Star Winds

Cursing Zhorga in his mind, Rachad skulked well out of the way. He had to admit that Zhorga had acted for the best as he saw it—but what would Rachad’s own position be if the book were never found? After all, there was no proof that it even existed. The inquisitor, however, might be unimpressed by his protestations to that effect.

He need not have worried. Although Matello would have persisted until every stone in the temple had been ground to a powder, in this event such thoroughness proved unnecessary. A fluted column, pulled down by means of a rope, smashed open as it struck the tessellated floor. Within a hollow space lined with alabaster a soldier found a heavy object wrapped in cloth of gold.

He took it at once to Matello, who unwound the glittering wrapping. He uncovered a massive tome with covers of solid lead nearly half an inch thick, engraved very skillfully with an iron stylus and then beautifully colored by rubbing powders or paints into the incisions.

Matello summoned Rachad and passed the book to him. “Is this what you sought?”

Gingerly Rachad accepted the book. It was so heavy that he nearly dropped it. On the front cover was an engraving of the philosophic tree, the signs of the elements hanging from its five branches. Below it was a somewhat less picturesque symbol that was cool and almost luminous in its simplicity: a blue square inscribed within a silver triangle, inscribed in turn within a golden circle.

Awkwardly he turned the book over. The back cover bore a single colored engraving which almost sent him reeling. A face glared out of the lead plate. An ancient, wild face that seemed to be alive. The skin was a dusty gold, veined with gray and silver. The hair exploded wildly in all directions to frame the face like a sunburst, and was gray mingled with rivulets of dull silver, a mixture of tones it shared with the beard. The eyes were a more brilliant, penetrating silver, lacking pupils but seeming ferociously, pitilessly aware.

Rachad made a quick guess that this was the symbol known as the lead man, who became first the quicksilver man, then the silver man, and finally was transformed into the gold man.

He turned the book over again and opened it to the frontispiece, where he read:

THE ROOT OF TRANSFORMATIONS

Including Also

The Art Of The Fulmination Of Metals.

“The title is the correct one,” he informed the baron. He turned more pages, but immediately observed that a sizable proportion of the leaves had been removed and that the spine gaped bare where they had been.

“My lord,” he said quickly, “half the book is missing!”

Matello grinned in triumph. “Then we have found what we were seeking! The other half already lies in the Aegis.”

Taking the volume from Rachad’s hands, he rose to his feet. “Let’s get aloft. It will be a pleasure never to have to set foot on this miserable planet again.”

Perplexed, Rachad followed the baron as, cloak flying behind him in the light breeze, he went striding away through the ocherous city. Soon all the others followed too, pouring from the destroyed temple, raising a cloud of orange dust as the procession made for the lighters that stood ready to convey them to the giant sailship orbiting overhead.

***

Tearing the meat from a chicken leg with his teeth and throwing the bone across the banqueting hall, Baron Matello leaned toward Rachad. “Well, young man,” he teased, “do you think you could make gold now?”

Rachad, who had been poring over the alchemical book, pursed his lips. “After sufficient study,” he said brazenly, hoping that Matello was too ignorant to gainsay him. “Provided I were supplied with the missing pages.”

In fact, he found the book almost impenetrable. For one thing, it was written in so many different languages—even different alphabets! And although supposed to be an explicit commentary, it was couched in the same cryptic style that characterized alchemists throughout the ages, replete with poetic expressions and arcane symbology.