Free Maker of Universes by Philip José Farmer Page A

had taken her. Also, he remembered having been well acquainted with her. Wolff questioned him further, for he was interested in what Ipsewas could tell him about Agamemnon and Achilles and Odysseus and the other heroes of Homer’s epic. He told the zebrilla that Agamemnon was supposed to be a historical character. But what about Achilles and Odysseus? Had they really existed?
    “Of course they did,” Ipsewas said. He grunted, then continued, “I suppose you’re curious about those days. But there is little I can tell you. It’s been too long ago. Too many idle days. Days?—centuries, millenia!—the Lord alone knows. Too much alcohol, too.”
    During the rest of the day and part of the night, Wolff tried to pump Ipsewas, but he got little for his trouble. Ipsewas, bored, drank half his supply of nuts and finally passed out snoring. Dawn came green and golden around the mountain. Wolff stared down into the waters, so clear that he could see the hundreds of thousands of fish, of fantastic configurations and splendors of colors. A bright-orange seal rose from the depths, a creature like a living diamond in its mouth. A purple-veined octopus, shooting backward, jetted by the seal. Far, far down, something enormous and white appeared for a second, then dived back toward the bottom.
    Presently the roar of the surf came to him, and a thin white line frothed at the base of Thayaphayawoed. The mountain, so smooth at a distance, was now broken by fissures, by juts and spires, by rearing scarps and frozen fountains of stone. Thayaphayawoed went up and up and up; it seemed to hang over the world.
    Wolff shook Ipsewas until, moaning and muttering, the zebrilla rose to his feet. He blinked reddened eyes, scratched, coughed, then reached for another punchnut. Finally, at Wolff’s urging, he steered the sailfish so that its course paralleled the base of the mountain.
    “I used to be familiar with this area,” he said. “Once I thought about climbing the mountain, finding the Lord, and trying to...” He paused, scratched his head, winced, and said, “Kill him! There! I knew I could remember the word. But it was no use. I didn’t have the guts to try it alone.”
    “You’re with me now,” Wolff said.
    Ipsewas shook his head and took another drink. “Now isn’t then. If you’d been with me then... Well, what’s the use of talking? You weren’t even born then. Your great-great-great-great-grandfather wasn’t born then. No, it’s too late.”
    He was silent while he busied himself with guiding the sailfish through an opening in the mountain. The great creature abruptly swerved; the cartilage sail folded up against the mast of stiff bone-braced cartilage; the body rose on a huge wave. And then they were within the calm waters of a narrow, steep, and dark fjord.
    Ipsewas pointed at a series of rough ledges.
    “Take that. You can get far. How far I don’t know. I got tired and scared and I went back to the Garden. Never to return, I thought.”
    Wolff pleaded with Ipsewas. He said that he needed Ipsewas’ strength very much and that Chryseis needed him. But the zebrilla shook his massive somber head.
    “I’ll give you my blessing, for what it’s worth.”
    “And I thank you for what you’ve done,” Wolff said. “If you hadn’t cared enough to come after me. I’d still be swinging at the end of a rope. Maybe I’ll see you again. With Chryseis.”
    “The Lord is too powerful,” Ipsewas replied. “Do you think you have a chance against a being who can create his own private universe?”
    “I have a chance,” Wolff said. “As long as I fight and use my wits and have some luck, I have a chance.”
    He jumped off the decklike shell and almost slipped on the wet rock. Ipsewas called, “A bad omen, my friend!”
    Wolff turned and smiled at him and shouted, “I don’t believe in omens, my superstitious Greek friend! So long!”

V
    H E BEGAN CLIMBING and did not stop to look down until about an hour had passed.