Epilogue:

The Golden Stair

“Though the basa is cleft from the vorn in death, the flames of Eshan carry it into the Deep Sky where the vorn is rejoined.”

Karendo Marha

Journey to the Infinite

The rushing roar in Mindar’s ears that came out of the engulfing darkness grew louder with each passing second. It seemed to be coming from everywhere at once, surrounding and defining itself as the only thing that existed. Then suddenly, out of the noise, shapes began to evolve and soon Mindar became aware that he was rising rapidly above the surface of Tessalindria. The land was dark, but flecked with splashes of gray and points of intense white light that illuminated the area around them with a sort of corona. There was no order or pattern except that the lights often seemed to be clustered.

As the various senses returned, Mindar realized that he was being held by his arms in his upward flight. He looked to his left, Visha’andar held his upper arm firmly with his huge right hand. His left was pointed forward and his whole body was bathed in whiteness. To his right, Vishortan held him with his left hand, his right pointed forward in the same way. They were ascending into the inky night sky.

“He is awake,” said Vishortan. His voice sounded like a huge waterfall as it tumbled into the night.

“Yes, he is,” responded Visha’andar in the same voice. Neither of them looked at Mindar. Their heads were tipped back so that their faces were set resolutely in the direction of their pointing hands.

“Where are we going?” ventured Mindar. The sound of his own voice surprised him. It reverberated against a thousand unseen walls, echoing back with startling power.

“We are taking Mindar home,” the Eladra answered in unison, their voices mingling into a single resonance. With a sudden synchronized motion, they changed direction, leveling off so that Tessalindria swept away below them. Mindar could see down. “Where are we now?”

“We are leaving Vindarill, where Mindar was slain,” said Visha’andar.

Mindar looked down again. Amidst all the gray patches and points of light, he could just see the shape of the city. They were headed out over the ocean and as they passed over its boundary, the lights and grayness stopped and the sea was black as ink.

“What happened?” Mindar spoke timidly, but his voice boomed with confidence into the night. He was not sure it was right to ask such a question.

“Minxa, servant of the NarEladra, took Mindar’s mortality,” boomed Visha’andar.

“Minxa, servant of the NarEladra, lay claim to Lonama’s map unrightfully,” echoed Vishortan, “so Minxa was slain at the hand of Visha’andar, servant of Mah’Eladra.”

Mindar shuddered. “There is no reason for Mindar to fear,” said Vishortan.

“I am not afraid,” Mindar answered.

They flew on above the dark ocean, traveling east with increasing speed. Occasionally they would see points of light on the ocean that Mindar supposed were trading ships.

There were many questions. “What happened after Minxa was slain?”

“The great battle continues,” said Visha’andar, “and Vashtor, servant of Vishtoenvar, is banished to Oblivion by the sword of Vishortan, servant of Mah’Eladra.”

“There were two NarEladra,” Mindar ventured.

“Drakathor, servant of Vishtoenvar, escaped into the fabric.”

“The fabric?”

“The infinite weaving of what Mindar calls time and space. To the Eladra, it is the fabric.”

“And what happened to Rindar—the young one?”

“Vishortan was watching over Rindar while I removed your basa. When Rindar woke, he inherited Lonama’s map and set out on his journey.”

“How long has it been since my mortality was taken.”

“Four Tessalindrian days.” Vishtorath said it in such a way that Mindar knew that nothing else was forthcoming without further questions. It was as if nothing was unavailable to be known, but nothing would be volunteered and Mindar felt no irritation or hesitation in the answers. As they moved on, Mindar continued asking his questions until he pieced together what had happened.

Vishortan and Visha’andar had taken his body to the warehouse. There, it had been prepared for the ceremonial cremation called Eshan. Eshan had been replaced by simple cremation over many years, but the Sessashians still practiced it in secret. It had taken four days to find a time when it could be performed and during that time, with the vorn fragmented following death, he had been unconscious. Mindar did not know much about Eshan, having thought his entire life that it was merely ceremonial. In the smoke of the cremation fire, his body had been carried skyward where it had been reunited to the rest of his vorn in the celestial form that it now had.

As he sped along between the two Eladrim warriors, Rindar noticed that he felt no weight. They were pulling him by his arms, but that was to propel him in the right direction instead of holding him up. He looked down at his torso. It glowed faintly, in a similar way to the bodies of the Eladra, but not as brightly. He was dressed in a simple white tunic that covered him from his shoulders to his ankles and it flowed and rippled as they sped along. The movement was not from the wind, of which he felt none.

