“All of which will cost a large amount of money, I take it?”
“Some considerable funding will be required, yes. But there can be no doubt of success. Ultimately we will draw any required quantity of metal from base substances, in the same way as plants draw nourishment from air and water and soil. For one is all, and all is one, and if you have not the one, then all is nothing, but with proper guidance the highest descends to the lowest and the lowest will rise to the highest, and then the total achievement is within our grasp. We are in command, let me assure you, my lord, of the element that enables all. Which element, I tell you, my lord, is none other than dry water, which has been sought by so many for so long, but which we alone have succeeded in—”
“Dry water?”
“The very same. Repeated distillation of common water, six, seven hundred distillations, removes its moist quality, provided certain substances of great dryness are added to the substratum at particular phases of the process. Permit me to show you, my lord.” Taihjorklin reached behind him and took a beaker from the tray. “Here, your lordship, is dry water itself: do you see it? This brilliant white substance, as solid as salt.”
“That scaly crust, you mean, along the side of the beaker?”
“None other. It is a pure element: the quality of dryness residing in first matter. From such elements as this can be rendered the elixir of transmutation, which is a transparent body, lustrous red in its emanation, by which—”
“Yes. Thank you,” said Septach Melayn, settling back in his chair.
“My lord?”
“I will report the details of today’s meeting to the Coronal immediately upon his return. One is all, I will tell him. All is one. You are the master of calcination and combustion, and the mystery of dry water is a mere elementary riddle to you, and with proper governmental funding of a certain considerable scope you assert that you can bring forth from the sands of Majipoor an infinite supply of valuable metals. Do I have it correctly, Ser Taihjorklin? Very well. I will make my report, and the Coronal will deal with it as he sees fit.”
“My lord—I have only begun to explain—”
“Thank you, Ser Taihjorklin. We will be in touch.”
He rang for Nilgir Sumanand. The Hjort and his assistants were ushered from the room.
Pfaugh, thought Septach Melayn, when they were gone. One is all! All is one!
The whole bizarre swarm of sorcerers and exorcists and geomancers and haruspicators and thaumaturges and warlocks and superstition-mongering seers of all the other kinds that had been spreading across the world since he was a boy had seemed bad enough to him. But one transmuter of metals, it seemed, could generate more nonsense than any seven wizards!
All that was Prestimion’s problem, though—when and if Prestimion deigned to come back from the east country. He and Abrigant could hire a thousand transmuters a week, if that was what they cared to do. That would not be an issue for Septach Melayn.
His own problem was that the regency was driving him crazy. Perhaps slaying a few more assassins would help to calm his nerves. He reached for his sword. Glared at the new horde of enemies that had come bursting into the room.
“What, six of you at once! Your audacity knows no limits, vermin! But let me teach you some fine points of the art of swordsmanship, eh? See, this is known as calcination! This is the combustion of sublimation! Ha! My rapier is dipped in dry water! Its merciless tip turns the one into all, and the all into one. So! Thus I transmute you! So! So! So!—”
His afternoon schedule was a busy one. Vologaz Sar was the first caller, his majesty the Pontifex’s official delegate at the Castle: a cheerful, airy-spirited man of late middle years, fair-skinned and with a look of fleshy good health about him, who seemed delighted to have escaped the gloomy depths of the Labyrinth after a lifetime in Pontifical service. He came originally from Sippulgar, that sunny city of golden buildings on Alhanroel’s distant Aruachosian coast, and like many southerners he had an easy, genial manner that Septach Melayn found pleasing. But today Vologaz Sar seemed troubled to some extent by Lord Prestimion’s continued absence from the Castle. He expressed puzzlement over the fact that a newly seated Coronal would spend so much time traveling about, and so little at his own capital.
“I understand Lord Prestimion has gone east this time,” he said. “That seems quite unusual. A Coronal would want to show himself to his people, yes, but who is there to show himself to in the east-country?”
They were drinking the smooth blue wine of the southland, which its makers rarely exported to other provinces. It had been very kind of Vologaz Sar to bring such a delightful gift, thought Septach Melayn. The Pontifical delegate was a man of taste and distinction in every respect. His manner of dress showed as much. Vologaz Sar had chosen impeccable garb, a long cotton robe of brilliant white, elegantly embroidered with abstract patterns in the amusing Stoienzar style, over a rich undertunic of dark purple silk, and hose of a paler purple hue. A black velvet mantle lay across his shoulders. The golden Labyrinth emblem on his breast that marked him as a member of the Pontifical staff was decorated with three tiny emeralds of great depth of color. Septach Melayn found the total effect greatly satisfactory. Such attention to detail of dress always drew his admiration.
He refreshed their bowls and said, choosing his words with care, “His journey east is not exactly a formal processional. He has special business of a delicate kind to handle there.”
The Pontifical delegate nodded gravely. “Ah. I see.” But did he? How could he? Vologaz Sar was much too polished, of course, to pursue the inquiry in that direction. He simply said, after just the slightest pause: “And when he returns, what then? Does other special business await him that will take him elsewhere again?”
“None that I’ve been told of. Is it a source of great concern to the Pontifex that Lord Prestimion’s been away so much?”
“Great concern?” said Vologaz Sar lightly. “Oh, no, great concern is not quite the right phrase.”
“Well, then—?”
For a moment or two there was silence. Septach Melayn sat back, smiling, and waited impassively for his majesty’s representative to come to his point.
After a time Vologaz Sar said, with a minute but perceptible intensifying of tone, “Has the notion of Lord Prestimion’s making a trip to the Labyrinth to offer his respects to his imperial majesty been discussed yet?”
“We have it on our agenda, yes.”
“With any specific date in mind, may I ask?”
“None as yet,” said Septach Melayn.
“Ah. I see.” Vologaz Sar took a reflective sip of his wine. “It’s custom of long standing, of course, for the new Coronal to pay a call on the Pontifex fairly early in his reign. To receive his formal blessing, and to set forth whatever legislative plans he may have in mind. Perhaps this has been overlooked, it being so many years since the last change among the Powers of the Realm.” Yet again his tone deepened and darkened ever so slightly, though it remained cordial and light. “The Pontifex is the senior monarch, after all, and, of course, is in a technical sense the father of the Coronal as well.—I understand from Duke Oljebbin that Confalume has been heard lately to remark on the fact that he’s had rather little contact of any sort with Lord Prestimion thus far.”
Septach Melayn began to comprehend.
“Is his majesty displeased, would you say?”
“That might be too strong a term. But he is certainly perplexed. He has the greatest affection for Lord Prestimion, you understand. I scarcely need point out that when he was Coronal he looked upon Prestimion virtually as a son. And now, to be so completely ignored—the constitutional issues aside, you understand, it’s a matter of simple courtesy, is it not?”