The Maiming of the Tree: chapter 14 of The Story of Aphelos

Now it was the wont of the Aphelossamê always to sleep in the night-time, though sleep was not needful for immortal men and women. While the body slumbered, its power flowed into the mind, so that sleep afforded a space for long, deep thought. These travels of the mind were not dreams, for the will of the sleeper directed them. Yet the thoughts of the sleeper might not journey without limits. At some times he found his vision clear and deep; and at others dim and shallow. Of all those in Aphelos, Obrámus’s thoughts journeyed farthest in space and time, and it may be that he often conversed in thought with his master, the Messenger from the West. 

One night the thoughts of the Lord Ingos ranged over the world, and his vision had never been so clear. But suddenly his thoughts fled back to his own realm, to the Silver Tree. In his mind he saw Obrámus the Wise gazing at the Tree; and out of the past he heard the Messenger say— ‘Guard it well, and watch for the deceiver!’ 

Ingos awoke; it was the middle of the night. He knew that all was not well, and arose quickly. He hastened to the Great Tree, on the mound called Ingos’s seat. His friend, the Moon, shone down brightly. He saw Obrámus by the Tree, looking upwards. The branches of the Tree were tossing and shaking. Two men were standing in the top branches of the Tree. One of the men in the Tree was Hergal, his wife’s cousin. He was clothed again in his rags and belt; something flashed in his upraised hand — the axe. And in truth, this was Ganting, the very same weapon which which Rauwenna smote her sister Dâyamuna.

The Lord of Aphelos ran to the Silver Tree and began to climb its welcoming branches. But then a great shudder went through the Tree, like a boat pounded by the waves. The Aphelossamê, sleeping on the ground below, felt a tremor in the earth; the wood seemed to moan as it bent, though no wind blew. For Hergal the deceiver had cut through the topmost branch of the Silver Tree, and held the severed limb aloft, with its golden fruit of immortality. He uttered a great shout of triumph. The Moon shone on the face of his companion. It was Usta, Ingos’s son.

Then grief struck the Lord of Aphelos, as the deceiver’s axe had struck the Great Tree. His purpose had been to cast Hergal from the Tree, but now his power drained from him. He simply said, ‘My son…’

‘Father!’ cried Usta to his father when he recognized him. But then a great black shape arose from the forest beyond and blotted out the white Moon. It was a flying monster that Hergal had summoned by some evil art from far beyond the shores of Aphelos; it came at its master’s call and hovered on dark beating wings by the maimed tree top.

Hergal now mounted its scaly back. ‘Usta!’ he called. Usta looked from where he stood on a bough, and then looked towards Ingos.

‘Father!’ he said again.

‘Usta, be not a traitor, but come when your master calls you!’ Hergal called with a rough, loud voice. ‘Your master awaits you! Come when I call you!’

Then Usta climbed the branches and mounted the monster behind Hergal. Ingos could do nothing.

The monster beat its wings slowly and Hergal wheeled it round to face Ingos. Its face and stench were alike hideous.

‘Hear this, Ingos, lord of Aphelos that is no more!’ Hergal cried out, his rasping voice full of scorn. ‘Or should I say, lord of Nothing? Now shall your Realm be taken from you, for the Tree is despoiled. My father, Nagbith, is the Heir of Ungubith the Great, the father of my fathers, Lord of Aumbrus, who once was abased but is to arise in power once more. I have taken the Fruit of Life for my father, and he shall be immortal, the High and Mighty, and no mere steward. His people will not wander like savages, without a Made Thing among them. They will labour to enrich themselves. They shall wrest the Lordship of the Earth from the paltry Doitherúna and use it to profit themselves. They will be masters of every skill and art. They will learn the secrets of the world. 

‘Nagbith the mighty rules the North and he shall rule the South too. He shall rule the Midworld. He will be made immortal, and his lordship will have no end. Farewell, Ingos! We shall meet again, perhaps, when your people are begging their way about the world. Come to my father’s door and see what he spares for you. Say farewell to your only dear son! I send no good wishes to my brothers and sisters and the other savages!’

