Within the Library of the Hanging Palace

Within the Library of the Hanging Palace

Beyond the gate lies the library of the Summer Palace, longed for object of your desire. It seems like a lifetime ago that you first heard about it, when young Ulantanu, the first of your captives from the dreamlands, answered the child witch Adriana’s probing questions.

As you step past the eerie, gracious guardian into that palatial chamber, you are struck by its immense airiness. Light streams through huge windows, through which you can see in the distance jungle scenes, thin trunks, like bamboo like forest with thin white fronds, and the interlocking lattice branches you know so well.

Immediately before the archway, light falls on a gleaming table of wood of a reddish hue that stretches before you. The chairs and the table are thin legged, with, smooth rounded edges, light and elegant. You can see that a copper band has been set into the edge of the table, inscribed with flowing forms. Over the table float a line of four lamps, now unlit, with polished bronze tops, and bottoms of pained glass hemispheres. At its other end, about 200 feet from where you stand rises is a second tower. The entrance has the shape of the mouth of an elegant head carved of porphyry, on the head of which rests what you now recognize as the metaphysical crown. The King’s tower it must be. In the portal, you see a strange ball of light move, as though rolling across a surface. Beyond is a chamber of rich carpets, and opulent furniture.

Books. Everywhere books. They line the exterior walls of the chamber, rising a full thirty feet into the air, to the very top of the glorious arched ceiling. They rise before you on the King’s tower, a cunning curved bookcase of monumental size. Books of all kinds and shapes, shelved with care, and seemingly organized by principle, and yet, for all that pell-mell. Here, a tall book with a blue binding, regal and majestic, leans against the last of series of brown and stolid books, on its other side, a Coptic bound book between magenta boards. And everywhere there are little niches, cutaways, bookends, glorious bookends of all kinds, little busts, quaint pictures on display. The aesthetic sensibility of the arrangement is overwhelming.

Following Dozar’s second sight, gift to him from the Slumber God—may his rest be eternal!—you head west walking to the north of the table. You pass by fine wooden shelves to your right, arranged in a large rectangle. From the shelves, carefully wrapped papyri emerge from peg holes, too many to count. You see in the middle of this space a large wooden table, at standing height, with weights and room to unroll the great parchments. One is open now on the table, and you see lustrous drawings which draw your gaze, almost pulling you towards the detailed scenes. But on you march.

Around the tower to the north you walk, past a strangely drawn circle set directly into the glittering floor. It is composed of shining stones, in huge pieces, Chrysoprase, Tourmeline, Cabochon, that make an exquisite diagram, replete with sigils and geometrical forms, triangles with circles, and looping figures. On one side sits a single velvet cushion, and by it a small set of drawers in some black wood, on the top of which sit sheaves of incense in an elegant vase.

But Dozar does not hesitate, and you hasten to keep up with his heavy steps. On he follows the curve of the King’s Tower. As you pass by the northernmost edge, you can see a glass case set 15’ up, in which the head of some immense white bird is preserved, wearing regalia like a crown. It looks down at you with glistering eyes. You press on, moving past it to curving shelves filled with books of the same binding, a faded pink cloth with golden lettering.

Then you come face to face with the well. A seeming tunnel of books that heads directly down. Like a cozy wormhole, leading quickly to dimness at its floor below. It is protected by a yellow shimmer, not unlike the reflection of a window of yellow glass. A single carpet emerges from a mural on the western side of the King’s Tower. The mural is of a peacock, it’s back to the viewer, its glorious tail revealed, royal purple and green like molten emerald, with eyes of rich pink and brown. The carpet is like a brides train, an extension of the tail, as thought the peacock dragged his splendor behind. It leads directly down into the well, clinging to a vertical path along the eastern side.

Dozar once again calls upon the power of his deity, entering into the divine slumber, drawing forth power, and with his thick hand he strikes the surface which shatters like so much glass. Down he walks along the carpet with Bashan at his heels, into the well, walking now vertically, his feet as surely planted as though he stood on the ground. And down, down he goes, past the little stooped corridors that lead off to the side of each of the four levels of the books. But Bashan’s attention is caught by a single tome, bound in red, perhaps some kind of leather. It rests alone on a narrow shelf at the back of one of these claustrophobic little corridors. The huge warrior presses forward in the space and reaches out a trembling hand. It seems almost cold to the touch and smells of ancient libraries, and of iron, and blood.

Dozar, meanwhile finds the book he is looking for on the second to last level. Stepping off the carpet, and suddenly reoriented to the surface of the balustrade, he reaches his hand out for a narrow folio, in rich blue chaps. Up out of the well the two huge figures come both come triumphant, exulting.

You may now tell me what you do.