Whatever Gods May Be Read Online Free Page B

to migrate their herd of men across the globe, always staying just far enough ahead of the roving vampire hoard to insure its protection.
    But, like Mankind, the Thelericks were faced with too many enemies.  For while the death rate due to Redeye attack was virtually nil, the Dark and its mysterious draining properties was killing off Thalick's colony at an accelerated rate.  The Stingers watched helplessly, as did later John Phillips, the slow deterioration of Mankind.  Phillips introduced what little knowledge could be useful to his dying people, including language, the construction of weapons and scant medical techniques, but like the Stingers who had watched over the colony for so long before, he sat by miserably while hundreds of men and women perished monthly.
    Of course, the coming of the Little One had changed everything.  Man was now at least crawling hopefully for new life again.  Phillips did not live to see the miracle of learning he had left behind, but what he had accomplished was enough to sow and harvest the beginnings of a new civilization.  From that original surviving mass of wandering nomads that Thalick and the other Stingers had salvaged, the city of New Phillips had sprung into being.
    Zolan clipped Thalick's tail sharply and instructed the Stinger to bypass New Phillips completely.  He did not want to be seen today.  Though he usually enjoyed his rare jaunts into town, which took place every fifty years or so, Zolan had decided against a public appearance this morning.  He regretted the decision, for he knew the people of this world adored him - as he did them; had he or the Stinger entered either New Phillips or Zolansville, both would have been treated as gods.  The Guardian and the Master, as Thalick and Zolan had been titled through the ages, were living legends as two of the three Lords (Phillips held the third, posthumous distinction) who had battled the Dark and won.  Festivities and celebrations, along with a slew of religious rituals, would have spanned for days.
    But there could be no distractions.  Not today.
    Zolan fought off another pang of regret.  For a few moments, as he stared at the mud huts and caves of New Phillips sprinkled on the slopes of the towering mountains, Zolan wished that he could share Thalick's gift of immortality.  Though Zolan's own world had discovered the secrets to prolonging life indefinitely, Death was an adversary that Man even in that advanced society could still not overthrow.  Man, wherever he could be found in the Universe, was still basically the same.  Whether he had just learned the fine art of spearing some hapless fish with a stick, or stumbled on a new way to touch the stars, Man still bore the inescapable yoke of mortality.  Not often did Zolan envy the Stinger's deathless existence; he had always considered it with a commixion of pity and revulsion previously.  But today, for just an instant, he felt that an eternity of watching a world rebuild itself would indeed be fantastically wonderful, and worth the burden of perpetual consciousness.
    WE GO BACK NOW Thalick interrupted Zolan's thoughts.
    "No, not yet.  A little further, Bug," Zolan responded firmly.
    New Phillips came and went.  The high mountains that paralleled their journey grew more rolling and less steep, and by mid-afternoon, the distant roar of the nearby sea could barely be heard by Thalick.
    Then, all at once, the desert ended.  What took its place was a salt flat, stretching out to the horizon.
    Thalick scanned the white wasteland ahead.  Not even a lonely weed or dying scrub bush could be spotted by the Stinger.  Overhead, one squawking buzzard circled around the two friends; it had not been a good day for the bird, and before Thalick and Zolan appeared, it had decided to head back for more promising grounds in the desert.  One look at Zolan, however, changed the buzzards mind immediately; it squawked hopefully and continued to circle.  Thalick scanned the