With that Hergal wheeled his foul steed about and fled away into the darkness, bearing the son of Ingos and Díamun with him.

Ingos came down from the Tree and stood facing his people, who were assembled in the clearing. For a long time no word was spoken, and the Moon sank slowly down. 

All the people of Aphelos stood mourning by the stricken Tree. 

But Obrámus said: ‘Lord, we have suffered a grievous harm and loss. We cannot in this hour confront our grief, nor take counsel together, so great is the shock. Let us rather return to our sleep, and in the morning our minds will be the clearer.’

‘My thoughts will journey far in sleep, seeking my lost child,’ replied the Lady Díamun.

‘Yea, Lady, so all our minds shall be scattered, if we give them their accustomed freedom. Therefore I counsel a remedy. Stretch forth your staff, Lord Ingos, and let each Immortal here take hold of it.’

And so the people of Ingos, grieving as they never had in all their time in Aphelos, came together and each laid a hand upon the staff of immortal wood, stronger than stone. Then Obrámus the Wise chanted words of peace that none there knew but he. Then they all cast themselves on the ground to rest. Straight away a blessed oblivion wrapped their minds until the first light of dawn.

Hergal: chapter 13 of The Story of Aphelos

 

Now the last comer to Aphelos, when all the other fugitives from Dúmiel had been received, was Hergal, the cousin of the Lady Díamun. 

It happened that one day the whole of Ingos’s people, men and women and children, were gathered together by the hill called Ingos’s throne, in the shadow of the Great Tree. This tree was now the tallest in Aphelos, and the trees of that land were all greater than those of the middle world. Under the tree sat the Lord Ingos and the Lady Díamun. 

Suddenly there stumbled into that assembly a mortal man, who seemed, beside the glory of that company, small and spectral. He wore the rags of clothes and a leather belt with a great axe in it. Those clothes, that belt, and that blade, fashioned from plant, beast, and the ground, were the first things made with human hands ever to enter Aphelos. The Aphelossamê were surprised, but the man far more so. He fell on his knees and seemed dazzled and perplexed. When he looked up once more he beheld Queen Díamun.

‘Sister!’ he cried, ‘I…nay, I will depart and cast these defilements from me!’ he said, and before Ingos could address him, he had backed away from the company and disappeared into the trees.

‘Is this your brother, Lady?’ asked Ingos.

‘It is Hergal, our cousin, but he was a brother to us — at one time,’ returned Díamun.

‘We did not think to see him here,’ said Beinun.

A shadow seemed to pass across the brows of Díamun and her brother.

‘It is good that he casts away those rags and that grim axe,’ said Ingos. ‘For you know there has been no made thing in Aphelos from the beginning, unless I reckon the Messenger’s harp, pipe, and horn, which he carried away with him. And we have no need to chop or fell.’

‘It is good, indeed,’ said Dóna, with a frown and a blaze in her eyes, ‘for our cousin was a man of strange ways —’

‘Peace, sister,’ said Díamun, ‘let sleep what is dead in our old mortal existence. For Hergal shall be an immortal too, and be set free from his former life, however it was!’

And the shadows passed away from the faces of all three. Then said Ingos to Beinun, ‘Go now, my brother, to your cousin yonder and clothe him with a sky-blue robe; and bring him hither again.’

Then Ingos went to the Tree and took down a fruit for Hergal and a fruit for himself, touching the joining-places with his staff. He handed them to the Lady Díamun. Then he stood to receive Hergal.

‘Let our brother come and eat the food of Immortals with us,’ he cried, and Hergal came, now with a radiant smile, and his brother and sisters smiled on him. When they had eaten together, the whole company set up a joyful shout, as was always their custom in receiving a newcomer to Aphelos.

And thus with love and mirth, Hergal the Deceiver was received in Aphelos the Golden.

