[written down by Johana Passerin]
Only untruthful things can be revealed in their entirety.
After the Party reached Xalgon, they handed the Elixir over to the scholars of Xalgon University so that it could be manufactured and help protect Qurand from the horrors of the New Age.
Jarn and his lictor Lišaj, Klaes, the Huntress, Daran, and Fox were declared heroes of Xalgon and rewarded with badges of honor and dignity: They all received rare signet rings proving their honorability and stature. Fox hung her ring around her neck on a chain, while the others wore them on the fingers of their left hand, as etiquette demanded. Daran wore her ring with great self-denial. She knew that while south and west of Xalgon such a badge opened many doors, in Sairis and the Arks, doors closed before the owners of such rings instead.
The heroes had free room and board on the University premises and received a decent sum of money besides. Following their arrival in Xalgon and their audience with the representatives of the University, they used the first few days to rest and recover.
Jarn and Lišaj acted diplomatically. Very soon, however, they excused themselves, stating they had to return to their duties. Since they spoke fluent Old Vezanian and cooperated fully with the representatives of the University, no one prevented them from leaving. Still, there was something they kept to themselves: they concealed everything about the Great Work that awaited them deep within the Mountain.
The Huntress suffered deeply over what had happened to her lady Ninurak. She felt that the churning cogwheels of the Great Work were a wound on the body of the goddess. Though declared a hero of Xalgon, she searched in vain for peace. Her soul languished. She bade a sad farewell to the remaining members of the party and departed into the woods. She had a grim foreboding that she and Jarn-Saguin now stood against each other. But that is another story, and we shall tell it another time.
Thus, only Klaes, Fox, and Daran remained of the party. Klaes realized that unimagined research opportunities had opened before him. He could walk freely into almost all of Xalgon’s libraries and depositories; the librarians were obligingly at his disposal day and night, accommodating him, searching card catalogs and indexes for him. Scarcely had he bidden farewell to Jarn and the Huntress when he threw himself into study. He searched for mentions of Ignotium, the phenomenon his teacher Zeilet had investigated. At first, he searched the catalogs in vain, until finally one librarian recalled: “Ah, Onda`at! That is what we call it here in Xalgon.” Publications on the subject were located in the esoteric literature section. The books described the issue rather pomposously and examined it mostly through the methods of magic, which frustrated Klaes somewhat. He was an Yllerian and a scientist, after all! Then he found an ordinary-looking slim book. A work by his teacher Zeilet, which someone had apparently published quite recently, only after her death. He knew this scientific treatise—he had never seen it in print, but as he flipped through it, he realized he recognized the formulations from her lectures. Only a few people could have held the book in their hands before him; the spine was firm and the pages untouched, yet a corner was dog-eared in one place. The marker was at the beginning of a chapter connecting the study of Ignotium with the scientific understanding of sleep and dreaming.
In Xalgon, the research into dreams and dreaming was a thoroughly serious scientific discipline. Xalgonians did not share the conviction that Qurand was woven from solid matter; on the contrary, they attached great weight to dreams and dreaming. When Klaes turned the page, a thin token depicting a smiling moon fell to the ground. He slipped the unfamiliar object into his pocket and requested to borrow the book. Thanks to his status, he could borrow it home for a week.
This temporary home was a dormitory apartment on the University grounds, which he shared with Daran and Fox. From their windows, they had a view of the city center, which came alive at night and slumbered by day. Here Klaes could devote himself to reading undisturbed. He finished the book that very evening, but reread it again and again with relish. He devoured the words of his beloved teacher and heard her voice in his mind:
Onda’at is the reverse side of the whole, the front of which is the visible part of the world. But how do we study that which can neither be directly seen nor measured? We would be tempted to answer: in precisely the same way as other invisible forces of nature—for example, the force we call gravity, or the force of magnetism, or after all, even that force of animal fluid that orientals, southerners, and savages call magic. We do not see these forces either, but their effects can be secondarily traced and subsequently described.
