Bradley, Marion Zimmer - Shadowgate 02 (54 page)

 
          
But you can't live just for someone else,
Grey,
Winter thought sadly.
You have
to live for yourself, too. There has to be a balance.

 
          
The
cold seemed to sink into her very bones as the child-spirit slipped free,
unbound at last.

 
          
Soon, Mommy. Someday . . .

 
          
A
line from the half-forgotten Blackburn Work came back to her and Winter spoke
aloud: "Here is the Third Gate, the Gate of Making and Unmaking, where
Life becomes Death, and Death, Life."

 
          
And
Winter's arms were empty.

 
          
"Now
it's my turn."

 
          
Winter
looked at Grey. He stepped away from her, dressed now as she remembered him
best, in beads and buckskin and acid-washed jeans. Behind him a road she had
not seen before stretched arrow-straight into the distance; a long straight
track, paved, not with yellow brick, but with shining silver.

 
          
"Thanks
for coming," Grey said, gesturing as if he knew the words were inadequate.
"Thanks for setting me free—for setting us both free. I hope— 1 hope you
can be happy." He turned to go, toward the waiting road.

 
          
Once he reaches it, it will be too late.

 
          
"No—wait!"
Winter said, grabbing for him. The fringe of his jacket slithered through her
fingers, and she clutched only air.

 
          
"Are
you just going to give up?" she cried.

 
          
Grey
looked back at her, faintly puzzled. "Give up? I'm dead, Winter."

 
          
"No
you aren't—not yet. You said there isn't any time here. You aren't dead
yet." There was nothing she could reach him with except her words.
"Come back with me—come back
to
me.
We can— There has to be some way we can try again," she pleaded.

 
          
"I
can't do it." There was fear in Grey's voice. "I can't make it back.
It's too far—you don't understand. The cord is broken. I can't find my way.
You've got to let me go."

 
          
"No
I don't!" Winter said, willing him to look at her, to
see.
"You said you love me—prove it! Or else it was all for
nothing—there's no point in trying because the mistakes we make last forever.
Prove that they don't— that no matter what we've done wrong we can take it
back, start again, so that it doesn't have to be forever—" Her voice
broke.

 
          
Grey
took a step toward her, away from the beckoning road. There was a sound in the
air, a faint and distant wind.

 
          
"All
right," he said, so low she could hardly hear him. "I'll try."

 
          
"Try!"
Winter lashed out at him. "'Try' isn't good enough! I didn't 'try' just
now—I
did
h
Now
it's your turn."

 
          
Grey
hesitated, and Winter lunged forward and yanked him away from the shining path.
His body was cool and unreal in her grasp. He fell against her, gasping a
little and laughing at the same time.

 
          
"All
right," he said. "I owe it. Lords of the Wheel," Grey intoned,
and Winter knew he did not speak to her, "I take back the chains of matter
willingly, to atone for my pride, according to your good pleasure." His
face changed; he looked older, grimmer, as if he faced an ordeal now that she
could not comprehend. "Help me, Winter. I can't find the way by myself.
Take me with you."

 
          
The
distant sound had grown louder, and now it was the rhythm of the surf on the
rocks below. As she stared up into Grey's face the astral light faded and it
began to rain.

 
          
There
was cold, and wind; the scent of the salt sea and the living earth. Grey's face
contorted with pain and he sank to his knees, tearing one hand from her grip
and pressing it to his ribs. As Winter watched in fear his clothing shimmered
and flowed again, turning to black motorcycle leathers and torn, blood-soaked
jeans. She knelt and flung her arms around him, trying to shield him.

 
          
The headlights. Oh, God, the cold. Won't
somebody come?
The echoes of Grey's fear and horror filled her mind. But
that was more than a year ago—this was now. In a place where time had no
meaning, Hunter
Greyson
was making the hardest
journey of all—into life.

 
          
"Don't
leave me," Grey gasped. "Stay with me." Winter held him against
her, pressing her cheek to his. His skin was cold as rain, and each breath
seemed to cost him more effort.

 
          
"Never,"
she said, as her tears began to mingle with the rain and the salt spray from
the rocks below. "I'll never leave you, Grey."

HOME IS THE HUNTER

For winter's rains and ruins
are over, And all the season of snows and sins; The days dividing lover and
lover, The light that loses, the night that wins.
— ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE

 
          
DECEMBER IN 
SAN FRANCISCO
 WAS A SEASON OF BLUSTERY
winds and soaking rain—and a pervasive dampness that struck through even heavy
winter coats with a numbing persistence. Christmas lights and holiday garlands
looked oddly out of place in a city where the temperature hovered in the high
forties and there wasn't even the possibility of snow.

