CHAPTER V


LUMENTOR




	Trajan's face looked as ash-grey as the mist outside the windows of the Zippercraft but 
his eyes were bright and firm.  He strapped himself into the co-pilot's seat and instructed Assiya 
to do the same.  

	"Close your mind to whatever that is out there," he ordered.  "Just think of them like 
fragments of a bad dream."  Quickly checking the instrument panels he concluded the craft had 
sustained only minor damage when it had become entangled in a sort of forcefield net, and the 
engines were still fully functioning.  

	"How are we going to get out of here?" Irwain asked, looking at him with concern.

	Sweat pearled on Trajan's face, but his movements handled the controls with briskness 
and precision.  "I am going to try to slingshot us out of here," he said.  "We will go into Reverse 
Impetus at Full Reverse, that will create an air momentum.  At a given Altitude Degree we will 
switch back to Forward Impetus at Full Forward and hopefully it will give the craft the force 
needed to break through the net.  It won't be a pleasure trip, so keep your straps on all the time.  
Now, cut off Parsplit!  Reverse Impetus at full speed.  Keep your eyes on the altitude needle.  
On my cue, cut off Reverse, and back to Forward!"

	The Zippercraft threw a bellow into the fog as it dived towards the depths of the Smaze.  
The howl of its torment nearly splintered their eardrums; the twisting and turning tar shades 
across the windscreen were torn to tatters and scattered into the milky air like flocks of black 
snow.  

	"We are at six Altitude Degree," Irwain said, as he felt how the fierce downward plunge 
seemed to tie his stomach up in little knots, "5, 4, 3, 2--." 

	"Now!" Trajan shouted.  "Cut off all Reverse, switch to Full Forward!"

	For a moment it seemed as though the Smaze bowels would flatten them into warps of 
Unliving, as the craft cancelled its Reverse speed and trembled in midair, then with another 
concert of screams and whines it sprang and spiralled upwards.  The moving mist outside 
whipped along the windscreens like sheets of frost.  The craft shook and shuddered and 
screeched with all the suffering of hell and the occupants feared it was tearing itself apart in 
agony.  With a burst of crackling and a spout of sparks the craft broke free from the net and for a 
second it hung like a gleaming drop of rain above a sizzling lake.  

	Trajan immediately galvanized the craft into the Parsplit Drive and it zoomed forwards in 
a silver line.  When the craft had regained stability, Irwain said, his fingers tapping the monitor, 
"I'm afraid we've lost the coordinators."  

	"Don't worry.  Follow the coordinates on the Frame.  This is Assiya's Frame that I've 
requested to be returned to me so that I could study the blinks that it snagged earlier."

	They looked at each other.  "Study while we all thought you were sedated and asleep?"

	"Study in my lucid and painless moments, which are very few."

      Irwain grimaced and returned his attention to the Frame, "Knowing you, I shouldn't be 
surprised.  We are back at the correct bearings. We will reach Lumentor in about an hour."  

	Even though he kept his wits about him fully, Trajan's ghastliness of face spoke plainly 
that he was tottering on the brink of collapse but Irwain dared not let him go as yet; the craft has 
sustained damage and he feared it might complicate the landing.  Irwain looked over his shoulder 
quickly and ordered Assiya not to leave her seat when she started to loosen her safety straps.  
"Everybody stay where they are!" he said as he checked all panels of the instrument board.  

	"The Reverse Vertical seems to be not working."

	"Then we have to glide into a landing," Trajan said, leaning his head against the seat 
wearily. 

	As the craft continued the journey no one spoke; Assiya was still half-paralyzed with 
terror for the Unliving whom she had never seen so close before her eyes, and Trajan struggled 
with a pain in his head which was affecting the focus of his eyes and a growing sickness in his 
stomach, which was worse.  Irwain's attention was constantly called to a deflection in the 
direction finder which he had to correct manually.  

