'It is correct that there was a dispute between myself and the present Grand Master of the fellowship,' Aaroen replied pedantically. 'Grimwald's concept of the septaggin is not only fallacious but is, moreover, a heretical interpretation of the divine tetrarch.'
'He's also a nasty little toad,' Tom said.
He moved to the centre of the loft and watched Aaroen sort through a stack of parchments. The priest found what he was looking for and held it up.
'I understand that you are knowledgeable about eclipses.'
'That's right.' Tom nodded. 'In my former realm we can predict the time of an eclipse to the smallest fraction of a heartbeat.'
'Did you tell Grimwald that?'
'I did. The little sod was going to do a deal with me. I was going to tell him about eclipses and he was going to tell me about the different realms of existence and how to travel between them.'
'He knows nothing about the realms,' Aaroen's voice boomed. 'Grimwald is an ignorant man, an usurper of the power of the septaggin and a blasphemer against the divine will ...'
Tom waited until the priest ran out of words.
'What do you know about the realms?'
'There are twelve,' Aaroen replied confidently. 'We are in the seventh. You journeyed here from the sixth and did so by following the Way of the Wizard.'
'I went up a realm,' Tom said.
'No.' Aaroen raised his head in a superior manner. 'You descended. The first realm is the highest. The twelfth is the lowest ... a most abominable and vile place.'
The revelation came as a shock but was not a total surprise.
'Her Majesty has often remarked that the place I came from seems to have many advantages over this one,' Tom said.
'In what way does she find it more attractive?'
'She's likes what I've told her about the religion.'
'Really.' Aaroen leant forward. 'Does religious practice in the sixth realm differ much from what you find here?'
'What I find here has a lot in common with what went on in my former realm in the past. By the time my people had reached the degree of material sophistication which I encounter amongst the village people here, they had abandoned the more barbaric aspects of the old religions.'
'Indeed.' Aaroen could scarcely contain his excitement. 'Did they adopt a new religion or modify the old?'
Tom embarked on a detailed account of every religious innovation since the advent of farming and Aaroen listened intently.'