The Gifts of Asti

The Gifts of Asti, by Andre Alice
Norton

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Title: The Gifts of Asti
Author: Andre Alice Norton
Release Date: August 11, 2006 [EBook #19029]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ASCII
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OF ASTI ***

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Transcriber's Notes:

This etext was produced from Fantasy Book Vol. 1, No. 3 1948.
Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the copyright on
this publication was renewed.
A number of typographical errors found in the original text have been
corrected in this version. A list of these errors is found at the end of this
book.
* * * * *

THE GIFTS OF ASTI
ANDREW NORTH
She was the guardian of the worlds, but HER world was dead.
Even here, on the black terrace before the forgotten mountain retreat of
Asti, it was possible to smell the dank stench of burning Memphir, to
imagine that the dawn wind bore upward from the pillaged city the
faint tortured cries of those whom the barbarians of Klem hunted to
their prolonged death. Indeed it was time to leave--
Varta, last of the virgin Maidens of Asti, shivered. The scaled and
wattled creature who crouched beside her thigh turned his reptilian
head so that golden eyes met the aquamarine ones set slantingly at a
faintly provocative angle in her smooth ivory face.
"We go--?"
She nodded in answer to that unvoiced question Lur had sent into her
brain, and turned toward the dark cavern which was the mouth of Asti's
last dwelling place. Once, more than a thousand years before when the
walls of Memphir were young, Asti had lived among men below. But
in the richness and softness which was trading Memphir, empire of
empires, Asti found no place. So He and those who served Him had
withdrawn to this mountain outcrop. And she, Varta, was the last, the
very last to bow knee at Asti's shrine and raise her voice in the dawn

hymn--for Lur, as were all his race, was mute.
Even the loot of Memphir would not sate the shaggy headed warriors
who had stormed her gates this day. The stairway to Asti's Temple was
plain enough to see and there would be those to essay the steep climb
hoping to find a treasure which did not exist. For Asti was an austere
God, delighting in plain walls and bare altars. His last priest had lain in
the grave niches these three years, there would be none to hold that gate
against intruders.
Varta passed between tall, uncarved pillars, Lur padding beside her, his
spine mane erect, the talons on his forefeet clicking on the stone in
steady rhythm. So they came into the innermost shrine of Asti and there
Varta made graceful obeisance to the great cowled and robed figure
which sat enthroned, its hidden eyes focused upon its own outstretched
hand.
And above the flattened palm of that wide hand hung suspended in
space the round orange-red sun ball which was twin to the sun that
lighted Erb. Around the miniature sun swung in their orbits the four
worlds of the system, each obeying the laws of space, even as did the
planets they represented.
"Memphir has fallen," Varta's voice sounded rusty in her own ears. She
had spoken so seldom during the last lonely months. "Evil has risen to
overwhelm our world, even as it was prophesied in Your Revelations,
O, Ruler of Worlds and Maker of Destiny. Therefore, obeying the order
given of old, I would depart from this, Thy house. Suffer me now to
fulfill the Law--"
Three times she prostrated her slim body on the stones at the foot of
Asti's judgment chair. Then she arose and, with the confidence of a
child in its father, she laid her hand palm upward upon the outstretched
hand of Asti. Beneath her flesh the stone was not cold and hard, but
seemed to have an inner heat, even as might a human hand. For a long
moment she stood so and then she raised her hand slowly, carefully, as
if within its slight hollow she cupped something precious.

[Illustration]
And, as she drew her hand away from the grasp of Asti, the tiny sun
and its planets followed, spinning now above her palm as they had
above the statue's. But out of the