I am sorry, but Onda’at is a phenomenon of an entirely different category altogether. The designation ‘phenomenon’ is actually imprecise here, for the word translates as ‘appearance.’ Onda’at, however, is not an appearance; it is the opposite of an appearance. We could also use the ancient word ‘Nav,’ which our ancestors used to designate death and the underworld as the opposite of manifest reality. But that would entangle us in questions of whether Onda’at was already intuitively grasped in ancient centuries, of which we have no reliable accounts.
Onda’at behaves in some respects like the forces known to us (we recognize it only through its effects, not directly), though with one difference: compared to the aforementioned forces, we have so far failed to grasp its laws. It appears as something ‘shy.’ It makes itself known in seemingly random moments; hence it is impossible to study in a laboratory. Our current scientific methods are therefore entirely unsuited, and we will make no headway in our research unless we radically transform them…
Fox was educating herself as well. She decided to take advantage of the opportunity and gain some new knowledge about divination—for instance, divination from the flight of birds, from dreams, from the entrails of sacrificed animals, or from omens in the sky. Regularly every night, she visited the Faculty of Mantic Knowledge and had black folios read aloud to her. At last, she could live according to her nature as a nocturnal animal—in Xalgon, the majority of the population was more active at night.
Fox had been interested in dream divination back when she was still staying at the Inn. She often listened to travelers spending the night at the Inn talk about what they had dreamed on their first night. For among pilgrims, travelers, and indeed the inhabitants of the Inn, the conviction prevailed that the first dream at the Inn held special meaning. Here in Xalgon they had no such superstition, but in most books and folios she came across information about the Lunapark. This aroused her curiosity. What was the Lunapark? Did people have more interesting dreams there? Word had it that it was not so easy to escape from there. She went to Klaes to beg him for some money for admission, but he brushed her off, saying he had no time for such things right now.
So Fox returned to the library and researched how to enter other people’s dreams. Then she practiced on Daran, discovering that Daran had a recurring dream almost every night about the Mound of Bones and how she had been forced to leave her brothers and sisters captive in the Palladin Fortress. Fox tried to change something in that dream, but without success. The dream repeatedly ended with her running through the woods eating mushrooms.
After a few days, a boggart—a messenger—visited them and delivered an invitation to a conversation with Halit. Halit Altun was a demon and the dean of the faculty of magic. Since the day he had received them upon their arrival in Xalgon, they had not seen him. They let the boggart lead them, and after a short while found themselves in a tea lounge on the third floor above ground.
“How are you faring? Are you satisfied with our care and study opportunities?”
Klaes took the floor and thanked him for the hospitality and the chance to rest after the ordeals they had suffered. Halit Altun gestured, and tea and salted biscuits were brought in. Fox, who was lying on a velvet cushion on one of the chairs, sniffed the air. She thought she smelled blood, and indeed—the biscuits lying before them on the table most certainly contained demon blood. She looked at Klaes, who leaned down toward her. She whispered her finding regarding the biscuits’ ingredients into his ear, but before Klaes could even sit back down in his chair, Halit’s voice spoke up.
“Yes, indeed, those are the rarer biscuits that we serve here only to distinguished guests. Blood sacrifice is a favorite pastime of some of my kinsmen, and from that offering wafers are then baked, such as these. But if you are timid, help yourselves merely to the tea.” He poured himself tea into a cup thinly ground from tourmaline and took a biscuit. He drank his tea with an affectationsly raised pinky finger.
“How is the manufacture of the Elixir progressing?” Klaes asked.
“Ah yes, the Elixir. Essentially on the very day you gave us the Elixir, we discovered that duplication is possible. But mass production has not succeeded so far. We are working diligently on it. For the news from the south is grim. Our foremost experts in the laboratories are now devoting themselves to questions of spatiotemporal magic, as it seems much of it will be needed to face the New Age. But I invited you today mainly to convey an invitation from the rulers of Xalgon to a grand celebration that will take place in two days, on the new moon.”
