And Eternity (2 page)

“But this is a house!” Orlene exclaimed. “A strange house, with leaves sprouting from the walls and soil for the floor! How can this be the realm of spirits?”

Jolie realized that it was best to focus first on the basics. Soon enough they would get to the specifics of the woman’s situation, when she was ready for them.

“All the Incarnations have homes in Purgatory,” she explained. “They each have servants and staff to assist them in their formidable duties. But the Incarnation of Nature prefers to run her household alone, so that none may know her comings and goings, and indeed it can be quite difficult to visit. That is why I am certain of our privacy.”

“This is the home of Nature?” Orlene asked, amazed. “Yes. That is why it is alive. All living things, and most dead ones, are her business. She is perhaps the most powerful of the Incarnations, aside from Good and Evil.”

“But how can we be here?”

Jolie smiled. “I am a friend of the Incarnation. Indeed, I am her closest companion and confidante, for all that I am merely a ghost like you. That is why I was able to bring you here.”

“I thought you were just a dream figment, a companion I invented in my sleep! You never said anything about Incarnations!”

“Not that you may remember at the moment,” Jolie said. “It was not relevant. I am part of a complex skein, and am not free to discuss much of it, but this much you may accept: I came to you by design, not chance, and I have loved you as I would my own child.”

Now Orlene remembered something. “You said you were a friend of my mother! But my parents never said anything about the supernatural!”

They were about to get into the woman’s history. That was good, because the more time and thought that separated her from the concept of her recent death, the better. “You were adopted. I referred to your natural mother, who had to give you up when you were just a few weeks old.”

“A blind Gypsy,” Orlene agreed. “There was never any secrecy about my origin. My parents were always good to me, and I am thankful to have come to them. I had hoped to be as good for my own baby as they were for me.” Then, abruptly, she clouded up, remembering the tragedy.

“A Gypsy woman gave you to your family,” Jolie agreed. “But she was not your mother. She was a friend of your mother, before I was. Your mother conceived you out of wedlock, and your father was unexpectedly prevented from marrying her, and she had other business, so had to give you up. The Gypsy would have kept you, but fate denied her; it was her charge to give you to a suitable American family, and that she did. Your mother could have followed you, but elected not to interfere; by her own design, she let you go so that you could be a complete part of your new family. Except that-”

“She sent you!” Orlene exclaimed.

“Not exactly,” Jolie said. “It was another who did that. He told her nothing except that you were well and happy. I came to you in your dreams and helped you to learn things you could not otherwise have learned, so that some day you might better understand the situation of your mother. In the course of that I soon came to love you myself, and now I regard you as mine too.”

“But you are no older than I am!”

“My dear, physically I am not. But I died in the year 1208. I have been a ghost ever since.”

Orlene stared at her. “But that’s almost eight hundred years ago!”

“Almost,” Jolie agreed. “I was seventeen, divinely married, and learning sorcery in southern France. But there was a crusade against the Albigensians, because they were resisting taxation, and the first thing the Church went after was opposing sorcerers. I died, and my husband fled, but he prevailed on Thanatos to let him carry me with him in a drop of my blood on his wrist. I could not quite depart the mortal realm, you see, because of an abiding evil in my situation, so I remained. When my husband was confined in Hell, Gaea took my drop of blood, and I became her companion instead of his. I am omitting considerable detail, but that is the essence. I remain in appearance as I was when I died: younger than you.”

“So you are seventeen-and eight hundred years old!” Orlene exclaimed. “And you knew my genetic mother!”

“And know her still. I can introduce you to her, if you wish.”

Orlene considered. “No, I think I would rather not know. I would not see her as my mother, and it could be awkward, especially since I am a ghost.”

“Perhaps that is best. She knows that I have been in touch with you, but does not know your identity or that you have died, and I will not tell her if you prefer.”

“Do not tell her,” Orlene agreed. “I have sown enough pain already! But do tell me, if you are the companion of the Incarnation of Nature, how is it that you had occasion to interact with others, such as my mother or myself?”

