Bearing an Hourglass (34 page)

“,dnatsrednu I” she agreed.

It was at that point he became fully aware of the futility of trying to have any continuing relationship with a normal woman. He had run up against this with Orlene, but that had been a special case. Now he realized it was not a special case; backward existence prevented any close relationship with any normal person. This was the penalty he paid for his office. Clotho had known, and had provided him with an alternate fulfillment. Clotho understood the problem of the Incarnations, who were human yet unhuman, himself most of all. As another Incarnation, Clotho could handle it. But Agleh—

“,rettel a uoy etirw ll’I” she said.

“A letter, yes,” he agreed, surprised.

“?ti dnes I dluohs erehW”

“Where?” Norton pondered. “To Chronos, I suppose, in care of Purgatory.” Did the mail service deliver mail to Purgatory? It seemed to him that Thanatos had mentioned that it did, in the course of their last conversation. He wrote the address out for her:
CHRONOS, C/O
PURGATORY
. “But I can’t be sure the letter will reach me or that I’ll be able to answer. And if it does reach me, I don’t know
when.”
Perhaps two years before she wrote it? Reverse time had its pitfalls.

Now it was close to six in the morning. He had come within striking time of his mission. Soon after 5
A.M.
…

A.M
.—how significant each marker of that had become! A. for Ante, M. for Meridian—before the meridian of
noon. A convenient contraction. It had never seemed very important to him before.

But it was time for him to orient on the conclusion of his mission. He had avoided the questing demons—yet how could he reach the right capsule at the key moment without alerting them? They would be clustering close, and though, as an Incarnation, he was theoretically immune to molestation by Hell’s minions, he wasn’t sure they couldn’t balk him on this. After all, he was the one trying to change reality or to unchange it. The advantage probably lay with the present status quo.

“,pleh ll’I” Agleh volunteered.

Involve her with the minions of Satan? Norton didn’t like that.
NO. DANGEROUS
, he wrote.

WHAT IF
SATAN WINS
? she wrote back.

She had him there. “Hell on Earth,” he muttered.

“,htraE no lleH” she repeated. And, on paper:
CAN YOU DO IT ALONE?

Norton considered. Probably he would have to wait till the last moment, then charge in and hope that nothing balked him. It was a one-chance effort. What were his chances for success? Fifty-fifty? With the fate of the world at issue, he did not like that. But how could he improve the odds?

YOU CAN
’
T
, she wrote.

He sighed. She was probably right. But he wasn’t sure how she could help. He certainly didn’t want her getting involved with demons; she was too nice a girl. “I’ll just have to try it by myself,” he told her firmly.

She started to protest, but he was firm. The memory of Orlene and her fate bothered him, and he was determined not to be responsible for any more mischief to a mortal.

Agleh relented reluctantly. She wrote:
COME BACK IF
—

“I will,” Norton promised, hoping he wouldn’t have to return here. He squeezed her hand and left.

He was getting better at walking backward, though his leg muscles protested. Much could be done with peripheral vision and careful attention to sound. By walking
ahead of another person, he could be reasonably certain there were no obstacles in the immediate vicinity, because in forward time he would have been following that person, and the other naturally avoided problems of terrain. In any event, he was now familiar with this region, and that helped.

His plan was to get as close to the key room as he could without being observed and hide until the proper moment. He would catch the demon just after it changed the capsule—which would be just
before
in normal time—and douse it with the holy water before it retreated back to its association with his prior self. Of course, that would not prevent it from rejoining him, but that was not the point; this would prevent it from messing with the capsule. If he timed his action precisely, the watching demons from this present time might not be able to balk him.

He backed to the shelter of a tree and paused there as if resting. A bird-dropping jumped up from before him to rejoin its origin; good thing he hadn’t been standing there! The other pedestrians continued on by, retreating toward their homes without paying him any attention. It was early morning now; the sun was no longer beaming down. When he believed no one was watching, Norton backed slantwise across the lawn to another tree, and thence to a side gate into the Senator’s estate. Now he was in a walled-in garden, a pleasant place. A child was there, just unpicking a flower; the stem became whole as she placed the severed ends together.

