Free Votan and Other Novels (FANTASY MASTERWORKS) by John James

will turn to the east. And in the east they will have little luck. They will conquer no land, nor will they change any nation, but rather will they be changed themselves.
    My tree, the oak tree, stood somewhere in the borders between east and west. Beneath it I saw the Votan-born lead their people against the east, and the east ride back over their bodies. And when they had any success and ruled for a time over the east, the east in time always swallowed them up.
    Yet the Votan-born ride against the east again and again. Sometimes they ride in the name of an Emperor who was a God, and sometimes in the name of an Emperor who knew no God, and sometimes in the name of a God who could not be anEmperor, because he was a God of Peace, and sometimes they ride in the names of no one but themselves. But whether they ride cased in furs against the cold or cased in iron against the arrows, whether they fight with swords or with fire, they ride against the east because the east rides against them. And always they die. Some die well, in battle or in bed. Some die ill, of dysentery or plague, or drowned in a ditch or crammed in a barn and burnt. And near the end of time, they will die not well or badly, but miserably, passionlessly, wretchedly, hopelessly, walking in naked columns to choke.
    And at the end of time – there will be an end of time. After the Votan-born have made the greatest music, and have painted the greatest pictures and sung the greatest songs that can ever be, then the east will come against them for the last time. And then, knowing clearly what they do, but not knowing whose will they do, the Votan-born will dissolve the whole world in fire, and they will return to the Sun whose sons they are.
    Out of that glare of fire I woke to the glare of noon. The men came, and I could not speak to them. They came to the very foot of the tree, and before my dry eyes they poured out cool, clear, bitter beer at the roots. Then they too were gone.
    After that my head became very heavy. I saw every thing far away yet very clear as when you look through glass into clear water, at shells and little fishes. I knew I was going to die. I watched the empty land and watched myself die.
    At sunset there was a thunderstorm, and the rain ran into the hollow, and I drank. Then I slept till I woke in the darkness. There was someone in the tree. You must know that there cannot be Apollo without Artemis. You cannot love the wolf and hate the bear. I heard her scramble into the branches, and the little twigs break beneath her. I heard her claws scratch on the bark. Then the bear turned to me, hairy chest against my chest, face against my face, breath mixed with my breath, cold teeth smooth against my cheek. She stayed while I might count a hundred. Then she climbed up, and I knew by the sounds that she had found the bees’ nest. Honey, wild honey, poured down on to my head and face, and I licked it off. The wolves did not come.
    Toward dawn, the God stood before me again, and spoke.
    ‘Go north, and begin the End for me. But do not call upon my name till you come again within the cities of the Empire. For long ago I left the Hyperboreans. Where you find peace, you will leave war, and where stability, confusion, and where trust, deceit. But in all you shall do my will.’
    Then I felt that the snag at the back of the limb was broken, and the chain ran smoothly up and down the tree. I saw myself alone and wounded and hungry on the great plain, and I thought that it no longer mattered.

5
    I was very far gone. The whole world seemed far away. I stood back and looked at myself. I saw how slow I was in thinking and I marvelled at it. I saw that my limbs trembled like an old man’s. I watched my own mind work slowly through the argument that if my chain was slack I ought to be able to reach the key. After an hour or more, I saw myself decide to try. Very slowly I worked the chain down the tree. For some reason I was afraid that I might fall.
    Little