When the Drum Fell Silent
By Lord Dunsany
1905
The Unbroken Beat
One missed beat erases everything.
In Pegana's unmoving mist, MANA-YOOD-SUSHAI shaped the small gods and the gaunt drummer Skarl.
Nothing stirred beneath the maker's veil until Skarl stretched hide across a drum.
He struck it again and again, and the rhythm rolled through the sacred stillness.
The endless music wearied MANA-YOOD-SUSHAI, who sank beneath the mist into sleep.
Skarl kept his arm raised, though the muscles tightened and his fingers curled around the beater.
One pause would wake the maker and unmake the gods, their future worlds, and the hand holding the drum.
So creation waited inside one aching arm and one unbroken sound.
The Secret Game
That unbroken sound became a shield, hiding every secret gesture from the sleeper in the mist.
Beneath its rhythm, the gods gathered in Pegana and spoke through ritual signs.
Let Us make worlds to amuse Ourselves while MANA rests.
Their radiant hands rose, and empty darkness opened around them.
Suns flared where their fingers pointed, while fragile spheres began circling through the Worlds.
They shaped Earth as a blue-green wonder beneath a young sun.
Mountains lifted, seas gathered, and clouds crossed bare continents.
The forbidden game had begun.
Above it all, Skarl's drum hid their daring from the sleeping maker.
Every newborn sun moved to that borrowed heartbeat.
Life Enters the Game
That borrowed heartbeat marked a million years before Kib reached toward the empty Earth.
His bright hand covered the plains with scales, fur, wings, and breath.
The gods watched beasts run beyond the ordered paths of worlds.
This is Life.
Life multiplied across Earth, warm and hungry, beyond a simple toy.
The gods recoiled, fearing Kib would shape men who could discover their Secret.
From Pegana's dim edge, Mung raised the invisible sign that severed breath from flesh.
Yet every fallen body left more life moving beneath the sun.
Kib shaped Men from beasts, filling Earth with faces turned toward the stars.
The gods veiled human minds, but Mung's shadow entered every home.
The game could now look back.
The Broken Silence
Those watching faces drew every god deeper into Kib's dangerous game.
Radiant hands shifted suns, stirred lives, and sent Mung's dark sign through crowded generations.
Then Kib did what no god had done.
He opened his mouth and spoke like a man.
Kib's first voice broke Pegana's silence, and the other gods recoiled from its echo.
Silence never returned.
The gods still played through the ages, though each pleasure trembled beneath Skarl's weakening rhythm.
They knew the sleeper would rise and judge their secret game of life and death.
Still, no hand lowered, and no world escaped their delight.
Under every laugh, the drumbeat thinned.
The Last Beat
The thinning beat stumbled once, while Pegana seemed to lean toward the missing sound.
Skarl's arm ceased.
The silence struck harder than thunder.
MANA-YOOD-SUSHAI stirred beneath the veil, and terror flashed across the radiant court.
Skarl shouldered his drum and walked alone into the void.
His task was finished.
Thunder fled the Worlds as the hound Time bayed through darkness.
Above Pegana, Mosahn spread enormous wings, and his trumpet voice tore through creation.
THE END.
The gods answered with no struggle, only the final sign of all the gods.
Their many hands moved together.
Then they descended with grave dignity toward golden galleons waiting below the mist.
Behind them, the maker's waking presence filled Pegana.
The River of Silence
The golden galleons slipped onto Imrana beneath the maker's waking presence.
The gods sailed downward without turning, their radiant forms fading beyond the farthest star.
They never returned to Pegana.
Imrana swelled as the Silent Sea pushed a lightless tide across creation.
Silence drowned the Worlds, the skies, and every city that had raised a voice.
Suns vanished.
Earth vanished with its beasts, its men, and Kib's restless gift.
Time searched with ravenous jaws, but nothing remained for the old hound to devour.
At last, Time folded beside the vanished Worlds and died.
MANA-YOOD-SUSHAI remained alone in the deep stillness, veiled once more by unmoving mist.
The maker considered another plan, while silence held the shape of everything lost.

The Gods of Pegana - Story Book

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