Part 11 (1/2)

There seems to be a human fascination with secrets. Secrets and secret societies have abounded throughout history, some relating to entire cla.s.ses of people, as with initiation rites for young men; some relating to religion, as with the ”mystery” cults of the h.e.l.lenic world; and some relating to specialized interests, such as deviant s.e.xual practices, fraternities, and the occult. The arcana of the Tarot reflect this interest: the word ”arcanum” means a secret.

The Major Arcana are ”Big Secrets,” the Minor Arcana ”Little Secrets” So it is not surprising that the Tarot has been the subject of exploration by some ”secret societies.” The most significant of these was conducted by the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, founded in 1887 as an offshoot of the English Rosicrucian (”Rosey Cross”) Society, itself created twenty years before as a kind of spinoff from Freemasonry, which in turn originated with the Masons, or builder's guild. The Golden Dawn had 144 members-a significant number in arcane lore-and was formed for the acquisition of initiatory knowledge and powers, and for the practice of ceremonial magic. Many leading figures of the day were members, such as Bram Stoker (the author of the novel Dracula) and Sax Rohmer (the creator of Fu Manchu). One of its ”grand masters” was the prominent poet William Butler Yeats. He presided over meetings dressed in a kilt, wearing a black mask, and with a golden dagger in his belt. But the Golden Dawn is remembered today for the impact some of its members had on Tarot. Arthur Edward Waite, creator of the prominent Rider-Waite Tarot deck, was a member; so was Paul Foster Case, a leading Tarot scholar; and so was Aleister Crowley, said to be the wickedest man in the world, who created the Thoth Tarot deck under the name Master Therion. Crowley was a highly intelligent and literate man, the author of a number of thoughtful books, but he had strong pa.s.sions, indulged in drugs like cocaine and heroin, practiced black magic (one episode left one man dead and Crowley in a mental hospital for several months; they had summoned Satan), and had h.o.m.os.e.xual tendencies that led him to degrade women. He set up a retreat in Italy called the Abbey of Thelema where his darker urges were exercised, and this became notorious. Yet for all the faults of the author, Crowley's Thoth Tarot remains perhaps the most beautiful and relevant of contemporary decks, well worth the attention of anyone seriously interested in the subject.

The picture about him wavered and faded. Brother Paul hesitated, but immediately realized the problem: his entry into the Animation had changed it. Maybe the legendary Chinese artist-what was his name?-had been able to enter his own realistic painting and disappear from the mundane world, but very few others had acquired such status! Brother Paul could only look, not partic.i.p.ate.

Yet why not? These Animations were governed by his own mind. If he wanted to paint a picture with himself in it, who was there to say he could not? He dealt the Six of Swords.

The picture formed. The stream of the unconscious had grown to the river of consciousness. The bridge was gone; this water was too broad for it. He could not see the castle at all. Of course this was a different picture, for a different card; the Five of Cups had stood for loss, while the Six of Swords represented a journey by water. He had lost the Five, appropriately, but gained the Six.

He spied a small craft on the water. It was a flat-bottomed boat, containing a woman and a child, and a man who was poling the boat across the river. ”Wait!”

Brother Paul cried, suddenly anxious, but also conscious of the possible pun: wait-Waite, the author of this deck. ”I want to go, too!” But they did not heed him; probably they were out of earshot, if they existed at all as people. They were, literally, of a different world, one he could not enter.

He thought of the vacuous mouthings of the Hierophant, and felt his ire rising again. He was Animating these pictures; he would have his answer! He had intended to ascertain whether there was any objective validity to these Animations, or whether they all merely represented a sequence of solidified visions from his mind. If the latter, he had his answer: there was no specific G.o.d of Tarot. If the former...

But right now he was merely trying to find his way out of this situation. He had intended merely to taste the water, not to drown in it!

Water-an excellent symbol. Why not put it to the proof?

He plunged into the river, half expecting to feel the sc.r.a.pe of ground against his body as he belly-flopped on reality. But his dive was clean; it was the shock of physical water that struck him. It foamed around his face and caught at his clothing; he should have stripped before entering! Yet he had not really believed...

If faith were the key to Animation, how was this water real, despite his unbelief?

