The Worlds of the Sheaf

Escape - Part 7

     Braddle Bandock was holding a small metal object when the four humans tapped on the door of his laboratory and strolled in. "Gentlemen!" he cried in his thin, piping voice. "And lady! To what do I owe the pleasure?"

     "We were telling Tom about your discoveries," said Edward, gesturing to take in the room full of ancient artifacts.

     The room was packed full of them from floor to ceiling and Thomas recognised a lot of stuff from Veglia. Items that must have been unearthed by the archaeological team they'd left behind and that the Jules Verne must have brought back while he'd been stranded on Fechlon. Most of the items were surrounded by transparent crystal, shielding the incredibly fragile objects from the rough handling they'd received during their long journey, and most also had little labels attached describing where they'd been found and how far under the ground. Some of them were books, and Thomas found himself wondering what ancient knowledge they contained. What clues they contained as to the long lost civilisation that had created them. The ink was faded almost to invisibility, though, and even after it had been restored there were bound to be concepts and nuances of language that not even the best translation spells could unravel. It would be a long time and a lot of careful study before the books finally gave up their secrets, for the first time in the Gods alone knew how many thousands of years.

     "You discovered that the Citybuilder and Ringbuilder civilisations have something in common," continued Edward.

     "Well, we don't actually know that," said the nome, but with a pleased grin. "It could just be a coincidence, you know."

     "What could?" demanded Thomas. "Do you think that the Citybuilders and the Ringbuilders belonged to the same civilisation?"

     "Oh no no, nothing like that," said the nome, waving his hairy hands at the other wizard irritably. "No, no, everything about them is far too different. Their architecture, their languages. The nature of the artifacts they left behind... No, no, they were quite different civilisations, I'm sure of it."

     "Then what?" demanded Thomas.

     "I was trying to cast an Identify spell. The same spell you used with such spectacular success on the Rossem meteorite. I was hoping to generate images of their civilisation, but although I tried many times, with several senior wizards lending me their power in an attempt to boost the spell, I wasn't able to accomplish anything. Their paramorphic traces have faded too much."

     The other wizards nodded their understanding. "They must be much older than the Rossem meteorite, then," said Tassley.

     "Not necessarily," replied Braddle. "The images of the Rossem ship contained in the Rossem meteorite were created by Rossemian magic, which might not have been affected by the conventional magical fields to which they would have been exposed during its time on Tharia. We can draw no conclusions about its age at all."

     "But you did learn something from the Citybuilder and Ringbuilder artefacts," pressed Thomas, eager to get the discussion back on track.

     "Yes indeed," agreed the nome. "I couldn't recover any actual images, but I was able to make an educated guess regarding the age of the oldest paramorphic traces. That, as you know, gives us a good estimate as to when the artefact was made, and the age of the youngest artifact tells us how long ago the civilisation fell."

     "They both fell at the same time!" gasped Thomas in astonishment. That had to be what he was leading up to.

     "Around the same time," agreed Braddle. "It's impossible to be precise without conjuring a Power and asking it directly..."