With a Tangled Skein (19 page)

"It takes many years of experience to foil Satan," Niobe said grimly. "He is an infinitely wily and indefatigable opponent. We thought it was the senator's life Satan wanted, not merely his career. It was probably too late to undo the damage when we became aware of the tangle." But her rage at Satan was renewed. So many times she had tried to foil him and had taken her losses, as it had been with Cedric, with Blanche, and now with the senator. She wished she could skunk Satan completely. But the person of goodwill seemed always to be at a disadvantage before the completely unscrupulous power that was Evil Incarnate.

Chronos' time was growing short. He became less confident as he approached the moment of his changeover. For him it was the assumption of his office; for the others, it was the termination of it. Each Chronos officeholder took the Hourglass, the single most potent magical instrument in existence, after a mortal existence. In this respect that office was similar to the others. But from that moment Chronos lived backward until the moment of his origin, when he had to pass the Glass on to his predecessor. It was an exceedingly awkward adjustment.

Niobe had always been-would always be-closest to Chronos, and now it was especially important. Physically he was twice her age, but in other respects he was much younger. There was now a kind of desperation in their lovemaking, as if he needed reassurance that some things remained as they had been in his mortal life. He could change time itself, but lacked experience, and that made him highly insecure.

Finally it came to the first time. Niobe knew it, because she had had the foresight to ask him, as if playfully, how many times they had done it, and then she had kept count. Now he was obviously smitten by her, but afraid to confess it, and unable to get a proper grip on his job while this impasse remained. She seduced him gently, letting him know it was all right, that she understood. Indeed she did! In her mortal life, so long ago, she would have been appalled to see herself now. But she was thirty-six years wiser now, and she knew Chronos better than he could believe at this stage. He was an old friend, and though she never had loved him, she regretted no part of their relationship. Satan, of course, called her a call girl, but it was a calling that had its self-respect. The understanding she brought to Chronos was important, yet she missed the true love she had once had, so briefly, as a mortal.

The affair was over, or had not yet begun. It came at last to Chronos' last/first day in his office. He was so bewildered she knew she had to take him literally in hand, leading him to his mansion where she could explain things more comfortably. Away from the mansion their times were reversed, making communication difficult, for now he had not yet learned how to use the Hourglass to control time. She had to use printed signboards to tell him how to reverse himself long enough for her to take him in hand, for the print was comprehensible whether a person was traveling forward or backward in time.

The place was near an amusement park, where he was standing, bewildered. She knew, from what he had told her before, that this was an hour after his assumption of the office; he had blundered out of the park by himself, and wished she had found him earlier. But now she understood why she had not (would not): she needed that hour to orient him. So her printed sign told him how to use the Hourglass to reverse himself. When he did that, he was suddenly moving forward in time again, and they could talk.

Once they were in his mansion they were still together-but now she was reversed, not he. The half hour of his reversal canceled the half hour of hers, so that she emerged at the same time as she had started the dialogue-a convenience she had carefully arranged. Chronos now understood enough to continue, and was in the hands of the loyal staff of the mansion; she knew it would work out, however haltingly, because she remembered that it had.

Now she had to get on with the other part of it: seeing the new Chronos in. Chronos was too important to her job to be left to chance, as it were; she had to know exactly what she had to deal with. She returned to the amusement park and explored the situation.

She picked up a few minutes after she had intercepted Chronos with her printed signs, before. This time she concealed herself from him. She retained her body, because Lachesis was too inexperienced to handle this, and it was Atropos' off-shift. She concealed her face somewhat with a kerchief, so that Chronos wouldn't recognize her if he saw her-not that he had any notion of her identity or nature at this point. He hadn't met her yet. She followed him as he meandered backward into the park. No one else paid him attention; mortals seldom noticed Incarnations, and the backward-living Chronos was difficult to relate to. So though they were in a crowd, it was in effect just the two of them, playing a kind of hide-and-seek.

She felt sorry for him, seeing him so confused and ill at ease. She knew what he was feeling, because he had told her about it. She knew him better than any other person did, now, and better than any other person would. Thirty-six years as associates and lovers did make for mutual understanding. Perhaps it would have been better if she had loved him, for certainly he had loved her. But, she decided, it had been necessary for one of them to be objective; that had enabled her to cope with the backward nature of their association, and not to take misunderstandings too seriously.

She remembered when they had agreed to try the act of love in their natural states, moving in opposite temporal directions. They had had to coordinate it carefully, before and after. It had turned out to be possible and intriguing as a novelty-but, for her, not really much different from the normal act, because she had been only slightly aroused. She had simply been there for him, and for her own curiosity. So it had been a disappointment-but now she remembered it clearly, for what reason she was not sure, as she watched him wandering backward through the crowd. Perhaps, she thought, this was an analogy of the human condition: each person blundering along in his own course, trying to relate to others, and succeeding only fractionally. Because each person, mortal and immortal, was traveling along his own unique timeline, unable to tie in with others perfectly, however much they all tried.

Finally he backed into the horror house. She followed. Neither of them bought tickets, as the park proprietors were no more aware of them than the other mortals were. It was not a matter of invisibility, just of not being noticed.

There, too, she thought, was an analogy of mortality: the key forces that governed the lives of people were generally unobserved by those who were most concerned.

The horror house was stocked with ghosts who floated out periodically, made faces, and yelled "Boooo!" supposedly scaring the paying customers. Only the smallest children were actually frightened; the others knew that ghosts were insubstantial and therefore harmless. Still, it was fun, in the sense that playing the rigged gambling games was fun. The illusion of fear and potential riches was what this sort of park was all about.

