Strong winds out of the northeast, laden with Arctic frost, blew steadily for days, and showed no signs of letting up. The republic's chief weather forecaster resigned his well-paid hereditary post, so distasteful had his work of predicting disaster become to him. People were praying to saints, devils, effigies, whatever they could think of, hoping to get some relief. Just to make matters worse, plague had been reported in some parts. And there were claims that Mongol outriders had been seen just a day's ride away, and there was no telling how quickly they were advancing.

The Venetians were exhausted by their constant worries, frightened by the huge forces shaping up outside of the republic, and suspicious even of each other. The usual ceremonies in honor of certain saints had fallen into abeyance. Churches were taken up day and night with prayers for the salvation of the city, and with anathemas delivered against the Mongols. Church bells tolled incessantly. This in turn spurred an air of desperate gaiety.

It was a brilliant season of parties, masked b.a.l.l.s, and fetes. Carnival reigned constantly, and never had Venice shown herself to greater advantage. Despite the storms, candles gleamed brightly in the mansions of the rich, and music could be heard up and down the ca.n.a.ls. People hurried through the rainswept streets in cloak and half mask, on their way from one parry to the next. It was as if one last fling was all that remained for the proud old city.

It did not go unremarked that there was something extraordinary about what was occurring, something that seemed to surpa.s.s Earthly logic, something that smacked of the supernatural and of the coming of the last days. Astrologers searched through old parchment ma.n.u.scripts and found predictions that the world was due to end soon, just as they had suspected, and that the Four Hors.e.m.e.n of the Apocalypse would soon be seen riding across the flaming sky at the time of the final sunset.

A strange incident occurred one day. A workman sent out by the city to a.s.sess storm damage discovered a hole in one of the dikes near the a.r.s.enal. No water was coming through it, however. Through the opening there came a blinding yellow light, and the workman could see something indescribable in silhouette on the other side. It appeared to have two shadows. The man ran away and told others what he had seen.

A group of scholars came to study the phenomenon. The hole in the dike had grown larger; the brilliant yellow color had faded. Now the hole showed a clear and unearthly blue, even though stormy rain clouds and dun- colored earth should have been visible through it. This hole was like an opening through everything, earth and sky alike.

The scholars studied it with trepidation. Little fragments of earth and sand on the edge of the hole were being pulled into it. As an experiment, they tossed a stray dog into the hole; the dog disappeared as soon as he broke the invisible plane of its surface.

One of the scholars said, "From a scientific point of view, this hole seems to be a rent or tear in the fabric of existence."

Another objected on a quibble. "How could the fabric of existence tear?"

"That we don't know," the first replied. "But we can infer that something tremendous is happening in the Spiritual Realm, something so enormous that it is having its effect on us down here on the physical plane of mundane existence. Not even reality is to be trusted any longer, so strange has life become."

More reports came in of other holes in the fabric of reality. The phenomenon was called the Anti-Imago, and examples of it seemed to be springing up everywhere, even in the interior chapel of San Marco's, where there was a hole almost three feet wide pointing obliquely downward and leading to where n.o.body could ascertain without taking the oneway trip into it.

A church s.e.xton reported a peculiar occurrence. A stranger had entered the building, and something about him seemed either more or less than human. Perhaps it was his ears, or the strange tilt to his eyes. This being walked about the church and its immediate area, looking at outbuildings and making notes on a roll of parchment. When the s.e.xton demanded to know what he was doing, the stranger said, "Just taking some measurements, so I can report the situation to the others."

"What others?"

"The others like me."

"But why should you and the others be interested in the state of our buildings?"

"We're provisional life-forms," the stranger said, "me and the others like me, so new we haven't even gotten a name yet. There's a chance we'll get to take over - reality, that is-and in that case we inherit what you leave behind. We thought it would be best to be prepared, so we are doing an inventory."

The report of this strange occurrence was investigated by learned doctors of the Church and judged to have never happened. The s.e.xton's report was ascribed officially to an unaccountable hallucination. But this judgment came too late, the damage was done, people had heard and believed the story, and the sense of panic increased throughout the city.

Chapter 7.

The pilgrims huddled in the common room in the inn, taking turns stoking the fire while they awaited their next orders. They should have been triumphant, happy, for they had finished their contest. But the weather trivialized their victories.

They had gone through hardships to get here, and now they were here and things were lousy. It wasn't the way it was meant to be. And none felt this more keenly than Azzie, who was being cheated of his story, though he couldn't figure out how it was happening.

That evening, as Azzie sat near the fire and tried to think what to do next, there was a rap at the inn door. The landlord called out, "We are full up, please go elsewhere!"

"You have someone within I would talk with," a pleasing female voice called out.

"Ylith!" Azzie called out. "Is that you?" He gestured peremptorily to the landlord, who threw back the door with bad grace. A few bucketsful of rain blew in, and with them came a beautiful black-haired woman whose features were balanced between the angelic and the demonic, making her look very appealing indeed. She wore a simple yellow dress covered with appliqued violets, and over it a sky blue cloak with a silver lining, a saucy red wimple about her head.

