Under A Velvet Cloak (28 page)

“I’m not innocent,” Kerena said. “True. I am very far from that, however I may look Still, judging physically alone, she might reach a verdict.”

Niobe looked at the dryad. “Can you
do
that?” Kerena
realized
that the girl’s naivete enabled her to relate much better to the tree nymph than Kerena herself could. The nymph did not hesitate to approach Niobe, but was politely wary of Kerena. Ah, the precious innocence of youth.

The hamadryad considered. Then she gestured as if removing clothing.

Clear enough. Both Kerena and Niobe doffed their clothing and set it on the ground. Kerena quietly lifted the chain from her neck and put the coin with her clothing, not wanting it to attract attention. Then they stood beside each other nude, for the nymph’s inspection.

The dryad shook her head. She gestured them both to stand on either side of her before a clear pool of water at the base of the tree. They did so and looked down into the water.

There were three virtually identical reflections. They were all visions of man’s fondest desire. No wonder the nymph had been unable to choose.

“Call it a draw,” Kerena suggested as the nymph returned to her tree. “I became perhaps the prettiest of my generation, and you are surely the prettiest of yours.”

“Maybe that’s why we were attracted to each other,” Niobe said.

“I don’t think so. There was something drawing me here before I saw you.” Kerena returned to her clothing and picked up her iridescent blouse. She would have to hide that the moment she got home, as there was nothing like it in her time. Interesting that her future clothing traveled with her, not disappearing when she went before its time. Maybe that was another aspect of the power of Night.

The coin slipped off and plunked into the dark water of the swamp, drawing its chain behind it.

“Oh!” Kerena cried, dismayed. How could she have forgotten that! Her invaluable database, the whole point of her travel into the future.

“What is it?” Niobe asked, alarmed by her outcry.

“I dropped a-a coin into the water. It is very precious to me. I must find it.” Already she was plunging her hand into the murky water. Of course she couldn’t tell the girl the real nature of the coin.

“Let me help.” Niobe came and put her hand in.

They searched desperately, but all they came up with were roots and mud. The coin had found a horribly effective hiding place. What was she to do?

“I fear it doesn’t want to be found,” Kerena said. “It may be avoiding us.” Because she had let it
go
out of the immediate presence of Nox, and it had become anachronistic in this setting. She had been so foolish!

“I know,” Niobe said. “The dryad can find it. She knows every part of her tree, roots and all. The roots will tell her where.”

“And she’s magical,” Kerena agreed. She looked at the dryad. “Please- can you
do
this?”

Now the dryad did hesitate. She gestured to Niobe.

“She says she would like to-to exchange favors.”

Kerena suffered a siege of caution. “Does she know my nature?” For it was important that Niobe not know that.

“Yes. She says you are-I don’t know the word, but it seems like Knocks. I must have it wrong.”

Nox. The hamadryad knew, all right. “What favor?” Kerena asked grimly.

“Her tree-she wants to know its future. She’s afraid some logger will cut it down. I don’t see how anyone could know such a-”

“Done.” Kerena was desperate to keep the girl from catching on. But she had to recover that database. The dryad’s wish to know the fate of her tree was quite reasonable; that would be her fate too.

Kerena stood back, and the nymph came back down from the tree. She went to the spot where the coin had fallen and reached into the water. Immediately she brought up the chained coin. She gave it to Niobe and retreated back to the tree.

Niobe brought the coin to Kerena. “Can you do what she wants?”

Kerena accepted the precious disk and put the wet chain over her head so that the coin came to rest again at her breast. She would not remove it again. “Yes.”

Kerena stood beside the tree, touched its bark with a finger, and moved into the future. She followed the tree to the present time as she knew it. Then its outlines fuzzed. She knew why: this alternate timeline was not assured of survival beyond that time. Only if it remained aligned with her own could it, and therefore the tree, remain beyond danger.

She returned to the time she had left. “The future becomes uncertain,” she announced. “But the tree remains for a century hence, and longer if this world remains. No one cuts it down.”

