“They shall be gathered together, as prisoners in the pit, and shall be shut up in the prison, and after many years shall they be punished. Beware the Wallcreeper, beware the bats, beware the demon that wasteth at noonday, and beware the one that walketh in darkness. Love, says Hans Mein Igel, love will save your life. Do you regret it?” asks the girl smelling of sweet flag and mint. “Do you regret it?” The girl is naked, yet innocent, nuditas virtualis. She is barely visible in the gloom, but so close Reynevan can sense her warmth.

The sun, the serpent and the fish. The serpent, the fish and the sun set in a triangle. The Narrenturm falls, the turris fulgurata crumbles away, the tower is struck by lightning. The poor fool falls from it, tumbles down, towards destruction. I am that fool, a thought flashes through Reynevan’s head, a fool and a madman, I am the one falling, tumbling into the abyss.

A burning man runs screaming across a thin cover of snow from a burning church.

Reynevan shook his head to drive away the apparitions. And then, in the glare of another flash of lightning, he saw Peterlin.

A spectre, motionless as a statue, suddenly glowing with an unnatural light. Reynevan saw that the light, like beams of sunlight through the cracks in a shed, was shining through numerous wounds—in his breast, his neck and his belly.

“Oh, God, Peterlin…” he groaned. “How terribly they… They will pay for this, I swear! I will avenge you… I will avenge you, dear brother… I vow…”

The spectre made a vigorous gesture. Clearly opposing, forbidding. Yes, it was Peterlin, for no one but their father gestured like that when he opposed or forbade something, when he reprimanded little Reynevan for japes or madcap ideas.

“Peterlin… Dear brother…”

The same gesture, even more vehement and emphatic. Leaving no room for doubt. The hand, pointing south.

“Flee,” said the spectre in the voice of Eliza of the nettles. “Flee, little one. Far away. As far away as you can. Beyond the forests. Before the dungeon of the Narrenturm claims you. Flee, leaping across the mountains, bounding over the hills, saliens in montibus, transiliens colles.”

The ground whirled furiously. And everything ended in darkness.

The rain awoke him at dawn. He was lying on his brother’s grave on his back, motionless and numb, raindrops splashing on his face.