The Quest of Iranon

A short story by H.P.Lovecraft

     Into the granite city of Teloth wandered the youth, vine-crowned, his
yellow hair glistening with myrrh and his purple robe torn with briers of
the mountain Sidrak that lies across the antique bridge of stone. The men
of Teloth are dark and stern, and dwell in square houses, and with frowns
they asked the stranger whence he had come and what were his name and
fortune. So the youth answered:

     "I am Iranon, and come from Aira, a far city that I recall only
dimly but seek to find again. I am a singer of songs that i learned in
the far city, and my calling is to make beauty with the things remembered
of childhood. My wealth is in little memories and dreams, and in hopes
that I sing in gardens when the moon is tender and the west wind stirs
the lotus-buds."

     When the men of Teloth heard these things they whispered to one
another; for though in the granite city there is no laughter or song, the
stern men sometimes look to the Karthian hills in the spring and think of
the lutes of distant Oonai whereof travellers have told. And thinking
thus, they bade the stranger stay and sing in the square before the Tower
of Mlin, though they liked not the colour of his tattered robe, nor the
myrrh in his hair, nor his chaplet of vine-leaves, nor the youth in his
golden voice. At evening Iranon sang, and while he sang an old man prayed
and a blind man said he saw a nimbus over the singer's head. But most of
the men of Teloth yawned, and some laughed and some went to sleep; for
Iranon told nothing useful, singing only his memories, his dreams, and
his hopes.

    "I remember the twilight, the moon, and soft songs, and the window
where I was rocked to sleep. And through the window was the street where
the golden lights came, and where the shadows danced on houses of marble.
I remember the square of moonlight on the floor, that was not like any
other light, and the visions that danced on the moonbeams when my mother
sang to me. And too, I remember the sun of morning bright above the
many-coloured hills in summer, and the sweetness of flowers borne on the
south wind that made the trees sing.

     "Oh Aira, city of marble and beryl, how many are thy beauties! How i
loved the warm and fragrant groves across the hyline Nithra, and the
falls of the tiny Kra that flowed though the verdant valley! In those
groves and in the vale the children wove wreathes for one another, and at
dusk I dreamed strange dreams under the yath-trees on the mountain as i
saw below me the lights of the city, and the curving Nithra reflecting a
ribbon of stars.

     "And in the city were the palaces of veined and tinted marble, with
golden domes and painted walls, and green gardens with cerulean pools and
crystal fountains. Often I played in the gardens and waded in the pools,
and lay and dreamed among the pale flowers under the trees. And sometimes
at sunset i would climb the long hilly street to the citadel and the open
place, and look down upon Aira, the magic city of marble and beryl,
splendid in a robe of golden flame.

     "Long have I missed thee, Aira, for i was but young when we went
into exile; but my father was thy King and I shall come again to thee,
for it is so decreed of Fate. All through seven lands have I sought thee,
and some day shall I reign over thy groves and gardens, thy streets and
palaces, and sing to men who shall know whereof I sing, and laugh not nor
turn away. For I am Iranon, who was a Prince in Aira."

     That night the men of Teloth lodged the stranger in a stable, and in
the morning an archon came to him and told him to go to the shop of Athok
the cobbler, and be apprenticed to him.

     "But I am Iranon, a singer of songs, " he said, "and have no heart
for the cobbler's trade."

     "All in Teloth must toil," replied the archon, "for that is the
law." Then said Iranon:

     "Wherefore do ye toil; is it not that ye may live and be happy? And
if ye toil only that ye may toil more, when shall happiness find you? Ye
toil to live, but is not life made of beauty and song? And if ye suffer
no singers among you, where shall be the fruits of your toil? Toil
without song is like a weary journey without an end. Were not death more
pleasing?" But the archon was sullen and did not understand, and rebuked
the stranger.

     "Thou art a strange youth, and I like not thy face or thy voice. The
words thou speakest are blasphemy, for the gods of Teloth have said that
toil is good. Our gods have promised us a haven of light beyond death,
where shall be rest without end, and crystal coldness amidst which none
shall vex his mind with thought or his eyes with beauty. Go thou then to
Athok the cobbler or be gone out of the city by sunset. All here must
serve, and song is folly."

