"But I'm the one who cuts the threads," Atropos said. "I've been with you long enough to know—"
"That thread was cut by your predecessor," Niobe said. "But I'm sure I checked it when Pacian married her, and it was of normal length. When Satan strikes, we all make mistakes. No one was supposed to die at that wedding; Satan interfered by sending his demon to—" She shrugged and swallowed, then continued. "And now we simply have to patch the Tapestry on a makeshift basis, as we have done before."
"Still, it could not have happened if I hadn't become careless," Lachesis said. "When Thanatos gets careless, he gets killed by his successor; when I get careless, innocent mortals suffer. It is time for me to retire."
Naturally Niobe protested. But they all knew it was true: Lachesis, as the measurer of the threads, should have been alert to Satan's interference in her measurement. No Incarnation could successfully interfere with another, if the other was on the job. Satan prospered by deceit—and Lachesis had been deceived. She had erred.
They located a suitable prospect, a woman of middling age who had no close family and had a talent for managing things, and approached her. She agreed, and the change was made. This time Niobe, as the senior remaining Aspect, handled it. She took the woman's hand, and the woman's essence entered while Lachesis' essence departed. Again it was done—and they had a new Aspect to break in.
Unfortunately, the change of Lachesis-identities did not make Fate's job easier. Satan took this opportunity to yank the threads about to his benefit. Once again it was a struggle to stave off disaster, and once again the staving was not complete.
The political scene was constantly in flux across the world, whatever nominal form of government a country had, and Satan was adept at the corruption of politicians. At any given moment, the representation of good and evil in politics was about even, worldwide. Every time an evil power-wielder was ousted, another developed. It was evident that Satan was really trying to gain a clear political advantage that he could use to gain a social advantage. Nowhere was the war between good and evil shown to better advantage than in politics.
Quite a number of Niobe's countrymen had emigrated to America, and now they were achieving political representation there. Whether this was good or bad depended on the particular men, but she tended to favor her own. Thus when, in trying to clarify the nature of the job for the new Lachesis, she discovered a Satanistic tangle of threads in the Tapestry, involving one of this lineage in America, she investigated. Satan was certainly up to something; tangles never occurred naturally. But she could not make it out clearly, and Lachesis was as yet too inexperienced to do so.
"Someone's thread is to be prematurely cut," Atropos said.
They zeroed in on it. Sure enough, the thread of a potential future candidate for the American presidency was to be artificially cut. That would seriously distort the Tapestry. But they weren't sure how bad it would be.
Niobe consulted with Chronos, who remembered the future. Her affair with him had proceeded intermittently for thirty-five years, and she was really quite fond of him; he was a decent man. Because the two of them moved temporally opposite, there was always a certain novelty in it, and it was a relationship they found mutually convenient. It was true: it took one Incarnation to truly understand another. But Chronos was unable to help her in this. "As you know, I have only been in office a year, and I have no knowledge of the world's future beyond that."
"I didn't know!" she said, startled. "I—I suppose I thought you were eternal, though I'm sure you told me at the outset." Indeed, now she remembered the reverse situation, when he had forgotten that her beginning-end was near. It was easy to do, over such a timespan! "Why, that means we'll have to be breaking you in, soon!"
He smiled. "You have done that very competently, Clotho; I will always be in your debt. I hope someday I can repay the favor."
"You did, Chronos," she reassured him.
Lacking the perspective of the future, they could obtain more specific information only by going to Earth to check the living threads. There they discovered that a demon had been dispatched from Hell. It would drive a car to intercept the senator on a back road at night and crash into him. Rather, the demon-spirit was to take over the body of a Satanist—a Satan worshiper—for this mission; naturally the mortal had not been told that he would probably lose his own life. He merely understood that, in return for assisting Satan, he would be richly rewarded.
The old, experienced Lachesis could have twitched the threads expertly to clear the tangle and prevent Satan from interfering. But what would have been simple for her was complex for the new one. It did take time to gain proficiency. They had to take the direct route: a visit to the senator himself.
The night the "accident" was scheduled, Niobe took the body and slid a thread to the spiderweb nearest the country house where the senator was having a private party with his workers, volunteers, and friends. There was a lot of liquor going around, and many of the attendees were comely young women. Niobe didn't approve; if this was one of the good politicians, what were the bad ones like? But of course a man could not be judged by his private entertainments; it was his performance in office that counted. Women could not be blamed for being attracted to the focal points of power like bees to flowers; that was their nature. She herself had not loved Cedric until he had shown his power. At least this made it easy for her to infiltrate; she was assumed to be a professional of another type.
