Kalik by Jack Lasenby Page A

“You’re thinking of mountains,” he said.
    I looked over his shoulder toward Grave Mountain. “There’s a lot of smoke rising.”
    “After rain, you’ll often see steam or smoke along the top.” More smoke rose, cupped white against the perpetual black cloud walling the sky. “You told Lutha there was no way across the mountains from the Land of the White Bear. But from this side there must be a way up to the crater.”
    I grunted, “What makes you think that?”
    “An old story of a shaman,” said Kalik, “who climbed Grave Mountain. Food and sex were forbidden on the sacred mountain but, once on the summit, he ate meat and lay with one of his slaves. White stuff fell out of the sky, covered the ground, and froze. The shaman must die of the cold. He cut the slave’s throat, prayed for warmth. His god sent fire under the sea from the North Land. It burst out of the mountain. The white stuff melted to a pool of hot water in which the shaman recovered his strength. He climbed down the mountain, but the roar of the fire had left him deaf.”
    “What about the other slaves?”
    “The white stuff froze them; the fire ate their bodies.” Kalik laughed. “Isn’t it interesting, Ish? The story says ‘white stuff’. He turned, looked at me. “Whoever first told that story couldn’t have known what snow was.”
    I mumbled agreement but was seeing the people perish on top of Grave Mountain.
    “Lutha’s old women know that story,” said Kalik, “but she says Hekkat forbids anyone to set foot on the mountain top. I have heard of men who tried to get up.”
    “Yes?”
    “The stories always say the mountain opened and swallowed them.” He chuckled. Kalik’s laugh was joyous, made me want to join in, but too often he was laughing at something cruel. Evil was deep in his nature. He would not change – perhapscould not. Yet I still found him attractive.
    “Opened and swallowed them!” Kalik chuckled again. “More likely they fell. Whatever happened, the cold would kill them, if the fires on top didn’t. Look!”
    Six black swans swept past, necks straight as spears tipped with red beaks. The creak of wings, the white flash as they wheeled a great broken ring above the lake. I kept seeing the flash as their wingbeat carried them south.
    The white flash became confused in my mind with the snow that fell on Grave Mountain. And another image came to mind: the story of a young man who sailed home with a black sail. His father saw it, and threw himself off a cliff. The young man had forgotten he had promised to hoist a white sail if he came home alive.
    “Black and white,” said Kalik. “They build huge untidy nests. The eggs are good eating. And the flappers.”
    “Flappers?”
    “Fat young birds without their full feathers. All they can do is flap across the water. Fast, but you can catch them. Like the geese when they’re moulting.” And he laughed again.
    “If they only come here occasionally, do they spend the rest of their time on Lake Weah?”
    “There might be another lake to the south,” Kalik said. “But if there is, it must be a long way off. That’s what one of the old stories says. ‘A long hard journey over mountains. Down a long valley, by a savage river.’ I can’t remember how it goes now. You know what those stories are like. Somebody looking for a place of their own.”
    “A place of their own!”
    “What’s that?”
    “I’ve heard stories like that.”
    “They’re all the same.” Kalik laughed. I thought you’d had enough of journeying, Ish? Besides, Lutha wouldn’t let you go. You’re her good luck sign – returning under the mountain, bringing her father back.”
    “I’ve done enough travelling,” I said. “Deserts, mountains, ice, snow. The sea. But nowhere as beautiful as Lake Ka. And food! The vegetables you’ve got here! And fruit! In the Whykatto there were a couple of green-leaved plants we could eat, but the sun shrivelled and killed them. And I