     So Iranon went out of the stable and walked over the narrow stone
streets between the gloomy square house of granite, seeking something
green, for all was of stone. On the faces of men were frowns, but by the
stone embankment along the sluggish river Zuro sat a young boy with sad
eyes gazing into the waters to spy green budding branches washed down
from the hills by the freshets. And the boy said to him:

     "Art thou not indeed he of whom the archons tell, who seekest a far
city in a fair land? I am Romnod, and borne of the blood of Teloth, but
am not olf in the ways of the granite city, and yearn daily for the warm
groves and the distant lands of beauty and song. Beyond the Karthian
hills lieth Oonai, the city of lutes and dancing, which men whisper of
and say is both lovely and terrible.Thither would I go were I old enough
to find the way, and thither shouldst thou go and thou wouldst sing and
have men listen to thee. Let us leave the city of Teloth and fare
together among the hills of spring. Thou shalt shew me the ways of travel
and I will attend thy songs at evening when the stars one by one bring
dreams to the minds of dreamers. And peradventure it may be that Oonai
the city of lutes and dancing is even the fair Aira thou seekest, for it
is told that thou hast not known Aira since the old days, and a name
often changeth. Let us go to Oonai, O Iranon of the golden head, where
men shall know our longings and welcome us as brothers, nor even laugh or
frown at what we say." And Iranon answered:

     "Be it so, small one; if any in this stone place yearn for beauty he
must seek the mountains and beyond, and I would not leave thee to pine by
the sluggish Zuro. But think not that delight and understanding dwell
just across the Karthian hills, or in any spot thou canst find in a day's,
or a year's, or a lustrum's journey. Behold, when I was small like thee I
dwelt in the valley of Narthos by the frigid Xari, where none would
listen to my dreams; and I told myself that when older i would go to
Sinara on the southern slope, and sing to smiling dromedary-men in the
marketplace. But when I went to Sinara i found the dromedary-men all
drunken and ribald, and saw that their songs were not as mine, so I
travelled in a barge down the Xari to onyx-walled Jaren. And the soldiers
at Jaren laughed at me and drave me out, so that I wandered to many
cities. I have seen Stethelos that is below the great cataract, and have
gazed on the marsh where Sarnath once stood. I have been to thraa,
Ilarnek, and Kadatheron on the winding river Ai, and have dwelt long in
Olathoe in the land of Lomar. But though i have had listeners sometimes,
they have ever been few. and I know that welcome shall wait me only in
Aira, the city of marble and beryl where my father once ruled as King. So
for Aira shall we seek, though it were well to visit distant and
lute-blessed oonai across the Karthianhills, which may indeed be Aira,
though i think not. Aira's beauty is past imagining, and none can tell of
it without rapture, whilist of Oonai the camel-drivers whisper leeringly."

     At the sunset Iranon and small Romnod went forth from Teloth, and
for long wandered amidst the green hills and cool forests. The way was
rough and obscure, and never did they seem nearer to oonai the city of
lutes and dancing; but in the dusk as the stars came out Iranon would
sing of Aira and its beauties and Romnod would listen, so that they were
both happy after a fashion. They ate plentifully of fruit and red
berries, and marked not the passing of time, but many years must have
slipped away. Small Romnod was now not so small, and spoke deeply instead
of shrilly, though Iranon was always the same, and decked his golden hair
with vines and fragrant resins found in the woods. So it came to pass
that Romnod seemed older than Iranon, though he had been very small when
Iranon had found him watching for green budding branches in Teloth beside
the sluggish stone-banked Zuro.

Then one night when the moon was full the travellers came to a mountain
crest and looked down upon the myriad light of Oonai. Peasants had told
them they were near, and Iranon knew that this was not his native city of
Aira. The lights of Oonai were not like those of Aira; for they were
harsh and glaring, while the lights of Aira shine as softly and magically
as shone the moonlight on the floor by the window where Iranon's mother
once rocked him to sleep with song. But Oonai was a city of lutes and
dancing, so Iranon and Romnod went down the steep slope that they might
find men to whom sings and dreams would bring pleasure. And when they
were come into the town they found rose-wreathed revellers bound from
house to house and leaning from windows and balconies, who listened to
the songs of Iranon and tossed him flowers and applauded when he was
done. Then for a moment did Iranon believe he had found those who thought
and felt even as he, though the town was not a hundredth as fair as Aira.