She filled a wineglass with water and carried it about so that no one realized she was not imbibing. She had never imbibed since that night Cedric got sick. She fended off the approaches of interested young men and worked her way to the senator himself. "Senator, your life is in peril," she murmured as she danced with him.
He smiled in that vote-getting way he had. "You are a Russian agent?"
"Just a friend of the status quo. There is a car ready to crash yours. Do not go driving tonight. Senator."
He smiled again, but this time there was a certain masked malice behind it; he did not like to have anyone tell him what not to do. Politically he stood for the right things, and more often than not did the right things, but that did not make him a perfect man. There was, she had long since learned, a mixture of good and evil in every thread of life—which was the point of life, if Satan was to be believed. She had never been satisfied that that was the whole of it, but it was at least a half-truth. So he was annoyed at her warning—but she was physically the type of woman the senator did not openly affront. That was why she had approached him in her own form, in a revealing gown. In a moment he would make a pass at her.
"You have something better to offer?" he asked.
"Your life," she replied evenly. "This house is protected; the assassin will not enter. It must catch you on the road, tonight. Remain here; by morning the threat will abate." For they had ascertained that this particular demon-spirit could not survive away from Hell for more than a few hours.
"Remain here—with you?"
"No, Senator. I am here merely to warn you, not to entertain you. Heed my warning, and all will be well." She turned and walked away.
When she was out of his sight, she changed to Lachesis, so that the senator could not recognize her, and moved on out of the house. Outside, she shifted to spider form and sat on the branch of a tree, watching.
Sure enough, her warning had not sufficed. Once a thread was positioned, it was hard to reposition, and this one was locked in a tangle. The senator emerged with a young woman; he was going to take her for a ride. He was married, but such men did not take such things too seriously.
Niobe, uncertain what to do, slid down a line to land on the senator's shoulder. She would just have to go along and hope she could enable him to avoid the assassination. Maybe if he saw the assassin-car approaching, he would take heed and get off the road in time. Of course, then the demon might come after him afoot, but perhaps she could balk it. Certainly she had to try. How she wished that this tangle hadn't occurred just now, wh
en Lachesis was inexperienced—but of course that was why it had occurred. Satan never passed up a chance!
The senator got into a small car, and the girl took the passenger seat. He drove out the back way, avoiding the guard at the front; he evidently didn't care to be recognized and have news of this tryst relayed to his wife. The fool!
Niobe knew the assassin was lurking out there, waiting to spy the senator's car. There would be little chance to escape once that happened.
It was difficult to talk while in spider form, but possible. "Senator!" Niobe said near his left ear.
He glanced at the girl to his right. "Yes?"
"What?" the girl asked.
"She didn't speak," Niobe said. "I spoke. I'm the spider on your shoulder."
The senator looked left, startled. "What sorcery is this?"
"Just a little shape-changing. I'm the woman who warned you before."
"The lovely one!" he said. "I didn't know you were magical!"
"What is this?" the girl on the other side demanded.
"There is a spider talking to me," the senator explained.
"A lovely spider? I don't believe it!"
"Take warning!" Niobe cried. "Get off the road before the assassin spies you!"
Now the senator was doubtful. "I thought it was a ploy for attention. But you disappeared. Now I learn you're a shape-changer. But why should you care about me?"
"I don't care much about you personally," Niobe said. "If I did, I'd probably tell your wife what you're up to tonight. But you are one of the better men in the bad mess that politics is today and you may have a considerable future, so I don't want an evil force to take you out. Please, Senator—turn about, get back to your party. Save your little dalliance for some other night."
"Now I hear it!" the girl exclaimed. "How can a spider talk?"
"I'm not sure," the senator said, and Niobe knew he meant about the situation, not about talking spiders. That was one of his weaknesses: the inability to make a firm decision on short notice. Normally he had advisers and scriptwriters to put words in his mouth; perhaps he depended on them too much. When caught unprepared, he could seem positively tongue-tied.
"Then play it safe!" Niobe urged. "The most you can lose is one tryst! The alternative will cost you your life!"
Still he hedged. "You may be magical, but I don't really know your motive. There may be danger at the party."
"Then go somewhere else!" Niobe cried in her tinny spider-voice. "Take a walk through the forest! Anything but a drive along this road tonight!"
He ground to a decision. "All right—I'll check this out. Emjay, you take the wheel. I'll get out and watch. If there's an assassin looking for me, he won't bother you— and I'll know him if I see him." He brought out a pair of tinted glasses and put them on as he brought the car to a halt.
"But I don't know the way!" the girl protested. "Just follow the road; it dead-ends at the beach. It's not far; I'll catch up with you there, once I've verified Miss Spider's story. I want to see what else is on this road."