Niobe paused beside a ghost. "But what do you get out of it?" she asked. "Don't you feel pretty stupid, playacting like this?"

"Well, it does get dull, and it is stupid, and it contributes to the prejudice people have against ghosts, but the pay is good," the ghost replied. "A ghost can't get a job just anywhere, you know."

"But what use do you have for money?"

"Well, it's like this," the ghost said, clarifying into the semblance of a woman. "I was on my way to work, when I was alive, and I was late, so I cut through this alley. I knew I shouldn't have, but I'd been late twice before that month, and I was on notice; I just had to get there on time. Suddenly a masked man jumped out at me. I screamed and ran, but he chased me down, held a knife to my face, and raped me. I was screaming all the time, but no one came to help me-and there were others in the alley, too, who could have helped. Finally-too late- I got mad, and I grabbed his hand and bit it. The last thing I remember is his knife coming down at my neck."

"Ah, yes," Niobe said. This was much more of an answer than she had sought.

"By the time I recovered consciousness, I was dead," the ghost continued. "I guess it took me a few minutes to die, while I was unconscious. There was my body, naked from the waist down, and my throat was a mass of blood, and the rapist was gone. Well, I didn't exactly take kindly to that. So I stayed around, determined to find out who had done it and make him pay. But that takes money, because private eyes don't work for nothing, so here I am, earning money. Pretty soon I'll have enough to hire one for a day, and if that doesn't do it, I'll keep working until it does get done." She shrugged. "When you get down to it, geeking isn't so bad." She paused to jump out at another child, screaming "Booo!" The child eeked and giggled, pleased, and went on.

"I wish you luck and fortune," Niobe said.

"Say-how is it you see me as a person?" the ghost asked. "I mean, most of the living folk don't-"

"You are a person," Niobe said. "I spun your thread myself. I'm sorry it was cut short."

"Oh-you're Fate! I didn't recognize you!"

"Few do," Niobe said, and proceeded on after Chronos, who had backed up the passage.

Why, she wondered, had Chronos chosen to make the change here? It was the next Chronos who had done it, the one coming from the future. He had not been bound to the site of birth, just to his moment of origin. He picked the place he wanted, and his successor had to come to it and take the Hourglass. Exactly how the successor knew where to come she was not sure; apparently there was a guidance in these things, and not the normal guidance of Fate. Lachesis had, of course, measured his mortal thread, but when that person became Chronos, that deleted the thread from the Tapestry as if it were an unscheduled demise. Chronos-the one she had known so long-had remarked that his mortal existence had seemed pointless and dull-jejune was the actual term he had used-so that when the opportunity came to become an Incarnation, he had taken it. But he hadn't realized that it meant living backward, or battling Satan.

Well, she was about to learn about the future Chronos. She watched from a cranny of the horror house as the Chronos she knew backed to a dark chamber illuminated only by the glow of the Hourglass. From the far side another figure came, walking forward. The other Chronos!

No-it was the one she knew! She could tell by the way he moved. He walked forward, and the other walked backward, and they met in the center of the chamber. The Hourglass flared. Suddenly, in the glow of the Glass, there were three: two young women and a child! Of all times for horrorhouse customers to pass through!

But the women looked oddly familiar. Niobe saw one in silhouette as she turned: wasp-waisted, hair flowing- She stifled an exclamation. It was her double! The double walked right toward her. "Come with me, Niobe," she said. "I'll explain." She took Niobe's hand.

Bemused, Niobe suffered herself to be led out of the dark chamber, leaving the other women and the child behind. What was happening?

Out in the light of day, her double turned to her with a smile. "I am yourself, two hours later," she explained. "You remember how you double up when you spend an hour in Chronos' mansion?" Oh. "Yes. But-"

"There are three of you then," the other continued. "Self One is the one approaching the mansion; Self Two is the one within it, living temporarily backward; and Self Three is the one living forward again, after emerging. You have always avoided each other before." "Urn, yes. But-"

"Right now you are Self One. I am Self Three. Self Two is with Chronos, living backward."

"But this is not his mansion!"

"He reversed us for an hour. He wanted company to see him out. He's only a child, after all."

"The-child I just saw?"

"Chronos can be any age or sex, as can any Incarnation," Self Three reminded her. "He'll tell you about it, as he told me. I'm just making sure you understand the situation."

Niobe took a deep breath. "I-think so. But who- who explained things to you when you were Self One? I mean, if we are all parts of the same person-"

"Self Three explained then, of course."

"But you are Self Three!"

"I am now. Then I wasn't. I was you."

"But-"

The other laughed. "Don't try to analyze it, self-sister! You'll lose your mind. There really aren't three of us, just one in three consecutive roles. Remember, Chronos is immune from paradox, and so are we when we interact with him."

Niobe nodded, though she felt dizzy. "Now I know how Chronos felt when he started in office, just a few minutes ago. It's almost too much to grasp!"

"I know. But it's hard for the other Chronos, too. He's afraid. So be kind to him; it won't hurt you. I'm in a position to know."

Then they both laughed; they were by no coincidence very similar people.

The two of them reminisced for the rest of the hour, finding themselves compatible. "We'll have to do this again some time!" Self Three said, and Niobe agreed. "Next time we spend time in Chronos' mansion-which I don't think will be for lovemaking-you come early, and I'll wait for you."

"Agreed." They shook hands.

Then, as the moment drew near, they returned to the chamber. "We must part," Self Three said, hugging her. She was a very huggable person. "It's been nice talking with you."

"Yes," Niobe agreed. She saw tears on the other's cheeks. In all the years she had been Clotho, she had never done this before. Now she realized what she had been missing.