"The pillar of the Lie and the pillar of the Secret," he said aloud as he walked between them, refusing to let himself be overawed; but then he entered Es Toch, and saw it, and stood still saying nothing.

The City of the Lords of Earth was built on the two rims of a canyon, a tremendous cleft through the mountains, narrow, fantastic, its black walls striped with green plunging terrifically down half a mile to the silver tinsel strip of a river in the shadowy depths. On the very edges of the facing cliffs the towers of the city jutted up, hardly based on earth at all, linked across the chasm by delicate bridgespans. Towers, roadways and bridges ceased and the wall closed the city off again just before a vertiginous bend of the canyon. Helicopters with diaphanous vanes skimmed the abyss, and sliders flickered along the half-glimpsed streets and slender bridges. The sun, still not far above the massive peaks to eastward, seemed scarcely to cast shadows here; the great green towers shone as if translucent to the light.

"Come," Estrel said, a pace ahead of him, her eyes shining. "There's nothing to fear here, Falk."

He followed her. There was no one on the street, which descended between lower buildings toward the cliff-edge towers. Once he glanced back at the gate, but he could no longer see the opening between the pillars. "Where do we go?"

"There's a place I know, a house where my people come." She took his arm, the first time she had ever done so in all the way they had walked together, and clinging to him kept her eyes lowered as they came down the long zigzag street. Now to their right the buildings loomed up high as they neared the city's heart, and to the left, without wall or parapet, the dizzy gorge dropped away full of shadows, a black gap between the luminous perching towers.

"But if we need money here—"

"They'll look after us."

People brightly and strangely dressed passed them on sliders; the landing-ledges high up the sheer-walled buildings flickered with helicopters. High over the gorge an aircar droned, going up.

"Are these all…Shing?"

"Some."

Unconsciously he was keeping his free hand on his laser. Estrel without looking at him, but smiling a little, said, "Do not use your lightgun here, Falk. You came here to gain your memory, not to lose it"

"Where are we going, Estrel?"

"Here."

"This? This is a palace."

The luminous greenish wall towered up windowless, featureless, into the sky. Before them a square doorway stood open.

"They know me here. Don't be afraid. Come on with me."

She clung to his arm. He hesitated. Looking back up the street he saw several men, the first he had seen on foot, loitering towards them, watching them. That scared him, and with Estrel he entered the building, passing through inner automatic portals that slid apart at their approach. Just inside, possessed by a sense of misjudgment, having made a hideous error, he stopped. "What is this place? Estrel—"

It was a high hall, full of a thick greenish light, dim as an underwater cave; there were doorways and corridors, down which men approached, hurrying towards him. Estrel had broken away from him. In panic he turned to the doors behind him: they were shut now. They had no handles. Dim figures of men broke into the hall, running at him and shouting. He backed up against the shut doors and reached for his laser. It was gone. It was in Estrel's hands. She stood behind the men as they surrounded Falk, and as he tried to break through them and was seized, and fought and was beaten, he heard for a moment a sound he had never heard before: her laugh.

A disagreeable sound rang in Falk's ears; a metallic taste filled his mouth. His head swam when he raised it, and his eyes would not focus, and he could not seem to move freely. Presently he realized that he was waking from unconsciousness, and thought he could not move because he had been hurt or drugged. Then he made out that his wrists were shackled together on a short chain, his ankles likewise. But the swimming in his head grew worse. There was a great voice booming in his ears now, repeating the same thing over and over: ramarren-ramarren-ramarren. He struggled and cried out, trying to get away from the booming voice which filled him with terror. Lights flashed in his eyes, and through the sound roaring in his head he heard someone scream in his own voice, "I am not—"

When he came to again everything was utterly still. His head ached, and still he could not see very clearly; but there were no shackles on his arms and legs now, if there ever had been any, and he knew he was being protected, sheltered, looked after. They knew who he was and he was welcome. His own people were coming for him, he was safe here, cherished, beloved, and all he need do now was rest and sleep, rest and sleep, while the soft, deep stillness murmured tenderly in his head, marren-marren-marren…

He woke. It took a while, but he woke, and managed to sit up. He had to bury his acutely aching head in his arms for a while to get over the vertigo the movement caused, and at first was aware only that he was sitting on the floor of some room, a floor which seemed to be warm and yielding, almost soft, like the flank of some great beast. Then he lifted his head, and got his eyes into focus, and looked about him.

He was alone, in the midst of a room so uncanny that it revived his dizziness for a while. There was no furniture. Walls floor and ceiling were all of the same translucent stuff, which appeared soft and undulant like many thicknesses of pale green veiling, but was tough and slick to the touch. Queer carvings and crimpings and ridges forming ornate patterns all over the floor were, to the exploring hand, nonexistent; they were eye-deceiving paintings, or lay beneath a smooth transparent surface. The angles where walls met were thrown out of true by optical-illusion devices of crosshatching and pseudo-parallels used as decoration; to pull the corners into right angles took an effort of will, which was perhaps an effort of self-deception, since they might, after all, not be right angles. But none of this teasing subtlety of decoration so disoriented Falk as the fact that the entire room was translucent. Vaguely, with the effect of looking into a depth of very green pond-water, underneath him another room was visible. Overhead was a patch of light that might be the moon, blurred and greened by one or more intervening ceilings. Through one wall of the room strings and patches of brightness were fairly distinct, and he could make out the motion of the lights of helicopters or air-cars. Through the other three walls these outdoor lights were much dimmer, blurred by the veilings of further walls, corridors, rooms. Shapes moved in those other rooms. He could see them but there was no identifying them: features, dress, color, size, all was blurred away. A blot of shadow somewhere in the green depths suddenly rose and grew less, greener, dimmer, fading into the maze of vagueness. Visibility without discrimination, solitude without privacy. It was extraordinarily beautiful, this masked shimmer of lights and shapes through inchoate planes of green, and extraordinarily disturbing. . All at once in a brighter patch on the near wall Falk caught a glimpse of movement. He turned quickly and with a shock of fear saw something at last vivid, distinct: a face, a seamed, savage, staring face set with two inhuman yellow eyes.

"A Shing," he whispered in blank dread. The face mocked him, the terrible lips mouthing soundlessly A Shing, and he saw that it was the reflection of his own face.

He got up stiffly and went to the mirror and passed his hand over it to make sure. It was a mirror, half concealed by a molded frame painted to appear flatter than it actually was.

He turned from it at the sound of a voice. Across the room from him, not too clear in the dim, even light from hidden sources, but solid enough, a figure stood. There was no doorway visible, but a man had entered, and stood looking at him: a very tall man, a white cape or cloak dropping from wide shoulders, white hair, clear, dark, penetrating eyes. The man spoke; his voice was deep and very gentle. "You are welcome here, Falk. We have long awaited you, long guided and guarded you." The light was growing brighter in the room, a clear, swelling radiance. The deep voice held a note of exaltation. "Put away fear and be welcome among us, O Messenger. The dark road is behind you and your feet are set upon the way that leads you home!" The brilliance grew till it dazzled Falk's eyes; he had to blink and blink again, and when he looked up, squinting, the man was gone.