main | table of contents The Reflecting Eye Copyright © 2003, S. Y. Affolee 36 Museum “Well, here we are.” Fala dropped the stub of her cigarette and stomped it out with the heel of her shoe. The Monteport Museum was a large square block that appeared to be carved out of singularly large granite boulder. Columns and stairs rose up from all sides as if this itself was some place of worship. A purple banner was unfurled on the front proclaiming the museum’s latest exhibit. The museum itself was on southwest Seadoch, past the city park. A large parking lot, not entirely empty, surrounded the building so that its nearest neighbors, a couple of small offices, were quite some distance away. Verity and Gammell had followed Fala’s sleek vehicle to the museum and now they were standing in its shadow and surrounded by slushy snow. They were right beside a small, almost hidden door at the side of the building which had a tiny black and white sign over it that said “Employees Only.” Fala took out her key and gave the doorknob a quick yank. Inside, they found themselves on a dark landing. Narrow stairs led up and down. “Ah, isn’t it fabulous?” Fala took in a deep breath of air before coughing loudly. “Are you okay?” asked Verity. The middle-aged woman waved her off. “I’m fine. I shouldn’t be breathing too hard. Anyways, it’s downstairs.” Down one flight of stairs, she opened another door which led into a darkened corridor lined with clear display cases lit up by interior lights. Some of them were table-like cases holding objects like old jewelry and pens and decorative objects. Some of the cases were taller than a person and held faceless dummies modeling old clothing from perhaps about a hundred, two hundred years ago. Dresses were of yellowing lace and chiffon and dulled pearls. Men’s suits were starched and creased by still looked delicate as if one touched them, they would crumble into dust. There were some paintings also hanging on the walls, dark, swirling oils and watercolors, the style indicative of their era. Along the floor, a cubby custodian was brandishing a broom. “Hey, how are you doing?” called out Fala. “I thought you guys were already done for the holiday.” The custodian looked up and Verity felt her pulse suddenly race when she recognized the slightly bloating face and the moustache. “Just cleaning after all you people who come in when you’re not supposed to,” he replied. He glanced at Fala’s companions and even in the dim light, she saw something cross his face. Was it surprise? They followed Fala to the end of the room which had another locked door. Inside was completely dark. Fala flipped a switch near the door and the light bathed a low ceiling room filled with shelves and drawers, all labeled meticulously with letters and numbers in some unknown system. “That custodian, I saw him before,” Verity whispered to Gammell. “Are you sure?” “Positive. What’s he doing here?” “Perhaps the Rothburne Institute and the museum hire the same company to clean up.” Verity frowned skeptically and tried to push the matter out of her mind. Surely it was coincidence, wasn’t it? “Is there anything I can help you look for?” said Fala. “This ancient religion you mentioned before,” said Verity. “Do you have any records of their rituals, what they did, and so on?” “Our records are far from being complete.” Fala took off her fur coat and draped it over her arm as she walked into the lines of shelves toward the back of the room. Verity and Gammell followed her. “We know they used to worship something. There are some pottery shards and some stone tablets with something carved on them, but we’re not sure if it’s actually writing or some sort of decoration. See for yourself.” The curator stopped at one of the back shelves and pulled out one of the drawers. She took out a stone tablet with a curious, unnatural script. “But isn’t that ancient?” said Verity. “We’re not supposed to touch it since it might be fragile, right?” “Those are just rumors to frighten the masses so they won’t come loot the museum if they get a hankering for stealing something,” shrugged Fala. “This has survived for thousands of years. I don’t think a little handling will cause it to crumble into dust.” She dropped the tablet into Verity’s hands. It felt smooth except for the letters which were carved on it. Those felt sharp. “Scholars have been studying these things for who knows how many years and they still haven’t deciphered it. Maybe it’s indecipherable. Maybe it’s nothing more than decoration.” “No, it’s decipherable,” said Gammell. “It is?” said Fala surprised. “Perhaps the scholars you consulted were poor at languages or didn’t want to decipher it for you. This looks like a sort of prayer tablet. It’s an