But already his entry was changing the Animation. The water was vaporizing, the river diminis.h.i.+ng. Brother Paul fixed his gaze on the people in the boat, striving to hang onto them, to prevent the entire image from evanescing. If only he could talk to them, these people of the Tarot background, and ask them- The boat s.h.i.+vered. The man flew up into the air, sprouting wings, and perched upon a low-hanging cloud. The woman aged rapidly into a hag. The child grew up into an extremely comely young lady.

As Brother Paul approached them, they turned to face him. He halted a few paces away, discovering that he was back on his feet and soaking wet. His glance traveled from one woman to the other, the young and the old. He realized that this was no longer an image from the Minor Arcana, but one from the Major Arcana. This was Key Six, known as The Lovers.

Well, not necessarily. There was a certain haziness about the scene, an impression of multiple images.

Naturally. He had dealt no card of the Major Arcana, had sought no specific ”Big Secrets,” so had laid down no dictum for the scene. The Animation was trying to form itself from chaos. He must not permit that; he had to retain control of it!

Brother Paul raised the deck of cards that was still in his hand-but hesitated.

There were many established variants of the Tarot, and the Major Arcana were powerful cards. Which variant of Key Six would be best?

His own Holy Order of Vision variant, of course. The scholars of the Order had refined the symbolism developed by the researchers of the Golden Dawn and clarified the ill.u.s.trations until this deck was as precise as the Tarot could be: a marvelous tool for self-enlightenment.

Yet the Holy Order of Vision did not restrict its Brothers and Sisters to its own Tarot deck, any more than it confined them to its own religious teaching.

The heart of its philosophy, like that of Jesus Christ and the Apostle Paul, was service to man. Freedom of faith was one such service. Those who wished to pursue the Order positions were free to do so, and to become Ministers of Vision. But individual members like Brother Paul were encouraged to seek their own understandings, for dedication to the Order had to be freely given. The Order a.s.serted that there was no freedom without enlightenment, so they were expected to study widely before orienting on any particular creed. Thus Brother Paul had investigated many aspects of religion and life, although so far these studies had been necessarily shallow: there was not time enough in a single human life to grasp thoroughly the full ramifications of any one of Earth's multiple faiths, let alone all of them. Had he focused his interest more narrowly, he could have moved beyond the ”Brother” stage of his Order by this time-but that was not his way. Now he had to ask himself: should he take the familiar Vision Tarot, or should he use the generally similar Waite deck in his hand, or should he seriously consider other Tarot decks?

Phrased that way, the question admitted only one answer. If he used the Tarot at all, he should use the one best suited to the need. He always tried to research the full range of a problem, never accepting one solution blindly. The Vision Tarot was good, no doubt of it-but was it the best for this situation? Since other decks reflected other beliefs, and the whole problem of Planet Tarot was one of conflicting beliefs, he could make no quick a.s.sumptions.

He had not planned to go this deeply into Animation, on this first attempt.

Discovering himself in over his head, as it were, he had the impulse to pull out immediately, and give himself the chance to consider more objectively, at leisure, what he had discovered, and to organize a more disciplined program of investigation. He still felt that haste would be foolish. He had the feeling that if he spoke to one of these two women, she would reply-and that this time the answer would be more meaningful than the response of the Hierophant had been. That did not mean he should speak now; he had to consider which woman to ask, and what to ask her. His choice of person might be highly significant. So he should withdraw, and recreate this scene only when he was properly prepared to exploit it.

One problem remained, however: how would he find his way out of this Animation?

Should he ask one of these women? Then he would be committing himself to dialogue with them, as he had with the Hierophant. Better to leave them both strictly alone for now.

Then he realized why he believed he would have an answer. One of the aspects of Key Six was choice-the choice between virtue and vice. One woman was the right one, but which was which? Fuzzy as they both were, he could not tell. And he was by no means certain that external appearance would provide the necessary clue.

Virtue was not necessarily lovely, and vice not always ugly; if they were, few people would ever make the wrong choice! This was another thing to work out carefully.

He had played with numbers and pictures, and gotten nowhere, because he had been playing. Now, at last, he was in the Animation, and the choice was far more precarious. He did not know whose G.o.d, if any, was manifesting here, and he would never learn if he allowed his preconceptions to dominate his investigation. G.o.d might well manifest through some quite unexpected medium.

