"Any flock of mind-marks or outlooks which inhibit the growth of knowledge is what we label bad wisdomlove."

-- The Cosmogon Codex, Leaf 3, Branch 2, Verse 8.

We edwhirved to the Shaft the day after my beseeking to the Mouth. The cones were not in sight. We walked around the ledge to the area on the wall where the controls had been. I pressed my fingers to the cold stuff, but no lights glowed. My fellows seemed astounded at this, but somehow I was not. I had the feeling that someone who knew more than us turned off the control system. Naturally, I suspected Night Ice or one of his minions.

Though there was nothing to attract our attention, we walked around the spiraling ledge as far as it went. There was nothing else to do but return the way we had come. I ran my fingertips over the wall as I went. About another quarter of the way around the Shaft's rimlength, I thought I felt something--went back--felt carefully as Dune Song brought the torch close to the wall. Yes, there was a hairline crack forming a square about a half a man-height. I pushed on the panel, and it gave way, receding into the shaft wall a short distance. I pushed harder, and it budged a little more, enough to fit my fingers into the space and touch the interior side of the panel.

I pulled, and the panel moved to the side, cool air flowing from the dark space. My fellows were eager to try, and they slid it the rest of the way, until the panel was gone and a square hole lay open to a horizontal shaft. We stared at the opening for a few moments. Then Drum Storm shrugged, bent over, and crawled inside. I followed, with Dune Song close behind.

After crawling a short distance, he hummed, and then broke into a song of moderate pace to match the rhythm of our crawling. I recognized the hymn and chimed in; Drum Storm soon joined, and our three-part polyphony resonated along the passage. I was somewhat enjoying this, though my knees soon began to complain.

After some shortlogs, we encountered a junction--another passage perpendicular to our own, ceiling high enough to to stand with a hunch. We could have continued in this manner left or right, but we were attracted to an opening that revealed dusty light.

We went through, hopping down into a large rotunda with a few small apertures in the dome, letting in enough sunlight to see. We walked around the whole hall floor, finding nothing else but another passage opening, this one actually made for wights.

So we followed that tunnel, and came upon another room with nothing of note. This process continued the entire day.

These places were long abandoned, empty of anything but a layer of desert dust. I began to grow disheartened. Perhaps the Shaft with the cones was the only wonder in the whole bedestow. Perhaps my idea of a journey of discovery was foolish.

I have met tenders of the gardens who claimed that everything to discover has already been discovered, and all that was left to do was to understand it. But, they also said, we might not be smart enough to understand the emanations of the Monad. All that was left to do, then, was to tend our gardens, making sure we had enough food until it was time to die. The thought depressed me, and my ferth rejected that outlook. Yet some part of me worried that the gardeners were correct, and that I was just naive.

When I began to move sluggishly, we increased the frequency of our rests. At one place in a high passage, there was a narrow aperture providing a view of mountains. I stared at the view for a few shortlogs, trying to cleanse my soul of negativity. Earlier in the day, I had the feeling that the next hall would reveal some wondrous miracle unknown to wightkind for thousands of years. But there was always nothing, and the feeling faded. Now it felt like we were on a march of drudgery through a forgotten tomb.

I ought to not waste any more time. I ought to give up. I ought to do something useful--perhaps make a journey into the desert to find more seeds for the gardens.

The sun neared the horizon, and we grew sleepy. I sat and leaned against a cold wall. We inhabited a dead, empty world. But there was something small tickling a back corner of my mind. It was the thought that maybe the world is more subtle than I have the right to demand--that maybe something strange and majestic lurks just beneath the surface.

~ Path Dust

Upon the Hour of the Moth, Xerophyte Day, First Moon, in this the 17,622nd Year A.R. ~