Suddenly he had laughed, cheerfully and out loud. "No, no," he said to the empty room. "I'm a Dorsai!"
"You rejected it," said Amanda in the darkness. "Why?" "I handled all things by intuitional logic, then," said Hal. "I ran the probabilities forward and found they went nowhere - at least as far as going where I wanted to go, which was to lead the human race to a time when none of them would ever do the sort of thing that had caused the death of my uncle James. But you do see-"
He turned to look in her direction. Although there was some light leaking around the door that led to the interior of the building and the bathroom facilities, there was not enough to read the expression on Amanda's face.
"How I'd entered the Creative Universe, and used it, I'd had to, to be able to put that message capsule on the ceiling. From that, I realized there must be an aspect of things I'd never taken into account before, and the concept of the Creative Universe grew from that." "But you turned away from it then?" she said. "My first thought was that it was only good for parlor magic tricks. It never crossed my mind it could be useful. Remember, at that time, as I say, I still believed in the way of getting physical control of all the worlds and making the people on them live by laws that would end the sort of situation that'd killed James. At that time I didn't see any reason it wouldn't work."
He hesitated. "But that was the first time I'd entered the Creative Universe," he said more slowly, "and, like everyone else since time began, I did it unconsciously. I said to myself, 'let's see if I can't walk on air,' and tried it, and found I could. The potential of that came back to me once I got control of all the Younger Worlds and found laws alone wouldn't change human nature."
He laughed. "Breathtaking discovery, wasn't it?" he said. "At any rate, then it occurred to me for the first time to go back to the twenty-first century and change the direction of history. My full appreciation of what the Creative Universe could mean for the race was born in my search for a way to do that. To begin with, it offered me a way to put my mind back into the past - and bring it back eighty years later than when it had left, in a two-year-old body. "
He lay for a moment without saying anything. Amanda waited patiently. "But even then I was making use of the creative forces largely unconsciously, without really understanding them. It was only when I had to recognize the Others as a result of the changes in intent I made in the established - frozen by time - historic forces of the twenty-first century, that I began to see the real shape of the job I had to do. It was then I really looked at the Creative Universe, and saw its ultimate possibilities, and the absolute necessity for them." "Tell me," said Amanda thoughtfully, "you don't use intuitional logic anymore?" "No," said Hal. "It doesn't help what I'm doing now and hasn't helped much with anything I've done for a long time. It's a Donal-style tool, about as useful as the ability to do calculus instantly in your head. Idiot savants have done things comparable to it for centuries without giving the race a chance for improvement, let alone helping it grow, the way I hoped-"
He stopped, on a note in his voice that left what he had been saying uncompleted. "But while my mind was back in the twenty-first century," he said, "under the influence of Walter Blunt and what the Chantry Guild was then, as well as by my own will, I entered the Creative Universe deliberately. Earlier, I'd just passed through it to get back in time. It was because I was there that I could be, and was, struck at by the Enemy. Otherwise, I'd never have begun to see what the conscious, willing entry into that universe promises everybody." "But there's no way you can use intuitional logic to see your way to the Creative Universe?" Amanda asked. "It doesn't work for that sort of problem. It's essentially a tool of the real universe, bounded by logic. It can't jump gaps - only go through the logical steps faster. I know I've been saying I have to find the way to the Creative Universe, but perhaps what I ought to be saying is that I have to make a way to it. If there was already a way, the kind of way I need, to the Creative Universe, intuitional logic could find it. But there isn't one yet, and intuitional logic not only can't find what isn't there, it can't make anything on its own." "I understand then," Amanda said thoughtfully. "You're saying you can't see ultimate consequences to anything?" "That's right. I can't. All that's visible to it is what ordinary logic would predict if ordinary logic had all the elements of the problem and unlimited time to work them to a conclusion. Intuitional logic not only doesn't work in the creative area, it doesn't work in the personal one - for instance, I can't see my own death, because like all reasonably healthy persons, I can't, on the unconscious level, conceive of myself as dead and the universe going on without me-"
Amanda did not move physically. The years of her upbringing, both as a Dorsai and as the protege of the Second Amanda, held her still. But her profound emotional reaction reached out to Hal with shocking impact, through that same channel by which they could touch each other across light-years of space. Swiftly he gathered her into his arms, holding her tight against him. She lay still there, too, but now he could feel the trembling inside her. "Amanda!" he said, "what is it?"
"I don't know. I can't tell you..." she said between teeth clenched tight. "It's as if the edge, just the edge, of some terrible sadness brushed me. Oh, my love-hold me"
"I've got you," said Hal. "Tell me you won't go away, ever!" "I'll never leave you," said Hal. "Oh, thank all heavens, all gods." Amanda clung to him. He held her tight, and, in time, they slept - still close together.
CHAPTER 17
Dawn through the uncurtained windows of the office woke them both. They dressed and found their way to the dining hall of the dormitory building they were in. They were seated across from each other at an end of one of the long picnic-style plank tables, having breakfast, when Amid joined them. "Someone told you we were here," said Amanda, as the old man sat down next to her. He looked more diminutive than ever side by side with Amanda, Hal noticed. It was as if the last year or so had shrunk him even further, only without harming him. He was a little kernel of a man, but hard and alive. "Quite right." He beamed at her. "I'd left word with those on kitchen duty in both buildings to let me know when you were up for breakfast."
He looked over at Hal. "I thought I'd take you out and see you started in the circle myself," he said. "Isn't that possibly going to mean a long wait for you?" asked Hal. "Ordinarily, yes," said Amid. "But it seems things are out of my hands. Word about a visitor here is already around, and those currently waiting have all volunteered to let you go first. We'll only have to wait until the first person to step out of the circle after we get there does so. Then you step in, Amanda and I go about our business."
"Your business?" Hal looked from Amid to Amanda. "Well, I about my business," said Amid. "I was merely using the expression. What Amanda's immediate plans are, I've no idea. I assumed you'd know." "I'm staying for a day or so," said Amanda, "so I can watch Hal at the start. I'll just wait around - unless you've got something I can do to help pay our way with you here? I know everyone on this ledge works at something or other." "You're our guest," said Amid. "That rule doesn't apply to you or Hal unless you want it to."