What was she doing here at this hour? The flower wasn’t even open yet; it was waiting for a direct ray of sun.

“,olleh ,hO” she said, becoming aware of Norton.

“Olleh,” he replied, then essayed a question. “Ereh evil uoy od?”

She glanced at him, her brow quirking at his odd pronunciation and emphasis. “.rotisiv a fo rueffuahc eht fo rethguad eht m’I .oN”

Norton found this too much to assimilate, so he just smiled. He wanted to get away from her and into the
house. “Gnol os,” he said, beginning to back away nonchalantly.

“!ynnuf er’uoY” she said.

Norton proceeded through the garden, handicapped by its unfamiliarity. He stumbled against the footing for a potted tree. Well, now he was alone; he turned about and walked forward.

A man stepped out before him from an alcove in the estate wall. “.sonorhC”

Norton froze. This man recognized him! “Who—?”

The man only smiled. Then Norton saw his eyes. They were like glassy lenses, with dim red lights behind. Demon eyes!

He had been caught by a demon lurking in human form. Now, in the immediate vicinity of Chronos, the demon could interact somewhat on his terms. “!yortseD” it said and grabbed for Norton.

That was warning enough. Norton let his cloak spread out beyond his suit. The man-demon’s hands aged and weakened as they came into contact with that cloak. Hastily he hauled them back, cursing backward.

“.olleH”

Both men turned. It was the little girl. She had followed Norton, perhaps curious about the odd man.

The demon leaped for her. The girl shrieked but was caught. “!lliK” the demon cried. He drew a wicked-looking knife and held it poised near the child’s face while his other hand held her by the hair.

Norton knew he would not be able to disarm the demon before the girl was stabbed. She was a hostage—and the demon would not hesitate to kill her. True demons were minor incarnations of evil, serving only the major Incarnation.

“What do you want?” Norton asked.

“,ereh yats tsuJ” the demon said.

Stay here—until it was too late—or early—to stop the other demon’s change of the capsule. Or until the last power of the Hourglass gave out. Either way, Satan’s victory. He could not tolerate that.

But if he acted, the child would die. He couldn’t tolerate that either.

Time wavered—and that gave him a notion. He concentrated, or rather relaxed, letting time flow forward.

The demon put away his knife and let the girl go, bounding back to Norton’s vicinity. This time Norton grabbed the demon, his white cloak extended, and held him fast.

The demon screamed. “You’re killing my body!”

Indeed, the body was aging. The skin wrinkled; the clothing rotted and fell away. In moments the shriveled body collapsed. It had died of old age.

Norton dropped it. The girl was staring, horror-stricken. “You dried him up!” she cried.

“I had to. He was going to hurt you.”

“Say—you don’t talk funny any more!”

Norton remembered. He concentrated, reversing time again. It was like picking up a monstrous load after inadequate respite.

“!erom yna ynnuf klat t’nod uoy—yaS” the girl exclaimed.

Norton took her by the arm and led her away. He knew the demon, now separated from the ambience of Chronos, would not recover—except that that execution would be undone by the resumed retreat of time. Avoidance was therefore best.

“!pu mih deird uoY” the girl cried, horrified.

Something nagged at Norton. It was the demon’s last cry: “You’re killing my body!” Of course that was literally true; a demon could not take physical form on Earth. Only in very special circumstances did that happen. The demons he had seen before were mere evil spirits, with no substance. This one had had substance—because it had taken possession of a living being.

That meant the demons could act physically here. They could not hurt him, Norton—but they could harm others. That made Norton vulnerable. They could take hostages.

This was too much for him to handle alone. He had dispatched one demon—or at least sent it back to Hell
by destroying its living host—but he couldn’t afford to chance that again. He had rescued the child, but there were too many other potential victims, and he knew that the minions of Satan would use them. He didn’t worry about destroying the living hosts, for he knew that a demon could enter a human body only when invited, and that only the worst elements of society would ever do that inviting. But he couldn’t stand to have the blood of one innocent victim on his conscience.