The dryad looked greatly relieved. She knew Nox spoke the truth.

“That’s wonderful,” Niobe said. “But how could you know such a thing?”

This complication with the coin had lead to a complication with Niobe. How could she safely explain her power? Maybe she could change the subject. “As I said before, there is something that drew me to you. I have special abilities; surely you do too.”

“But I’m just an ordinary girl,” Niobe protested. “I’m not smart or well educated, while I can see that you have extraordinary powers. My face is all of my fortune.”

That seemed to be the case, essentially. Yet the tremendous aura of significance surrounded her. There was certainly something about her. Kerena, as Nox, could probably fathom it-but was that the right thing to
do?
Surely not; it was not wise to interfere with a situation as potent as this. “I think I need to be on my way.”

The lines fudged dramatically.
You mustn’t do that,
Jolie thought, alarmed.

Even if I make her forget, this is dangerous,
Kerena said.

Not as dangerous as breaking off now.

Well, she would try it, and stop when Jolie saw the lines diverging. Jolie moved them back.

“But I’m just an ordinary girl,” Niobe protested.

“You are hardly that, Niobe.”

“Do you know something I don’t? Please tell me!”

Still no divergence. This was weird. “First I must tell you something of myself,” Kerena said. “I am not of this time. I come from a past time-about fourteen hundred years ago.”

“I don’t understand.” The girl was evidently too polite to call her untruthful or deranged.

“It’s not a thing I can prove directly. But I can demonstrate other things. I do have some magic powers. I can turn invisible.” She did so, briefly. “I can float in air.” She did so. “I can travel in time.”

“I am beginning to believe, Niobe said,
amazed.

Still no divergence. So she went for the rest. “I am Nox, the Incarnation of Night.”

“I didn’t know there was an Incarnation of Night!” But she saw the hamadryad nodding.

“That’s not surprising. I am the keeper of secrets. I am returning to my own time after a visit to the future of a hundred or more years from this time.”

“You do know the future?”

“I know a future, or two. The future is not fixed.”

“Can you see my future? Oh, please tell me!”

Could she do that? Kerena realized she probably could.

But there were constraints. “If I tell you your future, that knowledge will cause you to change it. Then what I tell you won’t be valid.”

“I don’t understand. Why should I change it? I just want to know, in case there’s something bad.”

“She really is of ordinary intelligence,” Molly said in her head. “As I was, before I had several decades without a body to think about things.”

“Suppose there
is
something bad,” Kerena said to Niobe. “What would you
do?”

“Why I would avoid it, of course.” Then she paused. “Oh, now I see. That would change it, and everything might be different. Still, maybe not as bad as it would have been.”

“But possibly worse. We toy with fate at our risk.”

“Still, I so much want to know. Even if it changes.”

And Kerena was quite curious too. Niobe seemed like a perfectly ordinary girl, apart from her stunning beauty. What was the overwhelming significance associated with her? So she compromised: “I also have power over memories, because secrets are made from them. I can cause you to forget what you learn here. So you may not be able to keep your knowledge.”

“Tell me, and if it seems I must not keep it, then take it away,” Niobe said. “At least I’ll know it briefly.”

“Even your knowledge of my visit here may have to
go,
because that could change your future too. You would know there was something, and you would search for it.”

Niobe blanched, but nodded. “Do what you must do, Nox.”

Kerena traveled into the future, following Niobe’s individual timeline.

What she discovered astonished her. Niobe was destined to have more impact on the future than anyone else except Kerena herself-and their fates were indeed intertwined. No wonder she had felt the attraction.

Jolie, too, was amazed. Now she recognized this innocent girl as the grandmother of Orlene, with whom she had seriously interacted. No wonder there was significance here; this girl was in a manner the start of a phenomenal series of developments. But it was no simple course; the skein of life was almost hopelessly tangled. Which was of course why Jolie was here to guide Kerena through the tangle. She did not hide her thoughts from Kerena. Awed, Kerena returned to the glade.

“I have looked,” Kerena said.

“I saw you flicker.”

