With a Tangled Skein (27 page)

"So that's why he died young! They never told me!"

"They could not, lady. No one could know until it was done. The Magician knew he had to protect his daughter beyond his own time, for the fate of mankind depends on her."

"So little I knew!" Niobe lamented. "I thought he was burying himself in magic just for-for a hobby. Or business. But he must have understood the prophecy far better than-"

"Yes. Then there was something strange. We think Chronos was involved, and that he stopped the unnamed from doing something else, but he won't say. He knows the future, but if he said, it would change, so-"

"So the Incarnations are all involved in-in a major engagement," Niobe concluded.

"A twenty-year engagement," Lisa agreed. "The unnamed means to take political power on Earth. His agents are at work in every nation, but America is difficult because its politics are so chaotic anyway. If he prevails there, the rest will fall in line, he believes, because of the economic leverage. So he must be stopped there, and Luna will cast the key vote against him-if she survives."

"And she wanted to be an artist!" Niobe exclaimed.

"Now we believe that we, the three Aspects of Fate, are at the center," Lisa continued. "The unnamed means to be rid of Luna, and we know that-"

"That I would give my life, happiness, and honor to protect her!" Niobe finished. "Of course I will do it- will become the Aspect of Lachesis-if that's what it takes! But I never performed in that Aspect before, and- what's this business about all three of you changing together? If the unnamed is pressing you as you suggest, that would be absolute folly! Three novices together-"

"Yes. Folly. That is why we come to you. You have experience-"

"That part I see! But you other two would have to remain, at least for a year or two-"

"We cannot," Lisa said. "We must change now-this week."

"That's preposterous, girl! You know what's at stake!"

"We know. But we have opportunities that come only once in a lifetime, if ever. We cannot turn those down, any more than you could have turned down your second love. The chance to have your daughter-"

Niobe held up her hand. "You make your point. We are all frail human creatures! Yet if you know, or suspect, that these opportunities have been arranged by-"

"He has, as you say, sweetened the pot to the point where we cannot desist. But it is more than that. You see, we do not know what he plans-and if we retain our Aspects, he will know we cannot be fooled, and he will do something else. Something we perhaps cannot prevent. So this trap of his-we decided it was better to fall into it-"

"With one experienced Aspect he doesn't know about!" Niobe concluded. "To spring his trap-and destroy it!"

Lisa smiled. "I knew you would understand."

Niobe mulled it over. She had sworn to have her reckoning with Satan for Cedric's death, but somehow she had never had a satisfying denouement. She had told herself that just doing her job, as an Aspect of Fate, had been sufficient, and seeing to the upbringing of Luna and Orb was sufficient, since they were integral to the foiling of the Prince of Evil. But how much better it would be to foil Satan directly, personally!

Her mortal life was over anyway. She had nothing left to live for. It was really no contest. "I'll do it."

Lisa smiled. "We're so pleased. We know you will do what has to be done. We know that our mortal situations will be protected from evil, with you in charge." She extended her hand.

Niobe was taken aback. "Wait! I didn't mean right this instant! I have to put my mortal affairs in order-"

"Lachesis will do that for you," Lisa assured her. "Before she moves on to her own situation."

Surely she could trust an Aspect of Fate to know the importance of the proper disposition of Earthly affairs! Especially when it was vital that Satan not know of the change.

Niobe took Lisa's hand. There was the odd jolt she had experienced twice before.

Then she was inside Lisa, looking out out through her eyes. A nondescript middle-aged woman stood before her: the old Lachesis.

Good-bye, mortal situation! Niobe thought with abrupt nostalgia. No life was easy to leave, even a completed one.

"Take the body," Lisa said, and turned it over to her.

Niobe stood again in her own form, in different flesh. Her original flesh had been lost when she had become Clotho, so long ago, and when she had returned to mortality she had taken Lisa's flesh. Her pattern, even to the genes of reproduction, had carried across. Now that flesh was subject to the will and image of the prior Lachesis. Surely Lisa, too, felt nostalgia, knowing that the flesh that had been hers had just passed to a third identity. It was a familiar yet strange business.

Niobe shook hands with the woman who had been Lachesis. "I think you already know anything I would say. Go to your situation and be happy."

"I can never thank you enough-Lachesis," the woman said. "Do you know what mortality offers for me now?"

"It's really not my business-"

"A title," the woman exclaimed. "I am in a position to inherit a title and a grand estate in Europe, and be a lady of quality with servants and functions and responsibilities. I always longed for this and feared it could never come about. As Lachesis I indulged my propensity for managing things-"

"That's a quality of those suitable for that Aspect,"

Niobe agreed.

"But now it can be real. I mean, mortal. And the estate needs me; without a person of the blood, it will fall prey to greedy distant claimants and taxes-it would be destroyed. But now it has come to me, if I claim it in time, and I know so well how to manage it! If I die of some disfiguring disease within twenty years, still I shall be well satisfied!"

Obviously so. Different folk had different dreams, and the right dream was worth one's life. "Bless you, and prosper," Niobe told her warmly.

"Bless you, wonderful woman!" the other responded. Niobe returned the body to Lisa so that she and Atropos could bid farewell to their companion. It was strange, sharing Fate with the woman who had succeeded her as Clotho, but evidently she had chosen correctly, on that day a quarter-century ago. Lisa had done the job.

When the other two were done, they changed to spider form and slid up the web to Purgatory. How quickly it all came back! Niobe did not for a moment regret her second tenure as a mortal, and she felt a lingering pang for that suddenly lost life-but she also felt an abiding joy for her return as an Incarnation. To be an Immortal-there was no mortal experience to match it!

