She felt a mingling of their waters, like the mingling of seas so clearly visible along the outermost pillars of Hercules, entering into the broad ocean of Atlantis.

She saw a dense weave of realities, Gaias in profusion, and knew that none of them were exactly like her world. But the gray-haired, smiling man who might have been Zeus or Aserapis told her to choose one in which the Jarts never did open a gate, never did invade…in which the expedition never happened…he suggested no more.

She closed her eyes.

“Time for saying au revoir,” the second avatar said. “I entrust Ser Korzenowski to these command individuals.”

Korzenowski transferred his clavicle to the gate-opener and backed away. The Engineer became separated from Olmy and Ry Oyu as the bubble split in two. Olmy watched him move off and vanish behind another black barrier.

Ry Oyu lifted the clavicle, as if to become used to its weight and capabilities again. “Ser Olmy, these are servants of the Final Mind—however misguided. They tell me they are eager to convey you to your chosen gate. They are preparing to find the gate and open it now. I believe we can trust them. But no one knows how much time has passed there…”

“Always an element of risk,” Olmy said.

“Uncertainty keeps us interested,” Ry Oyu commented.

“Thank you.”

“You are quite welcome. They will accept their modified expediter any time you choose to give him up.”

Olmy was not at all reluctant to part with this reminder of his greater failure. Again, he was surrounded by a pale fire. The Jart within him vanished.

For a moment, he savored the wonderful aloneness. To be restored, alive and sane, and to return to Timbl…

He thought of Tapi and Ram Kikura, of other failures less spectacular and ultimately perhaps more haunting.

“Be content, Ser Olmy,” Ry Oyu said, and clasped his hand, then released it.

Their bubble split in two again.

Ry Oyu turned to the command individuals. “I would like to travel back to the geometry stacks. I will need to open gates to two worlds in universes very slightly different from our own.”

His bubble moved back through the barriers, into the flaw station, and down to the Way.

He carried Korzenowski’s clavicle lightly. The bubble spread open at the bottom and gave him access to the living bronze surface.

The gate-opener closed his eyes and murmured the ritual incantations that prepared his mind, however unnecessary they might be in his present form.

“I lift this clavicle to worlds without number, and bring a new light to the Way, guiding this gate that all may prosper, those who guide and are guided, who create and are created, who light the Way and bask in the light so given…”