George Martin - Songs of the Dying Earth

She stepped to one side in the cleared space before the milling crowd, now beginning to settle down. “To present this wonder to you, the greatest Mage of the age, Rogol Domedonfors, Jr.”

The audacity of the nom du stage took Tybalt aback. The one true Rogol Domedonfors had lived ages ago, the last person dedicated to preserving science and machinery before mankind waned into its magics and superstitions.

The man appeared in a puff of flame and billowing smoke.

“I come to you with wonders,” he said, “things I learned at the green porcelain palace which is the Museum of Man.”

“Al1 wonders are known there,” he continued, “though most are studied but once, then forgotten. If you but know where to look, the answers to all questions may be found.”

“Behold,” he said “the Sun.” A warm golden glow filled the air above the makeshift stage. The glow drew down into a ball and the simulacrum of a yellow star appeared in the wings. It moved from the east, arced overhead, and settled westward. A smaller silver ball circled around it.

“For centuries untold, the Sun circled the earth,” he said. “And it had a companion called the Moon, which gave light at night after the Sun had set.”

Wrong, thought Tybalt, but let’s catch his drift.

The sun-ball had dropped below the leftward stage-horizon while the Moon-ball moved slowly overhead. Then the Moon-ball swam westward while the sun began to glow and came up in dawn on the eastward of the stage.

“Oooh,” said the crowd. “Ahhhh.”

“Til,” said Rogol Domedonfors Jr, “Men, practicing their magick arts, conjured up a fierce dragon which ate up that Moon,”‘

A swirling serpentine shape formed in the air between the Moon-and-Sun balls, coalescing into an ophidiaform dragon of purest black. The dragon swallowed the Moon-ball, and the Sun-ball was left alone in the stage-sky.

Wrong, thought Tybalt again, and I get your drift.

“Not satisfied,” said Rogol Domedonfors Jr, “Men, practicing their magic arts, pulled the Sun closer to the earth, even though they had to dim its light. Hence, the Sun we behold today.”

The Sun-ball was larger and its surface redder, great prominences curled out from it, and it was freckled like the fabled Irishman of old.

“So man in his wisdom and age has given himself a Sun to match his mood. Long may the Spirit of Man and his magicks last, long may that glorious Sun hold sway in the sky.”

There was polite applause. From far away, on the slide-hill, another moron dashed himself into the mud-pit.

It had begun to rain. They were inside the inn where Rogol Domedonfors Jr. and his companion, whose name was T’silla, lodged. T’silla placed before her a silver ball and three silvered cowbells.

“Ah!” said Tybalt, “The old game of the bells and the ball.” He turned back to Rogol Domedonfors Jr,

“Great showmanship,” he said, “But you know it be not true. The Moon was swallowed when Bode’s inexorable law met with the unstoppable Roche’s Limit!”

“True physics makes poor show,” said the Mage.

T’silla moved the cowbells around in a quick blur.

Tybalt pointed to the center one.

She lifted the bell to reveal the ball, quickly replaced it, moved the bells again.

Tybalt pointed to the leftward one.

She lifted that bell and frowned a little when the ball was revealed.

“Listen to the rain,” said Rogol Domedonfors Jr. “The crops will virtually spring up this year. There will be fairs, festivals, excitements all growing season. And then the Harvest dinners! “

“Aye,” said Tybalt. “There was some indication that wind patterns were shifting. That the traditional seasons would be abated. Changes in the heat from the Sun. Glad to see these forebodings to be proven false. Surely you ran across them when you were Curator of the Museum of Man?”

“Mostly old books,” said the mage. “Not very many dealing with Magick, those mostly scholarly.”

“But surely…”

“I am certain there are many books of thought and science there,” said Rogol Domedonfors Jr. “Those I leave to people of a lesser beat of mind.”

T’silla let the blurred bells come to rest. She looked up at Tybalt questioningly.

“Nowhere,” he said. “The ball is in your hand.”

With no sign of irritation, she dropped the ball on the table and covered it with a bell, then brought the two others around.

“Then do you not return to the Museum of Man?” asked Tybalt, adjusting his frogskin cap.

“Perhaps after this harvest season is over, many months from now. Perhaps not.”

T’silla moved the bells again.

From far away on the slide-hill, an idiot screamed and belly-flopped into the cloaca at its bottom.

“Give the people what they want,” said Rogol Domedonfors Jr, “and they’ll turn out every time.”

The way southward had been arduous, though most of the country-people were in an especially good generous mood because of the signs of a bumper harvest. They invited him to sleep in their rude barns and to partake of their meager rations as if it were a feast,

It was at a golden glowing sunset after many months of travel that he came within sight of the green porcelain palace that had to be the Museum of Man.

From this distance, it looked to be intricately carved from a single block of celadon, its turrets and spires glowing softly green in the late afternoon sun. He hurried his steps while the light lasted.

A quick inspection revealed it to be everything he’d hoped for. Tome after tome in many languages; charts and maps; plans of cities long fallen to ruin. In the longer halls, exhibit after exhibit of the history of the progress of the animal and vegetal kingdoms, and of Mankind. There were machines designed for flying through the air; others seemingly made for travel beneath the seas. There were men of metal shaped like humans whose purpose he could not fathom. He had time before darkness to discover that the northenmost tower was an observatory with a fine giant spying-glass.

He found a hall of portraits of former Curators of the Museum. Just before he had parted company with Rogol Domedonfors and T’silla months ago, she had handed him a folded and sealed paper.

“What’s this?” he had asked.

“There will come a time when you will need it. Open it then,” she said. All these months, it had been a comforting weight in his pocket.

He travelled up the hall of portraits, pausing at the one of the original Rogol Domedonfors from long ages past. He came up the hall as if transgressing time itself, noting changes in the styles of costuming in the portraits, from the high winged collars to the off-the-shoulder straps. The last full portrait outside the Curator’s door was of Rogol Domedonfors Jr. Tybalt noted the faint resemblance of the features shared by he and the original — the wayward cowlick, the frown-line on one side of the mouth, the long neck. Almost impossible that the same features would skip so many generations, only to show up later in the namesake.

Last outside the door was an empty frame with four pins stuck at its center.

Tybalt reached in his pocket, took out the folded and sealed paper, broke its waxen seal, and unfolded it.

It was a drawing of himself, done in brown pencil, wearing his frogskin cap. The legend below said: “Tybalt the Scientist. “Frogskin Cap” The last Curator of the Museum of Man.” It was an excellent likeness, though the words uneased him. When had T’silla had time between the game of the bells and the ball, and early the next rainy morning when they parted, to do such a good drawing