His voice was clear, though. It was the only sound in the world.

“I’m not entirely sure,” he admitted. “But I’m done here. I did what I was sent to do.”

The golden light grew until it was all she could see, and his voice was heard no more.

Chapter 56

Chapter 56

Dodge became conscious.

He had slept well despite dreaming long elaborate dreams about the other plane of existence. The sun had awakened him, rising above the rim of the distant Land and flooding the Firmament with light.

He had slept, as he did most nights, on the open lid of a tower that rose high above the streets of the city. For many years the lid had been an open and featureless disk of stone, but more recently he had raised a ring of pillars around its edge, and between the pillars Spring had caused vines to grow and interweave to make a low barrier. It came only to midthigh on Dodge, but it was high enough to prevent a little soul from toppling over the edge.

Spring had not slept with him last night, though. When Dodge got to his feet and strolled over to the western side of his tower he could look across several miles of city to the park. For long ages that had been a mound of rubble that the souls of the Firmament had carried there, one back-load at a time, and piled up as they had patiently excavated and reshaped the cratered landscape where they had come to rest on the day of the Fall. Thus they had built the city with its black streets lit by fire. But the rubble pile had not become a park until Spring had gone to it and begun to adorn it with her creations.