((Author's Note: In case no one knows (and I'm sure no one does), the last line is from an electronic song by Yahel, called "Reality." The line popped into my head. I like this piece, because it seems like a dream I never had, so to speak.))

"There are two ways to say it," she said, turning toward me in the cavernous, empty Hall. The sun was setting, and as she turned she stepped in front of it so that her head was framed by a circle of brightness that turned her face into a study of contrasts of light and dark, her eyes shimmering from shadowed depths.

"Either the only universal truth is that there is no universal truth, or--" she paused, looked at me as though she measured me, "or the only universal truth is that there are infinite truths. They are the same statement--with slightly different nuances."

I inclined my head slightly, to say I understood. She stood still, gazing at me. It seemed almost as if she cocked her head in thought, although she had not actually done so. After another long moment, she closed her eyes, and, half-turning, summoned me to her side with a gesture that seemed as surreal as her profile blazoned against the white sun.

I reached her in the matter of a few strides, stood beside her as we gazed down into the blind sun and the streets and square below; the gold and browns of the buildings and bazaars and people wandering through them were not muted by the light, but sharpened by it.

"Soon the sun will set once more on this lonely place," she said, as the people far below inched their way across the panorama like the caged birds they were. "Will you be ready for the dark?"

Her question echoed in a sudden blackness as the sun was sucked below the horizon. As my eyes struggled to adjust, I heard her next to me, repeating, "Will you be ready for that darkness?"

"I do not know, my lady," I replied. "I cannot know until my time has come. Until I must decide. It is then that...." I stopped talking. Then that...what? What trial was I to face in the time to come, what test? Test of what? What were we talking about? Then I knew I must be dreaming....

"What are dreams, but another level of reality, another skin on the onion, another sandstorm covering the remains of the first?" she said. "What is reality that you seek it so tirelessly and tiredly, so endlessly and so reluctantly?"

I had no answer. We stood still at the portal, never looking at each other as we spoke, but always out, out into the world, into the lands and skies of the only reality that can be measured, the only thing that can be known for certain as real.

"What is reality?" she asked me, her voice almost insolent in its sweetness, as if she asked what I had eaten for dinner, or what color my eyes were. As if she had not just read my mind for the third time that night, and as if she had not just asked one question too many for me to answer.

"I do not know, milady," I replied, stressing each word except the last. I knew I sounded exasperated and tired, but I was exasperated and tired, so I saw no harm in dropping pretence.

"Then maybe," she said crisply, turning toward me, "you should think about it until you find out." She continued pivoting on her heels until she faced the Hall, and began to glide away, any motion other than forward hidden by her voluminous skirts and the shadows.

I continued to look out the window. The city and its buildings and people were invisible in the dark. But I could see the desert beyond, the sands scattered with glistening sparks reflecting the sky spread over them.

"Reality," I said aloud, the word reverberating through the empty Hall. "Creating a bond with reality."