“Go away,” Josef yelled, and the soldier vanished before his eyes. He sat up, shaking and sweating, and lit the lantern. What a nightmare, he thought. Tomorrow he was going to start a painting for the Hosentaufs, no matter what it was. The lack of food was driving him out of his mind.

Suddenly he jumped to his feet, fully alert. Scenes from his “dream” rushed into consciousness. He saw those old ruins rising up from the gray dawn. What an idea for a painting, he thought. Already the experience with Seven was disappearing, first into a dream, then into the memory of a dream, then into the feeling that he’d had a dream that he’d forgotten. Only a clear image of the ruins remained. Josef lit another lantern and began a quick preliminary sketch of the circular hill and ruins at the Dig of the Tellers. As the charcoal lines outlined the scene, he had the weirdest feeling that the place was somehow familiar, as if he’d been there once and forgotten.

Chapter Eight

Proteus in the Dig of the Tellers and Story’s Tale

Window stood watching the sky as the dusk settled down, filling the wide earthen cup that held the ruins. His head was thrust upward, his long humped nose pointing at the suspiciously empty air above. The search party had not returned as they said they would. For hours he’d waited for their copter’s shocking emergence in the usually silent sky. Floaters were leary of Earth night. It was odd that he hadn’t heard from them earlier. Window thought back: they had no reason to doubt his word when he told them he hadn’t seen the boy, and promised to contact them if he did.

He opened his inner senses as fully as possible, but he could perceive no strangers in the immediate area, on the Earth surface, beneath it, or above. No alien thoughts nibbled at the far reaches of his mind; no unfamiliar shapes rose out of the darkness of his inner concentration. He smiled to himself—either Window wasn’t open, or the area was safe for the night. Still, he didn’t like it. He sat down, fingering a piece of broken pottery. A picture of the woman who made it so many centuries ago flashed into his mind. It was of early twentieth-century origin, fashioned apparently for show rather than use. Irritably Window dismissed the images, not wanting to be distracted. No skylevator had descended or risen that day, so his scouts told him. Then where was the search party?