Hergal was a solitary man. This was not thought amiss by the people of Ingos, for they set no rules for one another. Obrámus the Wise spent much of his time alone also, as befits a Wise-man, learning the lore and meaning of the trees and the plants, the earth, the beasts, and the birds. Indeed he had been absent on the very day of Hergal’s reception in Aphelos; if he had not been, his counsel might have led Ingos to act otherwise. Such was the decree of fate, that he was wandering far off beyond the great lake of Aphelos, and his counsel was lacking at that time.

Like Obrámus, Hergal spent much time wandering. It was thought that he, too, might be a Wise-man, but he spoke few words and none of wisdom. No man knows if ever these two met afield, and, if they did, of what they spoke. 

As companion to Hergal sometimes went Usta, the younger child of Lord Ingos and Lady Díamun, whose full name was Usmun-ta Urnuï, for he was the last to be born and grow up in Aphelos. 

‘For,’ said Hergal with a kindly countenance, ‘the other young folk are older than he, and each has his own companion. But just as he was the last to be born in Aphelos, I was the last to come here to land. So let me be his companion.’

The Children of Aphelos: chapter 12 of The Story of Aphelos

 

The Golden Years of Aphelos had begun, and they continued for how long no man knows. Some say that a thousand years went by in the middle world, others reckon it a shorter time. But in Aphelos it was as a single summer. Ingos and his people rejoiced and made merry, and there came new animals into the land, and trees and flowers of rare beauty, and there came also more people.

It is not recorded how many were Ingos’s people in Aphelos. Some say, as few as twelve, but that would not be to reckon the later comers, or the children; others say, twenty-two, agreeing with the number of the robes that came from the two trees of the Cave; but others say that Ingos learnt the secret of the flowering of the silver trees, and got more robes for his people, who were accordingly as many as fifty or even more. Those who came into the land were received soon after the Lady and her kin, fugitives fleeing from the fall of Dúmiel. Queen Díamun and her brothers and sisters welcomed them with both joy and tears; and they all clothed themselves in blue robes; and so Dúmiel was born again in Aphelos. The newcomers were of every age, from youths to very old. 

After some time had passed, there were born children; they came without pain and grew to the full stature of women and men, and so they remained as young immortals. Before long Dóna and Tairis had a child, and then Beinun and Tháli; and there came several more. At the last were born to the Lord Ingos and the Lady Díamun a daughter, Dîamána the Fair, and a son, Usmun-ta Urnuï the Last-born, whom all called Usta. But Obrámus the Counsellor had no woman partner. He said that it was no part of his calling as a Wise-man to marry. But when others were to be married, it was he, the most venerable of all in Aphelos, who heard their plighted troth. For he ever followed the way of the Messenger, whom he called Master.

After long years in the middle world had passed, children came no more into Aphelos. No one lacking a child of their own body mourned it; all the children of Aphelos brought joy to all, and nothing allayed the rejoicing of the realm. But Ingos marked it, and pondered what it might portend.

The Wedding of Díamun and Ingos: chapter 11 of The Story of Aphelos

 

On one of the following days the Messenger said: ‘Now my task is almost done. Here, Lord Ingos, is your land. Here your throne, here your Tree. Here plants to delight you, beasts to accompany you. Here people to love you. Only one more task remains for me to perform. That is your wedding.’

And then the Lord Ingos looked tenderly on the Lady of Dúmiel, and she returned his gaze. He took her hand, and knelt, saying. ‘Lady Díamun, will you bind your House to the immortal Realm for ever? For, when I saw you first, bathing in the lake yonder, I knew that you should be Lady of Aphelos.’

Then he arose, and she, kneeling in her turn, said: ‘Lord Ingos, I will be your Lady in Aphelos; I bring you no dowry save these people of Dúmiel; and though there can never be a King in Dúmiel—neither you, nor any other—the people of the Realm will be yours.’

