He rose from the ground at dawn, beating at the air with his enormous wings, feeling the shifting world of the real. To the west, four long columns of ash rising into the already clouded heavens showed that four of the newly formed volcanoes were still spewing. The clouds of ash and effluvia so generated were already changing the quality of the light.

Far to the north, north of the Inner Sea, he had another army, but it was too far away to seize the Sorcerer’s Isle. He had set that force to laying siege to Mogon’s network of natural caves and fortifications, the heartland of the mighty northern wardens. But they had become bogged in an endless series of small skirmishes that demanded his near constant attention; and the albino warden, Lostenferch, his lieutenant, was skilled at the use of magic but not at the employment of archers, and was wasting Ash’s time every day.

Ash dismissed the northern arm of his efforts. Too little; they will be too late. They failed to distract Mogon even from the prize.

In the east, he had Orley. Orley had too much of what Lostenferch lacked; Ash was tired of the thing that had been a man and his constant demands. Orley had a force that might or might not be strong enough to retake the Sorcerer’s Isle. Ash was poor at self-examination, but he had to confess that the seizure had surprised him; the revelation that Lot was not only alive but newly empowered . . .

Ash raised his head. Orley could never stand against Lot.

And the time, the time, the time. Suddenly there was so little time.

I will have to go myself.

It may be a trap.

How has he done this, my enemy? How has he raised all these forces and disposed them all across all the paths?

They are all against me.

I must defeat them all.

But doubt was now nagging him; the doubt of embodiment, of entanglement. He could no longer see anything of the future; had trouble remembering the pitfalls he’d seen from the aethereal.

How did Lot escape me? Why are his slaves so loyal?

One part of his many compartmented selves was moving the main army along the north bank of the Cohocton while another directed foragers and a third prepared workings in the aethereal. Too many of his compartments were brooding; counting casualties, trying to understand how many foes there were, from too little information.

I will retake the well and kill Lot.

At some point I will face the will.

Then I will turn and take the gate.

But even that was a complicated future; the ally he’d made and the deal for control of the gate were both gone. He no longer knew what stood on the other side of the gate—friend, or foe.

One of his many busy, planning selves offered a suggestion—of plain treason.

Ally with Lot.