"Azzie!" she cried, crossing the room. "Are you all right?"

"Of course," Azzie said. "Your concern touches me.

Have you perhaps changed your mind about a spot of dalliance?"

"Same old Azzie!" Ylith said with a chuckle. "I came here because I believe in fairness in all matters, especially those concerning Good and Bad. I think someone is doing you a disservice." Ylith then told how she had been captured by Hermes Trismegistus, who had given her to a mortal named Westfall. She told how she had been shut up in Pandora's box, and how with Zeus' help she had escaped.

"I know you think of Hermes as a friend," Ylith said, "but it seems he is plotting against you. The rest of the Olympians may be in on it, too."

"There's nothing much they can do from Afterglow," Azzie said.

"But the old G.o.ds are no longer in Afterglow. They've escaped! And I'm afraid I'm responsible, albeit unwittingly."

"It could be those guys who are s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g everything up," Azzie said. "I had thought it was all Michael's doing - you know how he opposes even my smallest triumph - but what's going on is beyond him. Someone has stirred up the Mongols, Ylith!"

"I don't understand why the Olympians are opposing you," Ylith said. "What difference does it make to them if you put on your immorality play?"

"The G.o.ds have a vested interest in morality," Azzie said. "But for others, not themselves. This interference of theirs is something else, I think. It wouldn't surprise me if this were the old G.o.ds' bid to return to power."

Chapter 8.

The weather was simply no longer to be tolerated. Azzie roused himself and looked into it. The most cursory inspection showed him that the storms didn't seem to be coming from any single source. They sprang up "in the north," where the weather mostly comes from. But what did that mean, the north? How far north? North of what? And what was there in the north that created the weather? Azzie decided he had better find out, and do something about it if possible.

He explained to Aretino what he was going to do, and then went to the window and opened it. The bl.u.s.tery wind came in with a huff.

"This could be dangerous," Aretino said.

"Probably is," Azzie said, and, spreading his wings, he took to the air.

He left Venice and flew north, in search of the place where the weather came from. He traveled the length of Germany, and saw much bad weather, but it was all blowing in from even farther north. Azzie crossed the North Sea, touched on Sweden and found it was not the storm breeder, but merely a place storms pa.s.sed over on their way to somewhere else. He veered into the eye of the wind and it took him toward Finland, where the Lapps had a great reputation as weather wizards. Wherever he went in that flat, snowy, pine-clad country, he always discovered that the weather didn't come "from here," it blew in "from over there," some place farther north.

At last he reached a region at the top of the world where the winds came funneling out at him with a speed and regularity that was impressive. The wind swept across the frozen tundra in a steady unending stream, and so strong was it that it resembled the waves of the sea more than rivers of the air.

Azzie pushed on, still moving to the north, though the whole world seemed to be narrowing and coming to a point here. He came at last to the very northernmost point of north and found a tall, narrow mountain of ice. On the top of that mountain was a tower, so old that it might have been put there before anything else existed and the only place was here.

The tower was topped by a platform, and on it stood a gigantic naked man with tangled hair and an expression most uncanny. He was working a large leather bellows. As he drove it up and down, the wind blew from its mouth. It was the origin of all the wind in the world.

The wind emerged from the bellows in a steady stream, and blew into and through the tubes of a peculiar- looking machine.

A strange creature sat in front of what looked like an organ keyboard, and his hands, with their many flexible fingers that almost appeared to be tentacles, played on the keys and shaped and formed the winds that pa.s.sed through, them. It was an allegorical machine, such as religions produce when they are trying to explain how things work. It directed the shaped and conditioned winds produced by the bellows pumper to the window, where they began their journey south to all points of the globe, and especially to Venice.

But why Venice? Azzie focused his X-ray vision, which all demons have but few use because it's difficult to work, like trying to do long division in your head. But now that he looked, Azzie could see that Ley lines had been drawn on the land beneath the ice, and these lines guided the winds and augmented their ferocity.

But what about the rain? Everything here in the topmost reaches of the north was dry, crisp, and brand-spanking-new, and without a trace of moisture.

Azzie looked around, but he saw no one but the man working the bellows and the other one, the operator of the wind machine. He said to them both, "My dear sirs, you are s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g things up in the portion of Earth where I reside, and I cannot permit it. I intend to do something about it unless you cease and desist upon the instant."

He had spoken up bravely, and he had no idea if he could prevail against these two strange creatures. But it was in his nature to advance boldly, and his nature did not desert him now.

The two creatures introduced themselves. They were incarnations of the G.o.d Baal. The one working the bellows was Baal-Hadad, the other was Baal-Quarnain, Canaanite deities who had been living quietly for some thousands of years, since the last of their worshipers had died. Zeus had enlisted them both into his service, saying there were none better for bringing up the sort of weather he was interested in, once the initial bag of breezes had been exhausted. Zeus himself was a weather G.o.d, but he was too busy nowadays for the tedious work of making weather.