Finally he noticed the faint hint of dawn on the eastern horizon in front of them. “Where are we going?” he asked again.

“Mindar is going home,” was the only answer Vishortan would give.

In the dim brightening of dawn, Mindar could see a coastline approaching. “Tessamandria?”

“Yes,” they said in unison.

The land was flecked with the same lights and gray spots but remained black in the increasing light of Asolara. “Why is the land black?” he asked, surprising even himself with the question.

“It is always black,” said Visha’andar without hesitation, “until the Eladrim stop to visit.”

It was one of those moments when a small glimmer of understanding bursts forth to a grand vision of the world. “What are the lights—and the gray spots?”

“They are vorns in whom the el of Mah’Eladra is alive.”

“And the gray?”

“Those whose mordage is hiding the light.”

“Can we go closer?”

“It is forbidden for Mindar to walk among the mortals.”

Mindar had barely started to ponder the meaning of these revelations when he heard the drums. It was a far off rumble at first, muddled and faint because of the great distance. They grew more distinct with each minute until he could here the deep booming that pounded chaos into a complex tapestry of sound. The Hallorian Drums! Mindar strained to look ahead. Far below and slightly to the right, he could see the white peaks of the Crown, glowing in the morning sun and standing starkly against the utter blackness of the rest of Tessalindria.

The Eladra slowed and moved gracefully into a upright position, almost as if they were about to stop and stand on something. Mindar felt himself swinging in with them and suddenly, in the emptiness, he was standing on something firm where there was nothing. The two giants were on either side of him and let go of his arms. Mindar was about to speak when he heard the screech of Visha’andar’s sword. There was a sharp hiss and the sword flashed in front of him, exploding in a brilliant flash of light against an incoming projectile. There was another hiss and Vishortan’s sword caught it behind him. Mindar was trembling. The two Eladra waited.

It did not take long. Bounding along the invisible plane on which they stood, four warriors were approaching from in front of them. Visha’andar stepped in front of Mindar and Vishortan behind. They backed toward one another until Mindar was nearly trapped between their huge glowing bodies. “Do not speak!” commanded Vishortan.

Mindar could hear the shouting of the approaching warriors. It was gutteral and dark and rumbled like thunder. He could hear the running tramp of their boots and felt it on the invisible floor under his feet The tramping slowed and the shouting became more distinct. “Stand back Vishortan,” one of them yelled. “this one is ours.”

His guardians were silent.

“We have come,” said another voice, “to avenge the loss of Vashtor at the sword of Vishortan.”

“You have no claim here,” thundered Visha’andar, “this one was washed in the Jualar springs.”

“The springs are destroyed!” The third voice was low and rasping. “this one can not have washed in them.”

Mindar could see them now as they walked in a circle around him and his two guardians. They were dark, as if the aura of the Eladra had been washed away.

“He is a portal walker, and washed before the destruction.” Vishortan’s voice seemed to echo off the sky around them as he spoke.

“Ha!, Even so, you are too few to defend him,” said the dark raspy voice.

“You cannot engage us on this cerulean plane,” thundered Visha’andar, “it is forbidden of Mah’Eladra.”

“Then let them defend you.” The attack was more sudden than Mindar could have imagined. With a single, unified shout, the air around them was filled with hurled projectiles. His two guardians fended them off with their swords, and each impact was followed by a deafening explosion. The NarEladrim soldiers approached, but never came near enough to strike either of the Eladra.

From high above, what was at first but a faint hiss streaked down on them and struck the plane around them like a mighty hammer before the enemy had time to react. In that instant, all four NarEladra were reduced to a shuddering puff of acrid smoke. The cerulean plane heaved under its impact, tossing Mindar off his feet to fall between the legs of his guardians.

He did not even have time to stand, before Visha’andar and Vishortan had grabbed his arms and started flying again. This time Mindar could feel the urgency in their flight. They swept downward, somehow defying the plane they had been standing on. Straight toward the surface of Tessalindria and then without any apparent signal, leveled out streaking across the black landscape, toward the glistening peaks of the Crown of Tessalindria.

À

“Our languages do not have words for the infinity of Mah’Eladra.”

Irokandolar

Deep Sky

Mindar toiled upward. Visha’andar and Vishortan had dropped him outside the rim of peaks. “It is forbidden for us to enter the Margah yet,” Vishortan had explained. They bid goodbye and vanished skyward with prodigious speed. Mindar had watched them until they were lost among the stars in the black sky.