“I am bound to Gaea by my drop of blood, the sole remaining vestige of my mortal body. But she is busy with many things which are hardly my concern, and gives me leave to go where I wish and do what I wish. I always return to her when she needs me, but most of the time I am on my own, and so I meet many folk, living and dead. At the moment I am engaged in a project to locate suitable candidates to become Incarnations, and this is a most challenging enterprise.”

“Incarnations! They are looking for replacements?”

“Not precisely. They merely want to have a pool of excellent candidates to draw from when the need arises. The candidates in the pool are not notified, they are merely observed, and then when the occasion should come, one of them may be tapped. It is better than allowing it to continue at random. I was observing a man in France, not far from my mortal residence, when I felt your dying. The observation is long-term and can wait, while your death was immediate, so I came right away.”

“I would not want to keep you from your job! Once I am reunited with my baby, I have little care for what happens to me. I would rather be in Hell with him than in Heaven without him.” She was evidently sincere.

“I will help you find him; my time is not pressed.” Jolie looked at the ghost. “But, if I may, let me get you into better shape.”

“Shape?”

“You look exactly as you were when you died. This is not kind. It might be better to restore you to your aspect of health.”

“I can have no joy until I find my son, Gaw.”

“Who?”

Orlene smiled. “He was named after his legal ghost father, Gawain. Gaw for short, or Gaw-Two.”

“Gaw,” Jolie agreed, understanding. “Come, here is a mirror.” She stood, beckoning Orlene to a full-length mirror set in the living wall. It was formed of level water, tilted vertically; Gaea preferred natural things, with some leavening of magic.

The woman looked, and was appalled. “I look awful!”

“Your grief caused you to waste away. You might have died in due course even if you hadn’t taken poison. But as a ghost you may assume any appearance, and it would be pointless to remain gaunt.”

“But I have sinned by killing myself, and should pay the penalty.”

“By the existing standard, yes, you have sinned. But your appearance can neither aggravate nor atone for that. If you are to recover your baby, it may be best to assume an appearance that does not advertise your grief. We may have to query many folk.”

Orlene, gazing at herself, seemed inclined to agree. Like most lovely women, she was conscious of appearances. “How can I-?”

“As you become experienced in your present condition, you will gain proficiency in form changing. But for now, why don’t you just lie down and rest or sleep, while I investigate the location of your baby? Think of the form you wish to assume, and your body will gradually approach it.”

“But I must search Gaw out myself!” Orlene protested. “And so you shall! But there are queries I can make most readily by myself, such as with the Purgatory Computer, which is in a public region. Let me do this while you rest; I promise that you will be the first to know anything I learn.”

Orlene wavered. “Can the dead sleep?” Jolie laughed. “The dead can do what they choose! I slept for centuries when my husband associated with Hell. I did not truly come awake until Gaea took me. I had much to catch up on then! Part of it I learned while being your friend, in your dreams, for you were a girl of the modern world.”

“My friend,” Orlene echoed. “Those dreams, I forgot them by day, but they were wonderful by night! We did so much together!”

“So much,” Jolie agreed. “It was almost like being alive again.”

“And now I am dead,” Orlene said sadly. “Already I regret my foolishness. I wish I had had your advice, before I…”

“I wish I had been watching!” Jolie said. “It is my fault as much as yours.” Indeed, she felt the guilt! To allow this woman, of all those alive, to die so pointlessly, Jolie felt she had been criminally neglectful. She dreaded the revelation she would at some time have to make.

“I think I will lie down,” Orlene said. “So much has happened! I never expected the Afterlife to be like this. It will take time to adjust.”

Jolie led her to a guest chamber in the residence. There was a bed of roses, literally, fragrant and soft. “Rest, here, and I will return shortly,” she said. “Remember, you are absolutely safe here; no one, mortal or immortal, will intrude. Only Gaea and I can enter without challenge, or those we bring.”