It was clear to Klaes that attending the celebration was an honor that could not be refused, and so two days later they set out for the square near the Temple of Time, the Horologium, which was otherwise completely closed and locked. They received appropriate dark-purple attire, which Daran put on only with extreme reluctance; Klaes did not particularly care. When they arrived at the site, they saw a ten-thousand-strong crowd gathered there. The seemingly countless throng, however, appeared merely as a gathering of ants compared to the immense size of the Horologium, which towered like a black dome-shaped mountain above them—the system of cogwheels and mechanical structures of this machine cathedral seemed from afar to be ornamental filigree, but now up close felt massive and crushing. Humans, dark elves, boggarts, undead, and demons dressed in ceremonial robes, and some held banners bearing images of cogwheels. Deep crimson and black prevailed. A cacophonous music of massive trumpets played, so sweet to Xalgonian ears.
In the middle of the plaza before the Horologium stood an altar, from which a tube led to a vessel with four handles. Beside it stood four hooded figures with blazing eyes.
Then a murmur ran through the crowd, and everyone fell silent, looking toward the direction from which a unit of glistening, black-clad knights was approaching. From their midst stepped one man. He was tall, of ascetic appearance, about sixty years of age. The others ceremonially stripped him of his armor, piece by piece, until he stood there only in a tunic as black as night.
The chorus of Xalgonian Knights began to sing a somber song that echoed across the assembly. Klaes looked around and, to his surprise, saw how many participants were genuinely moved by the singing. When even the last echo of the chorus bounced off the distant wall of the Horologium and died away, all eyes turned toward the red-clad master of ceremonies—a tall, gaunt man with an aquiline nose and skin as pale as ash. Undead, Klaes thought.
The master of ceremonies spoke in a remarkably clear voice that echoed across the entire gathering, amplified by the power of some sort of magic:
“Noble Sir Serkvath Itraniel of the House of Vidrax, known as the Heir of the Hollow Throne, Bearer of the Blood-Illuminated Obligation, do you step forward voluntarily to fulfill the destiny of your house?”
“Yes,” the man said in a resolute voice filled with emotion.
The master of ceremonies proclaimed jubilantly: “Your blood shall wash away ancient transgression, save the future, keep the veins of the Horologium from drying up, and sustain the heart of this city!”
Daran noticed that in the front row, a few paces in front of the man they were about to sacrifice, stood a young man who strongly resembled him. Perhaps a relative, she thought. A mix of emotions showed on his face—horror, pain, pride—and copious tears flowed down his cheeks.
Serkvath Itraniel Vidrax stepped up to the altar. The black-clad ritualists lifted him by the feet above the ritual basin, and the red-clad master of ceremonies slit his throat with one precise movement. Blood gushed forth in a stream, steam rising from it in the cold air. Soon it filled the vessel. The crowd gasped in awe. The moment the sacrificed man’s death spasms ceased, trumpets blared in a loud fanfare. Alongside classic trumpets about two swords long, giant mechanical trumpets sounded this time as well; the ground vibrated with resonance beneath their feet, and the sound was so deep it felt as though it pressed against their chests.
The professor standing next to Klaes nudged him with an elbow to alert him that they were to assume a ritual posture with hands pointing toward the ground and broad smiles on their faces. The blood was carried to one of the gates of the Horologium, where it was poured into a special funnel. The crowd waited with bated breath until the ground beneath their feet gently quaked. It was a different quake than the one from the trumpets—fainter, as if originating from a great depth. From the interior of the Horologium came a mighty sound, resembling a single shift of a giant set of cogwheels. People erupted into cheers. Vessels of alcohol began to circulate, and the revelry and celebrations commenced.
Then the dead knight was ceremonially and respectfully placed upon a bier and carried away. Walking right behind the bier was the young man who had earlier watched his relative’s death with tears in his eyes.
The day after the celebration, the weather changed. It grew cold, and a large black cloud settled above the Horologium, spinning there and refusing to drift away. Klaes tried to learn something about it, but in vain. The next night, when Fox returned from the study hall, burrowed into the satin blankets, and prepared to fall asleep, something thoroughly woke her up instead. It was as if she felt a gentle tremor of the earth, similar to the one they had experienced at the celebration. Unable to sleep, she woke Daran and Klaes and told them everything. They tried to soothe her, but to no avail. Then, looking out the window, they noticed that the cloud above the Horologium had vanished. The bustle of the metropolis pulsed beneath their windows, and above the streets and houses hovered a different cloud, a deep black stratocumulus as if before a storm.