“Go home,” he urged the girl. “Find your family and get far away from here. Fast. There is evil afoot.”

Wordlessly, the child nodded. Then she ran, taking off backward so fast her hair flung out behind her head, in the direction of her flight.

Norton, reluctantly, returned to Agleh. “You were right,” he admitted. “I can’t handle it alone. Those demons are taking possession of human bodies and they are unscrupulous. But I’m still not at all certain you can help, and I don’t want to risk—”

She waved aside his incomprehensible explanation.
TELL ME THE DETAILS
, she wrote.

His eye fell on his ring. “Okay, Sning?” he asked.

Squeeze.

“She can really help?”

Squeeze.

Agleh pointed to the ring. “?cigaM” she asked.

“Cigam,” he agreed. And explained briefly about Sning.

“?pleh I nac woh ,gninS” she asked the ring.

Squeeze, squeeze, squeeze.

“He can’t answer that sort of question,” Norton explained. Then, on paper:
YES-NO ANSWERS ONLY
.

“.yrroS .hO” She considered for a moment, then wrote:
CAN SNING HELP
?

Squeeze. It seemed Sning could read.

Norton was startled. “Directly? Physical action?”

Squeeze.

Time was running short. Together they worked out a campaign. The problem, Sning explained when they found the correct questions, was that demons could emulate
human beings by taking possession of human hosts. The minions of Satan could no longer be readily distinguished from innocent people. Norton and Agleh had to find a simple way to tell humans and demons apart, so that they could leave the former alone and eliminate or avoid the latter.

Sning’s poison could make a human being very sick, but should have no effect on a true demon, since that was only a spirit. The spirit demons were patrolling the area, trying to spot Chronos, while the demon-possessed bodies were acting to block him physically. There was no telling how many of each there were, but probably enough to do the job. Satan would have sent in the largest number immediately after the capsule was changed, as that was the critical moment; the network six hours after the event had been relatively thin.

Norton had presumed that the possessed people were worshipers of Satan, doomed to Hell and not worth his sympathy. But now he wondered: could demons somehow borrow the bodies of good people too? Sning reassured him; they could not. Goodness was anathema to the creatures of Hell. But his concern about the hostaging of innocent people in the area was valid, Sning agreed. Only the Senator himself was free of that threat, as Satan would not harm the man whose life he was trying to save for worse things.

Norton couldn’t tell the innocents from the possessed, at a distance, and he couldn’t afford to get up close without knowing. How could he identify the possessed ahead of time and get by them?

“The regular demons are really thickening,” Norton remarked, glancing out the window. “There’s one patrolling the street now.”

Agleh looked. “?erehW”

He pointed. “There.”

She squinted, “.gnihtyna ees t’nod I”

The demon was quite plain. Sning squeezed three times. “You mean she can’t see it?” Norton asked, startled.

Squeeze.

He turned to her. “There’s a spirit demon there—but you can’t see it.”

“,ti ees t’nac I” she agreed.

“But there
is
one there. Sning can tell you.”

She looked doubtful, so Sning uncurled and crossed to Agleh’s waiting hand. Like Orlene, she was not afraid of small serpents.

“!etuc woh ,hO” she exclaimed.

Sning curled around one of her fingers. “Ask him a yes-no question,” Norton said.

“?ereht nomed a ereht sI” she asked. Then she jumped. “!em dezeeuqs eH”

“How many times?”

“,ecnO” she said, holding up one finger.

“That means yes. Sey.”

“.ees I ,hO” She was pleased. “!mih peek dluoc I hsiw I”

Keep Sning? “Well, you might borrow him—so you can spot the demons. I can see them without Sning’s help.” That seemed to be another power conferred on him by the mantle of Chronos.

“,seY” she agreed.

Now it jelled. Agleh and Sning would scout the Senator’s estate, locating all the demons and possessed people. The minions of Satan would not suspect them, because Agleh was obviously a normal person, not an Incarnation. She would report to Norton, who would then move in to the capsule at the critical time, avoiding the pre-spotted demons. Sning would warn Agleh of any threat to her. With luck, there would be no trouble, and the deed would be done before Satan knew it.