Then Jared checked his charge as the entire tunnel abruptly began roaring with the soundless noise of the monsters. The sensations he received were like Effective Excitation amplified a thousandfold. But now there were no fuzzy half rings of inaudible sound touching his eyeballs, as in the Optic Nerve Ceremony. Instead, the screaming silence was like a detached, impersonal thing — something associated not with any part of himself, but rather with the mouth of the tunnel!
It was more than that, however. The noiselessness leaked off, much like valid sound, and touched many things — the dome, the wall on his right, the banging stones beside the entrance.
Starting forward again, he threw his hands in front of his face. The distant, whispering roar of Effective Excitation left him immediately. Then that proved it — the uncanny stuff that came from the monsters did inflict its weird pressure on his eyes!
Spared the confusing sensations, he concentrated now on the echoes coming from ahead. There was no monster in the entrance. That one had been there only a few beats earlier was borne out by the loitering scent. And his ears picked out the tubular object that lay on the floor of the tunnel. Even from this distance he could hear it was like the One Della had found in the Upper Level.
Just as he reached the entrance, one of the Protectors raised a rock over his head and raced toward the tube.
“No! Don’t!” Jared shouted.
The guard hurled the rock.
Eyes exposed again, Jared reached down for the remains of the object. It was warm and it rattled and tinkled when he shook it.
He noticed, too, that there were no more traces of the screaming silence.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Living alone and served his necessities by the widowed women of the Lower Level, Cyrus spent his time immersed in himself. When the opportunity to speak materialized, however, his tongue diligently set about the task of making up for long stretches of idleness.
Now, for instance, the Thinker was holding forth on many subjects, seemingly all at the same time:
“Jared Fenton. Prime Survivor Jared Fenton, mind you! Back for another session — just like we used to have gestations ago.”
Jared shifted impatiently on the bench beside him. “I wanted to ask about—”
“But I’m afraid you’ve got your work cut out for you — what with the hot springs trickling out and those monsters running around the passages. Have you decided what’s to be done about the river going dry? And that thing the monster left behind yesterperiod — what do you suppose it was?”
“It seems to me that—”
“Hold it! I’d like to think this thing out a bit.”
Jared was more than grateful for the few moments’ silence. It brought relief to his pounding head, which threatened to split like a manna shell each time he coughed. He’d had fever before — when he was bitten by a spider, for instance. But it was never like this.