Preface

And now were we confounded, for even as had happened in the land of the sunset, our migration into the land of longer summers had met with disaster. The man-things of that region had proved to be even more cruel than those we had encountered in the land of the sunset, and our dear Vlagh shrieked in agony as we swiftly bore her away from the broad water which grew larger and larger with each passing of that which brings light to her realm.

For behold, the man-things of the land of longer summers brought forth water, even as the man-things of the land of the sunset had brought forth the hot light which had spewed up from the mountains, and the loss of the servants of our beloved Vlagh had been even greater than our loss in the land of the sunset.

And the overmind of which we are all a part shriveled because of this loss, for we were all made less.

And great was our grief by reason of this.

Now those of us which seek knowledge are much different from those whose sole task is caring for the mother which spawned us all, for we have gone forth into the lands of the man-things and have seen much that may prove useful. Those which care for mother move only by instinct, while we who seek knowledge have gone beyond instinct, and now we have reached the land of thought.

Much have we discovered in the land of thought, and we faithfully presented this to the mother which spawned us all, and the overmind shared what we told to mother.

At first the overmind which guides us all was much confused by what we had found. Horrified was the overmind to discover from what we told it that the man-things can perform tasks even when they are not under the control of any thought other than their own. More horrid still was the knowledge that those man-things which had defeated us again and again were potential breeders, rather than potential egg-layers such as we are. Truly, the man-things are an abomination which should no longer be permitted to exist, for, as all the world knows, breeders should have no task other than the mating with those which lay the eggs which expand the number of the servants of the she which has spawned them all.

There is yet still another peculiarity among the man-things. They make noises by which they give others of their kind information. Some of those who seek knowledge have duplicated those noises, but they soon discovered that the man-things will often make noises which are not true. And it came to us that if the man-things have no way to know which noises are true and which are not-true, we could make the not-true noises also, and thereby could we conceal truth from the man-things, and this could give us great advantage.

As we have learned, much to the sorrow of the overmind, the man-things have many sticks with teeth with which they can cause hurt—and even death—to the servants of the Vlagh, but these sticks with teeth are not parts of their own bodies, but are separate and may easily be carried away by those of us which serve our dear Vlagh, and the overmind in its wisdom advised us to gather up those sticks with teeth which had been carried by man-things which had died during our struggles with them.

But then it came to the overmind that we still lacked the most powerful of the things which kill us, and that is the thing which flickers and lays clouds close to the ground or far up into the sky. And as the overmind came to understand the thing which flickers and puts out light and clouds which lie near the ground or rise up into the sky, we all came to know of it as well, and we knew full well that the thing which flickers and puts out light might be the best of the things which kill, for if we could have that thing which kills, we could kill the man-things from far off, and thus it would be that the sticks with teeth of the man-things could not reach us.

But though we sought far and wide, we found none of that which flickers and puts out light, and so we were confounded.

But then it came to the overmind that we should search not for the flickers or the light, but rather for the clouds which lie close to the ground or rise up into the sky, for these clouds are a sure sign that the thing which flickers and puts out light must lie at the source of those clouds.

And many were the clouds we sought rising from the nesting places of the man-things, but we dared not to enter those nesting places, for the man-things which live in those nesting places have many of the sticks with teeth and should they see us near their nesting places, they will surely take up their sticks with teeth and kill us one and all.

But then it came to those of us which had sought knowledge of the man-things in the land of longer summers that the man-things had often used a certain kind of low-tree to drive us away from their things-to-eat, for the low-to-the-ground clouds which come from that particular low-tree make it hard for us to breathe, and over the passage of many periods of light and darkness, many of our kind have died when they could no longer breathe.

And so it was that many of the seekers of knowledge circled around the new body of water which had brought death to many of the servants of our Vlagh to seek out a low-tree which was still putting forth the clouds which make it difficult to breathe. And after much searching, they saw a thin, dark cloud rising from a single low-tree. Then they carefully burrowed through the ground around that low-tree to loosen the limbs it had put down into the ground to hold it in place, and when the low-tree could no longer cling to the ground, they brought it back from the land of longer summers. And now we had that which flickers and puts out light—but only one of them.

Then it came to the overmind that we should have many of the flickers which put out light. And so we closely examined that single low-tree and returned once more to the land of longer summers to gather more of those low-trees, and we carried them back to the place where our single low-tree was flickering and putting out light and a thick cloud as dark as that part of the day when the light in the sky has gone away. And then we laid many of the low-trees we had found upon the single low-tree that flickered and put out light, and behold! Where before we had had only one, we now had many.

And then there came a time of confusion for the overmind. The land of the sunset and the land of longer summers were now beyond our reach by reason of the red liquid spouting from the mountains in the land of the sunset and the water rushing down the slope in the land of longer summers. There still remained two lands where we might go—the land of the sunrise and the land of shorter summers. Now the land of the sunrise was much closer for us, but it was also closer for the man-things that had killed so many of the servants of our dear Vlagh. The land of shorter summers was far away from where we were now, but it would also be far away for the man-things.

Many of the seekers of knowledge said “sunrise!” and many others said “shorter summers!” And the overmind could not decide between them.