	They were now in the depths of the Smaze where sky, lands and horizons existed forth as 
blankets of milky fog or curls of darker hued smoke everywhere the eye reached: a lifeless 
domain of infinite twilight.  A grey gloom above, below, all around in perpetuity where all voices 
had been smothered and life extinguished except splodges of Unliving which had also fallen 
silent as they approached the Centre.  At long last after an hour of great strain, an oval nimbus 
glimmered through the layers of mist, faintly at first.  Drawing near to its brim, the ovality had 
the appearance of spreading wings of light and pulling them into a wide space where the fog was 
not as dense and where walls and towers took shape before their eyes.  Before long the spires 
and domes of Lumentor became fully visible and a great city was unveiled in the twilight world, 
gleaming still with blue majesty but lying in fragments all across the bowl like a ruptured heart.  

	Assiya gave a little gasp as she saw lights behind curtained windows.

	"We have arrived," Irwain announced.

	"Decrease velocity," Trajan said and switched the controls to manual.  "Do you know of 
a suitable landing place?"  

	"When I was last here," Irwain told him tonelessly, "Lumentor was surrounded by thorny 
shrubbery and stumps of gnarled trees.  I doubt whether this has changed in the meantime.  We 
can glide to a stop over a fringe of bushes in front of the edifice." 

	Trajan wiped off the sweat that was dripping into his eyes and he frowned, peering with 
difficulty at the control board signals dancing before him.  "Velocity has been decreased and we 
have dropped altitude.  We circle the place with one swing, coming low over the ground on the 
second swing.  I will manipulate the craft to glide on its belly over the designated landing spot.  
It will be a little rough as I am not as skilful as a former sergeant of mine.  Are you ready?" 

	The craft shocked and whined into impulse drive as Trajan braked the engines.  Coming 
into closer range of Lumentor, almost glancing off its walls, the craft swung away at an abrupt 
angle and swept round the structure with one revolution, brushing sections of shattered walls and 
broken towers.  It dipped its nose low towards the ground as it completed the circuit, and made 
another sweep.  Buzzing for the second time from behind the rear of the edifice, the Zippercraft 
dropped lower still until its bottom was scraping along the hard ground. 

	The bumps hammered at the fuselage and sent the whole craft through succeeding shakes 
and convulsions.  Applying further brake, Trajan manoeuvered the vessel away from the front 
walls of Lumentor, into a forest of nettle and gnarled dry wood.  With the shrill yelling of the 
engines the Zippercraft slammed into the wiry and thorny arms of Smaze dragonweed.  The mist 
over the ground was hurled into the twilight in a dense cloud.  

	The Zippercraft thudded into a halt with a violent shock.  Smoke filled the interior.  
Irwain ripped away his safety straps and with quick fingers unsealed the door.  He jumped up 
from his seat as Trajan fell forward over the controls, coughing and retching.  Irwain had already 
disappeared outside as Assiya was still fumbling at her straps.  

	Nothing but curtains of clouds and smoke surrounded the fallen craft but a silhouette 
loomed through the mist, walking rapidly towards the site of the crash.  As Irwain approached 
the figure, he stood face to face with Krystan Schurell.  

	"My Lar Irwain," Krystan said, "I thought you vowed never to return to Lumentor." 

	"My Lar Krystan," Irwain said.  "There will be time enough to argue who is right and 
who is wrong, but not at this moment.  Trajan is inside and he is badly hurt."

	"Trajan!" Krystan exclaimed and wasting no more words he hurried together with Irwain 
to the Zippercraft and climbed inside.  Strings of smoke was still hanging thickly in the interior 
but Krystan swiftly assured himself there was no danger of fire.  Observing Assiya he did not 
even stop to question her extraordinary presence in a flycraft.  The one who lay crumpled over 
the instrument panels was his immediate concern.  

