Songs of the Dying Earth

The air was split with a resounding thunderclap and lit all over with great stabs of lightning, then a very fine and wholly unexpected vortex began spiralling out in the hall, churning and roaring.

It boded well and Amberlin dared to feel hope. He watched as the mighty cone of air finally narrowed and funneled down on a single lighted spot.

The anomaly then vanished in a final clap of thunder, leaving complete silence.

A lowly earthenware teapot sat upon the paving. It gave a tentative, “Me-Me-Me!” in a broken, throaty voice, then began reciting a bawdy ballad from the Land of the Falling Wall. It had just finished the chorus and was starting on the second verse when the contest time limit was reached and both kitchen utensil and song vanished in a puff of crimson smoke.

“Great Eunepheos, I can explain everything—” Amberlin began to say, but Eunepheos interrupted.

“It is after the event,” he said, rising from his throne. “Explain nothing! Now it is time for our judges to deliver their decision. Noble magicians, step out upon the floor one last time, if you will, and face your adjudicators.”

The three wizards did so, watching as the glass cases behind Eunepheos buzzed and crackled with renewed energies. Finally, when sufficient discussion had transpired, a single thread of force projected from each to penetrate Eunepheos’ body. When he now spoke, his eyes glowed with a lambent white light and his voice was an overlay of three voices made into one.

“By the order of presentation, we appraise you,” the composite voice said. Eunepheos the Darke stood frozen, only his mouth and jaw moving. “Tralques Iron Star, wonderfully done. You use magic borrowed from your betters, but inheritance is always difficult in magical affairs and you acquitted yourself superbly.”

Tralques bowed. “Thank you, noble sirs. Your example will inspire me to do better next time, I’m sure.”

Eunepheos seemed not to hear. “Sarimance the Aspurge, your invocations showed imagination and a truly commendable degree of respect to those who are your betters. You are skilful, strategic and inspiring, if somewhat unforgiving.”

Sarimance bowed. “Great lords, my relentlessness is inspired by your own discipline and dedication. We can only dream of the time when you were among us and thank you for gifting us with your presence here today.”

Again there was no acknowledgment from Eunepheos or the remembrance cases.

“Amberlin the Lesser,” the triple voice said. “Today you have surprised us with the selections you chose for such an important occasion. But you have shown a sense of novelty and the unruly, and there is about you an insouciance and irreverence that we like. In short, you have remembered that since we too are wizards of great power, if only as remembrances, for us magic and magical display are easy and second nature. What is missing from our lives are the elements of absurdity and genuine surprise. You have provided these things in ample measure — and are therefore our winner!”

Sarimance immediately cried out. “What! Great lords, I protest—!”

He vanished in a puff of smoke.

Tralques actually thought to flee, but only managed two steps before he too disappeared, this time in a twist of light.

Two new scintillants appeared among the thousands on the ceiling of the chamber.

Amberlin, utterly dumbfounded, went to give thanks, but instead found himself on the riverbank outside the Copsy Door at Venta-Valu with Diffin standing to one side, visibly trembling with what seemed a mixture of relief and fear.

“Oh, master, it is so good to see you,” the lanky creature said.

Amberlin managed to regain his composure. “Diffin, why are you here?”

“Master, I was looking out through the Clever Window as I promised I would when, just like that, it darkened over and a sharp, very frightening face appeared. It said that you had won a great contest of wizards and that the Anto brothers were never to be seen again. Nor were the wizards Sarimance or Tralques to be relied upon as referees in any future employment that I might care to seek.”

“I see. Anything more?”

“Nothing, great one. Though I might add that the lillobays and quentians have been freshly watered and that the Holding Book is back in the east tower and seems much happier, so far as books of power can indicate such things, with how the new Diffin comports himself.”

“Very well,” Amberlin said, adjusting his robes. “Let us take a day or two to see how the new Diffin comports himself.”

And together they set off to where the towers of the manse Furness stood glinting in the light of the old red sun.

Afterword:

Jack’s work had an enormous impact on me as a teenager. I first encountered it when I was fifteen with “The Dragon Masters” in the August 1962 issue of Galaxy magazine, and thereafter quickly tried to find everything by him that I could. He went straight to the top of a small list of distinctive SF and fantasy voices I was discovering at the time, among them Ray Bradbury, J.G. Ballard, Cordwainer Smith and Philip K. Dick. He seemed to be doing something very special, or, perhaps more to the point, seemed to be doing familiar things in a very special way.

While I didn’t discover The Dying Earth until ten years later, that linked collection confirmed everything I already loved and admired about Jack’s work: the elegance and euphony of the writing, the distinctive cadences and rhythms, the sheer inventiveness and antiquarian caste, the way less was so often more and how the standard writing corollary of ‘Show Don’t Tell’ effectively became: ‘Don’t Just Show, Suggest.’

Being introduced to Jack and his family by Tim Underwood at the end of 1980 meant the world to me, and led to the start of a very special friendship, one which has never ceased to be a source of great pleasure. One moment I’m a soldier sitting on a doorstep at the 3TB army base in 1968 reading Star King and The Killing Machine, then thirty years later I’m drifting off to sleep to the words of Night Lamp, Ports of Call, and Lurulu coming through the walls as Jack ‘reads’ through his current work in progress using his talking computer program. One moment I’m a steadfast fan, a fledgling storyteller refining my craft in faraway Sydney, trying to land my first sale, then I’ve become “The Smuggler” and one of Jack’s closest friends, making annual visits to the wonderful house in the Oakland hills, switching on the navigation lights in the bar whenever he announces that the sun is well and truly over the yard-arm, making sure there’s not a trace of zucchini to spoil a meal, taking enormous pains when playing washboard to Jack’s banjo, ukelele, and kazoo always to finish at the same time. As Jack has said on many occasions, usually when several glasses of tipple have come and gone: “Vance deposes, Dowling disposes!” Neither of us is sure what it means, but it makes for a fine toast.

As well as sharing many unforgettable adventures with Jack and Norma over the years, among them our momentous road trip to Three Rivers in January 1984 where we visited a genuine (we insist!) haunted house, we’ve spent hours discussing projects, process and storytelling in general. In a special sense, “The Copsy Door” is the result of years of rich and sustained exposure to Jack’s work, and of countless hours chatting before the fire, working at the kiln, listening to the Black Eagle Jazz Band, and choosing who, among friends and notables, would make the wholly imaginary voyage from Oakland down to Sydney on the fine Vance ketch, Hinano.

On a more specific note, I once unwittingly “borrowed” the name Amberlin from Jack’s Rhialto the Marvelous as a name for a cafe in my Tom Rynosseros stories. Jack in turn took my coining “shatterwrack” for the extinct volcano Shattorak in Ecce and Old Earth (unwittingly, he insists!). It seemed fitting that my contribution to this book had to concern a particular wizard named Amberlin.

How did the story come about? Why, it was very much a case of painting myself into a corner. I simply had Amberlin step into his workroom one fine morning to deal with something called a Copsy Door, then saw where it went from there. I like to think that, in more ways than one, Jack himself helped with the writing.

— Terry Dowling