Anomus pointed: “That is the stone I recall in my first memories.”
Manxolio approached, leaned precariously from the saddle on the shoulders of his oast, and scraped some of the moss free with a broad-bladed dagger. “This is the City of Sfere, founded in the third year of his reign by the Hero-King Sferendur, and is under the protection of the nine goddesses of Good Fortune, Long Life, and Tranquility. The words of a curse against trespassers who would disturb them is inscribed on the reverse: if I might venture an opinion…” (he gazed in bitter awe at the sheer volume of destruction involved in upending an entire city) “…the curse proved nonoperative.” He twisted in the saddle and looked toward Anomus. “If this is your home, you escaped a decisive disaster.”
Anomus was looking with great curiosity at the ruins. White stones shined in the sunlight. The square foundations of vanished buildings were arranged in rows like a graveyard. Sheep grazed among the broken columns. Down the slope, beneath the lake, could be glimpsed houses and towers, and the concentric stone benches of a great amphitheatre or coliseum, half-buried in mud and waterweed.
“Within myself, I observe merely a blank.” Anomus said, “If this was my home, even the grief I should feel has been taken from me.”
“Your trail ends here,” said Manxolio. “There is nothing more to discover.” Anomus seemed not to hear, and his face was set without expression.
Manxolio felt an unexpected compassion rising in him, like a bubble in the mud, and bursting forth. “Come! Return with me to Old Romarth, and I will, despite my age, make you my apprentice. You will learn the slights and craftsmanship of investigation, and become as watchful as a cat, loyal as a dog, dangerous as an erb! A man to be respected! We can start by learning the strangle-grips to use on a prisoner, which elicit pain, but leave no marks, or only such bruises as admit of ambiguous explanation.”
Anomus said, “I do not quit yet. Whatever stole my essential self did not commit the deed when this disaster befell. When did the river Scaum run dry?”
“Seven years past, no longer.”
Anomus said, “If your arts as an Effectuator can tell us nothing more, then mine as a scholar can do otherwise. Hold forth the Implacable Wand once more: the single question remains to us — to find the source of the invisible pulse the wand detected. Now that we are closer, a clearer sign may eventuate.”
Manxolio and Anomus dismounted, and trod the wintery grass. They came upon a wide square of colored tiles, cracked and faded, in the midst of the grass like an island, covered with an inch or two of stinking, standing water. In the midst was the rubble of a well mouth, clogged with a litter of branches and floating rubbish, and with weathered statues of river-goddesses still tilting dry pitchers above it.
The rains from two days ago apparently had overflowed the well, for now several trickles of water spilled over the cracked lip. Transparent insects with exaggerated legs danced across the stagnant surface, leaving tiny ripples. The image was one of desolation.
“The source is near,” Manxolio reported.
Anomus splashed across the stagnant water, sending irked insects to the air, and plunged his arm into the litter occupying the well mouth. Manxolio saw a glint of metal. In a moment, Anomus returned with an object, no larger than a tambourine.
“Here is a Transmultiangular Peripatetic Analept, flung into a well and abandoned as junk. By mere chance, it fell onto a mat of branches, and was carried to the surface again when the water rose. Who would dispose of such a remarkable artifact in so casual a fashion?”
The object in the hands of the young man was a twisted shape of brass and mirrored crystal, but an eye- defeating visual effect made Manxolio unable to register the shape in his mind. It seemed, from one viewpoint, to be a Penrose triangle, with some sort of strange depth held in the center; but when Anomus twisted it, it folded into a shape like a Moebius strip, a flat circle with a half-twist in it.
Anomus said thoughtfully, “It seems of new fabrication. None of the elements have suffered elution. There is no yellowing of the crystals, no Doppler effect due to expansion of microcosmic venules.”
Manxolio laughed without mirth. “It is yours.”
“In what sense? I would not throw such a thing down a well.”
Manxolio said heavily, “Nonetheless, it is yours. This is an instrument to induce a portcullis into some demon-world beyond the warp and woof of space, or a portage to the transplutonian worlds which whirl through the upper abyss.”
Anomus replied, “It is the end point of the Indigo Path of Instantaneous Motion, which allows for superluminal passage of energy and matter across any distances. The Path, to operate, must be maintained at both ends: there is no fixed anchor established at this end. But how do you know of it?”
“By deduction. And yet you seem, outwardly, to be human; indeed, you have the same color and accent as a man of Old Romarth: but this carried you here from elsewhere. You…” But he stopped, for the Dark Iron Wand was vibrating in his hand.
“What does this mean?” Manxolio asked.
But Manxolio was answered by the Wand itself, which reacted to his words, and imposed knowledge directly into his consciousness: the tension in timespace had reached a cusp, beyond which natural law is inoperative.
The sun passed behind a thin cloud, and, in the dim light, the full moon could be seen faintly in the east, surrounded by stars. The insects, which normally sang when the sun was dim, and the birds, which sang when it was shining, both were silent. The wind itself was still.
Manxolio said, “A supernatural event is occurring!”
He spoke truly: bells and gongs could be heard tolling from beneath the waters. Beneath the lake, the lifeless buildings now seemed whole, their roofbeams gilded and painted, and lights shined through their stained glass windows, painting the underwater with delicate colors.
While the two men stood in awe, the oast and the blue-feathered horse bellowed and whinnied, and fled away.
Arms of white mist, spangled as if with fireflies, had collected over the lake, then thickened and formed into a transparent figure, robed in shimmering iridium, and bearing a coronet of thirteen moonstones.
It spoke, and even though its voice made no noise, both men understood the meaning without hearing any words.
Anomus knelt, and addressed the disembodied shadow. “Illustrious specter, who am I and whence did I come? By what means might I recall my lost being?”
Again, the strangely wordless meaning was imparted into their understanding.
Anomus, or Guyal, listened with intent curiosity, but it was Manxolio who gaped in astonishment. “The Curator!” he whispered in awe.
