"You do not want the rule of Law?"
"We could not exist without Chaos. Temperamentally I serve Law. Intellectually, and as a player in the Game of Time, I serve Chaos. It is my soul that serves the Balance."
"And why is that, sir?"
"Because, sir, the Balance serves humanity best."
We were cantering through the shallow dust of a valley. A few hawthorn trees had managed to grow in the hollows, but mostly the scenery was bare rock. Slowing to a walk, Lobkowitz turned in his saddle and offered me a white clay pipe and a tobacco pouch. I declined. As he filled his own bowl, tamping it with his thumb, he sat back in the big wooden saddle and gestured towards the horizon. "We have kept our coordinates, I do believe. At this rate it will not be long before we reach our destination."
"Our destination?"
Almost apologetically Prince Lobkowitz said, "It is safe to tell you now. We travel, with a little luck, to the city of the Kakatanawa."
"Why could we not have gone back with the Kakatanawa when they returned home?"
"Because their path is not our path. If my judgment is accurate, when we find them, they will have long since been back at their positions. Those warriors are the immortal guardians of the Balance."
"Why are we all from different periods of history, Prince Lobkowitz?"
"Not history exactly, my friend, for history is just another comforting tale we tell so that we do not go mad. We are from different parts of the multiverse. We are from the multitude of twigs which make up this particular branch-each twig a possible
world, yet not growing in time and space as we perceive, but growing in the Field of Time, through many dimensions. In the Time Field all events occur simultaneously. Space is only a dimension of time.
"These branches we call spheres or realms-and these realms are finely separated, usually by scale, so that the nearest scale to them is either too large or too small for them to see, though perhaps the physical differences between the worlds are scarcely noticeable."
Prince Lobkowitz gave me a sideways look to check if I was following his argument. "Yet there are occasions when the winds of limbo breathe through the multiverse, tossing the branches to and fro, tangling some, bringing down others. Those of us who play the Game of Time or otherwise engage with the multiverse attempt to maintain stability by ensuring that when such winds blow, the branches remain strong and healthy and do not crash together or proliferate into a billion different and ultimately dying twigs.
"Nor can we let the branches grow so thick and heavy that the whole bough breaks and dies. So we maintain a balance between the joyous proliferation of Chaos and the disciplined singularities of Law. The multiverse is a tree, the Balance lies within the tree, the tree lies within the house, and the house stands on an island in a lake ..." He seemed to shake himself from a trance, in which he had been chanting a mantra. He came smartly awake and looked at me with half a smile, as if caught in some private act.
It was all he would tell me. Since I could now anticipate further answers to my questions as it became possible for him to offer them, I grew more optimistic. Was he relaxing because we were getting closer and closer to where Oona was in some mysterious danger? If Lobkowitz was so optimistic, there was every chance we would be there to rescue her.
On we galloped as if we rode on the soft turf of an abandoned shire, although the limestone now was melting and turning to a sickly, sluggish lava beneath the Nihrainian horses' hooves. The stink of the stuff filled my nostrils and threatened to clog my lungs, yet not once did I feel afraid as we crossed a sea of uneasy pewter and reached a shore of glittering ebony far too smooth to accept any mortal steed's hoof. The Nihrainian stallions took the slippery surface with familiar ease. Ducking as large trees came towards us, we found ourselves in a sweet-smelling pine forest through which late-afternoon sunlight fell, casting deep shadows and calling the sap from the wood. Lobkowitz let his horse stop to crop at invisible grass and turned his face upwards to admire what he saw. The sun caught his ruddy features. In the heightened contrast he resembled a perfect statue of himself. Great shafts of sunlight broke through the silhouettes of the trees and created an incredible mixture of forms. For a moment, following Lobkowitz's gaze, I thought I looked into the perfect features of a young girl. Then a breeze disturbed the branches, and the vision was gone.
Lobkowitz turned to me, his smile broadening. "This is one of those realms all too ready to mold itself to our desires and take the form we demand. It is particularly dangerous, and we had best be out of it soon."
We cantered again, across sparsely covered hills and through valleys of sheltered woodlands, and entered a broad plain, with a greying sky hovering over us and a cold breeze tugging at our horses' manes. Lobkowitz had become grave, turning his head this way and that as if expecting an enemy.
The clouds streamed in towards us, thick and black, and lowered the horizon. In the far distance I could make out the peaks of a tall mountain range. I prayed they were the Northern Rockies. Certainly this great, flat plain could be part of the American prairie.
It began to rain. Fat drops fell on my bare head. I was still wearing the clothes Sepiriz had first given me and had no hat. I lifted a gloved hand to hold off the worst of it. Lobkowitz, of course, was now dressed perfectly for the weather and seemed amused by my discomfort. He reached into one of his saddlebags and tugged out a heavy, old dark blue sea-cloak. I accepted it.
I was soon even gladder for the cloak as the wind came whip-
ping in from the northeast and hit us like a giant fist. Doggedly the Nihrainian stallions maintained their pace. As their great muscles strained harder, there was a hint of tiredness now. The endless veldt stretched all around us. Still no obvious signs of beaver, birds or deer. Once, as the wind howled fiercely and caused even my stallion to reduce his speed to a dogged plod, there came a gap in the clouds. Red sunlight brightened the scene for a moment and revealed a herd of deer running for their life before the wind. The first I had seen. They were clearly trying to escape the region. I had the distinct feeling we were not heading in the sensible direction. I remarked on the wind during a lull. Lobkowitz looked concerned as he confirmed my guess that we were heading into a tornado. Knowing little of such things in Europe, I could not recognize one. All I understood was that it was wise to find shelter.
Lobkowitz agreed that, as a general rule, it was usually wise to seek cover.
"But not this time. He would find us, and we would be more vulnerable. We must continue."
"Who would find us?"
"Lord Shoashooan, Lord of Winds. He commands a dangerous alliance."
Then, as if to silence my friend, the wind again became a shouting bully. The rain was a giant's fingers drumming on my back as we cantered on, crossing marshes, rivers and grassland with equal ease. The only thing powerful enough to slow us was that cruel, relentless wind. It seemed to carry hobgoblins with it, tugging at my body and teasing my horse. I could almost hear its hard, cackling laughter.
Lobkowitz rode in close now, stirrup to stirrup, so that we should not lose each other in the weather. Every so often he tried to speak over the wind, but it was impossible. I was sleeping intermittently in my saddle when the horses slowed to a walk. My body ached, yet they were almost tireless. This seemed to be the nearest they came to resting.
Mile by mile the prairie became low hills, rolling towards the mountains, slowly transferring into the range that rose tall and