 
          
Winter
maneuvered the heavy silver Mercedes expertly over the familiar route,
grateful for the weight that lent it stability in the rain and wind. Frodo and
Emily had teased her when she'd bought the big luxury car, but Winter had
pointed out reasonably that she was going to need the space for the therapy
equipment and the twice-weekly trips to PT that were a feature of all the
foreseeable future.

 
          
Fortunately
she'd found someone good close to home, so this was the last time for a while
that she was going to have to make the pilgrimage across the bridge from
Berkeley to the San Francisco Orthopedic Hospital—or, as its patients called
it, Resurrection City.

 
          
"I'm
so excited. I really don't know how I can ever thank you," Janelle said
from the passenger seat.

 
          
"
Jannie
, you've been saying that ever since you got here,
and that was six weeks ago!" Winter said indulgently. "What are
friends for, if not for this?" The heavy slap-slap of the windshield
wipers formed a backbeat to her words.

 
          
"But
you've done so much. . . ."Janelle said.

 
          
"I
didn't get you that job with— What is the name of that place up in
Seattle
?"

 
          
"Wizards
of the Coast," Janelle said, blushing proudly.

 
          
Janelle
Baker had walked out on Denny Raymond four months before and into the Bergen
County Women's Services shelter. She'd gotten in touch with Winter almost
immediately, and the two women had kept in close contact, each rebuilding her
life as she did so.

 
          
"And
Ramsey's flying out for Christmas," Janelle added. "Just think—we'll
all be together."

 
          
"All
of us who are left," Winter said, suddenly somber. Cassie would not be
here. She wheeled the Mercedes into the hospital parking lot and found a space
near the door. "I won't be long," she said. "Why don't you wait
here,
Jannie
?"

 
          
The
familiar smells of mingled disinfectants greeted her as the elevator opened
onto her floor. After so many visits, Winter could just have walked right past
the desk, but today was a special day.

 
          
"He'll
be right out, Winter," the nurse on duty said. "Happy
Holiday
."

 
          
"Thanks,
Rachel. Merry Solstice to you." Winter smiled, breathing deeply to cover
her nervousness. She'd waited so long for this moment— she wanted everything to
be perfect.

 
          
Hunter
Greyson
walked slowly down the hall toward her, a
muscular attendant hovering slightly behind. The clothes she had bought him for
this occasion still looked painfully new.

 
          
"Hi,
sweetheart," he said, smiling his crooked grin. "Want to go
dancing?"

 
          
Winter
came toward him and hugged him gently. Automatically, she glanced at Grey's throat.
A small white scar was all now that remained of the
tracheostomy
that had once let a machine breathe for him.

 
          
The
effects of a year-long coma could not be instantly shrugged off, but Grey's
progress toward health and mobility had been rapid, from the moment at
San Gabriel
when Winter had seen Grey open his eyes in
the hospital bed. She'd had a lot of explaining to do about her presence in the
building at that hour—not to mention the fact that Grey's respirator was shut
down—but the fact that Grey was alive and conscious counted for a lot. Once
he'd been able to make his own health-care decisions, Winter had been able to
get Grey moved to
Resurrection
City
and started on the long road to
rehabilitation.

 
          
"Ready
to go?
Jannie's
waiting in the car outside, and
Ramsey's getting in tomorrow," Winter said.

 
          
"Hail,
hail, the gang's all here." Grey put his arm around her waist.

 
          
"The
chair will be around in just a minute," Rachel said.

 
          
"The
hell with that," Grey shot back, grinning. "I'm walking out of here
under my own power."

 
          
The
aides and nurses applauded as he walked to the elevator and stepped inside. He
bowed carefully as the doors closed, and Winter steadied him as he
straightened.

 
          
"Dancing,
eh? Not for a few weeks, I'd say."

 
          
"Maybe
for New Year's," Grey suggested irrepressibly. He smiled fondly at Winter.
"Now that my time is my own again—or almost— what shall we do with the
rest of our lives?"

 
          
"I
know what I'd like to do," Winter said. She'd meant to say this later, but
somehow she felt the time was right. "I'd like to get married. You did ask
me, you know—fourteen years ago."

 
          
The
joy that filled Grey's face told her the timing had been right. "It's
about time," he said, taking her hand. "It took you long enough to
say yes."

 
          
"But
it's never too late," Winter answered, her eyes misty. "Not for a
beginning."

 
          
And time remembered is grief forgotten, And
frosts are slain and flowers begotten, And in green
underwood
and cover Blossom by blossom the spring begins.

 
          
— ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE