“Do you not trust Lom to meet this challenge, Riddler? Lom has met others. Greater ones than this. Don’t you trust Lom?”
“Lom is deluded. We waited, old one. We waited for wrath. For destruction. We waited for the mountains to flame and send these creatures into smoke, as happened in the time of the mud monsters. As in the time of the metal beasts from the farther star. Nothing. Only corrupt messages come from Lom, pitiful messages, messages which seek to bring these men into wholeness. The Brotherhood will not carry these messages.”
“The Brotherhood may not,” said Ganver, and his voice was like thunder in the city. “But Ganver will, and all the Eesties of Lom who are not witless children.”
We were in the Temple of the Bell once more. The lamp glowed with its glorious light; Shadowpeople sang from the book; dignified Eesties with solemn faces lifted crystals from the pool and laid them upon the curb. Green they were, glowing like drops of dew upon new leaves. We took them, absorbed them, then went out of that place.
“Oh, by all the gods,” moaned Peter, reaching for me. We had no hands to hold with, but we touched. The human parts of us could not believe the message we carried.
Lom had decided that man was destructive because he was weak. Man knew no way but destruction. He knew no way of quiet strength and slow building, no way of harmony and peace. He was weak and small and needed weapons and walls to protect himself. He did not believe in the kindness of others. He did not perceive the willingness of Lom to provide, even to these foster children from some other world.
And Lom, in response to this weakness, had decided to give man Talents. The message we carried was the Talent message, to be touched to children yet unborn.
All I could think of in a dazed way was that the Gamesmen would be much less proud if they knew. I—suddenly I was much less proud. My Talent of beast talking, it had been given. My Talent of Wize-ardry. Was that, too, a gift? Peter’s Talent of Shifting. And Mavin’s. Himaggery’s Wizardry. All the Seers, the Sentinels, the Armigers. All the Sorcerers. Nothing of our own. Only what we had been given? Tragamors and Elators, nothing of their own. In each of us, it was a Lom gift.
We had stopped our travels in a space of gray nothing, a cloudy, peaceful place. Ganver confronted us here, looking into our hearts, knowing that we knew what message it was we carried. “How much do you need to see?” Ganver asked. “How much of what we did, we Eesties? We carried the gift which Lom gave; we carried it high and low, far and near. To every place men dwelt, we carried it. Not all received it. Of those who did, most misused it. Some few learned to control it. Those you call the Immutables, they learned to do so. But most, most simply accepted it. Shall we go into the later memories, shall we see what happened then?”
I knew what had happened. More of what had already happened. Men began to use their strengths as they had used their weaknesses. To destroy.
Ganver did not show us much. It did not need to. There were more broken forests, more broken roads. There were creatures killed who should never have been killed, whom it was a monstrous arrogance to have killed. There were Great Games played upon the plains of the world, leaving them deep in blood, bones, and cold. Seldom—oh, too seldom—were there places of beauty built. Too seldom were there things of beauty done.
“Do you accuse me?” Ganver asked. “Do you still accuse me.”
Peter was stubborn. “My question is still the same, Ganver. Why are you letting Lom die?”
“Let us go back to the city of the Bell,” said Ganver.
So, we went back for the third time. This time the city hummed with dissension, like a warnet hive, full of hostile rumor. The ribbon-decked young Eesties were everywhere, and those old ones of Ganver’s bulk seemed somehow diminished. “We go to the pool,” called a familiar voice. “But we do not carry this last message of Lom.”
“Why, Riddler?” asked Ganver in a voice that already knew the answer. “Why?”
“Lom is mad! It has chosen to set these monsters beside the Eesties. It has messaged them to become as we are. To run the roads of Lom!” They pushed us before them, thrusting us into the Temple. The pedestal where the lamp had rested was toppled. The lamp had rolled into a corner and lay there, lightless. There were no Shadowpeople singing. The book was closed. There were young Eesties at the pool, painted ones. They were fishing blue crystals from the silver surface as fast as they rose to the top. From the low curbing they were raking them into baskets, carrying them away. Before any of the young ones could move to stop him, Ganver had seized two of the brilliant blue stone gems and passed them to us, into us.
After all that time of refusing, all that time of denying compulsion, I was compelled to know what the message had been that Lom had designed for men.
Which was only to show mankind what we had just seen and call him to run the roads of Lom, to serve as the Eesties served and to live as the Eesties lived.
Which was only to invite man to become like the angels.
Across the pool, the one they called the Riddler danced along the curbing, taking up the crystals one by one. “We will not carry this message, old Ganver. This message goes into a deep cavern somewhere. Let the man-beasts die of their own destruction, as
