“What rules?”

“Who can say? Not I. I am only a growing tower of sentient lumber. My staff may comfort you, however. Planted, it may blossom in strange climes. Then again, it may not. Who can say? Bear it with you, however, son of Oberon, into the place where you journey now. I feel a storm approaching. Good-bye.”

“Good-bye,” I said. “Thank you.”

I turned and walked on down the trail into the deepening fog. The pinkness was drained from it as I went. I shook my head as I thought about the tree, but its staff proved useful for the next several hundred meters, where the going was particularly rough.

Then things cleared a bit. Rocks, a stagnant pool, some small, dreary trees festooned with ropes of moss, a smell of decay… hurried by. A dark bird was watching me from one of the trees.

It took wing as I regarded it, flapping in a leisurely fashion in my direction. Recent events having left me a little bird-shy, I drew back as it circled my head. But then it fluttered to rest on the trail before me, cocked its head and viewed me with its left eye.

“Yes,” it announced then. “You are the one.”

“The one what?” I said.

“The one I will accompany. You’ve no objection to a bird of ill omen following you, have you, Corwin?” It chuckled then, and executed a little dance.

“Offhand, I do not see how I can stop you. How is it that you know my name?”

“I’ve been waiting for you since the beginning of Time, Corwin.”

“Must have been a bit tiresome.”

“It has not been all that long, in this place. Time is what you make of it.”

I resumed walking. I passed the bird and kept going. Moments later, it flashed by me and landed atop a rock off to my right.

“My name is Hugi,” he stated. “You are carrying a piece of old Ygg, I see.”

“Ygg?”

“The stuffy old tree who waits at the entrance to this place and won’t let anyone rest on his branches. I’ll bet he yelled when you whacked it off.”