Authors: Robert L. Forward
As the caravan of the followers of God’s-Chosen moved slowly west, bringing the Blessing of Bright down upon clan after clan, the word of the strange happenings on the eastern border reached Hungry-Swift, the Leader of the Combined Clans. It sounded serious enough to cause him to investigate personally. Taking a squad of needle troopers with him, he moved quickly along the pathways of Bright’s Empire, his troopers clearing the often-crowded way for him. Finally, Hungry-Swift cautiously arranged a meeting with God’s-Chosen and his followers.
Hungry-Swift was too much of a politician to use his power ostentatiously. He left his troopers and came alone to visit with the holy one. He had heard descriptions of the miracle worker, but still was not prepared for the tiny pale body, and especially the pink eyes. Feeling no fear from the little one, he went forward to meet him.
“Greeting, God’s-Chosen,” he said. “I hear strange tales about your work.”
“They are not tales, Hungry-Swift,” God’s-Chosen said. “They are the true Word of Bright.”
“Tell me more,” Hungry-Swift asked. “For what I have heard has come through many treads and has been distorted in the telling.”
God’s-Chosen had been keeping his traveling band well ahead of the sweeping beam. He found it better to keep the number of blessings to his followers down, so they would not get too used to it. Besides, if any of them ever figured out that the Blessing of Bright came every half-dozen turns, whether he called for it or not, they would soon be able to receive the Blessing without having the Word of Bright preached to them. His practised eyes found the beam in the north, and he gauged its motion.
“I could tell you much, Hungry-Swift, but you still would find it hard to believe,” God’s-Chosen said. “Come with me for a journey alone into the wilderness. Together we will pray and you shall have the Blessing of Bright come upon you alone. Gather food for three turns and come with me.”
“Why wait three turns?” Hungry-Swift complained. “Why not now?”
God’s-Chosen looked at him severely. “Because you do not believe,” he said. “And it will take three turns before I can get you to believe enough to receive the Blessing of Bright.”
Hungry-Swift could only agree that God’s-Chosen had judged the level of his disbelief correctly. He did not believe in this charlatan at all, and he doubted that three turns of preaching would change him a bit. However, the stories that he had heard of this strange one were not distorted, but often came from some of his best trooper commanders, who naturally had investigated anything that could perturb the security of the far-flung borders of Bright’s Empire.
Hungry-Swift hated to waste three turns, but if that was what it would take to clear up this mystery, he was willing to do it. If it turned out that there was no mystery, he personally would make sure that there would not be enough left of the pale body to bother collecting for the meat bins. Still, the miracle worker did seem to be very confident and unafraid.
“I will go with you, God’s-Chosen,” Hungry-Swift said. “Lead the way.”
The two loaded their pouches with a small amount of food and then God’s-Chosen took them to the northeast to meet the beam sweeping down from the north. The trooper squad leader had protested the idea of Hungry-Swift traveling without protection in the wilderness between clan camps, but Hungry-Swift brushed off his protests.
“We are well within the outer borders and there are no barbarians in this region,” he said. “And I hope you don’t think that I can’t handle that pale priest by myself. If I were just to tread on him lightly I would burst him like an egg-sac.”
As they journeyed into the wilderness, God’s-Chosen tried to preach continuously, but Hungry-Swift would take the opportunity during pauses to ask personal questions about the earlier times when God’s-Chosen had been called Pink-Eyes. After hearing of what Pink-Eyes had gone through as a hatchling and youngster, and about his conversion in the wilderness, Hungry-Swift gained a grudging admiration for the courage that seemed to fill the tiny body. Soon, Hungry-Swift stopped noticing that the personality that was God’s-Chosen/ Pink-Eyes inhabited anything less than a normal body. He was continually being surprised that Pink-Eyes was not of normal size, as, for example, when he had to ask for help to pick a pod high up on the side of a petal plant.
As their line of travel came closer and closer to intersecting the path of the beam from the Inner Eye, the preaching of God’s-Chosen became more and more intense. Hungry-Swift listened intently, for he now respected God’s-Chosen, but he had to admit that despite all the preaching, he still did not believe that his companion was Bright’s chosen one, and that he could bring the Blessing of Bright down upon him.
“I listen, God’s-Chosen,” Hungry-Swift said. “But I still have trouble with my belief.”