	The safety straps were holding Trajan in the co-pilot's seat as he relieved his nausea on 
the floor and over the instrument board of the craft.  He was still coughing and spitting as Irwain 
and Krystan leapt to his side and pulled his straps loose.  They held his head and eased him 
gently back against the seat, and with a groan he fainted on Krystan's shoulder.  

	"His wound is bleeding again!" Irwain said in dismay as his eyes caught the darkening 
stain on the bandage.  

	With his sleeve, Krystan wiped off the vomit from Trajan's lips and chin and said softly: 
"I'll take his shoulders while you take his legs, Irwain."  

	They lifted Trajan out of his seat and manoeuvered him through the door and along the 
side of the craft.  Assiya was waiting outside and gave them a hand as they lowered Trajan to the 
ground.  She followed them as they walked away from the thicket of dragonweed, going up a 
paved road which led to a yard of crushed stonework and bushes of thorn, passing pillars of 
decapitated archways, shards of glass and wood, sentinels of blackened trees linking brown 
brittle branches in grim defiance to the twilight of the Smaze.  They entered a hall where the 
walls would encompass a small valley and the ceiling would reach to the peak of a hill.  Once 
murals had brightened the walls with their art and richness of the mind and tapestries woven 
with the life and colours of sea, sky and mountains.  A calamity had wiped them out and coated 
the walls and high ceiling with a darkish sheen which only reflected the ruins of Lumentor. 

	Irwain and Krystan carried Trajan up a staircase and to a chamber where the curtains were 
drawn across the windows and the door of the veranda, and the width of a city square separated 
the walls.  A vestibule was refashioned into sleeping quarters with an alcove and here Trajan was 
laid down.  

	The room was also furnished with a long table, chairs, a cabinet and a hearth of artificial 
fire.  Looking at the haggard faces of Irwain and Assiya, Krystan said:  "There is food and drink 
in that cabinet.  Avail yourself of my hospitality, while I take care of our young hero here." 

	Closing the drapery of the alcove he bent over Trajan, gazed at his pallid face, felt his 
pulse and softly said: "Yes, a hero you are, coming all the way to Lumentor only through the 
strength of your own will and unaided by the Peregrinators!"  He stripped Trajan of all his soiled 
clothing and viewed with interest the red Insignia beneath his right collarbone.  

	"Trajan," he whispered as with a wet cloth he sponged away the sweat and vomit from 
Trajan's face and body, and cooled the heat of his fever.  "Once I held you in my arms as an 
infant, now I see you grown and become a--a commander.  Berin, old friend, you have kept 
your promise!  This long wait has proven worthwhile at last."  	Krystan cut away the stained 
bandages and with his fingers carefully prodded the ragged line of the wound at the right 
temple.  Grunting and grimacing Trajan jerked his head away.  His eyes flickered open, gazing up 
at Krystan who smiled at him.  His now grey, then purple eyes filled with tears.  "Father--," he 
murmured.  

	Krystan quickly pressed his fingers against Trajan's lips.  "You must know now that is not 
true.  I am your cousin, dear boy: my father was your grandfather's younger cousin.  Don't talk, 
rest now."  He clasped Trajan's face briefly between his hands and his eyes flared with blue 
starshine.  "Look into my eyes and you will not feel the pain as I treat and rebandage your 
wound.  With good fortune, you will not even keep a scar.  After I have finished I will give you 
jruma, bitterbrew, which will fight the fever and make you sleep."  

	"I sense something.  You have a Star Essence."

	"Yes, Commander, I am Starwind."

	Trajan twisted his lips.  "How easily do you say it.  I can't even bring myself to say 'I was 
Starglory'". 

	"You still are.  I sense traces of Starglory still within you.  In time you will be able to say 
it."

