Piers Anthony: Juxtaposition

He got up, felt momentarily dizzy with the sudden rising, and quickly squatted to let the blood return to his head. It was as if he had been lying here a long time, his body unused; he felt somewhat awkward and unsteady, but now was recovering rapidly.

He stared at his knees with slow amazement. They were fully flexed, without pain. His injury had been cured! Oh—of course. Sheen had taken advantage of his unconsciousness to have him in surgery, and now he was better. Though he really would not have expected her to do that without consulting him first.

He walked to the door. The short hall was dark, so he sang a spell: “Right—light.” Immediately there was light, though only half as bright as he had intended.

Wait—he could not do magic in Proton!

He glanced back—and saw the harmonica lying on a table beside the bed. Blue’s harmonica, left with the—

Then he heard a light tread on the floor, probably someone alerted by Stile’s own motion. He recognized it immediately: the Lady Blue. Sheen’s step was quite different.

He knew with a shock of incredulous joy that something had gone wrong. The reversal had sent himself and his alternate self to the wrong frames! Stile’s soul had gone to the golem body, whose knees were good, while the Blue Adept had left Phaze—

Phaze would not be safe until the Blue Adept departed it forever. The prophecy had been fulfilled after all. Stile was in Phaze, not the true Blue Adept, who had been here all along, in the harmonica, until this final separation. The Brown Adept, unacquainted with the book of magic, prompted by the all-knowing Oracle, had made the reversal-spell too comprehensive, and thus—

And the other prophecy, which he had thought had come after the fact—that Stile would be betrayed, for his own good, by a young-seeming woman. Brown seemed as young as they came. That mixup had been no accident! She had perceived more clearly than he where his true future lay, and had acted to make it come true. How neatly it all fit together now! The Blue Adept, loath to live with a woman who no longer loved him, and fascinated by the marvelous world of science and the beautiful, loyal, deserving creature Sheen—who was as much intrigued by Blue, a person in Stile’s own image and spirit who had left his love for the Lady Blue behind—

Now the Lady Blue came into view, breathtakingly lovely and somber. Her face composed, she approached Stile. “My Lord, thou knowest I will serve thee in all things with grace and propriety,” she said sadly. “What is to be, must be.”

She thought he was Blue, of course—and she loved Stile. She had the mettle to carry through, to bear and raise his son, with no word of regret or reproach—but this time she would not need it.

“Beloved,” Stile said. “I have news for thee, thee, thee...”

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Piers Anthony was born in August, 1934, in England, spent a year in Spain, and came to America at age six. He was naturalized American in 1958 while serving in the U.S. Army. He now lives in Florida with his wife Carol and their daughters Penny and Cheryl. His first story was submitted to a magazine in 1954, but he did not make his first story sale until 1962. Similarly, he submitted his first novel, which was also his thesis for his B.A. degree from college, in 1956, but did not sell a novel until 1966. In 1985 his 50 thbook was published. His first Xanth novel, A Spell for Chameleon, won the August Derleth Fantasy award for 1977. His novel Ogre, Ogre may have been the first original fantasy paper back ever to make the New York Times bestseller list, and all his fantasies since then have been bestsellers. He is currently writing three or four novels and answering twelve hundred letters a year. His house is hidden deep in the forest, almost impossible to find, and he now has a computer in the horse pasture.