“Even the act of confessing your disbelief is a motion in the right direction,” God’s-Chosen said. Then turning all of his eyes upward, and slowly counting off the moments since the previous flash of the beam just to the north of him, he chanted.
“Help, O Bright! Help this unbeliever find faith! Bring down the Blessing of Bright upon Hungry-Swift.”
Hungry-Swift’s eyes followed those of God’s-Chosen up to the strange formation of seven lights that hung overhead in the sky. He was calmly wondering how they managed to stay in one place while the rest of the stars in the sky moved from east to west—when suddenly his body seemed to explode with pleasure.
For what seemed like an eternity, Hungry-Swift reveled in the heaven-sent pleasure of Bright’s love. His eye-stubs reached out toward the Eyes in an attempt to copulate with the stars. They writhed back and forth, stretching to their limit—then suddenly they froze as they saw the beam coming down from the Inner Eye of Bright.
“I see! I see!!” he shouted. Then as quickly as it had come, the warmth stopped.
Hungry-Swift composed himself and self-consciously wiped the dribbles of yellow-white mating fluid from the orifice under each eye-stub. As he gathered his senses, he could hear God’s-Chosen praying.
“Thank you, O Bright, for bringing the Vision as well as the Blessing to the Leader of the Combined Clans. I pray that you will guide him to lead all the clans into greater worship of you.”
Completely convinced, Hungry-Swift also prayed. As Leader of the Combined Clans, he was automatically the head worshiper of Bright. However, the ritual chants that he had learned to use in the worship services now seemed completely inadequate, and he clumsily made up his own prayers.
“Lead me, O Bright,” he said. “Give me your Word, and I will follow it with all that I command.”
“I will give you Bright’s Word,” God’s-Chosen said. “For too long Bright has been neglected. Bright has been good to his people. They have grown in numbers and have prospered. What used to be a small clan gathered in the city of Bright’s Heaven is now many clans that are spread out over Bright’s Empire—so powerful that the barbarians shrink from angering them. Yet what have the ungrateful cheela done for Bright in return?”
“We worship him often,” Hungry-Swift protested.
“Yes, but where?” God’s-Chosen asked. “In tiny temple areas. What Bright deserves is a temple appropriate to his greatness.”
“Tell me what is needed,” pleaded Hungry-Swift.
“You shall build a Holy Temple. It shall be in the shape of Bright, in whose likeness we are but imperfect copies. The outer walls shall be a perfect circle, and a dozen greats of cheela shall be able to line up from one side of the circle to the other without crowding their edges.”
Hungry-Swift was appalled. “That will be almost as big as the city of Bright’s Heaven!”
“Yes,” God’s-Chosen went on, unperturbed. “For it must hold all who live in Bright’s Heaven, plus many
others. At one dozen places about the circle there shall be placed walls representing the eye-stubs of a cheela at full alert. At the ends of each eye-stub shall be a round mound representing the eyes. Between each pair of eye-stubs there shall be an opening in the Temple walls, representing the orifices that allow things to enter and leave the inner mysteries of Bright’s body. Finally, at the very center of the inner area, there shall be a circular mound representing Bright’s Inner Eye.”
“I will obey, God’s-Chosen,” Hungry-Swift said. “The Holy Temple to Bright will be built as you say.”
Still dazed, Hungry-Swift followed God’s-Chosen back to the two encampments. When the squad leader came out to greet them, it was obvious from Hungry-Swift’s demeanor that the Leader of the Combined Clans had felt the Blessing of Bright. He was even more awed when he learned that the Leader had also seen the Blessing, since very few had been allowed by Bright to receive this indication of being one of his chosen ones. The journey into the wilderness over, Hungry-Swift automatically resumed command.
“Call the troopers to alert,” he ordered. “We return to Bright’s Heaven at once, for there is much to do.”
Before he left, Hungry-Swift returned for one last visit to his friend and teacher.
“Are you God?” he asked.
“No,” God’s-Chosen said. “Bright is God. I am merely Bright’s vehicle by which he sends his Word and his Blessing. You have received the Word. Go and carry it out. Yours will not be an easy task, for it will take a dozen greats of turns to create a temple of that size. But do not worry about the time, for Bright is patient. I will stay here and bring the Blessing of Bright to all the clans. That too will take time, but by the time you have the Holy Temple built, I will have
brought the Blessing of Bright to all here in the east and will come to Bright’s Heaven to bring the Blessing down on all who live there—on the Holy Temple itself.”