“I was traveling to your future. It is amazing and complicated, and there is early tragedy. It might be kinder not to reveal it to you.”

“Oh, please, you must tell me!”

Kerena sighed inwardly. She had to do it. “I must drastically summarize, because there is so much. You will live here uneventfully about five more years, and become recognized as the loveliest woman of your generation. Then you will be married against your will to a boy five years your junior. He-”

“What?”

“That is only the beginning,” Kerena said grimly. “He turns out to be an extremely smart, strong young man, and you
do
come to love him. But Satan means to kill you, and your husband takes your place, dying in your stead, to foil that evil plot. That breaks your heart. You give your baby son to his father’s family and
go
on to become an Aspect of the Incarnation of Fate. Clotho, who spins the Threads of Life.” Jolie had of course known Fate, but had not properly tracked her mortal origins, as it were. Clotho had simply been Clotho, learning and performing her office.

“An Incarnation!”

“Later you leave that office to marry a mortal man, your son’s cousin, and bear him a daughter, whose daughter will die, then become the Incarnation of
Good.”
How straightforward it seemed, phrasing it that way! Niobe’s granddaughter Orlene, a fine sensitive ghost and
good
friend to the ghost that was Jolie, on her way to the miraculous destiny none of them had foreseen. “So you are to be the grandmother of God.”

“The grandmother of-” The girl couldn’t finish.

“God, or Good, too, is an office. They are all offices, except those that have not been animated by people. In one way or another, you are to be related to all the major Incarnations of Immortality.”

“I can’t believe this!”

“Perhaps I can show you some of it. I will take you on a spot tour of some of your relatives, as seen from this one site. I think I can safely take you there if I don’t try to move you physically. You won’t be able to speak to them or affect them, but you will see them briefly.”

Niobe simply stared at her.

“Take my hand,” Kerena said firmly. “Traveling will seem strange, but you can not be harmed because you will not really be there. Only your spirit will see.”

Awed, Niobe took her hand.

Kerena phased them both out and moved forward, tracing Niobe’s life as she had done before, except that she remained by the water oak tree. That was a blur, as Niobe’s visits to the tree were brief, until Kerena stopped to show an episode at its normal pace. Then they could both see the Niobe of the future, stunningly beautiful.

Thus they saw this same glade, anchored by the great tree, where a handsome and powerful young man took Niobe’s hand and sang to her. “That is Cedric Kaftan, your husband, a very fine young man who loves you absolutely.”

“But you say he dies!”

“To save you. What finer love can there be?”

A tear formed in Niobe’s eye. “I can’t let him sacrifice himself for me.”

“That’s why you must forget. Your future must be as it is fated to be, or your universe may suffer horrendously.”

They moved on, and paused again as Niobe brought a boy baby and left him by the tree. “What is she doing!” Niobe demanded. “She can’t leave him alone there!”

But then they saw how the dryad came down from her perch in the tree and took care of the little boy. “The nymph can’t have children of her own,” Kerena explained. “That is a price of her near immortality and youth. But she loves children, and will approach them and help them while mortal adults remain clear. She is teaching him magic. He is destined to become a great Magician.”

Indeed, they saw how the child was gleefully learning magic tricks the dryad showed him. It was a highly compatible association.

They moved farther forward. Kerena stopped when two little girls visited with the dryad, also learning magic. “The one with buckwheat-honey hair is Orb, your daughter by your second husband. The one with clover-honey hair is Luna, your granddaughter by another man, Cedric.”

“But they look like twins!”

“They are nevertheless more like cousins, once removed. It is a complicated relationship. Later in life you found love again, but that was about forty years later, with Cedric’s younger cousin. The two girls were born only days apart, and you took care of them both.”

“I see,” Niobe agreed, seeing herself come in due course to take them home. “But forty years? I look twenty!”

“Twenty three. You didn’t age while you were an Incarnation. But now, as a renewed mortal, you age normally again.” That was another key to Jolie’s initial nonrecognition: she remembered Niobe as the middle-aged Aspect of Fate, Lachesis, her once phenomenal figure lost.