Roger Zelazny. The Man Who Loved the Faioli
Roger Zelazny. The Man Who Loved the Faioli
It is the story of John Auden and the Faioli, and no one knows it better than I. Listen–
It happened on that evening, as he strolled (for there was no reason not to stroll) in his favorite places in the whole world, that he saw the Faioli near the Canyon of the Dead, seated on a rock, her wings of light flickering, flickering, flickering and then gone, until it appeared that a human girl was sitting there, dressed all in white and weeping, with long black tresses coiled about her waist.
He approached her through the terrible light from the dying, half-dead sun, in which human eyes could not distinguish distances nor grasp perspectives properly (though his could), and he lay his right hand upon her shoulder and spoke a word of greeting and of comfort.
It was as if he did not exist, however. She continued to weep, streaking with silver her cheeks the color of snow or a bone. Her almond eyes looked forward as though they saw through him, and her long fingernails dug into the flesh of her palm, though no blood was drawn.
Then he knew that it was true, the things that are said of the Faioli–that they see only the living and never the dead, and that they are formed into the loveliest women in the entire universe. Being dead himself, John Auden debated the consequences of becoming a living man once again, for a time.
The Faioli were known to come to a man the month before his death–those rare men who still died–and to live with such a man for that final month of his existence, rendering to him every pleasure that it is possible for a human being to know, so that on the day when the kiss of death is delivered, which sucks the remaining life from his body, that man accepts it–no, seeks it–with desire and grace, for such is the power of the Faioli among all creatures that there is nothing more to be desired after such knowledge.
John Auden considered his life and his death, the conditions of the world upon which he stood, the nature of his stewardship and his curse and the Faioli–who was the loveliest creature he had ever seen in all of his four hundred thousand days of existence–and he touched the place beneath his left armpit which activated the necessary mechanism to make him live again.
The creature stiffened beneath his touch, for suddenly it was flesh, his touch, and flesh, warm and woman-filled, that he was touching, now that the last sensations of life had returned to him. He knew that his touch had become the touch of a man once more.
“I said ‘hello, and don’t cry,'” he said, and her voice was like the breezes he had forgotten through all the trees that he had forgotten, with their moisture and their odors and their colors all brought back to him thus, “From where do you come, man? You were not here a moment ago.”
“From the Canyon of the Dead,” he said.
“Let me touch your face,” and he did, and she did.
“It is strange that I did not feel you approach.”
“This is a strange world,” he replied.
“That is true,” she said. “You are the only living thing upon it.”
And he said, “What is your name?”
She said, “Call me Sythia,” and he did.
“My name is John,” he told her, “John Auden.”
“I have come to be with you, to give you comfort and pleasure,” she said, and he knew that the ritual was beginning.
“Why were you weeping when I found you?” he asked.
“Because I thought there was nothing upon this world, and I was so tired from my travels,” she told him. “Do you live near here?”
“Not far away,” he answered. “Not far away at all.”
“Will you take me there? To the place where you live?”
“Yes.”
And she rose and followed him into the Canyon of the Dead, where he made his home.
They descended and they descended, and all about them were the remains of people who had once lived. She did not seem to see these things, however, but kept her eyes fixed upon John’s face and her hand upon his arm.