not women, but
demonesses—alighted on it. Similarly, the flying beasts settled among the
flowers with claps of their wings. They browsed the jasmine and the asphodel.
They stalked among the people, who drew aside with anguished sighings,
mechanical creatures, or else illusions, those demon dream artifacts which the
sun’s rays could destroy.
The man who
had retrieved the golden bone relic from the sand still clutched it, when one
of the beasts, a lion, came to him, and stared in his face with topaz eyes.
Perhaps this lion at least was one of the Vazdru themselves, in other form,
because the lion spoke to the man in hypnotic accents.
“That bone,”
said the beast, “is neither from the skeleton of Nemdur’s black queen nor from
the skeleton of anyone of importance. Give it therefore to me. It amuses me to
collect trivia.”
And the man,
shivering, extended the sacred relic he had gone such a distance to recover,
and the lion took it in its jaws. There was a terrible crunch; pieces of fine
gold and brown ivory were spat on the hyacinths under paw. The lion then
departed, its eyes shut as if in revulsion, Probably it was a demon, for
the touch of gold, reminiscent to Vazdru and Eshva alike, of the sun, filled
them with allergy. Only the Drin would sometimes work it, being less sensitive
than the aristocrats of Druhim Vanashta. (Revulsion, no doubt, was the cause of
the Eshva who stole the relic being seen continually passing the bone from hand
to hand, each taking a fair share of the golden discomfort to spare his
fellows.)
Upward, the
ring of the carpet flew. As once Nemdur’s court had careered up the long
flights of steps, the people were borne toward the topmost tier.
For sure, they
went on with their polite, habitual expressions of alarm. If this work of
night, this tower, were tall as Baybhelu, might it, too, anger the gods, who
would then cast it down? Yet something in them comprehended, a dim memory
carried in their racial cells, that even the gods could not cast down the power
of Azhrarn, or if they thought they could, they had never thought to try it.
Did the people
then realize they were on their way into his presence, into the presence of an
Azhrarn without disguise, an Azhrarn in the full aura of his princedom? That
one who, they had always been told, was hideous, shambling, evil in his looks
as in his deeds.
Perhaps
already the vistas and the harmonies and the drug-smokes had taught them that
wickedness did not always have an ugly shape.
The carpet
continued upward. Through the fountains which seemed not to be of fluid but of
heatless combustion. Past windows of sumptuous colors, behind which exotic
jigsaws of activity went on, never completely viewed or explicable. By
black-haired revelers who danced or embraced, or leaned out over balconies,
languidly.
The topmost
tier was suddenly reached. It was a lightless box, with doorways all around,
each one of black lacquer. The stars seemed close enough to wound with a
spear-cast, yet their silken glare did not alleviate this midnight peak, and the moon was old.
Now, the
topmost tier, like that of Nemdur’s original model, was the smallest of all the
tiers, as it had to be. True, it was a massive structure, but even so, not huge
enough to accommodate some several thousands of persons all at once.
Accordingly, what next came about was perhaps an illusion. Or else Azhrarn,
Master of Night and of so much more besides, had made a way into some second
dimension, into that place, maybe, sometimes known as Otherearth. And here (or
there) it was that he then entertained the multitude.
But whatever
he did, this is how it seemed and how later it was recounted by each man, each
woman and each child that had been raised that night into the sky about the
black tower.
The glamorous
music ended all at once, and only the winds that played about the tower-top
were heard. Then, all the lacquer doors slapped open, and one by one, as if
they had been instructed
demonesses—alighted on it. Similarly, the flying beasts settled among the
flowers with claps of their wings. They browsed the jasmine and the asphodel.
They stalked among the people, who drew aside with anguished sighings,
mechanical creatures, or else illusions, those demon dream artifacts which the
sun’s rays could destroy.
The man who
had retrieved the golden bone relic from the sand still clutched it, when one
of the beasts, a lion, came to him, and stared in his face with topaz eyes.
Perhaps this lion at least was one of the Vazdru themselves, in other form,
because the lion spoke to the man in hypnotic accents.
“That bone,”
said the beast, “is neither from the skeleton of Nemdur’s black queen nor from
the skeleton of anyone of importance. Give it therefore to me. It amuses me to
collect trivia.”
And the man,
shivering, extended the sacred relic he had gone such a distance to recover,
and the lion took it in its jaws. There was a terrible crunch; pieces of fine
gold and brown ivory were spat on the hyacinths under paw. The lion then
departed, its eyes shut as if in revulsion, Probably it was a demon, for
the touch of gold, reminiscent to Vazdru and Eshva alike, of the sun, filled
them with allergy. Only the Drin would sometimes work it, being less sensitive
than the aristocrats of Druhim Vanashta. (Revulsion, no doubt, was the cause of
the Eshva who stole the relic being seen continually passing the bone from hand
to hand, each taking a fair share of the golden discomfort to spare his
fellows.)
Upward, the
ring of the carpet flew. As once Nemdur’s court had careered up the long
flights of steps, the people were borne toward the topmost tier.
For sure, they
went on with their polite, habitual expressions of alarm. If this work of
night, this tower, were tall as Baybhelu, might it, too, anger the gods, who
would then cast it down? Yet something in them comprehended, a dim memory
carried in their racial cells, that even the gods could not cast down the power
of Azhrarn, or if they thought they could, they had never thought to try it.
Did the people
then realize they were on their way into his presence, into the presence of an
Azhrarn without disguise, an Azhrarn in the full aura of his princedom? That
one who, they had always been told, was hideous, shambling, evil in his looks
as in his deeds.
Perhaps
already the vistas and the harmonies and the drug-smokes had taught them that
wickedness did not always have an ugly shape.
The carpet
continued upward. Through the fountains which seemed not to be of fluid but of
heatless combustion. Past windows of sumptuous colors, behind which exotic
jigsaws of activity went on, never completely viewed or explicable. By
black-haired revelers who danced or embraced, or leaned out over balconies,
languidly.
The topmost
tier was suddenly reached. It was a lightless box, with doorways all around,
each one of black lacquer. The stars seemed close enough to wound with a
spear-cast, yet their silken glare did not alleviate this midnight peak, and the moon was old.
Now, the
topmost tier, like that of Nemdur’s original model, was the smallest of all the
tiers, as it had to be. True, it was a massive structure, but even so, not huge
enough to accommodate some several thousands of persons all at once.
Accordingly, what next came about was perhaps an illusion. Or else Azhrarn,
Master of Night and of so much more besides, had made a way into some second
dimension, into that place, maybe, sometimes known as Otherearth. And here (or
there) it was that he then entertained the multitude.
But whatever
he did, this is how it seemed and how later it was recounted by each man, each
woman and each child that had been raised that night into the sky about the
black tower.
The glamorous
music ended all at once, and only the winds that played about the tower-top
were heard. Then, all the lacquer doors slapped open, and one by one, as if
they had been instructed
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