So the spiders began to make a practice of taking new-born babies from their human mothers and bringing them up among baby spiders; in this way, they developed a class of human servants who were totally loyal to the spiders, and who despised their fellow men. Vaken the Wise had used the grey desert spiders as spies; now the Death Lords used their human servants in the same capacity. Those human communities who still resisted the spiders were betrayed. Within a few generations, the legacy of Vaken the Wise had been destroyed, and all the men in the country of the two rivers had been killed or enslaved.
Niall was shocked to realise that the spiders owed their triumph to their human servants; but there was worse to come. He learned how, in the time of Qisib’s successor Greeb, there had been a revolt of the slaves; it had been carefully planned, and before it was suppressed thousands of spiders and their human servants had been destroyed. The Death Lord asked Greeb to devise some method that would prevent such a catastrophe ever happening again. Greeb’s first suggestion was that all the slaves should be killed, so that the only human beings who remained would be the faithful servants of the spiders. But this was impractical; there were too many slaves. Besides, the spiders wanted to maintain a class of slaves because they found human flesh tasty, and were naturally unwilling to eat their local servants.
It was one of Greeb’s human servants who suggested the solution. The name of the traitor has not been preserved; all that is known is that he was skilled in the breeding of cattle. It was this man who suggested that the spiders should breed the slaves by the same method as cattle, and carefully select the fattest and most stupid to propagate their own kind. Any who showed signs of unusual intelligence should be destroyed long before they reached manhood. These ideas were adopted, and within a single generation the spiders achieved their aim: the total submission of their most dangerous enemy. Human beings came to regard the spiders as their lords and masters; defiance — or even resentment — became unthinkable.
As he listened to all this, Niall’s anger grew until he felt choked by it. It was directed against the giant plants as well as the spiders: they were responsible for making the spiders masters of the earth. When he thought of the spiders, with their poisonous fangs and evil eyes, Niall experienced a wave of loathing and revulsion. How could anyone favor a species that murdered, devoured and enslaved their fellow creatures?
His anger seemed to arouse a more personal response in the plant, and its reply was as unambiguous as human speech. It addressed him directly, as if speaking aloud, and seemed to be saying:
“Then how can you favour your own kind? They were murdering, enslaving and devouring their fellow creatures long before the spiders. They murdered and enslaved their enemies and bred animals for food. How can you say they are better than the spiders?”
For a moment Niall was alarmed by his own temerity. Then he realised this was absurd. The empress plant was superhuman, and therefore unoffendable. Besides, she could understand his thoughts whether he spoke them or not. He was also emboldened by the feeling that he was not entirely in the wrong; when he thought of the spiders, and of what they had done to his own family, he still felt enraged.
“At least men have always respected intelligence. The spiders know that men are as intelligent as they are, yet they want to destroy them.”
“As you would destroy the spiders.”
He said defiantly: “Yes, I would.”
Then his anger evaporated. As he looked into the soul of the empress plant, he saw that it was irrelevant. The concern of the giant plants was not for individual species, but for evolution. It made no difference to them who were the masters and who the slaves.
Besides, the story was not yet finished. In the century after the enslavement of man, the plants realised that something was going wrong. The evolution of the spiders was slowing down. They were becoming lazy, contented to remain all day long in their webs, catching flies for sport and gorging themselves on human and animal flesh. The plants tried increasing their injections of vitality, but it made no difference; the spiders seemed to accept it as a free gift.
Then the plants understood their mistake. On their own planet, life was so difficult and harsh that the struggle to evolve had become second nature. By comparison, the earth was full of variety. The result was that its creatures only evolved when they had something to fight against. During the first ten million years of their evolution, the spiders had hardly changed at all; now, in a few centuries, they had become masters of the earth. They were happy and secure; why should they make any further effort?
The plants decided to try an experiment. The bombadier beetles had always regarded the spiders as their hereditary foe. A bombadier beetle defends itself by producing a tiny explosion of hot gas, and this deters most of its natural enemies. But if a beetle wandered into a spider’s web, and the spider began to spin a cocoon of silk around it, the beetle would allow itself to be trussed up into a helpless parcel, for its firing mechanism was activated by direct attack. It was a slave of its instinct.
Now the giant plants decided to concentrate their efforts on the bombadier beetles. They determined the precise wave length of vitality to which the beetles responded, and transmitted this with increasing intensity. And as soon as the beetles became “more alive,” they learned to overrule their mechanical responses. When a spider tried to entangle a beetle in its silk, it was promptly driven off by a burst of scalding gas.
The spiders had become accustomed to having their own way, and were infuriated by this defiance. They were so angry that they decided the beetles deserved to be exterminated. (Niall smiled grimly; it was exactly what he would have expected.) But the beetles had gained a new confidence from their immunity, and fought back with courage and determination. When the spiders redoubled their efforts, the beetles redoubled their resistance. In the centuries during which the two sides fought for supremacy, both evolved new levels of will-power and intelligence. And finally, intelligence and common sense prevailed. When the Master of the beetles proposed a truce, the spiders accepted eagerly. But then, as both sides settled down to the pleasant existence of successful conquerors, their evolution began once more to mark time.
The experiment confirmed what the plants already knew: that on earth, creatures evolve only when they have to struggle. In that case, the attempt to create superbeings was apparently a failure.
Yet there was still one more possibility . . .
The Death Lords had made one serious mistake. They had been confident that man was no longer a danger to their species. It was true that the men of the desert remained free; but they were useful for breeding, and the spiders were convinced they posed no real threat.
And now, too late, they realised the full extent of their stupidity. The realisation had come with brutal suddenness on the day after the raid on the Fortress. More than three thousand spiders had died; many more lived on in agony, their torment experienced by every spider in the surrounding area. It was on that day that the Death Lords knew that their struggle to become masters of the earth had ended in failure.
The thought filled Niall with a feeling of grim triumph, and he recalled his own exultation as he had pointed the Reaper at a spider and pulled the trigger. Then, as he sensed the revulsion of the empress plant, the feeling evaporated, and he felt like a child who has been detected in some forbidden activity. He tried to hold his thoughts in suspended animation, as if holding his breath. When this effort became too much, he asked finally:
“What do you intend to do?”
The reply startled him.
“Now it is in your hands.”
It took several moments for Niall to digest this astonishing communication. His thoughts were in a turmoil. Did the plant mean. . . ?
He asked: “Do you mean we can do whatever we like?”
“We cannot prevent you.”
To Niall this seemed absurd.
“You could prevent me from leaving. You could” — it was impossible to conceal the thought — “kill me.”
“No. You came here in good faith because we made a compact. We cannot break that compact.”
He shook his head in bewilderment.
“But what do you want me to do?”
The answer was as clear as if it had been spoken.
“You must reflect and then make up your own mind. You are free.”