“My lord.” Gwen hooked fingers around his forearm. “I mislike the fashion in which that brew doth bubble.”
“Nothing to be worried about, I’m sure.” But Ron glanced nervously at some test tubes on another table, which had begun to dance, pouring another greenish liquid back and forth from one to another. They finally settled down, but…
“That vial, too, doth bubble,” Agatha growled. “Ho, son of mine! What dost thou?”
Behind them, glass clinked again. They whirled about to see a retort sliding its nose into a glass coil. Flame ignited under the retort, and water began to drip from a hole in a bucket suspended over the bench, spattering on the glass coil.
“My lord,” Gwen said nervously, “that brew doth bubble most marvelously now. Art thou certain that Harold doth know his own deeds?”
Rod was sure Harold knew what he was doing, all right. In fact, he was even sure that Harold was a lot more sophisticated, and a lot more devious, than Rod had given him credit for. And suspense was an integral part of the maneuver, pushing it close to the line…
But not this close! He leaped toward the alembic. Gasses being produced in the presence of open flame bothered him.
“What dost thou?”
The words boomed through the chamber, and Galen towered in the doorway, blue robe, white beard, and red face. He took in the situation at a glance, then darted to the alembic to dampen the fire, dashed to seize the test tube and throw it into a tub of water, then leaped to douse the lamp under the retort.
“Thou dost move most spryly,” Agatha crooned, “for a dotard.”
The wizard turned to glare at her, leaning against the table, trembling. His voice shook with anger. “Vile crone! Art so envious of my labors that thou must needs seek to destroy my Tower?”
“Assuredly, ‘twas naught so desperate as that,” Gwen protested.
Galen turned a red glower on her. “Nay, she hath not so much knowledge as that—though her mischief could have laid this room waste, and the years of glassblowing and investigating that it doth contain!” His eyes narrowed as they returned to Agatha. “I do see that ne’er should I ha’ given thee succor—for now thou’lt spare me not one moment’s peace!”
Agatha started a retort of her own, but Rod got in ahead of her. “Uh, well—not really.”
The wizard’s glare swiveled toward him. “Thou dost know little of this haggard beldam, Lord Warlock, an thou dost think she could endure to leave one in peace.”
Agatha took a breath, but Rod was faster again. “Well, y’ see—it wasn’t really her idea to come back here.”
“Indeed?” The question fumed sarcasm. “ ‘Twas thy good wife’s, I doubt me not.”
“Wrong again,” Rod said brightly. “It was mine. And Agatha had nothing to do with tinkering with your lab.”
Galen was silent for a pace. Then his eyes narrowed. “I’ truth, I should ha’ seen that she doth lack even so much knowledge as to play so learned a vandal. Was it thou didst seek explosion, Lord Warlock? Why, then?”
“ ‘Cause I didn’t think you’d pay any attention to a knock on the door,” Rod explained, “except maybe to say, ‘Go away.’ ”
Galen nodded slowly. “So, thou didst court disaster to bring me out from my researches long enough to bandy words with thee.”
“That’s the right motive,” Rod agreed, “but the wrong culprit. Actually, not one single one of us laid a finger on your glassware.”
Galen glanced quickly at the two witches. “Thou’lt not have me believe they took such risks, doing such finely detailed work, with only their minds?”
“Not that they couldn’t have,” Rod hastened to point out. “I’ve seen my wife make grains of wheat dance.” He smiled fondly, remembering the look on Magnus’s face when Gwen did it. “And Agatha’s admitted she’s healed wounds by making the tiniest tissues flow back together—but this time neither of them did.”
“Assuredly, not thou …”
“ ‘Twas thy son,” Agatha grated.
The laboratory was silent as the old wizard stared into her eyes, the color draining from his face.
Then it flooded back, and he erupted. “What vile falsehood is this? What deception dost thou seek to work now, thou hag with no principle to thy name of repute? How dost thou seek to work on my heart with so blatant a lie? Depraved, evil witch! Thou hast no joy in life but the wreaking of others’ misery! Fool I was, to ever look on thy face, greater fool to e’er seek to aid thee! Get thee gone, get thee hence!” His trembling arm reared up to cast a curse that would blast her. “Get thee to…”
“It’s the truth,” Rod snapped.
Galen stared at him for the space of a heartbeat.
It was long enough to get a word in. “He’s the son of another Galen, and another Agatha, in another world just like this one. You know there are other universes, don’t you?”
Galen’s arm hung aloft, forgotten; excitement kindled in his eyes. “I had suspected it, aye—the whiles my body did lie like to wood, and my spirit lay open to every slightest impress. Distantly did I perceive it, dimly through chaos, a curving presence that… But nay, what nonsense is this! Dost thou seek to tell me that, in one such other universe, I do live again?”
“ ‘Again’ might be stretching it,” Rod hedged, “especially since your opposite number is dead now. But that a Galen, just like you, actually did live, yes—except he seems to have made a different choice when he was a youth.”
Galen said nothing, but his gaze strayed to Agatha.
She returned it, her face like flint.
“For there was an Agatha in that other universe, too,” Rod said softly, “and they met, and married, and she bore a son.”
Galen still watched Agatha, his expression blank.
“They named the son Harold,” Rod went on, “and he grew to be a fine young warlock—but more ‘war’ than ‘lock.’ Apparently, he enlisted, and fought in quite a few battles. He survived, but his parents passed away—probably from sheer worry, with a son in the infantry…”
Galen snapped out of his trance. “Do not seek to cozen me, Master Warlock! How could they have died, when this Agatha and I…” His voice dwindled and his gaze drifted as he slid toward the new thought.
“Time is no ranker, Master Wizard; he’s under no compulsion to march at the same pace in each place he invests. But more importantly, events can differ in different universes—or Harold would never have been born. And if the Galen and Agatha of his universe could marry, they could also die—from accident, or disease, or perhaps even one of those battles that their son survived. I’m sure he’d be willing to tell you, if you asked him.”
Galen glanced quickly about the chamber, and seemed to solidify inside his own skin.
“Try,” Rod breathed. “Gwen can’t hear him, nor can any of the other witches—save Agatha. But if you’re the analog of his father, you should be able to…”
“Nay!” Galen boomed. “Am I become so credulous as to hearken to the tales of a stripling of thirty?”
“Thirty-two,” Rod corrected.
“A child, scarcely more! I credit not a word of this tale of thine!”
“Ah, but we haven’t come to the evidence yet.” Rod grinned. “Because, you see, Harold didn’t survive one of those battles.”
Galen’s face neutralized again.
“He was wounded, and badly,” Rod pressed. “He barely managed to crawl into a cave and collapse there—and his spirit drifted loose. But his body didn’t. No, it lay in a lasting, deathlike sleep; so his spirit had no living body to inhabit, but also had not been freed by death and couldn’t soar to seek Heaven. But that spirit was a warlock, so it didn’t have to just haunt the cave where its body lay. No, it went adventuring—out into the realm of chaos, seeking out that curving presence you spoke of, searching for its parents’ spirits, seeking aid…”