We counted too much on the first blast. But what’s left? Enough is left that I still have difficulty emerging. We’ll have to wait. They’ll do it to him, and for us. There’s all the time in eternity. Stop rushing. I’m concerned. I have my principals as well as you, and they have equally as unpleasant a way of making their wishes and sorrows known as yours. They’ll have to wait, like mine. They won’t wait. Well, they’ll have to. This is a careful operation. They’ve waited two million eternities already. You turn poetry, but that isn’t the figure. A long time, at any rate. Then a few more cycles won’t twit them that much. I’ll tell them what you said. You do that. I can’t guarantee anything. When did you ever? I do my best. That’s an explanation, not an excuse. I’m leaving now. You’re fading; it’s obvious you’re leaving. You’ll stay with Smith? No, I’ll leave him, and go take a rest at the black pool spa…of course I’ll stay with him! Get out of here. Arrogance! Imbecile!

Smith slept, and did not dream. But there were voices. When he awoke, he was more weary than when he had lain down. The grimoire still stood open, propped against the skull on the kitchen table he had set against the wall. The charts were still there, the candle was still half-down.

Something ferocious was gnawing at the back of his mind. He tried to focus on it, but it went chittering away into the darkness. He looked around the cistern. It was chill and empty. The fire had gone out. He swung his legs off the cot and stood up. Bones cracked. There was pain in his shoulder where the crossbow bolt had grazed him. He went to the rack and took out a corked decanter, pulled the cork with his teeth and let the dark gray smoke-fluid within dribble onto the raw, angry wound.

He was trying to remember. Something. What? Oh…yes. Now he remembered. The girl. The one who was spreading the word about him. Blue Serge suit, she was telling them, crowds of them, rat-packs in the streets, blue serge suit, a little weasel man, with a limp. He’s the one who did it. He’s the one who killed the world.