Klaes went to inquire about it at the University, but the answers were always very vague. For instance: The Horologium is a center of power where many planes intersect. Occasionally, non-standard atmospheric situations occur near it.
Klaes had previously looked at the Horologium using his spectacles from time to time. After the Celebration, the area around the Horologium had transformed. He lacked a long-term baseline, however, to state with certainty that it meant something. While he wrestled with the thought, Fox kept weaving around his feet, pestering him with pleas to go to the Lunapark.
“We’ll talk about it after breakfast,” Klaes brushed her off and headed to the refectory, where they had free food three times a day. They met Daran there, who was thoughtful and crestfallen most of the time, absent-minded. Staying in Xalgon did not agree with her, but she had nowhere to go; her city had perished and her loved ones had died, so Klaes and Fox were essentially her closest companions now.
Over breakfast, Klaes and Fox excitedly discussed their newfound interest in dreams and dreaming, sharing their findings. Fox sat on a chair, properly devouring something from a plate that looked and tasted like an omelet. Today Klaes preferred toast with several types of spreads and coffee imported from the far south.
“I would like to get to the bottom of that dream about Zeilet, my dear teacher,” Klaes said. “I once had a dream in which she told me—follow the water. Do you think one can communicate with the deceased in a dream?”
Fox swallowed a bite and said: “I am interested in dream divination too. I’ve learned quite a bit about it. But I haven’t read anything about dreams with the dead yet. Follow the water—didn’t you have that dream before we all fell into that stream with the dryads? Sometimes explanations are altogether too simple. Maybe it was a prophecy that we would fall in there.”
Klaes shook his head, pushing away the memory of what had followed their involuntary voyage with the dryads.
When they finished eating, they decided to go to the Department of Mantic Knowledge to continue their study of oneiromancy (this time together). Daran went with them because she had nothing planned and, moreover, had no desire whatsoever to walk the Xalgonian streets alone. Even if daytime was better than night, the city’s inhabitants were active at night; in the sunlight during the day, few were awake. And the days were shortening now, much to the delight of the city’s demonic and undead inhabitants, who were soon preparing to celebrate the winter darkstice.
Klaes decided to take a shortcut through the narrow alleyways leading from the square to the University. There they heard hasty footsteps behind them, and when they looked back, they saw a boggart, a messenger, hurrying toward them. He bowed and delivered a message: “Esteemed heroes, the rulers of Xalgon wish to speak with you.”
Klaes sighed. The message sounded more like a command than an invitation. So they followed the messenger. Surprisingly, he led them further into the tangled alleys of the old city, where the houses stood so close together that the sky could not be seen. He led them to the rear entrance of some palace from an archaic era. It lacked the luster and glitter typical of the modern Xalgonian style, being built of blue-violet granite. The paneling was made of tourmaline with cut, though now tarnished, reliefs. They had no time to examine them, as a pale young man stepped out of a low door, paid the boggart, and motioned for them to follow him. The boggart laughed and scurried away.
They entered the building and walked behind the young man through spaces in a fairly minimalist style, somewhat atypical in the otherwise overly ornate Xalgon. In every room they passed through, beeswax candles burned in sconces. Daran grew alert. It reminded her of home. She smelled an unmistakable scent, noticing details that evoked a cozy atmosphere. The rooms, moreover, had remarkably playful decor—what appeared to be a door was sometimes merely painted on the wall, while at other times a mirror or cabinet served as the entrance to another room.
Their guide stopped in front of a massive bookcase, pressed lightly on one shelf, and an entire section of the bookcase rotated. He gestured for them to enter. Then the wall closed behind them again. They found themselves in a smaller room with a fireplace where a fire burned. A real fire, Daran realized. She felt emotion overwhelming her. Tears streamed down her cheeks; she couldn’t control herself. It’s impossible! In the heart of the dark city of Xalgon, I smell the scent of home.
