His magn and Joiwind’s intertwined for a single moment and Maskull saw his face soften with love, while she looked exultant. She put him in her husband’s arms with gentle force, and stood back, gazing and smiling. Maskull felt rather embarrassed at being embraced by a man, but submitted to it; a sense of cool, pleasant languor passed through him in the act.
“The stranger is red-blooded, then?”
He was startled by Panawe’s speaking in English, and the voice too was extraordinary. It was absolutely tranquil, but its tranquillity seemed in a curious fashion to be an illusion, proceeding from a rapidity of thoughts and feelings so great that their motion could not be detected. How this could be, he did not know.
“How do you come to speak in a tongue you have never heard before?” demanded Maskull.
“Thought is a rich, complex thing. I can’t say if I am really speaking your tongue by instinct, or if you yourself are translating my thoughts into your tongue as I utter them.”
“Already you see that Panawe is wiser than I am,” said Joiwind gaily.
“What is your name?” asked the husband.
“Maskull.”
“That name must have a meaning—but again, thought is a strange thing. I connect that name with something—but with what?”
“Try to discover,” said Joiwind.
“Has there been a man in your world who stole something from the Maker of the universe, in order to ennoble his fellow creatures?”
“There is such a myth. The hero’s name was Prometheus.”
“Well, you seem to be identified in my mind with that action—but what it all means I can’t say, Maskull.”
“Accept it as a good omen, for Panawe never lies, and never speaks thoughtlessly.”
“There must be some confusion. These are heights beyond me,” said Maskull calmly, but looking rather contemplative.
“Where do you come from?”
“From the planet of a distant sun, called Earth.”
“What for?”
“I was tired of vulgarity,” returned Maskull laconically. He intentionally avoided mentioning his fellow voyagers, in order that Krag’s name should not come to light.
“That’s an honourable motive,” said Panawe. “And what’s more, it may be true, though you spoke it as a prevarication.”
“As far as it goes, it’s quite true,” said Maskull, staring at him with annoyance and surprise.
The swampy lake extended for about half a mile from where they were standing to the lower buttresses of the mountain. Feathery purple reeds showed themselves here and there through the shallows. The water was dark green. Maskull did not see how they were going to cross it.
Joiwind caught his arm. “Perhaps you don’t know that the lake will bear us?”
Panawe walked onto the water; it was so heavy that it carried his weight. Joiwind followed with Maskull. He instantly started to slip about—nevertheless the motion was amusing, and he learned so fast, by watching and imitating Panawe, that he was soon able to balance himself without assistance. After that he found the sport excellent.
For the same reason that women excel in dancing, Joiwind’s half falls and recoveries were far more graceful and sure than those of either of the men. Her slight, draped form—dipping, bending, rising, swaying, twisting, upon the surface of the dark water—this was a picture Maskull could not keep his eyes away from.
The lake grew deeper. The gnawl water became green-black. The crags, gullies, and precipices of the shore could now be distinguished in detail. A waterfall was visible, descending several hundred feet. The surface of the lake grew disturbed—so much so that Maskull had difficulty in keeping his balance. He therefore threw himself down and started swimming on the face of the water. Joiwind turned her head, and laughed so joyously that all her teeth flashed in the sunlight.
They landed in a few more minutes on a promontory of black rock. The water on Maskull’s garment and body evaporated very quickly. He gazed upward at the towering mountain, but at that moment some strange movements on the part of Panawe attracted his attention. His face was working convulsively, and he began to stagger about. Then he put his hand to his mouth and took from it what looked like a bright-coloured pebble. He looked at it carefully for some seconds. Joiwind also looked, over his shoulder, with quickly changing colors. After this inspection, Panawe let the object—whatever it was—fall to the ground, and took no more interest in it.
“May I look?” asked Maskull; and, without waiting for permission, he picked it up. It was a delicately beautiful egg-shaped crystal of pale green.
“Where did this come from?” he asked queerly.
Panawe turned away, but Joiwind answered for him. “It came out of my husband.”
“That’s what I thought, but I couldn’t believe it. But what is it?”
“I don’t know that it has either name or use. It is merely an overflowing of beauty.”
“Beauty?”
Joiwind smiled. “If you were to regard nature as the husband, and Panawe as the wife, Maskull, perhaps everything would be explained.”
Maskull reflected.
“On Earth,” he said after a minute, “men like Panawe are called artists, poets, and musicians. Beauty overflows into them too, and out of them again. The only distinction is that their productions are more human and intelligible.”
“Nothing comes from it but vanity,” said Panawe, and, taking the crystal out of Maskull’s hand, he threw it into the lake.
The precipice they now had to climb was several hundred feet in height. Maskull was more anxious for Joiwind than for himself. She was evidently tiring, but she refused all help, and was in fact still the nimbler of the two. She made a mocking face at him. Panawe seemed lost in quiet thoughts. The rock was sound, and did not crumble under their weight. The heat of Branchspell, however, was by this time almost killing, the radiance was shocking in its white intensity, and Maskull’s pain steadily grew worse.
When they got to the top, a plateau of dark rock appeared, bare of vegetation, stretching in both directions as far as the eye could see. It was of a nearly uniform width of five hundred yards, from the edge of the cliffs to the lower slopes of the chain of hills inland. The hills varied in height. The cup-shaped Poolingdred was approximately a thousand feet above them. The upper part of it was covered with a kind of glittering vegetation which he could not comprehend.
Joiwind put her hand on Maskull’s shoulder, and pointed upward. “Here you have the highest peak in the whole land—that is, until you come to the Ifdawn Marest.”
On hearing that strange name, he experienced a momentary unaccountable sensation of wild vigour and restlessness—but it passed away.
Without losing time, Panawe led the way up the mountainside. The lower half was of bare rock, not difficult to climb. Halfway up, however, it grew steeper, and they began to meet bushes and small trees. The growth became thicker as they continued to ascend, and when they neared the summit, tall forest trees appeared.
These bushes and trees had pale, glassy trunks and branches, but the small twigs and the leaves were translucent and crystal. They cast no shadows from above, but still the shade was cool. Both leaves and branches were fantastically shaped. What surprised Maskull the most, however, was the fact that, as far as he could see, scarcely any two plants belonged to the same