Fagirra nodded encouragingly. “You’re a bit scared; I understand. But, believe me, only carefully selected people are favored with such an honor. I will await you at seven o’clock in the evening on the corner of Violet Street. Do you know where that is?”
Then, having already taken his leave, Fagirra suddenly turned back.
“Oh yes, that reminds me: I must ask you to keep this in the strictest confidence. Lash is a secret, a sacrament. Are we agreed? Now if you’ll excuse me.”
Egert nodded and then watched for a long time as the man in the spacious gray robe walked away.
Fox was still visiting his relatives, so there was no one to ask Egert why he was so irritable. Egert mastered the desire to go to the dean for advice; both his sleepless night and his long, lingering day were full of hesitations.
Friendly students, meeting Egert at the exit, wished him a good night out and a successful rendezvous. Egert answered them vaguely, not understanding their meaning.
On the way to the place where he would meet Fagirra, he managed to convince himself that a visit to the Tower of Lash was an entirely ordinary, even trivial occurrence for a townsman, then he comforted himself with the thought that this inconceivable event offered the prospect of a beneficial change in his fortune, and he finally assured himself that the visit to the Tower would not take place at all, because Fagirra would fail to appear at the designated place.
Fagirra, however, was waiting; Egert flinched when the silent figure, his face hidden by the hood, appeared out of the shadows as if from nowhere.
The route they took through winding alleyways was so tortuous that there was no way Egert could have remembered it, even if he had wished to. The hem of Fagirra’s gray habit slid along the pavement before him, and two uniformly strong emotions battled in his souclass="underline" fear of going to the Tower and fear of refusing the invitation. Contrary to Egert’s expectations, Fagirra did not lead him through the main gates. The alley gave way to a small courtyard, which was so dark that Egert could hardly make out the man who appeared from out of the gloom with a bunch of rattling keys and a blindfold.
Bewildered, blind, led and nudged along the way, languishing from the fear that was as familiar as a chronic toothache, Egert was finally ordered to stop. The blindfold was whipped away from his eyes, and Egert saw that he was standing in front of a wall of heavy black velvet, which exuded a faint, bitter aroma unknown to him.
“You have been permitted to be present.” Fagirra’s robe rustled next to Egert’s, and the rough edge of his hood touched Egert’s cheek. “To be present and to keep silent. You are not to move from this spot. You are not to turn your head.”
Egert swallowed the sticky saliva that suddenly overwhelmed his mouth; Fagirra was obviously awaiting his answer, so Egert forced himself to nod.
A delicate, sweetish, slightly smoky fragrance was soon added to the bitter smell of the velvet. As he gazed at the black partition in front of him, Egert’s hearing became unusually acute. He heard a variety of sounds: far and near, subdued and susurrant, as if a horde of dragonflies were creeping about the inside of a glass jar, brushing their wings against the transparent walls.
The multitude of whispers was suddenly replaced by a desolate, muffled hush, which lasted long enough for Egert to slowly count to five. Then the black velvet partition shivered and the long, drawn-out sound, like nothing else on earth, instantly caused Egert to break out into a sweat: it was the dreary bellow of the ancient monster. That distant echo, which was heard by people out in the square and which had for so long disturbed the imagination of Egert, was nothing but a feeble shadow in comparison to this.
The velvet shifted again and then suddenly crashed down to the floor, dissolving in Egert’s vision from a blank wall into a black expanse, for there before his astounded eyes was revealed a hall of unimaginably large proportions.
It was inconceivable how such a colossal room could fit inside the Tower; for the first minute, Egert could make no sense of it, but upon closer inspection he saw that a line of tall mirrors encircled the hall. A long-nosed dwarf in a habit so fiery red that it scorched the eyes entered the velvety black space, encased in remote folds of fabric. His image was repeated many times in the mirrors’ luminous depths. He hoisted a vast trumpet to his mouth, using both hands to steady it, and with that instrument he produced that very same lingering sound that so boggled the imagination. Clouds of dense, dark blue smoke wafted from the mouth of the trumpet, which was turned upward while he blew on it.
There was an echoing rustle as many hundreds of hoods were lowered. The fiery red stain of the dwarf’s habit disappeared in the sea of gray robes, and a rustling whisper struck Egert in both ears, “Lash … ash … ashsha…” At first it seemed very far away, regardless of how keenly it penetrated Egert’s ears, but as it gathered strength, it became a piercing chant, echoing off the walls of the chamber. The chant entranced Egert, ushering a peculiar torpor into his body, and once again the long note of the vast trumpet resounded, filling the space above the lowered gray hoods with a shadowy figure, molded from swirls of smoke.
Egert’s heart thudded in his chest. The smoke had an unusually strong, pleasant, yet at the same time repulsive smell. “Lashhh … asha … shash…” The chant now came close, now receded, and Egert seemed to see surf rhythmically breaking against the shore of a gray sea composed of hoods.
The figures, shrouded in robes, were moving, some smoothly and regularly, some suddenly shuddering in sync as if from an unexpected convulsion. The space in the center of the hall gradually cleared, and an old man appeared, stretched out on the black, velvet floor. His silver mane spread out around his small, wizened face, which seemed to be framed by whiteness, like the moon is framed by shafts of light. The gray robes once again converged, and Egert saw the resplendently silver gray head rise up like a wisp of foam above the sea of gray hoods.
The ceremony, fascinating yet incomprehensible, beautiful yet monotonous, continued perhaps for a minute or perhaps for a full hour: Egert had lost all sense of time. When finally a wave of fresh evening air hit him in the face, he realized that he was standing by a grilled window, clutching the thick bars and staring at the main square, which was very familiar to him even though he was seeing it from this vantage point for the first time.
Then the ever-present Fagirra, laying his hand on Egert’s shoulder, whispered right in his ear. “I know a good dozen of the wealthiest and most eminent people of this city who would give their right arm for the singular good fortune of being present in the Tower during the sacramental.”
Turning toward the square, Fagirra exposed his face to the wind. The wide sleeves of his robe slipped up, revealing his wrists. Egert caught a glimpse of a green tattoo, the official mark of a licensed guild: the guild of swordmasters.
Fagirra smiled, having noticed Egert’s glance. “The paths that lead people into the shade of Lash are intricate and often inscrutable. Let’s go, Egert. The honor that has been conferred upon you is boundless. The Magister awaits you.”
The Magister’s hair seemed even whiter up close: like snow sparkling in the sun, like bright clouds at noon, like the finest quality linen. Inhaling a new scent—the smoke of various harsh fragrances wafted densely through the Magister’s study—Egert, feeling more dead than alive, answered questions. Yes, he was an auditor at the university. Yes, Dean Luayan was, without a doubt, an archmage and a man of immense worth. No, Egert was not yet succeeding at his studies but he hoped that, with time …