Beside the fireplace stood a woman in black hunting attire, her shoulder-length black hair braided into a tight plait. She had Vezanian features, an aquiline nose, beautiful eyes sharp as a razor, and pale, aristocratic skin. She greeted them with a respectful gesture and spoke:
“Welcome to my home. Perhaps you are surprised, for you were summoned to the rulers of Xalgon. I am no ruler of Xalgon, though my power is not small. I am Nazqawn, Queen of Arkagant. Please hear my words; I wish to tell you about what troubles me and what should reach your ears as well.”
Klaes thanked her and returned her greeting with a slight bow.
“I expected many things, but not this. It looks like the Ark in here! I can see on Daran that this is no illusion, but a genuine aurán. How is this possible?”
“My house has resided here since ancient times, but years ago events occurred after which I forged an alliance with the House of Arkin,” Nazqawn replied. “The rulers of Xalgon know of this. I am tolerated in the city; they keep me as someone who tests the strength of their plans. I observe and learn much, but their designs remain hidden from me.”
Then she stepped away from the mantelpiece, and the light of the aurán fell upon a figure sitting in an armchair whom they had not yet noticed. The young man shifted and looked at them. They saw he had pale skin and copper hair, but only where the light of the aurán fell upon him. Where his figure remained in shadow, he appeared as an older, gray-bearded, gray-haired man with ash-colored skin.
“This is Loverd Oidar Vinori, my personal specialist on matters of time and space. Loverd, these are the people I told you about. They have traveled the entire long road from Maghon all the way here.”
Loverd bowed but said nothing. Then they noticed that as he moved, his gray form shifted as well. It looked like a husk that the light of the aurán washed away.
“You brought the Elixir to Xalgon in the hope that it would be manufactured in sufficient quantity and serve to protect everyone from the New Age. I see you were duly rewarded for it,” Nazqawn said.
Klaes affirmed and raised his hand with the ring.
“Did His Magnificence Halit Altun tell you how the Elixir fared on its journey to Sairis?”
“No, he didn’t tell us that. He merely informed us that the manufacture of the Elixir succeeded, only it isn’t going fast enough yet for them to have a sufficient supply for the general public.”
Nazqawn smiled bitterly. “He didn’t tell you what you should know as bearers of the Elixir. According to reports I have from my spies in the south, a sufficient quantity of the Elixir did not arrive in Sairis. They failed to manufacture it. One of the messengers perished. In Sairis they are now doing what they can, but it is uncertain if they will succeed. And if they do, it won’t be right away. Sirgon lies in ruins. The government fled east and requested aid from Gandhara. Thus, the Gandharan legions marched into Sirania. That part of Sirania untouched by the New Age is under the Gandharan Protectorate. The city of Sairis itself is surrounded by the New Age. And Asvittára likewise remains unconquered for now.”
“We are deeply sorry to hear that,” Klaes said sympathetically.
Nazqawn waved her hand. “I am not concerned merely for Sairis, but also for my own city. Arkagas is in immediate danger. I officially requested Elixirs from the University leadership so they might provide aid to these cities, but both Sairis and Arkagas are, to the Xalgonian leadership, autocratic enemies of freedom. I venture to hope that you, with your status as heroes of Xalgon, might accomplish more. Entreat for a sample of the Elixir. I know that perhaps the fates of distant cities in the south and east where you have never personally been may not lie so close to your hearts, but believe me, with their fall, much good would perish.”
Klaes sighed. The weight of realizing a new task that this powerful woman had placed before him bore down on him. “We can try. But I do not know if we will succeed. The designs of the Xalgonian powerful are a mystery to me. What they do not wish to reveal, they do not say. They host us and show us honors, but give us only what they themselves want to.”
“I am grateful to you merely for the thought that you would try. The Elixir is absolutely vital for my city.”
Then Nazqawn turned to Daran, who had meanwhile stopped crying and trembling and was staring at the fire in the fireplace as if in a trance.
“Daughter of the aurán, what is your name, and where do you come from?”
“I am Daran Angiras Santra, and I come from Arkon,” Daran answered politely.
“What news is there from Arkon? Arkon is our child, dispatched from Arkagant.”