"Well, if you say—" the girl said doubtfully. She moved over and took the wheel. She moved slowly on while the senator hid behind the bushes at the side of the road.
As the car's headlights retreated, the senator addressed Niobe. "All right, spider-woman—change back to your human form! You got my attention, all right!"
"I didn't come here to—" Niobe protested.
"Change—or I'll squish you where you sit!" He brought up his open hand and made as if to slap his shoulder.
Niobe hastily changed. It wasn't that she was vulnerable in arachnid form; she was protected by the same web-ambiance that kept her safe when in human form, no matter how exposed she might seem. Thanatos and Chronos had their cloaks; she had her web. But she didn't want to tell the senator her true nature, so she obeyed his demand. She leaped off his shoulder and landed in her own form before him.
"Now that's better," he said, reaching for her.
She skipped away. "Senator, if you think this was all a device to get you alone out here—shouldn't you be afraid it's a trap?"
"Nope." He tapped his glasses. "These show evil. There's hardly any evil in you; you're just as lovely through these lenses as you are without them."
"Well, I'm not evil, but also not—" She broke off, hearing something.
He heard it too. He crouched behind the bushes, peering down the road.
The car came slowly from the direction the girl had gone. Its glass was reflective in the night, but the motor had an ugly sound. The senator stared—and gave a stifled gasp. Niobe put a hand on his shoulder, cautioning him to silence.
The car passed. The senator faced her, removing the glasses, his eyes round in the moonlight. "That thing in the car—it was a demon!"
"It was a man possessed by an evil spirit," Niobe agreed. "Now you know."
"If I'd been out there—"
"It would have spotted you, accelerated, and deliberately rammed you. It doesn't care if it dies; it's already dead, though the living man it possesses isn't."
He glanced down the road. "Will it go after Emjay?" he asked, worried.
"It shouldn't. It's targeted for just one person: you."
"I'll go after her anyway," he decided. "I don't want her out here while that thing's on the road!" He started down the road at a lumbering run.
Niobe paced him. "It's not safe for you afoot either, Senator! That demon will be back, and—"
"I'll hide when it comes!" he puffed, slowing to a walk; he was in no condition to run the whole way.
The assassin car did return, and the senator did hide in the bushes. Demon-possessed people were not very alert or observant because it took most of the demon's energy to operate the host's body, so the thing never even looked to the sides. It would have worked better if the demonspirit merely rode along in the body, letting the living person follow instructions—but when the instructions included a suicide collision, that was not feasible. The demon had to retain complete control so that there would be no last-moment balking. That was probably why it wasn't destined to survive long; it took a great deal of spiritual energy to translate into physical energy.
Why hadn't Satan sent a full physical demon, as he had to the Magician's wedding? Probably because that was very awkward to do. True demons were confined to Hell, and only on very rare occasions could they be sprung loose. The mortal plane was a hostile environment for demons, as it was for angels. It was easier to spring demon-spirits, as in this case—but they were less reliable. Probably Satan had not expected Fate to come to the scene personally; he had forgotten the score Niobe had to settle with him.
They reached a bridge that crossed a minor inlet of the sea, and stopped, appalled. The wooden guardrail had been smashed. Obviously the car had gone off the bridge and into the water.
"She didn't know the road!" the senator exclaimed. "See—the bridge curves, and she was going straight—"
He ripped off his jacket and kicked off his shoes. He dived into the water, searching for the car. In a moment he surfaced, gasping. "It's down there!"
He dived again, and surfaced again. "I can't get it open!"
Niobe sent a magic thread down and slid along it, impervious to the water. But in this mode she could only observe, not act on anything physical. She saw the car, and the girl inside.
She returned to the shore. "She's dead," she reported. "There's nothing you can do. Get on back to the house." Then, sick at heart, she retreated to Purgatory.
Satan himself awaited her there. "So you sought to interfere, sugarplum," he said. "Well, you did not succeed."
"I saved his life!" Niobe retorted angrily.
"And exchanged it for that of an innocent girl," he countered. "And My purpose has been served. I don't care whether that man lives or dies; I just want him finished politically. That has been accomplished."
Niobe brushed on by, refusing to speak to him again. But the following events proved Satan correct. The senator put out the s
tory that he had been driving the girl back to town, and had taken a wrong turn and blundered into the bay; he had fought free of the car but she hadn't. Some believed that; some did not; after all, his bulk was twice that of the girl. How could he have been more agile in escape than she? There were too many questions. The senator had been perhaps the leading candidate of his party for president; after the scandal of the girl's strange death, he could not come close to nomination. He continued as senator, but he would never be president. His career had been capped. All because he had let the girl drive an unfamiliar road alone.
"If I hadn't been inept with the threads..." Lachesis said.
"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.
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