Glyneth warily put down the sword, and rubbed the wax upon Kul's cuts, slashes, bruises and stab-wounds, despite Visbhume's protests against her lavish employment of his personal commodities. With wonder Glyneth saw the cuts seal and the flesh become whole, to the magic of the balm. Kul sighed; Glyneth, working as gently as she could, spoke in alarm: "Why do you sigh? Do I hurt you?"
"No... . Odd ideas enter my mind... . Scenes of places I have never known."
Visbhume rose to his feet and arranged the set of garments. He spoke with frigid dignity: "I will now take wallet and mount my carpet wole and be away from this unhappy site! You have done me incalculable harms, hurt my body and restrained my rightful exit from Tanjecterly. Still, in the circumstances, I will control my bitterness and make the best of affairs. Glyneth, my wallet, on this instant. Then, on my running carpet wole I will take my leave of you."
Kul said shortly: "Sit down on the ground; if you run I am too tired to chase you. Glyneth, go to the carcasses yonder and find some straps and cords from their harness."
Visbhume cried out in a brassy voice: "What now? Have you not dealt me trouble enough?"
Kul grinned. "Not nearly enough."
Glyneth brought straps, from which Kul fashioned a collor for Visbhume's neck with a leash twenty feet long. Meanwhile Glyneth gingerly explored Visbhume's garments for secret pockets and removed all his magical adjuncts, which she tucked into the wallet. Visbhume at last stifled his protests and sat crouched in surly silence. The eight-legged wole on which he had arrived had strayed no great distance and placidy cropped the sward with its feeding tubes. Kul climbed to its long flat back and threw down a pair of anchors to prevent it from coursing away.
Glyneth addressed Visbhume: "Now: will you answer questions and tell us all we should know?"
"Ask away," snapped Visbhume. "I must now serve you or risk damage to my poor body, where I already feel the pain of purple bruises. A person of my status is much demeaned."
"If we are hungry, what shall we eat?"
Visbhume considered a moment, then licked his lips. "Since I too hunger, I will tell you how to find bounty. In the wallet you will find a box. Take therefrom a scrap of cloth, and spread it smooth. Let fall upon it a drop of wine, a crumb of bread and a sliver of cheese."
Glyneth followed instructions and the trifle of cloth instantly expanded to became a fine damask cover laden with all manner of viands, and the three ate to their satiation, whereupon the cloth once more became small.
Glyneth said: "Visbhume, you have been forming quiet plots. If they help you, then we have only ourselves to blame, and we will therefore be vigilant, and show you little mercy if you anger us."
"Bah!" muttered Visbhume. "I could form a dozen plots a minute, or wear them like yonder tree wears its leaves, but to what avail?"
"If I knew, you would never learn from me."
"Ah, Glyneth, your words are hurtful! At one time tender feelings existed between us; have you forgotten so soon?"
Glyneth grimaced but made no comment. "How can we send a message to Murgen?"
Visbhume seemed genuinely puzzled. "To what purpose? He knows you are here?"
"So that he can open a new gate, and rescue us."
"Murgen, no matter what his power, cannot break a new gate when the pendulum is swinging."
"Explain, if you wilclass="underline" "
"I spoke in parable. There is no pendulum. At a certain pulse, time is static both here and on Earth, and the gate can be opened at one node or another. See the black moon which moves around the northern sky? It strikes a radius with a central pole and somewhere along the radius a node can be opened, if pulses are in synchrony. It is a matter of exacting calculation, since time moves at different rates here and on Earth. Sometimes here time goes fast and on Earth slow, and sometimes the opposite. Only when time runs at the same rate, as determined by the pulses, can the gates be opened. Otherwise, gates could be opened anywhere at any time."
"How can the gate be opened again, and when, and where?"
Visbhume rose to his feet and, as if in boredom or perhaps abstraction of thought, started to remove the collar from his neck. Kul gave the leash a tug which sent Visbhume jumping in a ridiculous caper to keep his balance.
"Do that no more," said Kul. "Be happy the strap is only around your neck and not through holes in your ears. Answer the question, and do not try to confuse us with verbiage."
Visbhume growled: "You would take all my valuable knowledge and give me nothing, and still tie me by the neck, as if I were a cur dog or a Progressive."
"But for your doing, we would not be here; have you forgotten?"
Visbhume blew out his thin cheeks. "No good cause is served in dredging up ancient history. That which is done is done, whether we rejoice or grieve! That is my slogan! At that twist in the prism known as ‘Now' we are to concern ourselves only with immediate cases."
"Just so. As of ‘now' answer the question."
Visbhume said loftily: "Let us work practically! I must take the lead, since the knowledge is mine, and you must trust me to consider our mutual interests. Otherwise I must in intricate detail school you in all the—"
Visbhume stopped short as Kul began to draw taut the leash. Kul said: "Answer!"
Visbhume said plaintively: "I was preparing my careful response! Your conduct lacks all gentility." He cleared his throat. "The matter is complex, and, so I fear, beyond your understanding. Time moves by one phase on Earth and by another here. Each phase consists of nine quavers, or pulses, or, even better, constrictions in and out from the central node of what we call ‘synchronicity'. Is this clear? No? As I supposed. There is no point in going farther. You must trust my best judgment."
Glyneth said: "You still have not answered me. How do we return to Earth?"
"I am so doing! Between Earth and Tanjecterly, the synchrony lasts six to nine days, and, as we have seen has just ended. Then it sweeps away, along the radius of the black moon with the center node. At the next pulse, the gate will open into another place, but none so easy as Tanjecterly. Hidmarth and Skurre are demon-worlds; Underwood is empty save for a moaning sound; Pthopus is a single torpid soul. These were discovered and explored by Twitten the Arch-mage, and he compiled an almanac, which is of great value."
Glyneth brought a long narrow book with black metal covers from the wallet. The spine was like a sheath housing a black nine-sided metal rod with a golden knob at the end. Glyneth, withdrawing the rod, saw that each of the nine sides was engraved in crabbed golden characters.
Visbhume casually held out his hand. "Let me instruct myself; I have forgotten my calculations."
Glyneth drew the book away. "What is the purpose of the rod?"
"That is a subsidiary instrument. Replace it in the sheath and hand me the book."
Glyneth replaced the rod and opened the book. The first page, indited in queer crawling marks with straggling tails and looping risers was illegible, but someone, perhaps Visbhume, had attached a sheet which would seem to be a translation of the original text. Glyneth read aloud:
"These nine places, along with the Gaean Earth, form the ten worlds of Chronos, and he has skewered them all on his axis. By cunning effort I have, constrained the axis, and held it fixed: such is the magnitude, of my achievement.
"Of the nine worlds I warn against Paador, Nith and Woon; Hidmarth and Skurre are purulent places infested with demons. Cheng may well be home to the sandestins, but this is uncertain, while Pthopus is trufy insipid. Only Tanjecterly will tolerate human men.
"In each, section, the almanac details the cycle of quavers and indicates the standard by which ingress and exit may be obtained. With the almanac is the key, and only this key will strike through the weft and allow passage. Lose not the key! The almanac is thereby useless!