Daran broke into tears again. “Our city is lost, my lady,” she said. Then she told everything about the fate of Arkon, about the rebirth of the Arkonians on the Mound of Bones, and their captivity in the corrupted Palladion.
“Ah, if there is still hope that any of them live, then we must journey there!” Nazqawn exclaimed upon hearing the sad tale. Daran thanked her, and Nazqawn shared her grief.
“I see you have Machuznatar’s staff. If you have the staff, you should have the shield as well. Where is the shield?” she asked then.
“The shield? We know nothing of a shield,” Daran answered in surprise. The women looked into each other’s eyes for a moment. Then Nazqawn pressed Daran in an embrace and turned back to Klaes.
“This is sad news. And I fear I must add more to it. Listen. I know from my people in Kaal Charmat that miraculous events have occurred beyond the western spur of the ice mountains. Something descended from the heavens. Furthermore, I know that a messenger is in the dungeons of Xalgon. I am nearly certain he has something to do with Talantius of Maghon. He spoke his name. The Draymen—that is what the Xalgonian secret service is called—are only just preparing to interrogate him. They won’t let me near him, but they might let you. We need to find out what happened.”
Klaes noticed she said we need to. We. “That is interesting. Could Talantius have landed somewhere again with his tower? But why do we need to know what happened to Talantius?” he mused aloud.
“Why, because he is the creator of the Elixir. That messenger supposedly also warned of spatiotemporal instability around the Horologium combined with the use of the Elixir. Then he vanished; he was transferred to another part of the prison where my spies cannot go. That is why I summoned Loverd, the only Arkonian specialist in spatiotemporal magic, who also studied in Sairis for a time. With the permissions you have, he might be able to examine the Horologium.”
“I see he is in disguise,” Klaes said. “When the Aurán illuminates him, it reveals his true form. But otherwise, he looks like an undead.”
“It is indeed so. The disguise works against random spot checks, but the red eyes of demons would detect him. Therefore, he cannot travel into and out of the city in the normal way, through the gates. He comes and goes via secret paths that I can guide him through. Danger threatens him only from demonic guards.”
“Another conspiracy,” muttered Fox, who was nestling near the warmth of the fireplace, listening attentively to every word.
“I have been to Xalgon twice,” Klaes said, “and always only on a study trip. I have no idea how I would justify an interest in some man who is in prison.”
Nazqawn shrugged. “I cannot take action either, whether directly or indirectly. They watch my almost every move. You have nearly complete freedom of movement in the city. Perhaps they are watching and checking you too, but not very carefully. I can provide you with my contacts. For example, I have a contact with a person in the banking corporation who keeps track of what money is spent on and what loans are drawn. His name is Zemrúšad. Another who could help us is my former teacher Elfthol. He spends most of his time in demonic dimensions, but who knows, perhaps we could manage to revive him. Or Lugašír, his pupil. He is employed at the University. He is a demon. Don’t be alarmed; he entirely lacks morality in the sense that we interpret it. There are possibilities. I will let you know. Do not attempt to contact me; I will always do so myself. As soon as I step out of the house, I am watched, and my visitors are as well.”
“I thought we would rest for at least a few days. But I was mistaken.”
“I will be immensely beholden to you if you help me. It is important; after all, you need the Elixir and protection for your home city of Yller too! It is our common cause.”
“Supposing we manage to obtain a sample of the Elixir. How are we to hand it over to you?” Klaes asked.
“Do not undertake anything. I will contact you in approximately five days. You must proceed in the same manner regarding the detained messenger. Now we must part so that your absence does not arouse suspicion.”
Nazqawn stepped toward the door. Daran seemed unable to move from the spot. “My lady,” she sighed, and Nazqawn leaned toward her.
“Yes, daughter of the aurán?” She read the silent plea in her eyes. “If you wish to rest here, you may. Your body and soul need to heal. You have suffered enough.”
Klaes had no choice but to agree. They bade farewell, and Daran sat down without a word by the flickering fire, soaking in its warmth. Klaes and Fox passed through the false wall; Lovind went with them.