      Trajan fell into a light swoon as Krystan moved noiselessly about, removing the old 
stitches and replacing it with sutures of which the nature and technique was only known to the 
Travellers.  He briefly woke up when he felt Krystan's hand raising his head by the nape of his 
neck and the hard rim of a bowl against his lips.  The viscous bitterbrew was true to its name and 
for a while Trajan coughed and spluttered in disgust but the pressure on the back of his neck told 
him in no uncertain terms that Krystan wanted him to drain the contents of the bowl.  
Afterwards he sank away into a deep sleep, dreaming of peace in his birthplace, so far still 
untainted by war. 

* * *

	Heedful of Vespar in peril Irwain was anxious to repair the Zippercraft which would fly 
him back to Okrane.  As soon as he was satisfied that his son, despite the bumpy journey, was 
slowly on the way to recovery, he occupied himself with clearing away the tangles of leathery 
and thorny dragonweed around the craft's body, which took him at least a day.  Inspecting and 
determining the damage lasted another day.  

	On the third day of his stay in Lumentor he saw Krystan standing near the tail section of 
the craft, examining the Parsplit Drive engines.  Approaching with assumed nonchalance he 
watched Krystan for a while fussing around.  "What is your verdict?" 

	"You have only partial Parsplit and zero Impetus," Krystan said.  "The Parsplit Drive can 
be repaired, I suppose, but I am afraid that the Impetus thrusters have completely burnt out." 

	"With enough leverage the Parsplit will still allow me to fly out of here, meaning of 
course I have to improvise a runway in this thorny jungle.  I would welcome your assistance, 
Krystan, although I appreciate you are not wholly enthusiastic about my leaving Lumentor again.  
I have brought Trajan to safety, he was my prime concern.  Now that he is safe, I can turn my 
mind fully to matters of national security."  

	Walking round the Zippercraft Krystan said:  "You are leaving your son behind and 
running away again?"

	 "Damn you, Krystan!" Irwain uttered with blazing eyes.  "Carlomon demanded him as a 
hostage in exchange for millions of Vesparan lives.  Were you in my position, you would have 
done the same, taking and hiding your own son far away, so that the battle will continue 
whatever the costs." 

	"The costs are beginning to get a bit high.  You know the other alternative, the only 
alternative."  

	"Why didn't you tell me about Trajan?" Irwain asked, his eyes flashing like grey blades. 

	Krystan speared him with the blue lightning of his eyes: "I told you about my marriage 
with your granddaughter, Norielle, whom you begot as Lar Trevarthen.  I told you about my sons 
but you brushed it off like a nuisance; you weren't interested at all about them or about my 
Dama.  You weren't interested that one of those sons is adopted on Evening Star near Aberon.  
All that you were interested in is to carve out a name for yourself."  

	"You only hinted; you did not tell me forthright who Trajan really was!"

	"What would you have done, Irwain, if I had told you the truth?  There was a feeling in 
me you would have done the boy greater harm than good if I had told you prematurely that you 
had another son, seeded by your Other Self!"

	Irwain murmured:  "I cannot tell you what I would have done.  Maybe I wouldn't even 
have believed you.  For someone who does not know who he is, the most logical thing is only to 
believe in himself, carve out a name for himself, like you said.  And I like being Governor 
General more than I like being Lar Trevarthen." 

	"Irwain!" Krystan pleaded, "you know who you are!  Look at your son!  You brought 
him here in face of so many dangers, at the risk of even losing your new domain.  Look at him, 
hard: that's how you, both of you, once were before Starglory separated you."  

	"I am not going to be reunified with a spectre of malformity!" Irwain almost screamed.  
"Now I ask you: look at the one you call Lord Schurell, look at me, what similarity do we share?"  

	"You both share Trajan," Krystan said, "Trajan is the fruit of the love between Lord 
Schurell and Vereina, whose grave lies at the back garden of Lumentor, but as you and Lord 
Schurell are the same entity, Trajan is also your son.  And you have acknowledged it, you care 
for him deeply, which is so painful and plain as these ruins surrounding us.  Can you not submit 
yourself to doing the Reintegration for Trajan's sake?" 

