sign of the presence of man or any other creature.
But on the fourth level I came across something different from everything I had seen for the last two days. The undisturbed peace was missing here; this place had a distinct smell of death. The walls of the hall were covered with a material like the bark of oak trees, the ceiling was a tangle of stone branches, and the floor was grass frozen in marble. A freakish combination of smells—roses, cinnamon, cardamom, ginger, dog-roses, and decomposition.
The dead.
Many of them, more than thirty. Skeletons covered with yellow parchment skin, wearing steel armor shimmering with the blue of the heavens and with crooked swords—s’kashes.
Elves. The bodies were especially numerous in the center of the hall. My little light picked out a coffin of black Zagraban oak with its bottom turned toward me.
I walked closer, trying not to disturb the bones of the dead elves. Probably, when the elves were attacked and taken by surprise, the ones carrying the coffin had dropped it and when it hit the floor it split open.
The elves had fought to defend their dead, but lost their own lives. Most men would say that dying for someone who is dead already is stupid, but Egrassa’s relatives took a very different view. The word “house” and the word “kin” meant more than their own lives to these creatures with fangs.
The lid of the coffin had been thrown a yard away, and the dead elf had tumbled halfway out of his final refuge. I wondered if his spirit had seen how the elves who brought him here died?
The elf in the coffin was wearing a crown. A circle of platinum with black diamonds, alternating with expertly crafted roses of tarnished silver. I was looking at the ruler of one of the dark elfin houses.
Sagot only knows what came over me, but I did something that was very stupid (even by my standards). I went over to the king’s remains, put them back in the coffin, and with a great strain turned the surprisingly heavy box back upright.
During these maneuvers the crown that had stayed on the dead king’s head for more than forty years fell off and hit the floor with a repulsive clang. I picked it up and in the light of my magical lamp the black diamonds suddenly came to life, sparkling more brightly than ever.
I couldn’t help exclaiming out loud in delight and admiration. Sagot! That subtle, shimmering play of light was so beautiful. I imagined what would happen if the stones were shown to the sunlight. The crown on the second level that had been melted by the pink ray from the ceiling simply couldn’t compare with the crown of the head of the House of the Black Rose. Well, how could horse dung possibly compare with the nectar of the gods?
I froze for a few seconds, struggling with myself. A part of me wanted to take this priceless thing; after all, the dead elf had no more use for it, and it would bring me an immense fortune. But another part of me appealed shrilly to my wisdom and prudence, pointing out that no one had ever managed to rob an elf from a ruling house, regardless of whether he was alive or dead.
This time the greed heaved a sigh of disappointment and gave way. Darkness take the diamonds, in the name of Sagot! Elves are vengeful even after they’re dead. Without the slightest regret, I cautiously set the black crown back on the dead elf’s head. Rest in peace, king, and forget that I unintentionally disturbed you.
My glance fell on a s’kash with a jade handle that was lying at my feet. I bent down and picked up the weapon, and the rippled pattern of the metal glowed dully in the light of my magical lamp. A blade worthy of the ruler of a house. As I laid the curved sword on the elf’s chest, my nose caught a faint scent of dog-roses. I folded the bony hands over the hilt.
First the left hand, then the right. The dead king’s right wrist suddenly flexed, setting his hand on top of mine, and I felt a sudden chilly sensation on my skin. The elf’s hand fell back onto the sword before I even thought of pulling my hand away.
Frightened, I held the hand against myself, unable to believe that I’d got away so lightly. The dead elf had only held me for a fraction of a second, but I could still feel that sudden searing chill on my palm. I staggered fearfully back from the coffin, realizing in some corner of my mind that I had instinctively closed my hand into a fist because the elf had somehow managed to put something in it. I opened my fingers fearfully, as if there was a vicious scorpion with a fiery sting hiding in them.
The fleeting flash of a falling star.
I just had time to see that it was black. The star fell to the floor with a faint tinkling sound. I bent down and picked up the beautiful thing—it was warm now, not cold. I couldn’t stop myself exclaiming out loud again.
Lying there on my palm was a ring every bit as beautiful as the crown of the lord of the House of the Black Rose. The body of the ring was made of interwoven threads of black silver and platinum, and its heart was a black diamond. It wouldn’t be surprising if the ring had magical properties, too—by the light of my lamp its facets shimmered with all the colors of the rainbow. Of course, the ring wasn’t as valuable as the crown, but even this black diamond was enough for eight years of the good life in my own little palace.
I walked up to the coffin and looked hard at the dead elf. The play of light and shade made his face look almost alive, almost animated, but very old. A faint odor of roses tickled my nostrils. With a final glance at the king, I walked away, clutching the ring tightly in my fist, realizing that it was a gift. An unexpected gesture from the race of elves, but it was true. I took the glove off my right hand, put the ring on my finger, and gazed at the facets of the stone.
A gold spark was suddenly born in the depths of the diamond. It flared up and went out, and then flared up again. Flash. Darkness. Flash. The spark pulsed slowly, languidly, regularly, as if there was a real heart hidden inside the diamond.
Enlightenment always comes unexpectedly. My heart was beating with exactly the same rhythm as the stone. Or rather, the stone was glimmering in time to the beating of my heart. I didn’t know what kind of ring I had on my hand and what the consequences of wearing it would be, but I did understand, or rather, I felt, that I was bound to it in exactly the same way as I had been bound to the Key. I could feel myself in the stone and the stone in me.
It was a kind of tickling sensation that only lasted for about three seconds, then the glimmering of the stone faded and it became an ordinary diamond again. I put my glove back on, concealing the precious thing, cast a final glance round the tree hall, pulled the hood of my black jacket up over my head, and went on my way, leaving the elf still unburied in the dense gloom.
Dead silence, broken only by the sound of my steps. I don’t have the words to describe all the beauty of the underground Palaces. Black and red, orange and gold, blue and aquamarine, intense purple and dull ochre, the cold of blue marble and the heat of fiery granite.
Walls sparkled with mica and magnificent columns of pure amber, reaching up to immense heights. Entrancingly beautiful statues of orcs and elves, pools with their bottoms covered in fanciful patterns of turquoise and flowing water. Ethereal stairways with slim banisters that seemed to have been carved by some master craftsman out of a single block of green mountain crystal, and balconies woven out of fine threads of some unfamiliar metal, running round the upper stories of the halls.
Shimmering walls and ceilings of black silver, the beauty of the faded autumn in the gestures and poses of every statue. A faint, barely audible
I kept on going, deeper and deeper under the ground. I didn’t even want to think about how many leagues of stone there were above my head. Who could have created all this frozen beauty at depths so incomprehensible to the mind of man? What miraculous means could they have used? And this was only the fourth level, there were forty-eight of them, plus those that had no names, where even the ogres never ventured when their race was at the height of its power. Whoever created Hrad Spein at the dawn of time must have been equal to the gods, or superior to them.
The gloom slumbered, the dead slept their eternal sleep in the niches of the ancient tombs, and I was the only one who knew no rest. No longer paying attention to the beauty of the underground Palaces, I tramped on and on, and every second, every step brought me closer to my goal, my Commission—the Rainbow Horn.
It was the second day of my journey across the fourth level and my seventh day in Hrad Spein. A week had