“I will accompany you,” he said, and it was the first time they had heard him speak. When he left the room with the aurán, he looked entirely like an undead, and even his voice was indistinguishable from the accent that caste possessed. He led them down, walking through an underground passage. They emerged onto the surface through a sort of barred gate opening into a narrow, dark alley. From there they reached the main avenue and headed for the University. Instead of going to the Department of Mantic Knowledge, however, they went to the library and spent the rest of the day studying disruptions of time and space. Fox lay rather bored under the table. They had no folios here that she could have read to her, nor any illustrated codices she could flip through. The librarian here was exceedingly unhelpful and annoyed, probably because he had the day shift and the afternoon was dragging on. He dozed in his armchair and paid virtually no attention to the three strange individuals in the study room.
That suited Klaes. He spoke in whispers with his new acquaintance, trying to understand his new task.
“We must leave the part with the Elixir entirely up to you. But Yller could be a good pretext,” Lovind whispered.
“What if they notice that Daran has disappeared?”
“Why, Daran went to the Lunapark,” Lovind countered, winking at Klaes. “In the meantime, I’ll play the role of the invisible servant.”
Fox straightened up under the table and barked: “All right then, to the Lunapark! I want to go too. Really! You promised me!” She laid her paw on Klaes’s knee.
“Not now, Fox. Some other time,” Klaes said, continuing his quiet conversation with Lovind.
In the evening, they returned to their dormitory apartment. On the way, Klaes stopped at the refectory and took food with him. Now they sat in the main room, finishing dinner. Through the window, lights and lamps could be seen coming on, and dark clouds were gathering in the sky once more. From the mantelpiece, a bust of the goddess of strife turned her noble nose in a surprisingly beautiful face toward them. The fireplace looked as if black lava erupting from the wall had solidified in strangely asymmetrical waves. The space in the fireplace where a fire could burn was swept clean and fitted with a grate.
Lovind turned the bust face to the wall and created a cone of silence around himself and Klaes.
Klaes fished inside his shirt and pulled out a miniature vial containing a few drops of the Elixir he had kept for his own use. Lovind sniffed it. “This is what I have left. It isn’t enough for manufacturing; we kept it for ourselves in case we encountered the New Age. It has occurred to me several times to try it out—to rub it on my eyes and then look at the Horologium. They say the Elixir reveals the true nature of things. But I am glad I didn’t do it, hearing those words of warning regarding the Horologium and the Elixir from Lady Nazqawn today.”
Lovind replied: “Knowing the monstrosities that rule this city, it is more than certain they will want to use the Elixir only for their own protection, if not outright to upgrade the Horologium.”
Just then, Fox caught sight of movement outside the window. She leaped up, her back bristling, because what she saw outside the window seemed familiar to her. A raven!
Klaes and Lovind looked toward the window as well. Now they all saw that the raven outside the window was behaving frantically. It beat its wings, head, and beak against the glass as if trying to get inside. After a moment’s hesitation, they opened the window and let the poor creature in. The raven flew around confusedly for a moment, then settled on the mantelpiece beside the bust.
“Thanks, thanks! Close the window, draw the drapes!” it croaked fearfully.
“Why?” Klaes wondered.
“Close it, close it! Mirk is outside!”
Klaes closed the window and drew the curtains, then asked the raven: “You know Mirk?”
“I… am Shard, I don’t remember anything. But I know Mirk. He’s terrible, evil, they chased me,” the creature croaked. Fox came closer, examining it. It didn’t seem like an ordinary raven to her. Klaes pulled out his spectacles and examined the raven, but found nothing unusual about it.
“Are you by any chance a shard of Mirk?” Klaes asked suspiciously.
“I don’t remember anything except for that light. And that attracted me. You have it on you,” the raven answered.
“You mean this?” Klaes said, holding up the vial with the Elixir.
“Oooooooo,” the raven groaned, his eyes widening in a blissful grimace. “I’d like the taste of that; Mirk would like the taste of that too!”