	"I love my son, very much.  From the first moment I saw him, he obsessed him with a 
desire to claim him.  He has not been an easy subject to claim though, but knowing him better 
makes me love and respect him even more.  But what you are asking, Krystan, is simply too 
much; I am not prepared to do it.  For now, my concerns lie with my country.  And I have 
wasted enough words.  I have to go back to Okrane." 

	Krystan decided to let the matter rest for the time being and without another word he 
assisted Irwain in carrying out the necessary repairs to the flycraft.  In the Smaze where the 
alternating reigns of day and night never occurred, they worked by the indicators of their 
digitals.  It was about six o'clock in the evening when they finally left the site of the Zippercraft 
and walked into the great hall of Lumentor, up the staircase into the recreation salon which now 
served as a residential chamber.  

	Standing on the veranda Irwain viewed the sea of mist closing thicker around Lumentor 
in the hours of the evening and set his eyes upon the garden of wilderness beneath his feet.  A 
hooded figure sat on a bench near the crumbling banks of a stone circle, which had in past days 
of glory spouted water as a fountain.  An old woman knelt at the figure's feet in humble respect.  

	"What does the old woman see in him?" Irwain said with some revulsion. 

	"Assiya is one of the very few who can see the real person behind the deformity," 
Krystan answered behind him.  Irwain swung round and reentered the room.  Briefly he stopped 
by the vestibule to look at Trajan who was restfully asleep, and his fingers caressed the pale face. 

	Turning away from the alcove, he asked Krystan: "Does Trajan know?" 

	"Of the truth?  No, not yet, but he must be told." 

	"This Starlight Core, Hexstone so I called it once, Starglory as you name it, do you know 
that for a time Trajan has absorbed it as his Force?"

	"I know, since he could not have come here without it but I also know that it is now gone 
from him.  I have not yet questioned Trajan what happened to Starglory." 

	"When he was shot he relinquished it to--to another son of mine."  

	"Where is it now?"

	"Somewhere in Geosphere D'Or.  There were first Two of them, then only One and the 
One had such impeccable leadership he threw back a whole enemy army from the hinterland to 
the coast in a single night.  Is this was it means, Reintegration?"  	Irwain started towards the 
door and spoke harshly across his shoulder:  "If you don't mind, Krystan, I'd like to camp 
outside in my craft.  I want to continue fine-tuning the instruments, especially the radio, so that I 
can leave tomorrow.  Who knows Okrane is in enemy hands by now."  

	Krystan said nothing as Irwain breezed out of the room. The chill of the fog creeping into 
the chambers indicated the evening was well advanced.  He drew the heavy curtains across the 
windows and the veranda and lighted the lamps and the fire.  On a small oven he mixed and 
heated up the bitterbrew with which he had been feeding Trajan regularly since the crash of the 
Zippercraft.  

* * *

	Since the arrival of his son in Lumentor, Trajan Schurell the Elder had refrained from 
entering Krystan's residential chambers and kept himself secluded in his quarters, as if he shrank 
away from the prospect of meeting his son face to face.  Confronting his alter ego, Irwain, was 
an even more daunting task and he avoided the latter as well.  

	More and more he felt himself drawn to the tranquil graveside of Vereina and there he 
would idle his days away in isolation.  One day meditating near the old fountain he encountered 
Assiya who, miraculously, despite the cloak, hood and all instinctively knew who he really was 
and paid him homage on her knees. 

	Lord Schurell bade her to rise but she declined saying it felt more comfortable just to sit 
at his feet.  "What am I to you," he spoke in his sad, clear voice, "but a mutilated apparition of 
the past; yet with such humility, and warmth, you greet me and pay me your respects." 

	Assiya spoke to him in a passionate voice:  "You are My Lord Laris Trajan Schurell, 
whom everyone thought perished in the Great Devolution and for whom I wept away my 
childhood and my youth but who, by some miracle or curse, continued to live over the long years 
in split existences.  The truth is blinding me with its brilliance: the world has come back to where 
it once started.  Here in Lumentor the Conception had begun and it shall end soon.  If only my 
father, your Adherent Master, were with me to witness it!"  