Then the Messenger listened while the Lord Ingos and the Lady Díamun gave each other their troth, and when this was done, the five others gave a great shout of acclamation that rang among the trees and glades of Aphelos.

At last Aphelos, the land that rose from the waves, was complete. Her people grew not a day older, and were set free from mutability. They stood erect and tall. The wise old Counsellor, Obrámus, was not made younger, but never became older; his bent back was straightened, his eyes awoke, and his wisdom was increased a hundredfold. The Messenger instructed him in many things.

They entreated the Messenger to stay with them as long as he would. In that uncountable time he taught them many things, both about the past and of the future, and warned them many times to remember that Aphelos was a land of re-birth; there was no telling who might come into it, and fate did not decree that it should endure for ever unchanged.

But he bade them harbour no gloomy thoughts, and told them to be merry and joyful and true for ever to their immortal nature. He told them to pass on his teaching to their sons and daughters.

One day he announced that the appointed time for his departure had come. ‘In the middle world whence you have come, my friends of Dúmiel, many seasons have passed since I came here.’

He went with Ingos to the Western Seashore where they first met, and spoke parting words of advice. ‘The Silver Tree with the Golden Fruit is your honour and your charge: guard it well! And watch, too, for the deceiver. Do not fear the accidents and changes of this earth, but look forward to the never-dying world.’

Then Ingos said: ‘Master, tell me your name.’

And the Messenger said: ‘My name is Astagant, the Good Giant. But tell no other mortal my name, for it is hidden.’

Then a great fish appeared from the waters, and the Messenger, crying ‘Farewell! we shall meet again’, mounted on its back, and plunged away over the thundering surf to the open sea. Ingos watched from the beach till the Messenger was a far speck in the West and the Sun began to sink that way too.

Dúmiel Reborn: chapter 10 of The Story of Aphelos

 

Then there was great mirth and rejoicing of Ingos and his new people. Presently the Messenger spoke again: ‘Lord Ingos, your guests, your new people, are weary and hungry.’

‘It is true, master,’ said Beinun. ‘While we were on the sea our victuals failed us long before sight of land; and since we landed we have dared eat nothing unbidden in this land. Yet only to look on this enchanted country is food and drink and sleep.’

‘I saw plentiful fruit,’ said Tháli, ‘but I had not the strength to pick it from the branches. We are like mere spectres in this land.’

‘That shall be changed,’ said Ingos. He fetched down seven golden fruit from the Silver Tree, touching their joining-places with his staff. ‘Here is the fruit of the everlasting Tree. He who eats this is transformed and made immortal, set free from hunger, thirst, pain, anguish, fear, desire, and death. Take and eat this!’

‘It is good!’ exclaimed Obrámus. ‘I remember it. I have seen this wondrous Tree in my dreams.’

‘Dreams you may call them, venerable friend,’ said the Messenger, ‘rather you were then truly awake.’

‘Lady,’ said Ingos to Díamun. ‘Queen of Dúmiel, eat first. And you, father Obrámus. Sister, Brother. Brother and Sister. And thus I eat with you.’

And thus Ingos feasted with the six Dûmiellamê from the fruit of the everlasting Tree, and so the immortals of Aphelos were re-born. And ever the love and joy and mirth of the Lord Ingos and his people were increased. And so began the long dwelling of the people of Dúmiel in Aphelos.

The People of Dúmiel: chapter 9 of The Story of Aphelos

 

The Messenger said no more of this. Time and anxiety did not hang upon Ingos as it hangs on mortal men. He waited without pain. The timeless days of Aphelos flowed by, and he drank deeply of them. At last one day the Messenger said:

‘The hour has come. You remember the day when the flowers of the two trees faded after the rainbow. Go now with haste to the cave on the mountain top, and bring thence the petals that fell. They shall be robes for all your people.’

Ingos arose and went with haste to the top of the mountain. There still in the cave lay the petals of the great blue flowers. He gathered them up. Though they were many, they were wonderfully light. He carried them back to his home under the Golden Tree where the Messenger waited. 