Klaes explained everything to Lovind about their encounters with Mirk, with the flock of ravens that precedes the New Age. The raven listened too, nodding. “Ah, yes… something is coming back to me. It’s like a sudden recollection of a dream, like a fleeting shadow on the surface of a lake. I remember… It was so long ago that even time no longer makes sense. I was different back then. I was not yet… who I am now.
There was that dark place. A void waiting to be filled. I awoke. No, I did not awaken on my own. She was there. The spirit of a swallow, shining like the first ray of dawn. Her light disturbed me from my eternal slumber. And then… then I was given a task. To fill that void. To turn it into a realm that would have its place among the worlds of Urulóki.
I began to create. But it was… hard. On my own, it was taking me too long. And so I decided to create a helper for myself. I took mud, the matter of darkness, and fashioned him in my image. His name was… his name was… The names fade into the mist for me… He was like my younger brother. At first he helped, but then… then it went wrong. He began to create too, but he created twisted, strange things, misshapen forms that did not belong in the beauty I wanted to create. I had to banish him.
I remember how he laughed when he reached the Rapids of Laughter. The river that flowed through our world ended there. The waterfall plunged into the unknown. And he… he simply plunged down. Disappeared. And I returned to my work.
When I finally finished my task, it was a magnificent world. Bushes, trees, hills, rocks… everything glowed in the silvery light of the stars. It was a place of peace, even if traces of him remained there—of my helper. Cursed places where his shadow still lingered. And in the middle of it all was Lake Vaurokash. Its water glowed like an eternal dawn, as if the sun never set there.
The spirit of the swallow returned and was pleased. She said it would be a place for birds leaving this world before being reborn. But I… I could not forget him. The one I had created and then banished. Where did he go? What became of him?
And so I set out after him. Down the Rapids of Laughter. And there… there I found something I didn’t expect. Darkness, even deeper than the one from which I had come. And in that darkness, they were there. They were everywhere. They were him, but at the same time they were not. They were shadows he had created from that darkness. And when they saw me, they attacked. They tore me to pieces. Each of them took a piece of me.
But my heart… my heart was too strong, too full of life. It burst from my chest and became the Sun. Yes, that’s how it was. That’s how it had to be. Because according to our stories… that is how the world came to be.”
“So you created Mirk?” Klaes asked.
“No, not that! I didn’t want you to go throwing the blame on me right away for everything that went wrong before and after! Why, I’ve only been here a short while!!
So they let the poor creature rest. Klaes offered him the leftovers of his dinner. The raven pounced on them ravenously.
“Do you know the fate of the Arkonians whom the Palladins imprisoned?” Klaes asked casually.
Shard groaned: “Oooooo. That makes my head hurt. As if someone hit me in it with a hammer. I remember ancient times, but not what happened yesterday.”
“Do you have any idea what you’ll do? Do you have to hide? What threatens you?” Klaes asked.
“Mirk is a cannibal,” Shard shuddered.
“He wants to eat you?”
“Just so, just so,” the young raven affirmed, and when he had eaten the last crumbs of Klaes’s dinner, he peeked through a crack between the drapes.
“Were they following you?” Klaes inquired further.
Shard jumped back from the window. “Yes, certainly! They’re lurking around the corner. Can I stay here?”
“Why not,” Klaes shrugged. But Fox bristled her back, her body twitching. “What?” she growled at Klaes. “Why should we of all people run a shelter?” Looking at the nervous fox, the raven dropped a dropping.
“See! He’s going to poop all over everything here!” Fox barked.
“He can be in the next room,” suggested Klaes, who realized he was once again mediating between quarreling members of their company. The raven was not quite their companion yet, however. Fox was right that they had taken him in somewhat in haste. But he had information that might be useful to them—he just had to remember it. He stepped forward and opened the door to the bedroom. Without turning on a light, he walked around to all the windows and drew the drapes. He gestured to the Raven, and it flew inside in a low arc. Fox cast hostile glances at him, baring her teeth.
“Thanks! I promise I won’t poop on your beds,” Shard croaked.
“We would appreciate that. And we would also appreciate it if you remembered. We’ll look for a perch for you, and perhaps a potion for recollection,” Klaes called after him before closing the door.
