After a time she turned the page to Betsy's farm.
And blinked. The house was gone.
The wind was so savage here that it was impossible to see more than a hundred feet, but there was no question: the house had been blown away. Orb expanded, questing for the cellar, and found it.
It was empty. In fact, it was simply a gouged-out hole, much larger than the original cellar. It was evident that the storm had spawned a tornado and torn the very stones and timbers out of the ground and scattered them across the landscape. Betsy and the organist and Betsy's family were gone.
Orb gazed around the horizon. A tornado? By the sound, there was another coming. She expanded and confirmed it; three of them tearing across the plain, spewing out sand and debris, their terrible tails whipping back and forth as if searching for anything not yet destroyed. Farther out were two more, orbiting each other. Indeed, they were everywhere, growing like monstrous trees. Some were so twisted that they seemed to be rolling like elongated barrels along the ground, their funnels impinging on the territory of neighboring tornadoes. Hell had arrived on earth, here.
She returned to Jonah. "The farm-gone," she said dully. The individual tragedies were losing their impact; they were only samples of what the whole world was suffering.
Jezebel didn't comment. What was there she could say?
Orb knew now that it was not going to stop. The flood had been replaced by the storm. If she sang again, what worse could happen?
She fetched her harp and sang the Song of Chaos a third time. But this time she tried a variation, intuitively; she modified it with the error-nullification theme. If straight repetitions didn't do it, maybe a null repetition would.
Again she felt it taking hold. But even if it stopped all the trouble this instant, too many lives had been sacrificed.
When the song was done, she moved to the surface, apprehensive about the result.
The wind was dying.
But did this mean an end to Chaos, or only the onset of another aspect of it?
Where was Chronos? He was the one who was supposed to be able to help! Why hadn't he contacted her before this?
Orb turned the page to Purgatory, then sought Chronos' mansion. She would brace him directly!
A maid met her at the door. "The Incarnation isn't in," the woman said.
"I'll wait," Orb said, pushing past her. She was beyond the point of politeness.
"It isn't wise," the maid protested.
"Just send him a signal, or whatever. Tell him Gaea is here. I won't leave until I talk with him."
The maid spread her hands. "No one can reach Chronos when he's out. He isn't like other Incarnations."
Orb picked a comfortable couch in the front room and lay down as for sleep. The maid departed.
To her surprise. Orb did sleep. She woke abruptly when Chronos entered the room. He was a handsome figure in a white cloak. "Ah, Gaea," he said. "In your lovely stage. Had I known you were coming, I would have been here to greet you."
"I left a message," Orb said curtly. "Why didn't you answer?"
"What message?"
"Hours ago! They said it would reach you!"
Chronos nodded. "Ah, I understand. You are early in your tenure, and do not properly appreciate my nature."
"The Purgatory computer says that you are the only one who can help me. The world is being demolished by my error, and I have to stop the disaster!"
"Let me explain," Chronos said. "I exist backwards. The message you left remains in my future, your past. Probably this visit of yours has nullified it, so I have no news of it in my past, your future."
"Backwards," Orb repeated. "Yes, of course. I didn't realize-"
"However I'm sure we shall be reconciled, because we have had a long and beneficial association."
"That can't be. I'm going to resign as soon as I can somehow stabilize the Chaos I invoked."
"Chaos?"
"If you live backwards, you have to know all about it, don't you?"
"Not necessarily. Your future, and therefore my past, is malleable. What you foresee occurring may differ from my experience."
"But if you have lived through it-"
"I have lived through a single track of it-one of an infinite number available. I try to avoid interfering with my own track, but sometimes it does change. This is of course an uneasy business for me, though I am immune from paradox."
"Well, I have an uneasy business outside!" Orb retorted. "Are you going to help me or aren't you?"
"I would be inclined to help you, for the sake of your beauty and the long association we have had. However-"
"For the sake of what?" Orb asked sharply.
Chronos smiled. "I suppose that was not an honest answer. But I do not believe it would be wise for you to know either the source of my inclination or my reason for denying it."
"You would do something for an attractive woman that you would not for an unattractive one?" Orb demanded. Her frustration and fatigue were telling, and she knew it, but she hardly cared.
"Well, men do," he said reasonably. "It depends on the relationship. But your case is special. You have generally met me in your assumed guise of age and maturity; to encounter you now in your beauty is-"
"I suspect that if I understood what you were getting at, I wouldn't like it," Orb said. "So much for the source of your inclination; what is your reason for denying it?"
"They are linked. Perhaps you had better simply accept my statement that I do not wish to interfere with the present course of history."
"Even though life on Earth is being wiped out?"
"Well of course it didn't-won't come to that, exactly."
"Are you being deliberately perverse? I am not making much sense of this."
Chronos sighed. "I suppose I had better explain. But I must warn you that to prevent this explanation from changing the very matter of which I speak, I shall have to erase this particular line after experiencing it."
"Erase it?"
"I shall set the time back to this point, and our discussion will not have happened in your reality."