Then the Messenger addressed him again. ‘Go to the lake yonder, to the great willow that overhangs the water at the nearer end. Take up again these sky-coloured robes, and leave them on the shore of the lake, in full view. Come back and tell me what you see there.’

Ingos rose and went to the lake as the Messenger instructed. He laid down the petal robes on the lakeside. Then he looked up and cast his gaze across the waters. There, on the farther shore where the trees stood back from the water to reveal a grassy bank, a woman was bathing in the clear water. She sent quiet ripples spreading down the lake. Ingos did not know who she was or how she had come to Aphelos. He might have called to her over the water, but he did not speak. She began to comb out her long, darkish hair with her fingers, using the clear waters as her looking glass. There was something in her appearance that answered to Ingos’s longings.

Ingos returned to the Messenger and told what he had seen.

‘It is well,’ said the other. ‘She is not alone, for others have come with her. And still others will come to this enchanted land, whose lord you are. They will be your people.’

Ingos sat on the mound at the foot of the great Tree, reflecting on the presence of other people in Aphelos. He became aware that the Messenger had left his side, walking away into the woods behind him. Presently he noticed another thing. Someone was moving among the trees fronting the mound. It was the woman he had seen by the lake. She was wearing one of the blue robes. She was very tall and her long dark hair reached to her waist: she had twisted some bright flowers in it.

She came straight towards the Great Tree, gazing in front and all around her, without at first noticing Ingos sitting at the Tree’s foot. He rose to greet her, and she saw him. For one moment she stood still, and then came rapidly up the slope and knelt at his feet, bowing her head very low. 

‘Hail, Lord!’ she said. ‘I have no gift to give, but if you are indeed the lord of this country, I am your servant.’

‘No, Lady, do not kneel to me. Rise —’

She got up and stood before him. ‘— I am Ingos, and I am indeed lord of this enchanted land, the land of Aphelos. Tell me, I beg, who you are.’

‘I am Díamun, Queen of the downfallen land of Dúmiel, and I am only so by the falling of my beloved mother, who was Queen while Dúmiel stood. And here, lord, are my people, the few that remain to me.’

And as she spoke there came, by the way which she had followed, two men and two women, whose looks proclaimed them to be of the race of Queen Díamun of Dúmiel. All had clothed themselves in blue robes.

‘Here are Dóna my sister, and Tairis her husband; and Beinun my brother and Tháli his wife. These are all who remain of the people of Dúmiel, barring one.’

The four Dúmiellamê greeted Ingos and offered him their allegiance, and he received it and welcomed them. When this was done, Queen Díamun spoke again. ‘But where is Obrámus, the eldest of our company? Brother, he was with you, I think.’

Beinun replied: ‘Yes, sister, he was, but we left him sleeping on a grassy bank beyond the trees. He was very weary. Obrámus, lord, is the eldest and wisest of us. He is a good and venerable man.’

‘He is a father to us,’ added Dóna.

‘And yet his age is great, and his time is short. Our voyage has taken many years from his life, I fear…’ said Tháli.

‘Fear not!’ cried Ingos in a loud and joyful voice. ‘Not a year, not a day, shall ever be taken away from that good man’s life, or to any man’s or woman’s in this land, nor added to it. For this is Aphelos, the deathless land on earth, and I am Ingos, the lord of it, and first earthly immortal. Here grows the Golden Fruit of the Tree, which is the food of immortality.’

The five people of Dúmiel gazed in joy and wonder as he stood under the Tree with his hands held high. 

At that moment an old man with white hair came uncertainly into the gathering. He, too, had put on one of the robes. ‘Welcome, father,’ said the Lord Ingos.

A smile of recognition spread across the aged face of Obrámus.

‘Hail, lord! I have seen you…standing on a high mountain top and walking among the golden trees of this enchanted land. And I knew that you are one and the same Ingos, who, in a distant age, brought our fathers and mothers into Thrâyeldim; and that you are he who endured the Dolorous Stroke from the hand of Oigenas.’

