The Black Throne

She had gray eyes, and brown hair lay disheveled upon her brow. Her hands were delicate, fingers long.

Her blue skirt and white blouse were sand-streaked, smudged, the hem of the skirt sodden. Her full lips quivered as her gaze darted from him to the castle and back, but her eyes remained dry.

"I'm sorry," he repeated.

She turned her back to him. A moment later her bare foot kicked forward. Another wall fell, another tower toppled.

"Don't!" he cried, rising, reaching to restrain her. "Stop! Please stop!"

"No!" she said, moving forward, trampling towers. "No."

He caught hold of her shoulder and she pulled away from him, continuing to kick and stamp at the castle.

I caught hold of her shoulder. The whole damned roof was coming down, and fire was falling in on us, along with rafters, stone, wood.

"A

She didn't even seem to realize I was there. Somewhere high above I heard a wall give way. In a moment, I felt, the entire silly-ornate structure would be down here in the cellar with us.

"A

She wailed and the earth moved beneath our feet. So I clipped her on the jaw and caught her as she fell.

Then I called upon that bond established back in Spain before I'd entered Toledo.

"Ligeia!"

I saw her limned in light as I raised A

"I am waiting," she said.

"Here is my half of the way. Meet me at the middle, pray."

The corridor of silver shot forward to join with its counterpart. As I walked it to the place where the lady waited I heard at my back a long tumultuous shouting sound like the voice of a thousand waters.

I kept going.

XV

Months later I discovered to my total surprise that I had been named in the last will and testament of Seabright Ellison, inheriting from him a small stipend and the residence known as Landor's Cottage, where A

Our friends, such as Dirk Peters, have come to visit us from time to time. Neither of us has forgotten Edgar Allan Poe, who has left two worlds the poorer for his passing. We would that he could share with us the park-like splendors of this place where, on all sides, the violets, tulips, poppies, hyacinths, and tuberoses entangle amid the tall trees, among lily-fringed lakes and meadows.

And at times we open a different door, to the rear of that pleasant dwelling, stepping out upon a foggy beach where the sea flows warm as blood and dark shapes pass. From there we've journeyed many a midnight mile to realms both rare and strange, whose ways would not be open had our dear brother never been:

By a route obscure and lonely, Haunted by ill angels only, Where an Eidolon, named NIGHT, On a black throne reigns upright, I have reached these lands but newly From an ultimate dim Thule—

From a wild weird clime that lieth, sublime, Out of SPACE—out of TIME.

From Dream-Land, Edgar Allan Poe