There was a tingle like a mild electric shock. Forrester opened his
mouth and then closed it again as the tingle stopped, and the sense of
falling simply died away. He had closed his eyes on the way into the
curtain, and now he opened them again.
He closed them very quickly, counted to ten, and took a deep breath.
Then he opened them to look at the room he was in.
It was unlike any room he had ever seen before. It didn't have the
opulence of the High Priestess's rooms. I am a room, it seemed to say,
and a room is what I was meant to be. I don't have to draw attention to
myself like my poorer sisters. I am content merely to exist as the room
of rooms, the very type and image of the Ideal Enclosure.
The floors and walk of the place seemed to blend into each other at odd
angles. Forrester's eyes couldn't quite follow them or understand them,
and judging the size of the room was out of the question. There was a
golden wash of light filling the room, though it didn't seem to come
from anywhere in particular. It was, in fact, as if the room itself were
shining. Forrester blinked and rubbed his eyes. The light, or whatever
it was, was changing color.
Gradually, he realized that it went on doing that. He wasn't sure that
he liked it, but it was certainly different. The colors went from gold
to pale rose to violet to blue, and so on, back to gold again, while
little eddies and swirls of light sparkled into rainbows here and there.
Forrester began to feel dizzy again.
There were various objects standing around here and there in the room,
but Forrester couldn't quite tell what they were. Even their sizes were
difficult to judge, because of the shifting light and shape of the room
itself. There was only one thing that seemed reasonably certain.
He was alone in the room.
Set in one wall was a square of light that didn't change color quite as
much as everything else. Forrester judged it to be a window and headed
for it. With his first step, he discovered something else about the
place.
The carpeting was completely unique. Instead of fiber, the floor seemed
to have been covered a foot deep with foam rubber. Forrester didn't
exactly walk to the window; he bounced there. The sensation was almost
enjoyable, he thought, when you got used to it. He wondered just how
long it took to get used to it and settled on eighty years as a good
first guess.
He stood in front of the window. He looked out.
He saw nothing but clouds and sky.
It took a long while for him to decide what to do next, and when he
finally did come to a decision, it was the wrong one.
He looked down.
Below him there were tumbled rocks, ledges of ice and snow, clouds
and--far, far below--the flat land of the Earth. He wanted to shut his
eyes, but he couldn't. The whole vast stomach-churning panorama spread
out beneath him endlessly. The people below, if there were any, weren't
even big enough to be ants. They were completely invisible. Forrester
took a deep breath and gripped the side ledges of the window.