Orb realized that such was the power of this Incarnation, that he was not bluffing. "No! I forbid that! If you have a legitimate rationale for your action or inaction, and it concerns me, I believe I have a right not only to know it, but to remember it. I want you to tell me exactly what is on your mind, and why you seem to be refusing to help me undo the damage I have done."
"But you see, Gaea, your knowledge would almost certainly change the matter that I relate! Therefore it would become meaningless, and perhaps much worse."
Orb stifled a sharp retort. She reminded herself that her impetuous meddling with an aspect of the Llano had gotten her into trouble more than once, this time quite seriously. There could be merit in his caution. "Then tell me, and let me judge whether it is proper for me to remember. But you must promise to let me decide."
"I suppose you do have that right," Chronos said unhappily. "But-would you mind changing to your other form?"
"My other form?"
"The mature one. You-I prefer that you change."
"I hardly know what you're talking about. This is the form I have had since maturity; I know of no other."
"Again, my vantage betrays me. In your future I have known you in the other guise. The reason for my concern will be apparent when I have explained."
"Then you had better tell me what form you are asking me to assume and how I should do it."
"I really don't know how you do it. It is just one of the powers of your office, as it is for Fate."
"One moment," Orb said. She turned the page to Fate's Abode. The young oriental woman was there. "Could I speak to my mother for a moment?" Orb asked.
"I'll wake her." There was a pause, then Niobe appeared.
"What is my other form, and how do I achieve it?" Orb asked.
"Why I don't know, dear; the prior Gaea had many forms, and I'm sure you will, too. I think you just-choose it."
"But I have no idea how!"
"Perhaps if you imagine a progression in your appearance similar to mine," Niobe said. "In my youth I looked like this." She changed to a young and startlingly beautiful woman.
"Oh, mother, I had almost forgotten!" Orb exclaimed. "You were such a creature!"
"But I didn't take care of myself," Niobe said, reverting to her middle-aged spread. "I suspect something similar would have happened to you in time, if you had not assumed your office. If you will just imagine it-"
Orb concentrated, trying to picture herself when she became her mother's age.
"Yes, that's it," Niobe said.
"You mean I changed?"
"Come to the mirror, dear." She led Orb to a full-length mirror.
Orb was astonished. She was now a solid, middle-aged woman, perhaps twice her normal mass, her hair starting to gray. "Oh, ugh!" she exclaimed.
"No, it is very good," Niobe said. "You look very much the part of Mother Nature now." She contemplated Orb critically. "Except for the green hair."
"My hair is not green!"
"Precisely. The Green Mother traditionally has a green tinge about her."
Orb concentrated. "Like this?" Now her hair showed greenish in the mirror.
"Yes, dear. That is very nice."
Orb realized that she must have chosen-in Chronos' futuristic past-this form for much of her official activity. "I suppose it will have to do. Thank you, mother."
"Do be careful, dear."
"It's late for that!" Orb turned the page back to Chronos' domicile.
"Yes, much better," Chronos said. "You are your familiar self."
Orb was not completely pleased, but elected to pass over the matter. "Now tell me everything I need to know."
"It began about fifteen years hence, in your framework," he said. "Perhaps a few more. I was-well, I met a ghost."
"A ghost! There are millions of them being made right now!"
Chronos shrugged. "This ghost had an unusual proposition. He wanted me to impregnate his wife. This was a thing he could not do himself, of course."
Orb realized that this was a highly unusual story. She resolved not to interrupt until it was complete.
"I met his wife and fell in love with her. I could not marry her, of course, but I lived with her like a husband, and she bore my child, though it was legally the child of the ghost. Unfortunately, the baby had a malady and died, and she committed suicide because of her grief. She was the perfect woman and the perfect mother and she felt she had no life without her baby."
How well Orb could understand that! If only she had been able to keep her own baby!
"That left my own life meaningless. With the ghost's help, I assumed the office of Chronos and have held it until this time. As you can appreciate, I would not have come to this had I not met the woman, and had she not died. I think I would give it all up, to live out my life with her, but I can not, and I believe I am a competent officeholder and that my input is beneficial. This is the past that I feel I should not change, the future that you will come to know."
"I am sorry for your tragedy, of course," Orb said. "But I do not see how it relates to me. Meanwhile, I have a most pressing problem in my present, not my future."
"But your present affects your future, and therefore my past. The woman I loved, and will always love, is alive today, as a child. Her name is Orlene."
It was as if cold water had been dashed on her. "Who?"
"Your daughter-who in her adulthood rather resembles you as you are now. That is why I find your natural appearance so disconcerting."
Orb thought of her reaction to her encounters with Mym, both real and in emulation. "I understand. But-my daughter?" This was such a surprising development that she was still assimilating it.
"As a woman of twenty. Old enough to know her mind. She had a magic talent, the ability to perceive the best matches in people, as if the people glowed. I glowed, for her." He leaned over and put his face in his hands. "Forgive me," he said, his voice muffled by his fingers. "It has been long since I have spoken other."
Orb gazed at him with a certain compassion. Her baby girl-as a woman this man had loved! Now at last she knew Orlene's future!