ode to the one that must not be named. Quite tame, actually.” “It’s the same kind of writing on the back of the mirror,” said Verity. “What mirror?” asked Fala. “Gammell’s mirror. It’s a family heirloom,” she lied, not wanting to say that she had found it. “Huh. That’s interesting. Maybe you can come done later after the new year and help us decode all of this that we have down here.” Gammell raised an eyebrow. “The museum will pay you of course,” Fala added hastily. “Didn’t you say once that you were a consultant of some sort?” “Yes.” Fala nodded enthusiastically. “Wonderful. You must come back. At any rate, we don’t have any actual artifacts that pertains to the rituals and the cult that you spoke of earlier. But we do have a book on the subject. A really old manuscript, and unlike these stone tablets, it’s quite fragile. You need gloves to touch it.” Verity handed the tablet back to the curator to place back into the drawer. They followed Fala further down the shelves to a bookcase filled with ancient books with weathered bindings. There was a small table with a wooden box nearby. Fala opened the box and took out three pairs of white cloth gloves and handed one pair to her companions. The curator put hers on and selected one of the books near the top shelf. It was a large square volume with a leather binding. The corners were worn away, but the edges of the pages still gleamed with gold. Fala opened the cover and turned the first stiff thick page which crackled in the quiet air. “This book was initially produced in the old country,” said Fala. “And then it was shipped her when one of the older families settled in the city. This text is mostly a compendium about the strange practices of the unsettled lands at the time. This book is about five hundred years old.” She turned a page and they could see that the printing of the book was an odd blocky form with curving serifs. The spellings were odd too which probably helped date it back five centuries. Fala stopped at a page that was titled, “Unmentionables.” “I’ve read this chapter before,” said Fala, “But I’ve often puzzled over it. There’s nothing in contemporary times that I know of that would compare to it and there is no concrete evidence about it. Basically, what it’s trying to say is that this reality is only one of many. I guess it’s more like many different parallel worlds, some that could be similar and some that are utterly different. There are places in each world where the barrier is thinner than most and this is where things can pass from one place to another.” “That sounds like fantasy,” said Verity, “or the theories of a very deluded physicist.” “Well, who knows what they believed back in those times,” said Fala. “Science wasn’t as developed and superstition was as common as, well, common sense. Anyways, what this says is that some parts of this country is weaker than others. It even specifically mentions the East Tower.” “The East Tower is five hundred years old?” asked Gammell. “No, it’s older than that. I think they picked that place because it was interface between water and land. There are a couple pages of mumbo jumbo in this book about the special properties of interfaces and such,” said Fala. “The East Tower was here for a long time, even before the old families came to settle in Monteport. Of course, back then, the East Tower was more like a pile of rocks than an actual tower. It was only the later generations that built it.” “And what about the West Tower?” asked Verity. “The West Tower is actually a very recent landmark, maybe about two or three hundred years old. It was built for surface symmetry. Before that, there was only one tower. But the East Tower, that was where the barrier between these worlds or realities was thinner and there would often be people who go there to see if they could commune with Aunat, the Nameless One. And there would be others who would go there to commune with their own spirits or gods. Some even said that the barrier only led into one kind of reality—the reality that would make one mad because it was never meant for any human comprehension.” “And what do you think about it?” said Gammell. Fala closed the book and tapped her gloved fingers on the cover. “I’ve been to the East Tower a couple of times. I typically don’t go to the Old Quarter, it makes me uneasy, but I had to go to the tower to see if what some people said about being closer to Aunat was true.” She paused for a moment and then took the book up in her arms to put it back on the shelf. “But the East Tower, especially if you go inside where the reservoir is or up on top, is far from being religiously enlightening. I found it terrifying.” She then shrugged. “Or maybe I was just afraid of heights.”