"Vale...."
The voice was weak, now, weak as is the voice of one dying. Black horror rose about him—
Then, in an abrupt flooding surge of joyous change, the blackness was blotted out by light.
VI
A soft, distant shimmering glow pierced through in arrows of jeweled brilliance. A swirling mist swam toward and around him. It was a beautiful, soft enchantment. A green world of gently swaying fronds and phosphorescent bubbles climbing and bursting in clouds of multi-colored flame.
It was an underwater city, a delicate coraled Babylon of some alien beauty, with avenues of high dainty ferns swaying to the urgings of invisible currents. Enmeshed in this strange ensorcelled dream of jeweled, glimmering, glittering wonder, Venard's mind sped through emerald halls....
And suddenly, by his side, there was Vale—her presence mistily improbable, and yet somehow definite. He could not see, he could not feel, but he could know—
He and Vale were being summoned, called by frantically urging minds.
They floated into a room that was nebulous, quivering now into plainer sight, now withdrawing into indefiniteness. Then Venard saw a brilliant flame that grew, hardened, crystallized, shone brighter and more brilliantly strange. Mists of argent light, then floating shadowy shapes of incredible delicacy swam into view. He knew it now.