“Bright give me strength that I might live to see the time,” said Hungry-Swift.
“Your work will keep you strong,” God’s-Chosen said. “Now go!”
At first Hungry-Swift experienced resistance to the project of building the Holy Temple. There were even rumors that some of the underleaders, or even one of the nearby clan leaders, might attempt a formal challenge to his leadership.
Hungry-Swift quickly eliminated all objections to the building of the Temple by insisting that everyone with any power or authority take a journey to the east to be initiated by God’s-Chosen into the mysteries of the Blessing of Bright. As the converts returned, the enthusiasm for the project grew.
Fortunately the barbarians were quiet during these times, and the crops grew well without excessive tending, for soon nearly one-third of the population of Bright’s Heaven and surrounding areas was engaged in hauling rocks and loose crustal material to form the outline of a cheela at perfect alert, with twelve round eyes perched out on extended eye-stubs. The first thing built was a round mound at the center that represented the Inner Eye of Bright. Then as the outline of the Holy Temple grew, the old worship area was abandoned and services were held inside the growing Temple, with the High Priest speaking from the Inner Eye mound.
As the greats of turns passed, God’s-Chosen moved slowly west, pausing to make sure that each clan camp was given the Blessing of Bright. As they moved nearer and nearer to Bright’s Heaven, the clan camps became closer and closer together. They also began to spread more widely to the north and south, because the
population pressure had overcome the natural reluctance to engage in travel in the hard direction. It soon became impossible for God’s-Chosen to bring the Blessing to each camp himself. There also came rumors of small groups of cheela who had received the Blessing out in the wilderness without God’s-Chosen being anywhere near. God’s-Chosen then decided that the time had come to give to others the power to bring the Blessing. Since some could see the beam if it were near, he made them his disciples. He sent them off in the hard directions, north and south, with instructions to take the Word to the clans there. They were to watch the Inner Eye carefully and, as the beam approached, time their worship services with the receiving of the Blessing of Bright. The results were not as satisfactory as the well-preached services that God’s-Chosen conducted, but more and more of the cheela in the great Empire felt the miracle of the Blessing of Bright.
As the greats of turns passed, the Holy Temple neared completion. Nearly all who worked on it had taken time off now to complete a pilgrimage to the east to receive the blessing from God’s-Chosen, and all returned to work with renewed vigor. When God’s-Chosen reached the outskirts of the sprawling city of Bright’s Heaven, he left his preaching to Hard-Rock and went ahead to see the Holy Temple.
When Hungry-Swift heard of the approach of God’s-Chosen to the city, he came out with an honor guard of troopers to greet him. As they moved along the pathway to the city, the troopers would move ahead, lining the pathway and keeping the curious multitudes from bothering God’s-Chosen and the Leader of the Combined Clans as they moved leisurely along, their pace limited by the small tread of God’s-Chosen.
The crowds that gathered along the pathway were well behaved. The troopers would suffer hatchlings to ooze between them, or allow an eye-stub to be
rested on their topsides (especially if the eye-stub belonged to a nubile one of the opposite sex). The onlookers were treated to an unusual sight: a huge battle-scarred warrior with an obvious air of command, who carried the highest rank in Bright’s Empire, maintaining pace and speaking deferentially to a tiny, pale, pink-eyed, clanless one. Yet the pale one had an air of assurance about him that caused the crowd to murmur as he passed. Occasional cheers radiated outward from small groups as the two made their way into the city.
“How is the Holy Temple proceeding?” God’s-Chosen asked.
“The basic foundation is done, O God’s-Chosen,” Hungry-Swift said. “And the finishing work is well under way. We should have it completed well before the Blessing of Bright is due to come down upon the Temple grounds.”
“Good,” God’s-Chosen said. “I would like to see it.”
As the two took the path to the south to visit the Temple, a squad of troopers formed a chevron in front of them and pushed their way into the hard direction. The two leaders moved comfortably along behind the pathbreakers. As they came closer to the Holy Temple, even God’s-Chosen was impressed, for the outer walls of the Temple seemed to extend almost to the horizon in both directions.