further below the surface. It was a splendid room, equipped with all
kinds of luxuries and embellishments and spreading out like a quarter
circle around a central stage with a podium upon it. Seats were arranged
in arching rows, with a sort of cluster of seats around a wooden desk
being allotted to each of the members of the council and his aide de
camps; there were two hundred such clusters. Sitting there like they had
been woken from sleep to attend to us were the delegates, looking tired
and untidy, a rare state for a Canitaur to be in, with their clothes
ruffled, their hair uncombed, and their eyes glazed with a discordant
state of mind.

Wagner, who turned out to be a high official among them, led me to the
top of the stage where the podium was, with a sofa, desk, and several
chairs behind it, concealed from the council by the raised floor and
walls that formed the base of the podium, creating a small, private
anteroom for those at the podium. I laid myself down tiredly on the sofa
to rest while Wagner took the stage and began to speak.

"Friends, comrades, associates," he said to the council, "I thank you
for neglecting your beds at this late hour to join with us here in the
Hall of Meeting, for there is something very important to be shared. You
are all no doubt familiar with the ancient prophecy of the Externus
Miraculum: long ago it was told that in our extreme need, when hope no
longer exists in the hearts of many, an ancient would be sent by Onan
our lord to redeem and deliver us from the evils of this world, for as
our doom was wrought in their times, so would our hope originate. The
past cannot be changed except by those who first made it, and our
present is dictated by the happenings of the past, so that for a better
future the past must be changed, and only then will we be freed from the
burdens of history."