The soil where he laid his foot was black. The rocks were black. The trees’ black branches bore black leaves. Mindar marveled that with all the black that he could see anything at all, but despite the endless dark motif of the world around him, every detail was vivid in its blackness. Everything was cold to the touch and there were no detectable odors, as if the air had been scrubbed clean to the point of emptiness.

But, somewhere behind the dark sanitized landscape, the pervasive thundering cascade of the Hallorian drums, filled everything with their incessant pounding, sending out a message of unbridled, vibrant life at their source.

After a short time alone, Mindar was joined by other luminous beings traveling upward. They did not speak, but fell in together in a joyous ascent. Mindar noticed the strange sense of time, as if it were traveling past them faster than in his life and then almost as if there were no time at all. This sensation heightened as they came over a low rise to find an encampment of explorers. They were preparing breakfast.

Mindar’s party stopped in astonishment. The breakfast preparations were in slow motion and everything was black. One of the explorers had a glimmer of light that cast a sort of gray around where she worked. They did not notice the travelers. Mindar guessed that they could not see them, so he wandered into their midst. They were talking, but no sound came from their black mouths. He could pass right through them and when he did, he could feel the chill of their blackness. How very odd it seemed that they were living in the same space, and experiencing the vivid colors and odors of the high mountain environment and yet were totally detached from the new reality that Mindar felt.

He passed his hand in front of the face of the one surrounded in gray. She looked up, as if something had happened and said something silently to the others who turned toward her slowly and then looked up, searching for something. She shrugged and they all fell to their various tasks. A gentle tug on his sleeve by one of his traveling companions reminded Mindar that they had to continue traveling upward.

As they came near to the rim of the crown, the light started changing. There were spaces in the rocks that were filled with dazzling light and blue-white rays shot out from them like searchlights into the black sky. In places, brilliant undulations of color ran like waves across the ground before them as if they had burst from some container that was not quite able to contain them. As they rolled past, Mindar felt as if there was a sound that followed them, but it was somehow just beyond his ability to hear. They sent a shudder through him that he could only remotely connect with the chills he often felt when he had been very afraid, but they left no impression of fear.

The travelers moved faster and in spite of the steepness of the slope, they were nearly running. Waves of color were splashing over the rim and rolling down the landscape to be swallowed by the darkness. They reminded Mindar of flames, licking into the sky and disappearing into the blackness, except these were moving down.

On they climbed. The undulating colors rolled first around their ankles, then up to their knees and then their wastes as if they were wading in it. It splashed against their bodies and swept around them, leaving a trail of dazzling luminance behind each of them. Suddenly the being in the lead stopped and scooped his hand into the flood around them and brought it to his mouth. It splashed over his face in a shower of lights. He leapt up, laughing and splashing more all over him. With each handful he grew brighter.

Soon, all the travelers were splashing and laughing. It was sweet and thin, with no noticeable substance and carried a hint of a spice that reminded Mindar of the thin flaky wafers that Visha’andar had given them on the road to Kinvara. It invigorated him and made him dizzy and giddy. He started to run up toward the rim. The others followed.

As he burst up onto the narrow trail along the knife-edge that formed the rim of the Crown of Tessalindria, the light and the sound from the deep crater nearly knocked him back. The crater was filled to the top with frenzied motion that seemed to be moving everywhere at once. Everything shimmered as it moved. He looked at the other beings beside him. They stood transfixed in awe.

The sound of the drums came from everywhere, as if each of the thousands of beings that swarmed in the crater were contributing all their energy to the pulsating rhythms. The color that has been leaking over the rim filled it like an ocean that could not be contained. Mindar could feel it sloshing past his knees as it started it course down to where it was swallowed by the blackness of the slope behind him.

On the far side spiraling upward into the stars, he could see the golden staircase. It was complete now and reached skyward above him, twisting to a fine point of white light that looked like a star. He thought back to the time he had stood here so many years before. What he had seen then was but a flicker of what he was looking into now. He thought about the explorers camped out below, so black and lonely in the darkness, or rather in their daylight. They would climb here later to see the empty desolate scar of the crater. They would see nothing, taste nothing, feel nothing and hear nothing of what he saw. They would see a gray empty desolation, never suspecting that it was filled to the brim with life beyond description.

One of the others who stood with him tapped him on the shoulder. He looked over at her and she held her finger up indicating that he should watch. Without warning, she leaned forward and with a broad sweep of her arms, launched herself into the ocean of color. She streaked downward in a graceful arc, like a hawk diving for its prey before leveling out and disappearing like a shooting star into the brilliant frenzy of the crater. One by one the others followed until Mindar was left standing alone on the rim. Then he leaned forward, and with a mighty shove, launched himself into a dive, hurtling down into the infinite brilliance of the Grand Eliia Margah.

