Trembling as though he stood in an arctic wind, Dennis stepped back from the creature—the construct—which he’d almost embraced. He drew his sword and, after a moment’s consideration, sheathed it again.
Chester had been right: the sword would be no help to him here.
“Chester,” the youth whispered, “I knew that wasn’t really my father. I knew it mustn’t be, but…”
“You did not know, Dennis,” the robot said gently. “Your father could be here. Even I can not tell truth from image in this place that is the sea hag’s place.”
“Chester, do people do what they want to do, even when they know they mustn’t? Do other people…?”
“People see what they hope to see, Dennis,” Chester replied, stroking his master’s shoulders. “People know what they wish to know, and they act on that truth which they create for themselves. And it may be…” but here the robot’s voice grew so soft that Dennis was not sure of the words he was hearing “…that they are happier to live lies.”
Dennis looked out over the sea, sun-struck and faceted with choppy waves. He was higher than he’d ever been before, even in the tallest of the palace towers. The brilliant openness of everything before—and below—the balcony gave him a touch of vertigo.
“All right,” he said under his breath. “There’s a long way yet to go.”
He was not surprised when the thing of fluid shuffled along behind them, following the thing of wire. The foot membranes squelched as they settled on each tread. Bubbles continued to rise through the yellow fluid.
Dennis knew he must be nearing the dome, because the jungle was very far below when he leaned out and looked. If he turned his head to peer upward, he saw nothing but sky and the sun-dazzling eave molding of the tower’s next layer above.
Dennis was breathing quickly now. Tired from the climb, he was sure, but—nervous also. Very nervous.
He looked at Chester. “Do you have any wisdom for an old pupil, my friend?” he asked jokingly.
“Do not undertake any task and then carry it out badly,” the robot obediently quoted.
The youth’s wry smile became a real one. “We won’t do it badly,” he said, squeezing the tentacle Chester offered him. “We’ll do it right.”
If it kills me, his mind added.
Three steps higher, and Dennis saw the stairs meet a floor of rainbow glass. There was no door at the top, only a rectangular slot.
Through the slot, Dennis could see his own distorted features reflected from the concave inner surface of the dome which covered the spire of rock.
“There’ll be something waiting right there for us,” Dennis said musingly. “Ready to get us as soon as our heads come over the edge of the floor.”
“Do you wish me to go before you, Dennis?” Chester asked.
Dennis thought… Thought of Chester flying through the air, struck by Malduanan’s leg as he lunged to save his master’s life; Chester wreathed in blue fire, his limbs flailing wildly as he blocked the lightning bolt Rakastava meant for Dennis.
Chester crumbling into rust, struck by the baton as Dennis dangled helplessly from the ceiling that was part of Mother Grimes.
“No,” he said quietly. “Thank you, Chester. But this one’s mine.”
He poised, then rushed up the remaining stairs with the robot behind him.
CHAPTER 62
Nothing attacked as they burst out onto the smooth glass floor.
Aria ran toward them from the large pavilion beneath the center of the dome.
“Oh, Dennis!” she called as her slippers twinkled over the mirroring floor. “Oh my love, you’ve won!”
The glass above Dennis had a pebbled appearance. Its outer surface was beaded with water wrung from low clouds and the wind-lifted spray. The youth glanced up, saw himself shrunken and foreshortened; and looked back with a hard expression at what seemed to be his wife.
The only structure within the dome was the one from which Aria had come, a flat-roofed circle of ornamented marble columns. The pavilion was reflected from the concave dome to the floor and back again—hundreds of times—in a rosette, like the pattern of reality glimpsed through a bee’s eye.