[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
slammed into the wall of the van, almost pitching forward onto the thing
revealed before me. The lantern tipped over and rolled along the metal floor.
I screamed again.
What? Sanjay had run back to the van. Now he stopped and clutched at
the door. Arhhh . . .
The thing I had carried like a bride from the cremation grounds may
once have been human. No longer. No trace remained. The body was
63
Dan Simmons Song of Kali [ e - r e ads ]
swollen twice the size of a man more a giant, putrid starfish than a man.
The face had no shape, only a white mass with wrinkled holes and swollen
slits where the eyes, mouth, and nose might once have been. The thing was a
sick simulacrum of a human form, crudely molded of suppurating fungus and
dead, distorted meat.
It was white all white the white of the bellies of dead carp washed
up from the Hooghly. The skin had the texture of bleached, rotted rubber,
like something peeled and shaped from the underside of a poisonous toad-
stool. The corpse was bloated taut; inflated from the awful internal pressure of
expanding gases and organs swollen to the bursting point and beyond.
Fractured splinters of ribs and bones were visible here and there in the puffy
mass like sticks embedded in a rising dough.
Ahh, gasped Sanjay. A drowning victim.
As if to confirm Sanjay s statement, there came a whiff of foul river mud,
and a slug-like thing appeared in one of the black eyeholes. Glistening feelers
tasted the night air and then withdrew from the light. I sensed the movement
of many other things in the swollen mass.
I pressed back against the side of the van and slid my way to the rear
door. I would have pushed past Sanjay and run into the welcoming night, but
he blocked me, pushed me back into the narrow chamber with the thing.
Pick it up, Sanjay said.
I stared at him. The fallen lantern threw wild shadows between us. I could
only stare.
Pick it up, Jayaprakesh. We have less than two minutes until the cere-
mony begins. Pick it up.
I would have jumped Sanjay then. I would have happily choked him until
the last gasps of life rattled out of his lying throat. Then I saw the gun. It had
appeared in his fist like the lotus flower suddenly popping into the palm of a
clever traveling magician. It was a small pistol. It hardly looked large enough
to be real. But it was. I had no doubt of that. And the black circle of the barrel
was aimed right between my eyes.
Pick it up.
Nothing on earth could have made me pick up the thing on the floor
behind me. Nothing except the absolute certain knowledge that I would be
dead in three seconds if I did not comply. Dead. Like the thing in the van.
Lying with it. On it. With it.
I knelt, set the lantern upright before it sputtered out or set fire to the
shroud, and put my arms under the shape. It seemed to welcome my grasp.
One arm moved against my side like the furtive touch of a timid lover. My
fingers sank deep into the white. The flesh felt cool and rubbery, and I was
sure that my fingers would break through at any second. Soft things shifted
64
Dan Simmons Song of Kali [ e - r e ads ]
and stirred inside it as I backed out of the van and took a step. The thing
sagged against me, and for a second I felt the terrible certainty that the corpse
would deliquesce and flow down over me like moist river clay.
I raised my face to the night sky and stumbled forward. Behind me,
Sanjay shouldered his own cold burden and followed me into the Temple of
the Kapalikas.
65
Dan Simmons Song of Kali [ e - r e ads ]
8
Sa etan panca purusam, asvam, gam,
avim, ajam . . . Purusam prathaman alabhate, puruso
hi prathamah
e sang the sacred words from the Satapatha Brahmana.
And the order of sacrifice shall be this . . . first
man, then horse, bull, ram, and goat . . . Man is fore-
Wmost of the animals and most pleasing to the gods . . .
We knelt in the darkness before the jagrata Kali. They had dressed us in
plain white dhotis. Our feet were bare. Our foreheads were marked. We
seven initiates knelt in a semicircle closest to the goddess. Then there was an
arc of candles and the outer circle of Kapalikas. In front of us lay the bodies
we had brought as offerings. On the belly of each corpse a Kapalika priest
had placed a small white skull. The skulls were human, too small to be from
adults. The empty sockets watched us with the same intensity as the god-
dess s hungry eyes.
The world is pain,
O terrible wife of Siva
You are chewing the flesh.
The head of our eighth initiate still hung from the hand of Kali, but now
the young face was chalk-white and the lips had pulled back into a rictus grin.
66
Dan Simmons Song of Kali [ e - r e ads ]
The corpse, however, was gone from its place at the base of the idol and the
goddess s bangled foot was raised over empty air.
