The Queen of Penesthelia and Firman the Brave 6
The Little Man of Gold
Now, the child thought her about the stone too heavy to move, and she left the cave and broke a limb from a pseudopine, and she took a knife and carved a flute. And sitting on a stone by the cliffs, she played on the flute a melody over and over.
Now you listen to my tale about the Queen of Penesthelia and Firman the Brave, and you hear many impossible things, but now I will tell you something truly impossible, and yet you must believe.
She played the tune, and there was another cleft in the stones, and a Beast came out of the cleft all over with dust and web and darkness as though it had slept five hundred years. It picked its way across the ancient pseudopine needles with six hooved feet on six long legs, and all across the Beast were eyes, and all across the Beast were mouths, and it was black and shaggy and smelled like a manufactory for making chemic drams. And it was a thing terrible to look at, but she did not fear it at all, and she said, “Hello, Beast.”
The Beast looked down at her, and it was as big as a horse, and it breathed louder than a horse, and its hooves were like feet and like hooves, and it pranced and leaned down and smelled the child.
“Beast, will you help us?”
The Beast made a sigh, and she led it into the cave, and the squirrel and the dog and the horse and Firman the Brave were astonished at what the piping of the child had brought to them.
“Beast, please help us move this stone!” the child asked, and it took one pair of legs, and then another pair of legs, and then it braced itself against the floor of the cave and it pulled, and it pulled, and it pulled, and the child played her flute and piped a melody, and Firman the Brave stood by the Beast, and the dog stood by Firman, and the squirrel by the dog, and the horse last of all, and the child played the flute more, and they all of them pulled until the stone rolled over.
And under the stone was a cask of wood, and in the cask was a cylinder of steel, and in the cylinder was a bed of silk, and on the bed was a little man all of gold.
And the little man of gold arose and leaped to the top of the stone they had moved and bowed and doffed his cap, and said, “I am the Little Man of Gold of the Valley of Gold, what would have you of me?”
And Firman the Brave said, “For the love of the Queen of Penesthelia, I have sailed the Lesser Sea, and for her love, I crossed the Upper Plateau, and for her love, I crossed the dead lands and the seas of sands and the land of the Men of War, and I ask you to come back to Penesthelia with me.”
“Verily, for the Queen of Penesthelia, I will come,” said the little man of gold and hopped off of the stone, and he was all of gold, his garment and his hat and his face and his hands and all manner of parts of him.
And none of them knew when the Beast was gone, but when they turned it was no more with them in the cave, nor in the outside of it.
“This is a mystery to me,” said Firman the Brave, “for all know that on land on Iphigenia, there is not a beast bigger than a beetle—save the little xenosnakes—from day to night and from pole to pole, saving only the beasts and birds that came down from the sky with men, and surely no Beast like that comes from Earth. So there must be no Beast at all, and we have only dreamt it.”
“This only tells what you know,” said the little man of gold.