‘If that is true,’ cried Tairis, ‘then how blessed are all who come into your land! Our father Obrámus has raised our hopes of salvation from the waters many times by telling us of his visions. We trusted in him and we felt sure that we were coming to a wonderful land that would console us for all our suffering. And so it is; and so is the lord of it.’

‘The Realm of Dúmiel shall live on!’ said Obrámus.

‘In exile,’ added Queen Díamun.

‘Yes, lady, in bodily exile; but this land of Aphelos is the true home of any woman or man, for here are numberless joys and salvation from animal needs and base desires,’ answered Ingos.

‘You speak truly, lord, for such an exile is in truth a home-coming for our people,’ she returned, and there was love between them.

Ingos now saw that the Messenger had returned. He stood just by him on the mound of the Great Tree. The three men and three women of Dúmiel at once knelt.

‘Hail, most wise and noble master,’ said the old Obrámus, ‘Now I know who it is that instructs me in my dreams.’

‘Welcome, Queen of Dúmiel, lords and ladies and you, most venerable man. But do not kneel to me, for I am but a messenger.’

The Fowls, Beasts, and Fishes: chapter 8 of The Story of Aphelos

 

And so, talking with the Messenger, Ingos passed the days in the shadow of the golden tree. And the Messenger instructed the Lord of Aphelos in many things. And on a day he asked him if he had declared his friendship for the fowls and beasts and fishes of the land. Ingos replied that he had not done so. And so the Messenger set aside three days for this.

The first day they went to a part of the plain which had no trees but was flat and grassy. The Messenger sat on a hummock at the top of the meadow and reached into the folds of his white robe. He brought out a small horn which hung by a cord from his neck. He handed it to Ingos with the words: ‘blow a long, loud note on this.’

Ingos put the horn to his lips and blew. The note was low, haunting, and very clear. Then the Messenger took the horn back. After a few minutes the Beasts of Aphelos began to arrive — not every animal, but the chief of each species.

‘Go to the Golden Tree and bring fruit for your subjects,’ said the Messenger. Twelve apples will suffice. The Beasts and Birds and Fishes will not gain undying life, but they will lose their fear of you and become your friends. I will speak with the Beasts while you are away. Mind that with your staff you cause new fruits to grow.’

When Ingos returned the plain was full of animals of every kind. They sat still and silent, waiting for him to speak. 

He said: ‘Beasts of Aphelos, let us share our meal and afterwards we will be able to converse. Here are the apples from the Golden Tree.’

Then he and the Beasts ate together, and afterwards they acknowledged him as their lord, frisking and frolicking and fawning all round him. And there was love between the Beasts and Ingos. But the wondrous beasts called the Tídhari did not come to that meeting, for they were too shy. 

The next day the Messenger sat under the Golden Tree and brought out a small reed pipe and told Ingos to pipe on it. The high, clear notes echoed around the forest and summoned the Birds of Aphelos, who sat on the branches of the great Golden Tree. Then Ingos ate with the Fowls of the Air, and they called him master with their songs and calls. And there was love between the Birds and Ingos.

On the third day Ingos and the Messenger went to the lake that was nearby, and to the rivers, and the streams, and to the sea shore, and by each Ingos played on a harp that the Messenger gave him, and summoned the fishes of the waters and of the Sea. He cast the flesh of four of the Golden Apples on the water and shared his meal with the fish. And the Fish recognized him as master, and there was love between the Fish and Ingos.

One day Ingos said to the Messenger: ‘Now I am at one with everything in this Realm. Always the beasts play around me or birds perch on my shoulders, and even the fish look out of the water to greet me. Yet one thing is lacking, I have no people. I have no friends, no companions, no counsellors. You, master, are the only one.’

‘And I shall leave you when the hour comes, Lord Ingos,’ replied the Messenger. ‘Yet put your mind at rest. What you say is true, is foreseen, and is provided for.’