O terrible wife of Siva
Your tongue is drinking the blood,
O dark Mother! O unclad Mother.
I felt almost nothing as I knelt there. My mind continued to echo Sanjay s
words. I should have used you. I was a provincial fool. Worse than that, I was a
provincial fool who could never go home again to the provinces. Whatever
else came from this night, I knew that the simple verities of life in Anguda
were forever behind me.
O beloved of Siva
The world is pain.
The temple fell into silence. We closed our eyes in dhyana, the deepest
contemplation possible only in the presence of a jagrata. Sounds intruded. The
river whispered half-perceived syllables. Something slithered across the floor
near my bare feet. I felt nothing. I thought nothing. When I opened my eyes,
I saw that the crimson tongue of the idol had lolled farther from the gaping
mouth. Nothing surprised me.
Other Kapalikas came forward until each of us had a priest kneeling in
front of us, facing us across the obscene altars we had supplied. My Brahman
was a kindly looking man. A banker, perhaps. Someone who was used to smil-
ing at people for a living.
O Kali, O Terrible One,
O Chinnamasta, She Who Is Beheaded,
O Chandi, Fiercest of Aspect,
O Kamaski, Devourer of Souls,
Hear our prayer, O Terrible Wife of Siva.
My priest lifted my right hand and turned it palm up as if he were about
to read my fortune. His other hand went into the loose folds of his dhoti.
When it emerged, I saw the quick gleam of sharp steel.
The chief priest placed his forehead against the raised foot of the god-
dess. His voice was very soft. The goddess will be pleased to receive your
flesh mixed with blood.
The other priests all moved in unison. The blades slid across our palms as
if the Kapalikas were whittling bamboo. A fat sliver from the meaty portion of
my palm sliced off neatly and slid across the blade. All of us gasped, but only
the fat man cried out in pain.
67
Dan Simmons Song of Kali [ e - r e ads ]
Thou who art fond of sacrificial meat, O Great Goddess. Accept the
blood of this man with his flesh.
The words were not new to me. I had heard them every October during
the modest Kali Puja in our village. Every Bengali child knows the litany. But [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
zanotowane.pl doc.pisz.pl pdf.pisz.pl ocenkijessi.opx.pl
slammed into the wall of the van, almost pitching forward onto the thing
revealed before me. The lantern tipped over and rolled along the metal floor.
I screamed again.
What? Sanjay had run back to the van. Now he stopped and clutched at
the door. Arhhh . . .
The thing I had carried like a bride from the cremation grounds may
once have been human. No longer. No trace remained. The body was
63
Dan Simmons Song of Kali [ e - r e ads ]
swollen twice the size of a man more a giant, putrid starfish than a man.
The face had no shape, only a white mass with wrinkled holes and swollen
slits where the eyes, mouth, and nose might once have been. The thing was a
sick simulacrum of a human form, crudely molded of suppurating fungus and
dead, distorted meat.
It was white all white the white of the bellies of dead carp washed
up from the Hooghly. The skin had the texture of bleached, rotted rubber,
like something peeled and shaped from the underside of a poisonous toad-
stool. The corpse was bloated taut; inflated from the awful internal pressure of
expanding gases and organs swollen to the bursting point and beyond.
Fractured splinters of ribs and bones were visible here and there in the puffy
mass like sticks embedded in a rising dough.
Ahh, gasped Sanjay. A drowning victim.
As if to confirm Sanjay s statement, there came a whiff of foul river mud,
and a slug-like thing appeared in one of the black eyeholes. Glistening feelers
tasted the night air and then withdrew from the light. I sensed the movement
of many other things in the swollen mass.
I pressed back against the side of the van and slid my way to the rear
door. I would have pushed past Sanjay and run into the welcoming night, but
he blocked me, pushed me back into the narrow chamber with the thing.
Pick it up, Sanjay said.
I stared at him. The fallen lantern threw wild shadows between us. I could
only stare.
Pick it up, Jayaprakesh. We have less than two minutes until the cere-
mony begins. Pick it up.
I would have jumped Sanjay then. I would have happily choked him until
the last gasps of life rattled out of his lying throat. Then I saw the gun. It had
appeared in his fist like the lotus flower suddenly popping into the palm of a
clever traveling magician. It was a small pistol. It hardly looked large enough
to be real. But it was. I had no doubt of that. And the black circle of the barrel
was aimed right between my eyes.
