Despite the impatient frowns of a few of his fellow contestants, Hollinrede said, “Therefore we’re to be judged as a unit? An entity?”
“Yes and no,” the voice replied. “And now the Test.”
Hollinrede saw to his astonishment a color spurt from his arm and hang hovering before him—a pool of inky blackness deeper in hue than the dark of space. His first reaction was one of shock; then he realized that he could control the color, make it move.
He glanced around. Each of his companions similarly faced a hovering mass of color. The giant of Fondelfor controlled red; the girl of Dubhe, orange. The Alpherazian stared into a whirling bowl of deep yellow, the Terran green, the Spican radiant violet, the Denebian pearly grey.
Hollinrede stared at his globe of black. A voice above him seemed to whisper, “Marti’s color would have been blue. The spectrum has been violated.”
He shrugged away the words and sent his globe of black spinning into the area between the seven contestants ringed in a circle. At the same time each of the others directed his particular color inward.
The colors met. They clashed, pinwheeled, seemed to throw off sparks. They began to swirl in a hovering arc of radiance.
Hollinrede waited breathlessly, watching the others. His color of black seemed to stand in opposition to the other six. Red, orange, yellow, green, violet. The pearl-grey of the Denebian seemed to enfold the other colors warmly—all but Hollinrede’s. The black hung apart.
To his surprise he saw the Dubhian girl’s orange beginning to change hue. The girl herself stood stiffly, eyes closed, her body now bare. Sweat poured down her skin. And her orange hue began to shift towards the grey of the Denebian.
The others were following. One by one, as they achieved control over their Test color. First to follow was the Spican, then the Alpherazian.
Why can’t I do that? Hollinrede thought wildly.
He strained to alter the color of his black, but it remained unchanged. The others were blending, now, swirling around; there was a predominantly grey cast, but it was not the grey of the Denebian but a different grey tending towards white. Impatiently he redoubled his efforts; it was necessary for the success of the group that he get his obstinate black to blend with the rest.
“The black remains aloof,” someone said near him.
“We will fail if the black does not join us.”
His streak of color now stood out boldly against the increasing milkiness of the others. None of the original colors were left now but his. Perspiration streamed down him; he realized that his was the only obstacle preventing the seven from passing the Test.
“The black still will not join us,” a tense voice said.
Another said, “The black is a color of evil.”
A third said, “Black is not a color at all. Black is the absence of color; white is the totality of color.”
A fourth said, “Black is holding us from the white.”
Hollinrede looked from one to the other in mute appeal. Veins stood out on his forehead from the effort, but the black remained unchanging. He could not blend it with the others.
From above came the voice of their examiner, suddenly accusing: “Black is the color of murder.”
The girl from Dubhe, lilting the ugly words lightly, repeated it. “Black is the color of murder.”
“Can we permit a murderer among us?” asked the Denebian.
“The answer is self-evident,” said the Spican, indicating the recalcitrant spear of black that marred the otherwise flawless globe of near-white in their midst.
“The murderer must be cast out ere the Test be passed,” muttered the giant of Fondelfor. He broke from his position and moved menacingly towards Hollinrede.
“Look!” Hollinrede yelled desperately. “Look at the red!”
The giant’s color had split from the grey and now darted wildly towards Hollinrede’s black.
“This is the wrong way, then,” the giant said, halting. “We must all join in it or we all fail.”
“Keep away from me,” Hollinrede said. “It’s not my fault if—”
Then they were on him—four pairs of hands, two rough claws, two slick tentacles. Hollinrede felt himself being lifted aloft. He squirmed, tried to break from their grasp, but they held him up—
And dashed him down against the harsh rock floor.
He lay there, feeling his life seep out, knowing he had failed—and watched as they returned to form their circle once again. The black winked out of being.
As his eyes started to close, Hollinrede saw the six colors again blend into one. Now that the murderer had been cast from their midst, nothing barred the path of their harmony. Pearly grey shifted to purest white—the totality of color—and as the six merged into one, Hollinrede, with his dying glance, bitterly saw them take leave forever of their bodies and slip upward to join their brothers hovering brightly above.