Gary Gygax - Dance of Demons

"As well as having means to prevent their torments ere they could pass to this alternate reality," she added. "But we had no such choices, though I be mistress of alternatives, and you are master of time's many channels."

"So true, my lady, so true. Had that vile scum detected our trap, the whole would have come a cropper, as they say."

Lady Tolerance was uncertain if he meant Tharizdun, the lord of Entropy, or both when he mentioned "scum." It covered both so well she decided not to ask. "They sealed their own tomb, didn't they, Chronos? And all to defeat a trio of mortals with little but some small tokens of power."

"That they did, but the tokens were quite puissant, considering. Remember it was the three rings which drew all of Entropy's essence into that one pocket cosmos. It was if the entity willingly climbed into his own crypt and shut it fast afterward."

"It is not for eternity.. ."

"No, not in terms of the multiverse, good lady. He and Tharizdun will have some length of stay there in the severed continuum, though. After a few ages have rolled the archfiend will expire, I suppose. Then the Lord of Entropy will be loose everywhere again."

"Are you so certain as to the eventual winner?"

"Not even Evil can withstand the creeping inroads of inertia. That one will eventually bring even you and I down. . perhaps. There is much new energy and life to be sent into the multiverse whilst the thug is caged, of course!"

"Ah yes," Lady Tolerance agreed. "Millennia without unwanted decay! There is much for me to do, and you'll have your hands full as well, marking and charting without interference, won't you?"

"A pleasurable prospect," Chronos said, rubbing his hands in anticipation.

She thought of Entropy's gullibility. "The inert one was so anxious to squash out all vitality with his deadening weight that he totally ignored the many probable outcomes of his own cooperation with the Archfiend."

"Not surprising," Chronos noted. "Even I have trouble trying to second-guess probability when there are more than a score or so variables in the equation. But of course we had to be most spare in allowing the champion and his comrades time and opportunity. We did a masterful job, didn't we? It all seemed perfectly natural. The right inspiration at the correct moment, and no chance for failure."

"No chance, for Probability was being ruled. Time meted out exactly."

"I was particularly proud of your diverse solution to the rescue of the three, wondrous lady."

"As Tharizdun unmade the sword by the same progression of evil which had given Courflamme such might, he thought he was demolishing the truth of the weapon. Of course, the blade was augmented incredibly by addition of the destructive and creative forces which came into it during the time of confrontation. Basically, however, Courflamme was of Balance. Tharizdun should have remembered that. It was shadow and dawn through dewdrops, forged in and of the elements. All in all, a very mundane weapon."

"As he destroyed it, its three components were freed to give life again to Gord and Leda and the bard too," Chronos ruminated. "Entropy then helped to send them into our prepared alternate existence, with the blessings of Weal, as he destroyed the rings.

The Mistress of Probabilities became solemn. "The price which had to be paid.

"Most of the good ones, the ones of neutral aspect as well, are now incarnated here. Those who were instrumental in the war, the ones who paid with the greatest suffering and even death agonies, are now rewarded too."

"You refer to Gord, now Lord of Cats, and Leda who rules the shadowsphere, I suppose. Those two are well suited to their domains — and to each other!"

"Do you forget the old troubador? Gellor has much before him, and most of it wealsome, I should suspect. They are but three of the many now finding their new lives on the rich lands of Yarth. Bah! I begin to run on insufferably, and with things you know better than I, lady."

True Proctor Chronos, but I enjoy hearing you say so, for it is ever satisfying to hear praise." She laughed, and the Lord of Time smiled ruefully. He hadn't meant to shower Lady Tolerance with such admiring phrases. Friends or no, they could well be at odds soon, although of most friendly manner. The contest between them now had yet longer span ahead than ever before. "Well. .?"

"Well indeed. Changing Lady! Let us two see what we can devise in the way of new prospects for ourselves."

"Proctor! I am shocked!" Chronos stood up. "Wait," Lady Tolerance implored. "Not so shocked as to refuse your suggestion! If you have the time, I am the one for variations."

If indeed a whole cosmos was gone, a world devastated and sunk into forgotten nothing, the gray city depopulated, and all that went with it consigned to the flames of gross Evil, life still persisted. In truth, it burgeoned in freshness and vitality throughout the multiverse, in the conjoined realms of shadow and of the felines who walked through the night, Gord and Leda, and on a riotous new world called Yarth. The one-eyed overseer of its precincts was likely to prove a worthy Demiurge.

Evil won. . and lost. It is the way of things, and always a new adventure awaits — just around the bend of the road.