He turned around to his companions.  “What is the greatest wonder, in all this wonderful scene?” he demanded.

“Acquaint us,” said Maskull.

“All that you see is born from pleasure, and moves on, from pleasure to pleasure.  Nowhere is right to be found.  It is Shaping’s world.”

“There is another wonder,” said Tydomin, and she pointed her finger toward the sky overhead.

A small cloud, so low down that it was perhaps not more than five hundred feet above them, was sailing along in front of the dark wall of cliff.  It was in the exact shape of an open human hand, with downward-pointing fingers.  It was stained crimson by the sun; and one or two tiny cloudlets beneath the fingers looked like falling drops of blood.

“Who can doubt now that our death is close at hand?” said Tydomin.  “I have been close to death twice today.  The first time I was ready, but now I am more ready, for I shall die side by side with the man who has given me my first happiness.”

“Do not think of death, but of right persistence,” replied Spadevil.  “I am not here to tremble before Shaping’s portents; but to snatch men from him.”

He at once proceeded to lead the way up the staircase.  Tydomin gazed upward after him for a moment, with an odd, worshiping light in her eyes.  Then she followed him, the second of the party.  Maskull climbed last.  He was travel stained, unkempt, and very tired; but his soul was at peace.  As they steadily ascended the almost perpendicular stairs, the sun got higher in the sky.  Its light dyed their bodies a ruddy gold.

They gained the top.  There they found rolling in front of them, as far as the eye could see, a barren desert of white sand, broken here and there by large, jagged masses of black rock.  Tracts of the sand were reddened by the sinking sun.  The vast expanse of sky was filled by evil-shaped clouds and wild colors.  The freezing wind, flurrying across the desert, drove the fine particles of sand painfully against their faces.

“Where now do you take us?” asked Maskull.

“He who guards the old wisdom of Sant must give up that wisdom to me, that I may change it.  What he says, others will say.  I go to find Maulger.”

“And where will you seek him, in this bare country?”

Spadevil struck off toward the north unhesitatingly.

“It is not so far,” he said.  “It is his custom to be in that part where Sant overhangs the Wombflash Forest.  Perhaps he will be there, but I cannot say.”

Maskull glanced toward Tydomin.  Her sunken cheeks, and the dark circles beneath her eyes told of her extreme weariness.

“The woman is tired, Spadevil,” he said.

She smiled, “It’s but another step into the land of death.  I can manage it.  Give me your arm, Maskull.”

He put his arm around her waist, and supported her along that way.

“The sun is now sinking,” said Maskull.  “Will we get there before dark?”