Orlene lay in the bed. The bright petals rose up around her like the decoration on a fluffy quilt. She closed her eyes and in a moment was asleep.

Already she was looking better. The deep lines on her face were easing, and her gaunt body seemed to be filling out. She had been beautiful, very like her mother, and soon would be again.

Satisfied, Jolie faded out of the scene.

She went first to Gaea. This was easy to do; she merely relaxed, and her home drop of blood hauled her in elastically. In an instant she was there.

It was a biological laboratory. Gaea had assumed the form of a gallon of air, making her effectively invisible. Jolie didn’t have to bother; as a ghost she was naturally invisible, unless she made an effort to manifest optically or sonically. Only another ghost or an Incarnation could perceive her now.

“Business settled?” Gaea inquired, spying Jolie.

“Only begun, it seems,” Jolie replied. “My friend died because she lost her baby, and she wishes to find him. I told her I would help.”

“By all means. You mean to check the Computer?”

“Yes, by your leave.”

“Granted. As it happens, I have a spot of research myself. Perhaps you could check that at the same time.”

Gaea was always polite about her requests. The truth was that she had complete power over Jolie, who was now one of her staff members, but she never abused it. Quite the opposite! It was possible that she did have research to do-but as likely that this was merely a way of legitimizing Jolie’s mission. “Certainly. What do you need?”

“This is a genetic laboratory. The gene splicing is routine, but the project isn’t. They have, they think, perfected a variety of fruit fly that will consume residual oil pollution, and they are breeding it in sufficient number to colonize the Gulf coastline where the spill of ‘ninety-five still festers. My concern is that a random mutation could direct those flies elsewhere. Here is the key aspect of the pattern; have the Computer run a check for possible mutations within my specified tolerance.” She held out a ghostly pebble.

Jolie took the pebble, knowing that the pattern was imbued; the Purgatory Computer would know what to do with it. “I shall be back shortly, Gaea.”

“And perhaps, thereafter, we shall make a visit,” Gaea murmured. “If you feel inclined.”

“Always.” They never spoke directly of this particular matter; it was an understanding of long duration.

The Purgatory Computer had not been changed in twenty years. At this point, the equipment of the mortals was far more sophisticated. But the Purgatory Computer had magic and personality, and it did the job, so there was no push to replace it. Jolie had come to know it well, in the course of her errands for Gaea; they got along just fine.

A
GREETING
,
BRIDE
OF
SATAN
, the screen printed as she entered its main chamber.

“And half a greeting to you, obsolescent machine,” she responded cheerily. “Got a pain in your nuts and bolts?”

NOT
UNTIL
THIS
MOMENT
,
GHOST
GIRL
.

“Watch yourself, or I’ll kick you in your data base.”

YOU
CAN’T
. IT
WOULD
BE
ANACHRONISTIC
FOR
A
THIRTEENTH-CENTURY
PEASANT
TO
KNOW
THAT
TERM
.

“I learn quickly, you overachieving word processor.”

ENOUGH
OF
THIS
FOOLISH
BANTER
,
EVIL
EMISSARY
.
WHAT
IS
YOUR
WILL?

“Two items, you arrogant device. Run this sample through your files and see what it matches.” She fed the pebble into a little hopper.

The computer blinked. THERE is A 15% PROBABILITY THAT THIS WILL MUTATE INTO A FUEL-EATING SPECIES WITHIN FIFTY YEARS. THE GREEN MOTHER WILL NOT LIKE THAT.

“She certainly won’t! How much damage would occur if that happens?”

DEPENDS
ON
THE
FUEL
. BY
THAT
TIME
THERE
MAY
NOT
BE A
LOT
OF
CRUDE
OIL
LEFT
,
BUT
IF
THE
FLY
GOES
FOR
SYNTHETIC
OIL
,
THERE
COULD
BE A
MAJOR
DISRUPTION
. IT
CAN
BE
EXTREMELY
DIFFICULT
TO
REVERSE
SUCH
A
COURSE
,
ONCE
ESTABLISHED
.