The Abode was unchanged: a cocoon, a house made of silk, the most comfortable retreat for the spinner and handler of threads. Still there was no staff, for the three women of Fate remained too independent to be waited on. There was a reasonable supply of Void-substance for Clotho. Everything was in order.

"Now it is my turn," Lisa said, and started out again.

"Already?" Niobe asked. "But we just got here!"

"Yes-to be sure you had your bearings. As you can see, I have arranged things for my replacement; it will be a fortnight before she has to visit the Void." She paused. "What an experience, that first time!"

Niobe shrugged, mentally. It was essentially the business of each Aspect to choose her successor, and to time her own return to mortality. Niobe had become Clotho, in large part, because the prior Clotho had liked her, and now was Lachesis because the three Aspects had agreed she was needed. She would go along with what had been decided.

Clotho descended a thread toward the western coast of America. "To what situation are you going?" Niobe asked.

"True love," Lisa answered raptly. "One day last month I was hiking in the mountains when a young man floated down on a flying carpet to ask directions. He had an accent I recognized. 'You're from Hungary!' I cried. He was taken aback. 'My parents were,' he said. 'My mother was carrying me when they fled during the-' and he shrugged, for in America few understand how it was in Budapest. 'I'm from there too,' I told him, and I spoke to him in our language. 'Wait!' he cried. 'I am not good at it! All my life has been here.' But he understood enough. Now he wants to marry me. He understands about how I am, almost twice his age. We did not tell his mother about that-she would not understand-so I told her my own mother had told me how it was with her when she fled, and then I told her in our tongue my own experience as if it were my mother's-and I think it could have been my mother's, if she hadn't died in the invasion of our homeland-and his mother cried with the memories, and she reminded me so much of mine, I cried too! I think she wants me to marry her son twice as much as he does! I will move in with them, and I know I will never have trouble with my in-laws!"

Niobe hated to raise the question, but felt she had to. "Yet you believe this is the work of-of the anonymous one-to get you out of the way?"

"Yes. Lachesis-the one before you-verified how that one had nudged that thread to place him flying where I was hiking, so we would meet. So little a thing-but though there was manipulation, the person is genuine. There is no great evil in him. The unnamed knows I would not take an evil man. An Aspect of Fate cannot be deceived by fool's gold! So the intent may be evil, but the offering is good. It is not for me the evil is intended, but for you."

Yes, surely so. The ways of Satan were devious but effective. But maybe this time the Father of Lies would find himself outmaneuvered, for the Incarnation of Fate was no innocent mortal to be fooled by manipulations of chance. Especially not with a former Aspect returning, with her firsthand knowledge of Satan's ways. You have a surprise coming, 0 Evil One! she thought.

They came to ground in an unsettled area. A young woman was walking at dusk toward the high cliff that descended to the crashing sea. She was Oriental and quite pretty.

Lisa intercepted her. "Where do you go, solitary maiden?"

"What does it matter? My life is over."

"But you are young and pretty and intelligent," Lisa protested. "You have much to live for!" Obviously Fate had researched this woman's thread.

"No, I have nothing to live for," the girl demurred. "My family has cast me out for not following the old ways, for being too willful and violent, and now I have no family."

Niobe knew that the Oriental cultures could be very strict about their traditions, and that there were sometimes conflicts with the ways of the Occidental world. The girl had probably refused to marry the man the family had chosen for her. Niobe could understand, even though her own arranged marriage had been a good one. She disliked admitting it, but parental judgment did seem to be as good as that of the participants. But America touted itself as the land of the free, and it had become unacceptable for girls to heed the judgment of their elders. There was more to tragedy than lost romance.

Amen! Atropos agreed.

"And now you are ready to depart this world?" Lisa asked.

The girl glanced at the cliff. A gust of sea breeze ruffled her black hair. "If I have the courage."

"I have an alternative." And Lisa explained about Fate and the role of Clotho.

It took the young woman a while to grasp it, understandably, but when she peered over the dark and savage ocean, she decided that this was a better alternative. Atropos took over the body, extended her hand, and it was done. Clotho had changed.

Lisa now stood in her physical form, just like herself; all traces of Oriental heritage had vanished. Niobe had never quite understood the magic that did this, but of course that wasn't necessary. Welcome, Clotho, she thought, and the process of education began.

They returned to the Abode and relaxed for a few hours. Niobe, as Lachesis, took over the body and contemplated the Tapestry, while Atropos continued to explain things internally to Clotho. The prior Lachesis had left the Tapestry in good order, considering the troubled times, so there was nothing urgent to do at the moment. Niobe had seen the job performed during her prior tenure as an Aspect, but now the responsibility was hers, and that was different. She hoped Satan would leave them alone for a few weeks while she got into it-and knew he wouldn't.

Next day it was Atropos' turn. There had been an accident, and her mortal great-grandchildren had become orphans. They would become wards of the state and be assigned to separate foster homes unless she, their only remaining blood relative, assumed control. They were eleven and nine years old; Atropos believed she had enough mortal years left in her to get the older one to the age of discretion before she died. She had to do it; they were her blood kin. Satan did not seem to have arranged this; rather, he had foreseen the opportunity and arranged for the other two Aspects to leave at the same time Atropos did. If Lachesis had not caught the hint in the Tapestry, Satan's ploy would have been effective. As it was, no easy time was coming, Niobe was sure, but at least they had a chance to win.

Atropos slid down a thread to the one she had selected. This brought her to a slum area where an old black woman sat in her rocking chair on a rickety porch, watching children play handball in the street. She looked up as Atropos appeared before her. "'Bout time you got here," she remarked.

Even Atropos was taken aback by this. "You know me?"

"I know you. I was expecting Death, though, not Fate."