And Orlene had died-would die prematurely, in tragedy. That was the second shock. Her death precipitating this man's assumption of his present office. No wonder he was concerned about Orb's reaction! If she acted to save Orlene, by diverting her from the ghost marriage, Chronos might never become Chronos!
Her eye fell on the ring on Chronos' finger. The one that looked like the ring Mym had given Orb and that she had given to her daughter. Orlene had given it to him, as a signal of her love for him!
Or was it another imitation? Beset by a sudden intense curiosity. Orb extended her hand to touch the ring.
It came to life immediately, uncurling and sliding from Chronos' hand to hers. It coiled about her finger.
"Is it really you?" she asked.
The ring squeezed once.
Of course it could be lying-another ring of the type, pretending to be the one she had owned. But she doubted it "What he says is true?"
Squeeze.
"You could not help my daughter?"
Squeeze.
Orb put her own face in her hands, sobbing silently. For a time she remained thus. When she recovered, the ring was back on Chronos' finger. It was his, now, by the right of the chain of love.
She found Chronos looking at her. "Now you understand," he said. "I dare not change her future; therein lies paradox."
"But she has no future, if the weather continues!" Orb protested. "She may already be dead!"
"That need not be final."
"Not final! What is more final than death?"
"Time."
"But if she dies, your paradox is already upon you! You must save her."
"No, I may not interfere with the natural order where it concerns my own past. That would risk a disaster worse than we can know."
"But-but if you have experienced the future-how can this present holocaust be reconciled with that?"
"It can't."
"You are talking riddles! You can't meet and love a woman who was killed in her childhood!"
"There is a way through. That is what I must accept."
"You live backwards! You have already experienced it! What happens? How can this be undone?"
"There is no problem about the how. I can act at a later time-an earlier time, for you-and nullify this particular path. The problem is the why. Only with the advice and consent of the other Incarnations will I take such an action, for it affects us all."
"You don't know whether you did it? Will do it?"
"Because the action I will take affects my own past, I can not be sure what has happened in my past. There is a region of uncertainty, where the lines of history diverge and tangle.
Nothing is absolutely fixed. In one of those lines the decision will be made, and it will guide what I will do in your past."
"You have no notion at all what is going to happen?"
"Only that the ultimate decision was yours. I acted as the Incarnations agreed, after you decided. I believe it was the correct decision."
"So I can save the world?"
"So it seems."
Orb realized that this was as much of an answer as she was going to receive. "If I can save it, I will save it," she declared. "No matter what."
"I am not sure of that," he replied.
"Not sure-!" But she decided not to react further in his presence. She turned the page back to Jonah.
Jezebel was there. "Who are you?" she asked, startled.
"What do you mean, who am I?" Orb said. Then she realized that she was still in her new, mature form. Hastily she willed herself back to normal.
"You have learned a new trick," Jezebel remarked.
"Yes, it seems I have."
"You look tired. Let me fix you something to eat, and you can rest."
"I don't know whet
her I'm tired or not, now," Orb said. "After that meeting with Chronos, my mind is spinning!"
"Chronos is going to help?"
"He won't commit himself! He says that I will be the one to decide. But-oh, it's all so frustrating!"
"Well, eat," Jezebel said, setting some toast before her.
Orb looked at the watch on the wrist of the demoness. Surprised, she looked at her own. "I think your watch has stopped," she said. "It's two hours behind mine."
"Oh?" Jezebel compared the two, then went for a desk clock. The clock agreed with Jezebel's watch. "I think yours has gained."
"Gained? How could it?"
Jezebel shrugged. "You have been traveling all around the world. Perhaps it got jogged."
"I suppose," Orb agreed. She reset her watch.
She discovered that she had gulped down her toast in short order. "I can't sit here while that's out there," she muttered, and turned the page to Pate's Abode.
The oriental woman was there, as before. "May I talk to my mother again?" Orb asked.
"Again?"
"Yes, she helped me an hour ago."
Niobe appeared. "An hour ago? No."
"What do you mean, no? You showed me how to assume a mature aspect." Orb shifted into it, then back.
Niobe considered. "You were visiting with Chronos?"
"You know I was, Mother! And what he told me-my daughter, your granddaughter-"
"Let me tell you something about Chronos, dear. His mansion reflects his lifestyle. Anyone who enters it lives backwards. I have experienced the effect many times. A visitor emerges earlier than she enters. On occasion I have even met myself arriving. How long were you there?"
"How long-" Orb repeated, realizing. "You mean-an hour earlier than-?"
"You are now in your own past, as it were, by that amount. Don't worry, it clears automatically after you catch up. It is like a string that loops back on itself; it may not reach as far, but it's all there."
"Jezebel!" Orb exclaimed. "She said I'd talked with Chronos-before I did! Only I was in my time, and-oh, it's all confused!"
"These things happen," Niobe said. "I suggest you go off by yourself until it clears, then proceed normally. I was about to take a nap; Clotho will alert me when you arrive, in your past. But after this-"
"I'll be more careful with Chronos!" Orb finished.
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