“I gave him what he wanted,” said the wizened curator, a smile creeping in at the edges of his lips.
Pulling out an eyeglass, I inspected the small black orb. The translucent material held many slight imperfections which caught the light of our room, sparkling like little stars as you shifted your perspective. In the dead center, though, a tiny mass of blackness could be seen.
“Here,” said the curator, handing me his magnifying lens.
Taking this, I was able to gaze deeper into the orb. The small dark spot now took on a distinct shape. Bifurcated, the lower half appeared to be distinctly triangular and the upper a sort of regular series of spikes.
“There he is.”
“What?” I said.
“He’s in there, in his castle.” The curator laughed. “He wanted to rule over a universe, so I made him one, a small one, and put him and his dreaded black castle in it.”
I thought back to the giant crater where the evil lord’s castle had been, and considered what the corresponding shape of the missing earth might appear to be. Looking back into the orb, the little triangular section of the dark spot fitted nicely.
Tale Told 