"There's scarcely enough to report it," Dutiful replied. He took a breath, and despite his own words, began in the orderly way in which Chade had schooled both of us. "I had retired to my chambers, exactly as if I were going to sleep for the night. I was in my bed. There was a low fire in the hearth, and I was watching it, unfocusing my mind in a way that I hoped would invite sleep and yet leave me aware enough to reach out with the Skill. Twice I dozed off. Each time, I roused myself and tried to approach the exercise again. The third time, I tried reversing the process. I reached out with the Skill, held myself in readiness, and then tried to sink down into sleep." He cleared his throat and looked around at us. "Then I felt something big. Really big." He looked at me. "Like that time on the beach."

Thick was following the tale with his jaw ajar and his small round eyes bunched with thought. "A big fat blue lizard," he hazarded.

"No, Thick." Dutiful patiently kept his voice soft. "Not at first. At first, there was just this immense… presence. And I longed to go toward it, and yet I feared to go toward it. Not because of any deliberate threat from it. On the contrary, it seemed… infinitely benign. Restful and safe. I was afraid to touch it for fear that … I'd lose any desire to come back. It seemed like the end of something. An edge, or a place where something different begins. No. Like something that lives in a place where something different begins." The Prince's voice trickled away.

"I don't understand. Talk sense," Chade demanded.

"It's as much sense as you can apply to it," I interceded quietly. "I know the sort of being, or feeling, or place, that the Prince is speaking about. I've encountered such, a time or two. Once, one helped us. But I had the feeling that one was an exception. Perhaps another one of them might have absorbed us and not even noticed.