A gong-stroke sounded; Vermoulian ushered the company into the dining room, where the great table glittered with silver and crystal. The magicians seated themselves under the five chandeliers; in deference to his guest who had lived so long in solitude, Vermoulian refrained from calling forth the beautiful women of ancient eras.
Morreion ate with caution, tasting all set before him, comparing the dishes to the various guises of lichen upon which he usually subsisted. “I had almost forgotten the existence of such food,” he said at last. “I am reminded, dimly, of other such feasts — so long ago, so long … Where have the years gone? Which is the dream?” As he mused, some of the pink and green stones lost their color. Morreion sighed. “There is much to be learned, much to be remembered. Certain faces here arouse flickering recollections; have I known them before?”
“You will recall all in due course,” said the diabolist Shrue. “And now, if we are certain that the IOUN stones are not to be found on this planet —”
“But we are not sure!” snapped Gilgad. “We must seek, we must search; no effort is too arduous!”
“The first to be found necessarily will go to satisfy my claims,” declared Rhialto. “This must be a definite understanding.”
Gilgad thrust his vulpine face forward. “What nonsense is this? Your claims were satisfied by a choice from the effects of the archveult Xexamedes!”
Morreion jerked around. “The archveult Xexamedes! I know this name … How? Where? Long ago I knew an archveult Xexamedes; he was my foe, or so it seems … Ah, the ideas which roil my mind!” The pink and green stones all had lost their color. Morreion groaned and put his hands to his head. “Before you came my life was placid; you have brought me doubt and wonder.”
“Doubt and wonder are the lot of all men,” said Ildefonse. “Magicians are not excluded. Are you ready to leave Sahar Planet?”
Morreion sat looking into a goblet of wine. “I must collect my books. They are all I wish to take away.”
11
Morreion conducted the magicians about his premises. The structures which had seemed miraculous survivals had in fact been built by Morreion, after one or another mode of the Sahar architecture. He displayed his three looms: the first for fine weaves, linens and silks; the second where he contrived patterned cloths; the third where his heavy rugs were woven. The same structure housed vats, dyes, bleaches and mordants. Another building contained the glass cauldron, as well as the kilns where Morreion produced earthenware pots, plates, lamps and tiles. His forge in the same building showed little use. “The Sahars scoured the planet clean of ores. I mine only what I consider indispensable, which is not a great deal.”
Morreion took the group to his library, in which were housed many Sahar originals as well as books Morreion had written and illuminated with his own hand: translations of the Sahar classics, an encyclopedia of natural history, ruminations and speculations, a descriptive geography of the planet with appended maps. Vermoulian ordered his staff to transfer the articles to the palace.
Morreion turned a last look around the landscape he had known so long and had come to love. Then without a word he went to the palace and climbed the marble steps. In a subdued mood the magicians followed. Vermoulian went at once to the control belvedere where he performed rites of buoyancy. The palace floated up from the final planet.
Ildefonse gave an exclamation of shock. “‘Nothing’ is close at hand — more imminent than we had suspected!”
The black wall loomed startlingly near; the last star and its single world drifted at the very brink.
“The perspectives are by no means clear,” said Ildefonse. “There is no sure way of judging but it seems that we left not an hour too soon.”
“Let us wait and watch,” suggested Herark. “Morreion can learn our good faith for himself.”
So the palace hung in space, with the pallid light of the doomed sun playing upon the five crystal spires, projecting long shadows behind the magicians where they stood by the balustrade.
The Sahar world was first to encounter ‘Nothing’. It grazed against the enigmatic nonsubstance, then urged by a component of orbital motion, a quarter of the original sphere moved out clear and free: a moundlike object with a precisely flat base, where the hitherto secret strata, zones, folds, intrusions and core were displayed to sight. The sun reached ‘Nothing’; it touched, advanced. It became a half-orange on a black mirror, then sank away from reality. Darkness shrouded the palace.
In the belvedere Vermoulian indited symbols on the mandate-wheel. He struck them off, then put double fire to the speed-incense. The palace glided away, back towards the star-clouds.
Morreion turned away from the balustrade and went into the great hall, where he sat deep in thought.
Gilgad presently approached him. “Perhaps you have recalled the source of the IOUN stones?”
Morreion rose to his feet. He turned his level black eyes upon Gilgad, who stepped back a pace. The pink and green stones had long become pallid, and many of the pink as well.
Morreion’s face was stern and cold. “I recall much! There was a cabal of enemies who tricked me — but all is as dim as the film of stars which hangs across far space. In some fashion, the stones are part and parcel of the matter. Why do you evince so large an interest in stones? Were you one of my former enemies? Is this the case with all of you? If so, beware! I am a mild man until I encounter antagonism.”
The diabolist Shrue spoke soothingly. “We are not your enemies! Had we not lifted you from Sahar Planet, you would now be with ‘Nothing’. Is that not proof?”
Morreion gave a grim nod; but he no longer seemed the mild and affable man they had first encountered.
To restore the previous amiability, Vermoulian hastened to the room of faded mirrors where he maintained his vast collection of beautiful women in the form of matrices. These could be activated into corporeality by a simple antinegative incantation; and presently from the room, one after the other, stepped those delightful confections of the past which Vermoulian had seen fit to revivify. On each occasion they came forth fresh, without recollection of previous manifestations; each appearance was new, no matter how affairs had gone before.
Among those whom Vermoulian had called forth was the graceful Mersei. She stepped into the grand salon, blinking in the bewilderment common to those evoked from the past. She stopped short in amazement, then with quick steps ran forward. “Morreion! What do you do here? They told us you had gone against the archveults, that you had been killed! By the Sacred Ray, you are sound and whole!”
Morreion looked down at the young woman in perplexity. The pink and red stones wheeled around his head. “Somewhere I have seen you; somewhere I have known you.”
“I am Mersei! Do you not remember? You brought me a red rose growing in a porcelain vase. Oh, what have I done with it? I always keep it near … But where am I? Where is the rose? No matter. I am here and you are here.”
Ildefonse muttered to Vermoulian, “An irresponsible act, in my judgment; why were you not more cautious?”
Vermoulian pursed his lips in vexation. “She stems from the waning of the 21st Aeon but I had not anticipated anything like this!”
“I suggest that you call her back into your room of matrices and there reduce her. Morreion seems to be undergoing a period of instability; he needs peace and quietude; best not to introduce stimulations so unpredictable.”
Vermoulian strolled across the room. “Mersei, my dear; would you be good enough to step this way?”
Mersei cast him a dubious look, then beseeched Morreion: “Do you not know me? Something is very strange; I can understand nothing of this — it is like a dream. Morreion, am I dreaming?”
“Come, Mersei,” said Vermoulian suavely. “I wish a word with you.”
“Stop!” spoke Morreion. “Magician, stand back; this fragrant creature is something which once I loved, at a time far gone.”
The girl cried in a poignant voice: “A time far gone? It was no more than yesterday! I tended the sweet red rose, I looked at the sky; they had sent you to Jangk, by the red star Kerkaju, the eye of the Polar Ape. And now you are here, and I am here — what does it mean?”
“Inadvisable, inadvisable,” muttered Ildefonse. He called out: “Morreion, this way, if you will. I see a curious concatenation of galaxies. Perhaps here is the new home of the Sahars.”
Morreion put his hand to the girl’s shoulder. He looked into her face. “The sweet red rose blooms, and forever. We are among magicians and strange events occur.” He glanced aside at Vermoulian, then back to Mersei. “At this moment, go with Vermoulian the Dream-walker, who will show you to your chamber.”
