Night turned gradually to day, and so to night again.
The boy sang his song of the Old Kingdom in the chamber below the tower, and his people gathered to listen to him, to weep, and to drift away into the pillared halls again.
In the East, the Maggot-Cloud seethed and boiled and grew nearer and nearer the beautiful Palace.
Up in the tower with the boy-King the, children drank the rich wine that dulled their minds, and fell into a despairing sleep, waking to glimpse the mournful, silent boy standing by the window, with the blood- red light from the stained glass on his skin.
In their fitful sleep, strange and distant images appeared to tease them, only to disappear down black and echoing corridors.
Faces emerged from the darkness over and over again, and then sank into the night-black sea. Darach, the Queen, Benedick, the Keeper, the horsemen and the boy.
They glimpsed in sleep the marshlands, mist-bound, and the Beacon, fought the crab again, and ran in the forest, or in the field of buttercups where they had met with the rider.
And sometimes they caught hints of more distant places, places they had almost forgotten.
Rows of semi-detached houses on a bleak November morning, with the frost on the lawns and hedges, on the dead leaves in the gutter. Rain running down the window, blurring the street outside.
Memories of when they were small. The swing in an Aunt's back-garden, the smell of new-mown grass, a day at the sea-side with sand in the sandwiches, school playgrounds, a nosebleed, a loose tooth, 'All things bright and beautiful' sung in the Infants' school, with the dust caught in the sun through the window. Sad days and happy days. Warm feelings of Christmas, and the first day of the holidays.
All these things and a hundred more came to the children as they slept, and they woke with the Cloud nearer than ever, and the boy still standing by the window.
Another day passed.
Now the Cloud was very close. Outside the Palace, it was creeping across the ground. Cracks ran in the earth, opening by slow degrees into smoking fissures. Within the Cloud, the gloom was deep and all- pervading. It was like the end of the world; a landscape of slime and stone and smoke-belching crevices. All species of life were returning to the forms of their predecessors, and eventually to the mire and the tar pit.
Birds took on scales and teeth, as their fearsome forefathers had worn.
The great lizards returned to stamp the earth for a brief span, before they, in their turn, disappeared as the darkness deepened, and only the slime remained.
Thus the Cloud made an end to all life which its shadow fell upon.
Inside the Palace, the children wandered the echoing halls without purpose, their eyes unseeing, their minds unthinking. The Palace, the mosaics, the sweet wine and the boy had all worked their magic on the children, so that they had no will left in them.
Now even their dreams of their former lives had faded, and they could not remember how they came to be in the Palace. Darach, Desolation – they were just names, and meant nothing.
And the boy-King was pleased, for he had companions at last, although they were his unknowing prisoners. He had been lonely and frightened since he had become King.
Now, he thought, though the Cloud will overwhelm us, I will have friends beside me at the last.
They were in the boy-King's room at the top of the tower when finally the end began. Graham was sitting on the floor in front of the window, looking out with sightless eyes to the dark wall of Cloud not fifty yards from the Palace walls. Suddenly a shadow fell across the window.
The boy, who was sprawled in the corner, stood up. "Graham!" he said. "Come away from the window!"
"What?" Graham turned slowly, sleepy with the wine. Colin shook his head to try and clear it.
Something was hovering outside the window. They could all hear the beating of its wings. The children stirred from their stupor, woken by fear.
"Look out Graham!" yelled Colin.
The window was smashed inwards, the colored glass exploding into a million pieces, spiralling and tumbling with a horrid slowness. Time seemed to freeze.
In that moment Graham remembered where he had seen all this before. In a dream, a long, long time ago.
His wine-cup flew from his hand as the claws closed around him. The children rushed forward, but the wings dragged backwards, and Graham disappeared through the window. Colin reached for him but their hands missed touching by inches. For a moment, however, he caught sight of the winged creature that had captured Graham before it bore him into the wall of Cloud.
"Eyes," he said when it had gone. "It had hundreds of eyes."
He knelt in the shattered glass from the window and was silent. The spell, if spell it had been, was broken.
"We must go after him," said Colin. "How could we have stayed here so long, after coming so far?"
"I feel as if I've just woken from a long sleep," said Gwen.
"Me too."
"What about him?" Gwen pointed to the boy-King, who had shrunk back against the wall in fear, and was still frozen there, staring through the window.
"The Cloud is very close," said Gwen gently to the boy-King, "but you and your people can still escape. Or come with us -"
"Yes," said Colin, "come with us. We can win - I know we can. And with you to help us."
The boy-King didn't move.
"I must stay," he said after a moment. "I am a King, and this is my only place. When it falls, then so must I. I am unable to feel what you feel, and I would be lost. I envy you your belief, your courage, and your strength. I'm sorry I detained you from your task. I was lonely and wanted companions with me when -" he stopped, and tears cascaded down his cheeks. At last he said, "I will believe there can be other dreams and lives. Next time I will share yours. For now - I must be a King."
"Goodbye," said Gwen.
"Goodbye," said the boy. "I hope you succeed."
He turned his face away from them, and said no more. Gwen ran out of the room, and started down the stairs.
"Come on Colin!" she shouted.
"All right," said Colin. "I'm coming." Then he spoke very quietly.
"Boy -" he said.
The boy looked up.
"I won't forget you," said Colin, "or the people with stars for eyes! I think there'll be other dreams."
"Yes," said the boy softly.
"I'll be seeing you," said Colin. The boy understood. He smiled.
They stood for a moment, in the high tower on Desolation's Edge, a boy from this world and a King from that, and smiled at each other.
Then Colin was leaping down the stairs, five or six at a time. When he and Gwen were at the bottom he took her by the hand, and the two of them raced out of the Palace by the Eastern gate, and into the darkening air.
The Maggot-Cloud reeled before them. The world seemed to shake. Colin looked at his sister, and tightening his grip on her trembling hand, said, "Come on, Gwen. We're all the world has got left."
Then they raced across the shaking ground, and plunged into the darkness.