	"You are the daughter of my Adherent Master?" said Lord Schurell in wonder.  "O 
Assiya, he and his wife, your mother, were with me until their end and he was the last one who 
died in my arms, in a world far away from here.  I buried them at the foot of mountains, tall, grey 
and smooth as glass, and planted a sapling near their mound for that was their wish: to hear the 
rustling of leaves in the wind while they slept in all eternity."

	"You could not have buried them in a more beautiful place, My Lord!  And so I want to 
be buried too: under the shadow of a tree.  But do not grieve too much for the end is near."

	"How am I to accomplish the end?" Lord Schurell questioned moodily. "I have my mind, 
but not my body." 

	"You have your son," Assiya said and recounted to him what had passed from the time 
she had encountered Trajan in Merinburg up to the frightful instance when they crashed at the 
front gates of Lumentor. 

	The twilight of the Smaze had crept into the late hours of dusk as Lord Schurell heaved a 
sigh, and his gloved fingers went under the shade of the hood where they touched his hidden 
face.  "Trajan!" he cried out in a voice full of torment, "I dread to see my own son.  He lies there 
sick.  Sometimes at night I hear his moaning and yet I cannot bring myself to go and give him 
care and comfort.  I cannot face his rejection."

	The chill of evening wormed through the grounds of Lumentor and Lord Schurell 
gathered his cloak tighter around him as he rose to go to his quarters, offering Assiya his gloved 
hand to help her rise also.  She envisioned his once gentle smile and she took his arm to 
accompany him.  She prepared his meal in his residential part of Lumentor but very few words 
were exchanged and she left him as he was still sitting in an armchair before a feeble fire in the 
hearth.  

	He sat listening to the night sounds creeping through the wrecked palace, a vague 
creaking of old timber and crunching of loose masonry but it was quiet otherwise, a brooding 
quiet dampening even the memories of days gone by.  He heard nothing coming from the 
sickroom; Trajan was asleep after the first feverish nights.  Trajan, O Trajan.  Why do I say to 
you?  What can I tell you about your mother?

	"Everything, father, everything you know."

	The thought vibration shook him out of his lethargy and he gave another start when a 
hand closed on his shoulder.  Turning his head round he gazed into eyes that he thought he 
would never see again, the grey-purple eyes of Vereina.  And a face not unlike his own in the 
past looked up at him as someone as young as he had been on that terrible day, as wounded in 
soul and body as he is now, knelt down at his side.  

	"Trajan."

	"Father."

	Tears that he did not know he still had welled up in his eyes.  "Trajan, you are not well.  
You shouldn't get up and walk around at nights." 

	"I want to see you, father, I sense your presence.  And I understand you can't come to 
me, so I am coming to you.  Let me see you."

	"I am too badly scarred, my boy."

	"Trust me, father, please."

	In the stillness of a brewing night that waited for a cleansing wind, Lord Schurell pulled 
the hood off his face, the gloves off his fingers and ultimately dropped the whole cloak on the 
floor.  Trajan stared with widening eyes at the hideous scars and furrows distorting the features 
of a once noble face, the mangled fingers of his hands, the misshapen and crippled body, but 
above all at the large, grey eyes, clear like crystal lakes preserved on the surface of a desert, 
shining like guiding beacons in a swamp of strife.  The eyes that he had so often glimpsed from 
the past beckoning at him

	"My Lar, my Father."  Trajan reached out, took the mutilated hand and pressed it to his 
brow.  As he looked up at his father, the tears were streaming down his face. 

	"Trajan, my Firstborn, our Firstborn!" Lord Schurell cried and folded his son in his arms, 
their tears mingling. "Trajan, dear and only son of Vereina.  You have the strength that we lack.  
You will bring the Annulus of Conception to a close."