When dawn came Iranon looked about with dismay, for the domes of Oonai
were not golden in the sun, but grey and dismal. And the men of Oonai
were pale with revelling, and dull with wine, and unlike the radient men
of Aira. But because the people had thrown him blossoms and acclaimed his
sings Iranon stayed on, and with him Romnod, who liked the revelry of the
town and wore in his dark hair roses and myrtle. Often at night Iranon
sang to the revellers, but he was always as before, crowned only in the
vine of the mountains and remembering the marble streets of Aira and the
hyaline Nithra. In the frescoed halls of the Monarch did he sing, upon a
crystal dais raised over a floor that was a mirror, and as he sang, he
brought pictures to his hearers till the floor seemed to reflect old,
beautiful, and half-remembered things instead of the wine-reddened
feasters who pelted him with roses. And the King bade him put away his
tattered purple, and clothed him in satin and cloth-of-gold, with rings
of green jade and bracelets of tinted ivory, and lodged him in a gilded
and tapestried chamber on a bed of sweet carven wood with canopies and
coverlets of flower-embroidered silk. Thus dwelt Iranon in Oonai, the
city of lutes and dancing.

     It is not known how long Iranon tarried in Oonai, but one day the
King brought to the palace some wild whirling dancers from the Liranian
desert, and dusky flute-players from Drinen in the East, and after that
the revellers threw their roses not so much at Iranon as at the dancers
and flute-players. And day by day that Romnod who had been a small boy in
granite Teloth grew coarser and redder with wine, till he dreamed less
and less, amd listened with less delight to the songs of Iranon. But
though Iranon was sad he ceased not to sing, and at evening told again of
his dreams of Aira, the city of marble and beryl. Then one night the
reddened and fattened Romnod snorted heavily amidst the poppied silks of
his banquet-couch and died writhing, whilst Iranon, pale and slender,
sang to himself in a far corner. And when Iranon had wept over the grave
of Romnod and strewn it with green branches, such as Romnod used to love,
he put aside his silks and gauds and went forgotten out of Oonai the city
of lutes and dancing clad only in the ragged purple in which he had come,
and garlanded with fresh vines from the mountains.

     Into the sunset wandered Iranon, seeking still for his native land
and for men who would understand his songs and dreams. In all the cities
of Cydathria and in the lands beyond the Bnazie desert gay-faced children
laughed at his olden songs and tattered robe of purple; but Iranon stayed
ever young, and wore wreathes upon his golden head whilst he sang of
Aira, delight of the past and hope of the future.

     So came he one night to the squallid cot of an antique shepherd,
bent and dirty, who kept flocks on a stony slope above a quicksand marsh.
To this man Iranon spoke, as to so many others:

     "Canst thou tell me where I may find Aira, the city of marble and
beryl, where flows the hyaline nithra and where the falls of the tiny Kra
sing to the verdant valleys and hills forested with yath trees?" and the
shepherd, hearing, looked long and strangely at Iranon, as if recalling
something very far away in time, and noted each line of the stranger's
face, and his golden hair, and his crown of vine-leaves. But he was old,
and shook his head as he replied:

     "O stranger, i have indeed heard the name of Aira, and the other
names thou hast spoken, but they come to me from afar down the waste of
long years.I heard them in my youth from the lips of a playmate, a
beggar's boy given to strange dreams, who would weave long tales about
the moon and the flowers and the west wind. We used to laugh at him, for
we knew him from his birth though he thought himself a King's son. He was
comely, even as thou, but full of folly and strangeness; and he ranaway
when small to find those who would listen gladly to his songs and dreams.
How often hath he sung to me of lands that never were, and things that
never can be! Of Aira did he speak much; of Aira and the river Nithra,
and the falls of the tiny Kra. There would he ever say he once dwelt as a
Prince, though here we knew him from his birth.Nor was there ever a
marble city of Aira, or those who could delight in strange songs, save in
the dreams of mine old playmate Iranon who is gone."

     And in the twilight, as the stars came out one by one and the moon
cast on the marsh a radiance like that which a child sees quivering on
the floor as he is rocked to sleep at evening, there walked into the
lethal quicksands a very old man in tattered purple, crowned wiht
whithered vine-leaves and gazing ahead as if upon the golden domes of a
fair city where dreams are understood. That night something of youth and
beauty died in the elder world.
