“The effort, the preparations, all the expense! Oh Gandamel, you shouldn’t have!”
“For you, my lady, no expense shall be spared.” The wizard bowed like a gentleman. Young Lady Muriel giggled.

“I give you truth in the pleasant disguise of illusion!” he waved a hand and extinguished the candles around the room. “Close your eyes and concentrate on the runes. See their shapes, how they dance into lines, connecting into webs of delicate spells. Can you see the spell?”

“Oh, oh, yes – it stretches across the ceiling!”
“Good. Good. Now concentrate on the spaces between, try to see beyond them.”
“There are stars, galaxies, and presences, Gandamel! I feel them!”
“Open your heart to them, to their language.”

Lady Muriel was quiet for a long time. She began to sweat, Gandamel worried it was too much for her and was about to break the spell when she opened her eyes.
“I understood the art of conversation!”

“How did they speak?”
“By smell!”
“Smell?”
“Yes! Isn’t the air delightful after the shower?”