9
Baradir experienced the feeling of waking up, though he did not remember having parted with his consciousness.
Shortly afterwards, revising this idea, he instead developed the certainty that he was asleep after all, lost in the depths of a dream. For were these not the sumptuous walls of his own palace, rising around him?
How could that be, save that he dreamed?
He lay prone, in the centre of the room he had once thought of as The Chamber of Moon and Pearls. Every inch of it was glass, stained and frosted; the hues were the serene silver-white of moonglow, and the soft iridescence of sea-pearls.
Thus far it was familiar enough. But, the images formed among the glass were not what he remembered. A brutal storm tossed the ocean waters dominating one wall; the seas moved as he watched,
