The Lighthouse of Alexandria is a tall tower at the tip of the Alexandrian coast that guides ships “to a certain port” and serves as a focus for travel to other times. It is the seat of the guardian of Libra and neutral territory.
| Location | Alexandria |
| Spanish entry | Faro de Alejandría |
Description
It stands on marble and on land won from the sea: stones, flattened earth and “something like concrete”. Visitors arrive by teleport and climb near-marble stairs. From the top “the horizon is not at 11 meters, it is at 3 kilometers”.
The upper chamber, about ninety feet (thirty meters) across, has eight windows facing “the eight directions”. At its center a bronze-gold column forty feet (twelve meters) tall, wound by a spiral stair, carries six arms with twelve scales whose pans move constantly, as if floating; six chests, one under each arm, support it. Above stands “a kind of organ, a keyboard, a giant controller” with large copper and gold keys sized for a hand.
Function
- Time travel: it is “a focus for traveling to other times”, aiming at specific locations as well as within a radius. With the Eiffel Tower and the Lighthouse of Serpent Island — a black monolith with a will-o’-the-wisp glow that “brings ships”, where the serpent may be nesting — it forms a triangulation aimed at a stellar position. If it goes dark, transit to other times closes; hence it is attacked and garrisoned.
- Neutral ground: a place of communications and “replicas”, the only possible meeting point between opposing sides.
It reportedly held “all the great objects of science and magic together”, tested there.
History
It went dark and was relit. It has been attacked and was a site of conflict with the elemental planes. In one version it is not at full height, and “a kind of fort and a guard” stand in its place.
Other lighthouses
Alexandria is the pattern for others: lighthouses on an island; in Isidora, glowing “now and then” at dusk; at the foot of the mountain near the marsh; an unfinished one compared with Alexandria; the Lighthouse of Bilixin, allowing transit between Antiterra’s platforms because the guardian Bilixin “opens the place”; and a black lighthouse needed to guide travel into the Plane of Shadows.
Its reverse is the Negative Lighthouse, “the dark version of the Lighthouse of Alexandria”: a huge port with a “very tall, thin and angular” lighthouse, reached through the black lighthouse at the bottom of the Gorge of Gorgias, where not even the people of the Plane of Shadows descend — “perhaps the only direct way”.
Conflicting accounts
Its height is given as 40 meters above sea level, 120 meters, “almost 30 or 40 meters”, and 700 feet above ground.
Open questions
- What the six chests hold, how they relate to the scales and keys, and who may play the organ are unknown.
- Who darkened and relit it, and for how long, is not recorded.
- Whether the unfinished lighthouse is another, a replica or this one in another era is unclear.
- “Twelve valantes” and a “reflection of the lighthouse” with special power are unexplained.
- Who guarantees its neutrality, and whether the minor lighthouses share its network, is unknown.