Perhaps he had an inadequate tool in this Tarot concept, or even a ludicrous one, but now he seemed closer to the truth he sought than he had been before, and closer than he might be in the future, and he was not sure he should waste the opportunity. G.o.d would not necessarily wait on his private convenience.

Therefore he might be best advised to take what was offered and follow this up right now.

Yet his innate sense of caution cried out like a fading conscience; he could not allow himself to be unduly influenced by minor considerations. He had been intrigued by his fleeting glimpse of the Empress, the Girl of the Wheatfield, who had turned out to be Amaranth, and who might be one of these figures before him. If he left this Animation now, would she come with him? Or would she be lost? How could he be sure?

Sure of what? He shook his head. Sure he was not pursuing this vision because he suspected he might have some sort of power over her here, some way to make her amenable to... to what? He had no legitimate business with her, unless it was to use her relief-map torso to find his way out of here. Since she was not an a.s.signed watcher, her very presence here threatened to distort his whole mission, especially since her body and personality were so...

He was going around in circles! Was it better to try to escape this Animation, so as to be able to set it up properly at another time instead of more or less by accident, or should he plunge ahead, now that he was this far along? He was hopelessly confused, now, about his own motives. He needed more objective advice. But he could not seek it without vacating this Animation (the Key Six scene seemed to be frozen obligingly in place, in all its foggy detail, while he wrestled with his uncertainties), and that would be a decision in itself, perhaps an error. That meant he was on his own, regardless. Unless, somehow, he could obtain a guide within the Animation itself.

Well, why not? ”I want,” he said aloud, clearly, ”to select an adviser, who will then guide me through this Animation.”

”Don't we all!” a voice agreed.

Brother Paul looked around. It had been a male voice, yet both figures before him, though obscure, were definitely female. ”Where are you?”

”Up here on cloud nine.”

Brother Paul looked up. The former boatman looked down. ”Are you up there by choice?” Brother Paul inquired.

”Not that I'm aware of. I was poling my wife and kid across the river, when suddenly-” The man paused. ”I don't even have a wife or kid! Am I going crazy?”

”No,” Brother Paul rea.s.sured him. ”You are part of a scene I conjured from the Tarot cards.”

”You conjured it? I thought I conjured it!” The man scratched his head. ”But if it fits your notions, it must be yours, because I never set out to fly!”

Was this a real man, a colonist, partic.i.p.ating, like Brother Paul himself, in the Animation? Or was he entirely a figment of the evoked picture? Brother Paul hesitated to inquire, since he was not sure he could trust the answer. He should be able to work it out for himself in due course. ”Well, maybe we can get you down from there. I'm about to deal another card.”

”Wait!” the man cried in alarm. ”If you deal away this cloud, I'll fall and break my leg!”

Brother Paul started to laugh, but immediately reconsidered. There was little doubt that these Animations were three-dimensionally projected visions, that even a camera's lens could see (and he hoped his recorder was watching well, because who on Earth would otherwise believe this story?)-but within them, there had to be some core of physical reality. People did die while experiencing Animations. If this man was real, he might actually be perched up in a tree, and if his ”cloud” disappeared so that he believed he had to fall, he might very well topple from his branch and suffer serious injury. Brother Paul did not want to be responsible for that!

”Very well. I will leave this card, and merely summon spokespersons for each separate Tarot deck, if that turns out to be possible. I'm sure you will be secure.” If the man believed him, he would be safe. Faith was the key, if his present understanding were correct.

”Couldn't you just conjure me a ladder, so I can climb down?” the man asked plaintively.

Brother Paul considered. ”I'm not sure I can do that. So far, I have formed these scenes by laying down cards and concentrating on the scenes they depict. I have no card with a ladder. If I try to put a ladder in this card, where it does not belong-well, when I introduced myself into a scene before, it changed. I fear it is not possible to make any change in an existing scene without breaking up the whole pattern. So the attempt to introduce a ladder might abolish the ground on which the ladder rests and lead to the very fall we seek to avoid.

Maybe spot changes would be possible if I had greater experience with Animation, but right now I'm afraid to-”

”I get the message,” the man said. ”Do it your way. I'll wait. This cloud is pretty comfortable, for now.”