The Facet

Crystal trunks under crowns of prism glass, standing in their own dust. Nobody carved them and nobody planted them: cut one and there are rings inside, and every year there is one more.

Low dunes of crystal dust heaped by a wind that does not blow here, or has not yet. Each one is a crescent, and the horns of every crescent point the same way. Shards of prism glass stand in the slopes where they fell.

A tall smithy of crystal brick with a chimney higher than its roof, floored in plating that came through the rift with the smiths. Here they forged the edges that cut the facets, and the hearth of light has not gone out. The roof has fallen in over the anvil, and the one who stands at it with his hammer raised has not moved since. The blade blanks are sealed in the west wall.

The same ring as on Earth, on a dais of the local stone and in the colors of this world: whoever set the gates out did it on every world at once. This one sleeps. It answers only one who has brought down the master of this world and lived through its trial; then lay the master's heart, the dust of the road and what this world gives into the ring, and it will join the other gates that are awake.

A stepped pyramid of prism glass with a chamber at its heart, sealed on every side. Through the glass you can see the sarcophagus, the two chests, the candles, and that there is nobody inside, and never was.

A round shaft six blocks deep with a stair winding down its wall. The veins in the brick grow thicker toward the bottom, and the bottom is brighter than the sky: the light in this well comes from below.

A long hall of crystal brick with mirrors of dark glass between its pilasters and a greater mirror at the far end, framed in light. The roof has come down over the east aisle and half the mirrors are gone. This is where the facet came to look at itself, and something still looks back.

Two pillars of prism glass on a paved dais, with a stepped lintel between them and nothing in the opening. The road beyond ends after two paces. Whoever raised the gate meant it to lead somewhere, and the somewhere has not arrived yet.

The cutters of the Facet carved four tiers into the living crystal under a rock face split by light: cells and workshops, the halls where they learned to lead light with runes and mirrors, the forges where the tall smiths of the End hammered light into wedges, and at the bottom the mirror galleries. They believed that light split finely enough would open the gate on the plain, and to keep the light in order they built a guardian out of prism glass. The cutters are long gone. The smiths still stand at their forges, and the archon still sorts the light into colors.

A ring of polished crystal and resonant ore standing on its rim, taller than two houses. It hums when something warm comes near, and the hum climbs with every step closer. Nothing has been found yet that it is tuned to.