And Eternity Read Online Free PDF Page B

see. It was as though the mountain were a jewel set in the land and had contracted slightly, leaving a space. If nothing were done, in time the jewel would fall out of its setting and be lost. Meanwhile it remained, and it seemed it was theirs to climb. The path went up to the edge and on up the slope, neatly ignoring the gap.
    “Nox is there?” Orlene inquired, glancing up.
    Jolie considered. “When Gaea is busy, or wishes to make a point, she makes it difficult for others to approach her residence,” she said. “Even other Incarnations lack power to approach her in her domain, unless she accedes. Nox is by all accounts the most seclusive of Incarnations, so perhaps this is her challenge that keeps away intruders. If so, then it means we are on the right path.”
    Orlene grimaced. Even in that expression she looked better than she had been when grieving for her baby. The challenge was taking her mind from her personal problem, and that was good. “Then we had better get moving.”
    They stepped over the gap and stood on the mountain. The oddness abruptly magnified; this was definitely an unearthly structure! There was a vibrance about it, an animation not as of life but as of an awakening machine with sophisticated circuits. Suddenly Jolie was uncertain of the security of her ghostly state; whatever was here seemed competent to capture her spiritual aspect as readily as it might have her physical aspect.
    Orlene, too, hesitated. “Something about this,” she said. “I feel a power I don’t trust.”
    “The power of an Incarnation, perhaps,” Jolie agreed. “Sometimes Gaea manifests physically in the mortal realm, and when a mortal becomes aware of her, he is awed by her mere presence. This feels somewhat like that. An Incarnation is to ordinary folk what a mountain is to a molehill. They have powers we hardly dare dream of. If this mountain is of Nox, she is aware of us, and we are in her power.”
    “She wants us to desist?”
    “I think if she wanted that, she would have removed the mountain entirely, or made the path impenetrable. No, I suspect this is merely her warning: we are in her territory now, and must obey her rules. She will let us proceed if she chooses.”
    Orlene gazed up the slope. “You say she is the Incarnation of Night, yet this is light.”
    “I confess I don’t understand this aspect, but surely we shall be in darkness before we reach her.”
    “Let’s hope it is only physical.”
    Then Orlene noticed something in the path. It looked like a stick, jammed in so as to stand vertically. But it wasn’t natural; the upper end was shaped into a handle.
    Jolie reached down to take it, but her hand passed through it. “An illusion!” she said, hardly amused. In a sense, everything here was illusory, including themselves, but so far it had all been in a common framework, interacting as if physical. She didn’t want the confusion of layered illusions.
    “You mean it isn’t real?” Orlene inquired, reaching for it herself. This sort of thing evidently remained a novelty to her.
    “It’s real, just not on the same plane, the same level of being,” Jolie explained. “There are an infinite number of planes of being, and the Incarnations can craft them to their needs. We, as ghosts, are on one plane, and seem solid here, but not on Earth. It depends. This must be Nox’s doing.”
    Orlene’s hand touched the stick. “But it’s real!” she exclaimed. Her fingers closed about the handle and she drew it out of the ground. “A wand!”
    “A magic wand!” Jolie agreed, trying to touch it and failing again. “One only you can wield!”
    “But what can I do with it? I know nothing about this!”
    “It must have been left for you. This may be Nox’s invitation for you to proceed. The wand may be the key to progress when some barrier appears.”
    “You mean I wave it and magic happens?” Orlene waved it experimentally. Nothing happened.
    “You may have to invoke it,” Jolie offered,