À

“Resplendent joy and unbounded kirrin await those who can set their foot to the golden stair .”

Irokandolar

Deep Sky

Mindar made his way slowly through the endless streets and levels of the margah. All sense of time and space was lost and everywhere, the throbbing endless pulse of the drums seemed to drive every movement. He could move at will. There was no up or down and seemingly, there was no bottom to the Margah. He could descend or ascend simply by desiring to do so and he could stop anywhere. There were no boundaries and yet all around him were realities that defied description. He was sure they all had names, but their intense realness defied words.

From everywhere in the Margah, one could see the golden stair. It was as if every way and passage led there, as if every street and stairway pointed that way yet it did not seem odd that this was true.

He was surrounded by other beings, moving and shifting, talking without words and saying things he understood without hearing them. He seemed to know them all, but could identify none of them, yet even in the immersion of his vorn in this overwhelming sea of intensity, he felt as if he belonged there.

Mindar could not remember how long he had been in the Margah when he felt the first glimmer of recognition in another being. He stopped and looked around, with the growing awareness that someone he had known was nearby.

“Mindar?” he turned toward where he thought the voice was coming from. When he saw the speaker, his awareness was made complete. It was Erinshava and yet it was not Erinshava. Mindar realized suddenly that what he was seeing was the true vornal person of his friend, stripped of all the imperfections of the Tessalindrian bound woman he had known. She touched his arm and then hugged him. “How long have you been here?” she asked as she stepped back from the embrace. She was speaking the original language.

“I just … I think I just got here.” Mindar’s words surprised him.

“Same here!” A hint of surprise emanated from her face, though Mindar realized that it was not really Erinshava’s face at all.

“Have you seen any other’s?” he asked, the words of the Kor’Alura rolling effortlessly out of his mouth.

“You are the first,” she said, “but I am sure we will find the others.” Mindar suddenly realized that even amidst the incessant, deafening, throb of the drums, he had no difficulty hearing his friend.

They walked on together. “What happened after I left you and Sereline behind at the portal?” he asked, still intrigued by the seeming timelessness of their situation.

“It’s a long story,” she said. Mindar could sense her smile.

“What happened to Sereline?”

“I’m sure that she also has a long story,” said Erinshava, “but I know only a fragment … do you feel it?”

While Erinshava had been speaking, Mindar was suddenly aware of another presence.

“Dakan!?” Erinshava said.

Another being to their right stopped and turned. The old man looked young. His body shone with its youth and energy. Mindar recognized the Rizerand descendant by his nature. Dakan smiled as he embraced Erinshava. “Erinshava,” he said slowly as if savoring the sound of the name, “and you have found Mindar.” He paused as he wrapped his arms around Mindar’s neck and kissed him. “And see, I have found your friend.”

Mindar felt it before the words reached him. Sereline! She stood before him, gleaming. Her hair was the like a fountain of light, streaming down over her shoulders and the white robe hung loosely from her shoulders. She held out her arms and Mindar stepped into the embrace. Everything was different. Mindar could feel the pure fullness of their friendship, completely unclouded by the physical desires that had surrounded their relationship while they were living. The crisp cleanliness made him suddenly aware of the nature of unfiltered psadeq and kirrin; life beyond life; the full weight of the infinite relationship.

“I knew I would find you,” she said as she smiled and stepped back from his arms with a gentle shyness.

“Have you waited long?”

“I just got here … I … I was going to say yesterday—but I cannot tell.”

“Do you remember what happened after I fell through the portal?”

“Every detail. Like it was today.”

“Tell me everything,” Mindar begged. “What happened to Therall and Serinda?”

Sereline smiled. “You would be so proud of them, Mindar, they—“

Her words were lost in the sudden fanfare of horns that rose above the pounding of the drums. The small party turned toward the sound that rolled down from the bottom of the golden stair. “I think its time to go!” shouted Dakan as he waved in the direction of the staircase.

Sereline extended her left hand and Mindar placed his right into it. He wanted to hear what she had to say, but the ever-increasing intensity of the horn fanfare captivated their attention as the throngs of beings began slowly drifting toward its source.

It seemed to be a lot farther than it looked when they started. As they walked, the density of the crowd of converging beings increased, yet even in the increase it did not ever feel crowded.

