Niall felt the same, and if it had not been for the thought of Veig, might well have remained with them until days drifted gently into weeks. But the day had already passed its midpoint, and the autumn dusk would soon be falling.
He knew instinctively how to return to his normal human state; it merely required slowing down his increased vibrational rate. Admittedly, he had to overcome intense reluctance to do it; it was like getting out of a warm bed on a cold winter morning and then jumping into a freezing cold bath. But as he forced himself to do it, the chameleon men faded away, and once more he was aware of them only through the sympathy they had established. The stones became opaque once more, and the presence of their sad warrior guardian grew dim, like a dream.
Yet in the moment of returning to the physical world, Niall felt a surge of happiness, and knew that this was the world in which he had been intended to live out his life. In that brief moment, he seemed to understand why he had been born.
It was time to leave. He bent down and picked up his damp clothes, then dressed quickly because there was a chill in the air. Before pulling on his pack, he took his watch from it and looked at the time; it was within two hours of dusk. But he was not looking at his watch simply to check how late it was, but as an expression of pleasure at returning to the world of time.
Because they knew they would soon be taking leave of their guest, the chameleon men also returned to their physical forms. As they left the stones that had sheltered them, they made a ritual gesture of thanks to its guardian, and Niall, although he was no longer conscious of the presence of the old warrior, did the same. Then they went out again into the pale sun of the autumn afternoon.
The bright green grass sparkled in the sunlight, and it was no longer necessary for Niall to “look sideways” to see nature spirits — his brief transformation to the bodiless state meant that their vibration was no longer slightly beyond his normal range of perception. So as they walked on over the springy grass, with its intersprinkling of gorse and heather, he was able to see clearly the flickering of vital forms that hovered on the edge of physical existence. They appeared like a glimmer of color, not unlike a flame seen in the sunlight; but as soon as he tried to focus his eyes on them, he became aware once more of the curious nature of nonphysical things. A physical form can be seen simply by looking at it, whereas seeing a nonphysical form is like speaking to it and receiving a reply. Before it can be seen, a nonphysical form must decide — so to speak — what to reply, or even whether to reply at all. In other words, a nonphysical form chooses to be seen.
Niall was aware of the absurdity of such an idea. Yet it was here, in front of his eyes. A nature spirit seemed to flicker on the edge of a patch of gorse whose flowers had long ago withered away. But when he looked at it, it simply disappeared, and he could see only the prickly green gorse. In order to see it, he had to look at it more gently, less demandingly, as if saying: “Please show yourself to me.” Then the form might emerge, looking like a pulsating ball of light, or a will-o’-the-wisp, or a furry small animal, or even a grotesque little human being. But there was always a split second before it appeared when Niall was aware that he himself was making the final choice about what it would look like.
He knew intuitively that these forms did not possess much intelligence – probably less than an animal — or much willpower. But their bodiless existence meant that they hardly needed intelligence.
Instead of following the path toward the ridge, the chameleon men led him into a hollow not far from the track. In the bottom of the hollow there was a construction of flat stones, which covered a well. The water was so clear that Niall felt the need to kneel and gaze into it, as if plunging his soul into the cool depths. It was about three feet deep, and the bottom was of a white substance like sand. The sides of the well were thick with green moss. In a small annex built of flat stones was an earthenware vessel, similar to the one from which Niall had drunk in the cave of the chameleon men, except that it had a handle, and a crooked wooden stick, part of a branch from which the bark had been stripped.
One of the chameleon men took this stick, plunged it into the water, and stirred vigorously. The result was that moss flaked into the water, filling it with floating fragments. Niall was instructed to take the earthenware jug by the handle and fill it with water. He dipped it and filled it to the brim. Then the leader of the chameleon men took it from him, and took the first drink, after which he handed it back to Niall, who also raised it to his lips and drank.
The familiar earthy taste was so startling and invigorating that Niall stared into the water, wondering if it possessed some magical property. He then handed it to the others, and they drank in turn. As they did this, Niall was aware that this was more than a ceremony of leave-taking; it was a ritual whose purpose was to establish a sense of abiding kinship and to offer him protection.
As the jug returned, the leader of the chameleon men handed it to Niall and pointed to the water.
“If you wish to return to us, remember this taste.”
As he stared into the green, brown-flecked eyes, Niall experienced a rush of gratitude, mixed with a certain astonishment. He became suddenly aware that he had inspired great affection in his companions. This seemed incomprehensible to him until, with an instinct that sprang from telepathic closeness, it struck him that they were deeply concerned for his safety. This strange being who was a king among his own kind, and who had the courage to launch himself into a river that came from nowhere (for this was how the chameleon men thought of the river that flowed under the spider city), was now about to risk his life seeking out a dangerous enemy.
What impressed them above all was that he was alone. The chameleon men had never been alone for a moment of their lives, and even their leader was more of an elder brother than an authority figure. Niall realized, with a kind of embarrassment, that they saw him as a person of heroic stature. But he was aware that being alone is part of the lot of all human beings, and that there is nothing particularly heroic about it.
He took out the flask of water from his pack, emptied it on the ground, and refilled it with water from the well.
In the annex that had contained the jug, there were also a number of flat stones that he recognized as worked flints; cooks in his kitchen still used them when they ran out of matches. The flints obviously had been left there — like the jug — for the benefit of travelers. Niall took two of these, struck them together to produce a spark, and stowed them in his pack.
They climbed out of the hollow and uphill to the top of the ridge. Looking ahead across moorland that extended as far as the eye could see, Niall understood why this ridge had been chosen as the westward limit of the territory of the chameleon men. The lands behind them were full of a variety of valley and woodland, and of many different kinds of creatures, where the work of the chameleon men was necessary to preserve harmony. But the terrain that lay before him seemed to be lacking in variety. To the north, Niall could see the Gray Mountains, to the south the farmlands that were the territory of the spiders and the bombardier beetles; beyond them lay the sea, and beyond that the Delta.
Of these lands the chameleon men had known nothing before Niall came among them; now his awareness had become part of their own, extending their knowledge to more than ten times that of their own boundaries. But Niall was also the gainer, for he was now as familiar with their territory as they were themselves.
There was no time for a lengthy leave-taking; it was time to move on. The chameleon men would return to their peaceful, timeless world of woods and streams, while Niall would return to the time-obsessed human world.