Pick it up.
Nothing on earth could have made me pick up the thing on the floor
behind me. Nothing except the absolute certain knowledge that I would be
dead in three seconds if I did not comply. Dead. Like the thing in the van.
Lying with it. On it. With it.
I knelt, set the lantern upright before it sputtered out or set fire to the
shroud, and put my arms under the shape. It seemed to welcome my grasp.
One arm moved against my side like the furtive touch of a timid lover. My
fingers sank deep into the white. The flesh felt cool and rubbery, and I was
sure that my fingers would break through at any second. Soft things shifted
64
Dan Simmons Song of Kali [ e - r e ads ]
and stirred inside it as I backed out of the van and took a step. The thing
sagged against me, and for a second I felt the terrible certainty that the corpse
would deliquesce and flow down over me like moist river clay.
I raised my face to the night sky and stumbled forward. Behind me,
Sanjay shouldered his own cold burden and followed me into the Temple of
the Kapalikas.
65
Dan Simmons Song of Kali [ e - r e ads ]
8
Sa etan panca purusam, asvam, gam,
avim, ajam . . . Purusam prathaman alabhate, puruso
hi prathamah
e sang the sacred words from the Satapatha Brahmana.
And the order of sacrifice shall be this . . . first
man, then horse, bull, ram, and goat . . . Man is fore-
Wmost of the animals and most pleasing to the gods . . .
We knelt in the darkness before the jagrata Kali. They had dressed us in
plain white dhotis. Our feet were bare. Our foreheads were marked. We
seven initiates knelt in a semicircle closest to the goddess. Then there was an
arc of candles and the outer circle of Kapalikas. In front of us lay the bodies
we had brought as offerings. On the belly of each corpse a Kapalika priest
had placed a small white skull. The skulls were human, too small to be from
adults. The empty sockets watched us with the same intensity as the god-
dess s hungry eyes.
The world is pain,
O terrible wife of Siva
You are chewing the flesh.
The head of our eighth initiate still hung from the hand of Kali, but now
the young face was chalk-white and the lips had pulled back into a rictus grin.
66
Dan Simmons Song of Kali [ e - r e ads ]
The corpse, however, was gone from its place at the base of the idol and the
goddess s bangled foot was raised over empty air.
O terrible wife of Siva
Your tongue is drinking the blood,
O dark Mother! O unclad Mother.
I felt almost nothing as I knelt there. My mind continued to echo Sanjay s
words. I should have used you. I was a provincial fool. Worse than that, I was a
provincial fool who could never go home again to the provinces. Whatever
else came from this night, I knew that the simple verities of life in Anguda
were forever behind me.
O beloved of Siva
The world is pain.
The temple fell into silence. We closed our eyes in dhyana, the deepest
contemplation possible only in the presence of a jagrata. Sounds intruded. The
river whispered half-perceived syllables. Something slithered across the floor
near my bare feet. I felt nothing. I thought nothing. When I opened my eyes,
I saw that the crimson tongue of the idol had lolled farther from the gaping
mouth. Nothing surprised me.
Other Kapalikas came forward until each of us had a priest kneeling in
front of us, facing us across the obscene altars we had supplied. My Brahman
was a kindly looking man. A banker, perhaps. Someone who was used to smil-
ing at people for a living.
O Kali, O Terrible One,
O Chinnamasta, She Who Is Beheaded,
O Chandi, Fiercest of Aspect,
O Kamaski, Devourer of Souls,
Hear our prayer, O Terrible Wife of Siva.
My priest lifted my right hand and turned it palm up as if he were about
to read my fortune. His other hand went into the loose folds of his dhoti.
When it emerged, I saw the quick gleam of sharp steel.
The chief priest placed his forehead against the raised foot of the god-
dess. His voice was very soft. The goddess will be pleased to receive your
flesh mixed with blood.
The other priests all moved in unison. The blades slid across our palms as
if the Kapalikas were whittling bamboo. A fat sliver from the meaty portion of
my palm sliced off neatly and slid across the blade. All of us gasped, but only
the fat man cried out in pain.
67
Dan Simmons Song of Kali [ e - r e ads ]
Thou who art fond of sacrificial meat, O Great Goddess. Accept the
blood of this man with his flesh.
The words were not new to me. I had heard them every October during
the modest Kali Puja in our village. Every Bengali child knows the litany. But [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]