“Mindar!” Another yell rose above the din and Mindar looked up to see Lutaka waving frantically. He was laughing as he waded through the throngs who did not seem to care that he was cutting across the flow. “Erinshava—Sereline—and you, Dakan!”

Others joined in: thousands of thousands, streaming peacefully toward the huge pedestal from which the staircase spiraled upward. The pedestal was itself a sort of staircase, perfectly circular with hundreds of layers, each smaller than the one on which it rested that formed a staircase from all directions. The top circle, from which the staircase started its majestic sweep upward, was ringed with mighty Eladrim princes, gleaming like the sun. Each held an enormous ram’s horn to his lips, warbling out the vast sounds of the deafening fanfare. In the center of the circle were the drummers, pouring their energy into the huge drums that lay around them on the platform. There must have been hundreds of them.

There was no way to talk and everyone glided forward, slowly wending their way between the mighty princes and the drummers. Mindar marveled at how big the drummers were. With each hit, showers of colored sparks leapt up into the air. As they flew up from the drums, they dissolved into the sky in thick wisps of color. This was the source of the strange colors that filled the Margah and overflowed its brink to spill down the banks.

A long corridor extended before them, cutting through the drummers to the foot of the staircase. Tall Eladrim Warriors lined the corridor, sternly watching each trembling pilgrim and interspersed with men and women in white robes. Mindar felt as if he knew them all, but could not remember where he would have met them. As they moved down this corridor through the drummers, a new sound met their ears. It sounded like a waterfall, but within its deep reverberation one could here the repeated phrase in the Kor’Alura, “Well done, well done!”

Mindar felt himself shaking and he could feel Sereline’s hand trembling. On the staircase in front of them and above them, the stream of beings was rising slowly. When they came to where they could see the base of the stairs, two figures stood on either side. Preceding the two were eight women in long flowing robes of bluish white, whose hair resembled the color of glowing copper. “Hannahoruan!” gasped Mindar. “And Hanara!” He realized suddenly that all eight looked nearly the same. They stood smiling as the travelers passed through.

All their attentions were drawn suddenly to the two last figures before the stair. The one on the left was smaller and his face shown like the Asolara. He was dressed in radiant white and his arms and head were bare. His skin shimmered and cast light in waves that pulsed in time with the drums. Erinshava tugged on Mindar’s robe. As she pointed to the figure on the left, she shouted “Sessasha!”

The figure on the right was a head taller than Sessasha and dressed only in a loincloth and a belt that bore a long sword at his right side. His eyes sparkled like stars; his hair was as white as the heart of a furnace and his chest, belly thighs shown like gold reflecting the light of a thousand fires. His left hand crossed his chest and rested purposefully on the hilt of the sword as if he were about to draw it suddenly. Mindar felt a chilling terror when he looked at this commanding vissage and simultaneously felt the warmth and compassion that emanated from him.

As they drew closer, Mindar could tell that the booming waterfall voice came from this larger figure on the right. “Well done, well done!” With each step closer, the voice was stronger, more terrifying and more compelling. He could feel Sereline’s grip tightening on his hand. He squeezed back, hoping to allay her fears and as he did so, he realized that it was not fear, but anticipation. They were now close enough for Mindar to notice that as each person passed between Sessasha and the terrifying guardian, they knelt in homage before moving up the stairs.

Dakan was walking to Mindar’s right and slightly in front of him. He pulled his sleeve and Dakan turned. “Who is it?” he asked. Even as he spoke, he knew who it was Ransom and the spirit of Ransom at the same time. Dakan did not answer.

Without warning, the others with him seemed to dissolve and Mindar felt the intense aloneness one can feel in the midst of a huge assembly. He was facing Ransom and without hesitation, fell to his knees. He did not know why, but there was no other appropriate response. “Well done,” boomed the voice of the waterfall. “Stand up, and enter. Well done!”

Mindar was on his feet and his eyes rose to meet the starlit eyes of the one to whom he had paid homage. As he did so, he felt the flood of acceptance and infinite compassion. The giant nodded toward the stair with a smile. Mindar turned and suddenly, Erinshava, Dakan and Sereline were at his side again. They were laughing and Sereline’s eyes sparkled like sapphires and her face shone like the morning sun.

A distant chorus of deep voices drifted down from somewhere above them. Dakan smiled, his teeth flashing in the brilliant reflection of the light from the stairs. “They are calling,” he said, his voice rolling like thunder. “And we will go to them now.”

“Who?” asked Mindar. The sound of his own voice shocked him.

“Mah’Eladra!” roared Erinshava, “Mah’Eladra!”