And when he hath slain all sounds Hish boweth low to the ground;
then cometh into the house, with never a sound of feet, the god
Yoharneth-Lahai.
But away in the forest whence Hish hath come Wohoon, the Lord of
Noises in the Night, awaketh in his lair and creepeth round the
forest to see whether it be true that Hish hath gone.
Then in some glade Wohoon lifts up his voice and cries aloud, that
all the night may hear, that it is he, Wohoon, who is abroad in
all the forest. And the wolf and the fox and the owl, and the
great beasts and the small, lift up their voices to acclaim
Wohoon. And there arise the sounds of voices and the stirring of
leaves.
THE REVOLT OF THE HOME GODS
There be three broad rivers of the plain, born before memory or
fable, whose mothers are three grey peaks and whose father was the
storm. There names be EimÎs, Z‰nÎs, and Seg·strion.
And EimÎs is the joy of lowing herds; and Z‰nÎs hath bowed his
neck to the yoke of man, and carries the timber from the forest
far up below the mountain; and Seg·strion sings old songs to
shepherd boys, singing of his childhood in a lone ravine and of
how he once sprang down the mountain sides and far away into the
plain to see the world, and of how one day at last he will find
the sea. These be the rivers of the plain, wherein the plain
rejoices. But old men tell, whose fathers heard it from the
ancients, how once the lords of the three rivers of the plain
rebelled against the law of the Worlds, and passed beyond their
boundaries, and joined together and whelmed cities and slew men,
saying: “We now play the game of the gods and slay men for our
pleasure, and we be greater than the gods of Pegana.”
And all the plain was flooded to the hills.
And EimÎs, Z‰nÎs, and Seg·strion sat upon the mountains, and
spread their hands over their rivers that rebelled by their
command.
But the prayer of men going upward found Pegana, and cried in the
ear of the gods: “There be three home gods who slay us for their
pleasure, and say that they be mightier than Pegana’s gods, and
play Their game with men.”
Then were all the gods of Pegana very wroth; but They could not
whelm the lords of the three rivers, because being home gods,
though small, they were immortal.
And still the home gods spread their hands across their rivers,
with their fingers wide apart, and the waters rose and rose, and
the voice of their torrent grew louder, crying: “Are we not EimÎs,
Z‰nÎs, and Seg·strion?”
Then Mung went down into a waste of Afrik, and came upon the
drought Umbool as he sat in the desert upon iron rocks, clawing
with miserly grasp at the bones of men and breathing hot.
And Mung stood before him as his dry sides heaved, and ever as
they sank his hot breath blasted dry sticks and bones.
Then Mung said: “Friend of Mung! Go, thou and grin before the
faces of EimÎs, Z‰nÎs, and Seg·strion till they see whether it be
wise to rebel against the gods of Pegana.”
And Umbool answered: “I am the beast of Mung.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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