Jack closed his eyes and realized he could see the sense that it did make. “In that place, you have to turn twice to rotate a full circle,” he said.
“I thought you’d understand.”
“It’s got a different logic, like the jumps we make. Did you see her?” Jack asked.
“I don’t call it seeing. But yes, I suppose I did. She was at the center of the jade lake. She wasn’t dressed in white, she didn’t wear anything. At first I didn’t know why the man called her the Queen in White. Maybe he saw her differently, or knew something else about her. She was very tall. If I came from somewhere else, saw with different eyes, I suppose she might have been beautiful. She had limbs or arms or things coming out of her that I didn’t recognize, but they looked right—they fit. Even so, I knew that if I came near her, she would suck my eyes right out of my head. I felt like a piece of bloody ice. She just stood at the center of her knot, watching, infinitely curious, curious like a hunger, curious like fear—she wanted to know everything about me. And so angry, so disappointed. I wanted to tell her what she needed to know, just to end her disappointment, her rage—but I couldn’t explain it in words. Instead, what I had to give her would shoot up out of my skin, all the places I had been and things I had done or would do—past and future, all my selves, just a big, chewed-up mess flowing into her knot. She’d end up wearing me like a dress or a scarf. I didn’t think I was going to die—but I knew that what was about to happen would be worse than dying.”
Jack sat stiff on the cot, hands trembling under his thighs. “Umhmm,” he murmured. She smiled. “But I’m here, right? So relax.”
“That’s not easy,” he said with a nervous grin.
“Well, deal. I had been holding something back—didn’t even know it, lucky for me, because I might have told her. Maybe youknow what I’m talking about.”
“Maybe.”
“Tell me what I did.” Ginny looked straight at him.
Jack made a circular scissors motion with his fingers.
“Yeah. When I was finished—and it took just an instant—I was flat on my face, covered with leaves. Trees had fallen all around and water was everywhere—steaming but cold. Duckweed hung on all the trees. The lake had flung itself up out of the hollow, and I didn’t see the man again—I don’t know where he went. The whole forest was flattened.”
“What about your stone?”
“I dropped it, but then I found it,” Ginny said, nodding. “It was right near the path, still in its box. I picked it up and walked back between the trees. Near the house, I saw that the car was gone. I was alone. You must have done the same thing, Jack. So tell me what I did that made them go away.”
He still couldn’t answer.
“Can we sliceworld-lines?” she asked. “Not just jump between them, but cut them into pieces, killthem?”
He shook his head. “It’s something to do with the stones summing up. They’re part of us. We can’t lose them unless we die.”
“I knew that when I pawned the box. It always comes back to me. Did youcut things loose? In the storm.”
“I don’t remember. I don’t think I had time.”
“Hold my hand,” Ginny said, and held it out.
He didn’t hesitate. Her fingers were hot and her skin seemed to glow a faint cherry-red like the iron stove in the next room. “You’re burning up,” Jack said, but did not let go.
“Sometimes I do that. It’ll pass,” Ginny said. “I survived, didn’t I?”
“You sure did.”
“I know why they want to catch us,” she said. “Whoever they are.”
“Whatever they are,” Jack added.
“They’re afraid of us.”
He squeezed her fingers and the heat subsided. “Makes you wonder about Bidewell. What are we getting ourselves into?”
“Bidewell’s not afraid, not of us,” Ginny said. “That’s why I came here. No knots, no fear—just quiet and lots of books. The books arelike insulation. I still feel safe here. My stone is safe, too—for now.”
Jack let out a low whistle. “Okay,” he said.
“You’re not convinced.”
“It’s quiet—that’s okay. But I’d like for everything just to get back to normal.”
“Was it ever normal—for you?” Ginny asked.
“Before my mother died,” he said. “Well, maybe not normal—but fun. Nice.”
“You loved her?”
“Of course. Together, she and my father were…wherever we ended up, we had a home, even if it was just for a day.”
Ginny looked around the warehouse. “This feels more like home than anyplace I’ve ever been. What about you? What’s your story?”
“My mother was a dancer. My father wanted to be a comedian and a magician. My mother died, then my father. I wasn’t much more than a kid. They didn’t leave me much—just a trunk, some tricks and some books on magic—and the stone. I didn’t starve—I had learned how to play guitar and juggle, do card tricks, that sort of thing. I fell in with a tough crowd for a while, like you, got out of it…learned the streets, started busking. Managed not to get killed. Two years ago I moved in with a guy named Burke. He works as a sous chef in a restaurant. We don’t see much of each other.”
“Lovers?” Ginny asked.
Jack smiled. “No,” he said. “Burke’s as straight as they come. He just doesn’t like living alone.”
“You’ve met those women before?”
“I know Ellen pretty well,” Jack said. “I met the others a few days ago.”
“Did you do those sketches that Miriam found…in your apartment?”
“I’m a lousy artist. The other one did them. My guest.”
“Where’s he from, do you think?”
“‘The city at the end of time,’ of course,” Jack said, trying for sarcasm, but his voice cracked.
“Mine, too,” Ginny said. “But the last time I dreamed about her, she’s not there. She’s outside, lost somewhere awful.”
“The Chaos,” Jack said.
She looked down at the floor. “I don’t want to talk about it.”
“All right,” he said.
“Jack, do theyhave stones like ours?”
He shook his head. “I don’t think so.”
“Maybe we’re supposed to bring them.”
“I don’t see how. They’re there—we’re here.” He pushed back, then looked down at a large cardboard box labeledVALDOLID , 1898. “What kind of books does Bidewell collect?”
“All sorts,” Ginny said.
Jack pulled up the interleaved flaps and lifted out a dusty volume. The book’s hinges had cracked and the leather left powder on his fingers. The gold-embossed words on the spine still did not mean anything. He looked up. “Gobbledygook Press,” he said. “I guess the stones aren’t finished.”
“A lot of his books were like that before. Bidewell seems to know the difference.”
“Makes as much sense as everything else.” Jack was about to put the book down, but something tugged in his arm—the faintest pull on a hidden nerve—and he turned to a middle page. There, surrounded by more nonsense, a paragraph poked up that he could (just barely) read: Then Jerem enterd the House and therei found a book all meaningless bu for these words: Hast thou the old rock, Jeremy? In your pocket, wihyou?
Ginny watched him closely as his face flushed, as if he had been prancing around naked. Tongue poking the inside of his cheek, Jack slowly flipped through more of the book. Nothing else made sense.
“What is it?” she asked.
He showed her the page. She read the lines and her jaw fell like a child seeing a ghost. “All the books are different,” she said. “I’m not in any of them.”
“Have you looked?” Jack asked.
She shook her head. “There wasn’t time.”
FOURTEEN ZEROS
CHAPTER 55