Skuld pointed at the silvery vapor. “These are the Mists of Time; here is where all things begin, a future flowing toward the present, to wash over all mortal things and stream into the past. Here, child, here at the start of the River of Time is the future; it is the beginning of all things, whereas the past is the end of all, for there, at the end of time’s flow, all things come to rest, buried in antiquity.”
Camille frowned and said, “Perhaps it is all relative, depending on whether one looks at time as a flow streaming o’er the mortal world, or if one looks at it as a mortal moving forward through a flow of time.”
Skuld laughed again and said, “You are quite clever, my child,” the maiden at the loom calling Camille “child” even though Skuld herself appeared to be no older. “My sisters will delight in you.”
“Ah, then,” said Camille, her heart a bit lighter. “Raseri was right, assuming your sisters live on this river too.”
“They do,” said Skuld. “Have you any sisters?”
Camille nodded. “Five… and a brother as well.”
“And what do folk say of them?”
“Until of recent, very little. But now that they have wealth and a mansion, they are courted.-My sisters, that is. My brother Giles is yet too young to be sought out by prospective brides. Regardless, I believe that folk say my sisters are quite fetching… certainly Lord Jaufre does, the old roue.-But tell me, Lady Skuld, what do folk say of you and your sisters?”
Skuld smiled. “Many things: some curse us; some bless us; some say nought, while others make up fanciful tales. Some men have it all wrong about the three of us. They say that one of us spins the thread of a man’s life, and that one of us measures the thread, while the third one cuts the thread. But that is obviously wrong, for my sisters and I seldom interfere in the affairs of others-oh, at times we do intervene when someone fails to live up to the terms of a wager, but in the main we stay aloof. Too, occasionally when times are dire do we take a hand, but even then we follow a set of rules. Ah, but the men who say we spin and measure and cut the thread of a man’s life do have it wrong, for time and fate are continuous, flowing from the future through the present and into the past, washing over all on the way to the Sea of Oblivion.”
Camille frowned and slowly shook her head. “I yet find it difficult to comprehend the flow of time as you tell it to be.”
“Why so?”
“Well, is it not true that what a man has done affects what he will do? Do not the events of the past shape those of the future? And does that not mean that the events of the past occur before those of the future? Is not the past merely prologue for that which is to come?”
Continuing to watch the mist, Skuld said, “As you yourself pointed out, Camille, it all depends on whether one perceives the past and present and future from the standpoint of one who is moving through the wash of time, whereas my sisters and I perceive it from the point of view of the flow itself as it washes over those standing still. Hence, I weave, as do my sisters, shaping the great tapestry of time. Together we depict that which might come to be, that which is happening in the moment, and that which has gone. As for my part, the patterns I set thereon are not quite fixed, for they are mutable by those depicted. Hence, the tapestry is a living thing, and I alter what I portray even as I weave. My middle sister alters it again by what occurs, and my third sister binds it forever. Hence, in a sense, you are right: for those who stand in the flow of time, the past is prologue, even though it is gone beyond recall, though from my view the past is yet to be.”
As Camille pondered that enigma, the shuttle slammed side to side, bearing the weft of time back and forth through the warp, the treadle setting the pace, the batten pounding the threads home, the unseen cloth growing. Finally Camille said, “I am quite amazed that you-or perhaps your splendid loom-can weave an invisible tapestry.”
Without looking away from the mist, Skuld said, “Invisible to you, perhaps, but not to me.” Then Skuld pursed her lips. “If you wish, I can make visible to your eyes the events and other such it contains-great wars to come, men flying in machines through the air, and the like-but heed: should I give you such knowledge of the future, you may bring even greater disaster to all. Even so, I will show you if you so desire.”
Hearking back to her discussion with Alain concerning predestination versus free will, and about knowing the future, Camille said, “No, Ma’amselle, I’d rather not see. Still, I would like to know if I will succeed.”
Skuld raised an eyebrow. “If I say yes, will you try less hard? If I say no, will you abandon your search?”
Camille shook her head. “No, for you yourself said that what you weave is mutable, hence, even though I might welcome the knowledge, still I or others might make it change. And so, whether the answer is yea or nay, I would go on, either to preserve the yes, or to alter the no.”
“You are wiser than your years, Camille,” said Skuld.
“Oh, I think not, Lady Skuld, for if I were, I would not now be searching for a place east of the sun and west of the moon. And that is why I came, to ask where such a place does lie, for at that place is my Alain, or so I have been told.”
Skuld said, “You need ask my middle sister, for, from your point of view, she is much older than I, while I think of her as being much younger, given how differently you and I perceive the flow of time to be.”
“But haven’t you already woven into your tapestry the place I seek?”
“Mayhap, Camille. Even so, you still must ask my sister.”
“Where can I find this sister?”
Yet weaving, Skuld said, “My sisters and I are bound by a rule: no answers of significance or gifts of worth can we give to anyone without first a service of value being rendered to us-which, in my case, you have certainly done- but even then we must ask a riddle and have it correctly answered. Hence, resolve me this: from that which is yet to come, unto the singular now, what am I?”
Camille glanced down through the growing dawnlight at the River of Time and said, “You are the Future.”
“Indeed,” said Skuld, “and a gift from and for the future you shall have.” She tilted her head toward the turning spinning wheel. “Take my finest golden carding comb and keep good care of it; hold on to it to the very end, for then it might do you some good.”
“But, Lady Skuld,” protested Camille, “Should the thread snap again, time itself will be broken have you not the comb to tease out a new thread from the mist above.”
Skuld shook her head. “I have another, my child, though not fashioned of gold; hence, you must take this one, else Faery itself might fall, for there is one who will pollute the River of Time even more than the one I now place on my tapestry.”
Camille looked at the loom where the invisible depiction grew. “You now weave someone evil?”
“Aye, a monstrous man yet to be; one who will reach out his arms to take in the masses and clutch them unto his breast; one who will do a little three-step jig dance of victory; one who will start a dreadful holocaust. Regardless, Camille, you must take the carding comb, else one will come and destroy Faery itself by polluting beyond all recovery the very River of Time.”
Camille sighed, yet did as she was bade and took up the golden carding comb. “Again I ask, Lady Skuld, your middle sister, where can I find her?”
With a flick of her eyes, Skuld glanced at the horizon, bright with the oncoming sun. And with her right hand she gestured downstream and intoned:
“As grain is to stones that roll and grind,
Moments are crunched in the weft of time,
Seek the like and my sister you’ll find.”
Again Skuld glanced at the bright horizon, and she said, “And this I will tell you as well: leave not the banks of time’s flow, else surely you will lose the stream.”
And in that very moment the limb of the sun edged over the rim of the world, and so vanished Skuld and loom and spinning wheel all, and day came on the land.
And Camille heard Scruff instantly chirping, for he would have millet seed.
29
