“Should you choose to…” These words strike me as odd, because it seems as if there has always been a kind of inevitability to your and Rose’s travels. Those of us left behind, perhaps, can see it more clearly, the way it all eventually weaves together and connects. There are patterns; loops are opened that ultimately must be closed. The choice is whether or not to open new ones, I suspect.
Duck, you are the pride of my life. I should very much like to hear you play again, and I hope to see you return to me soon; if not here, then in the past. I’ve tickets to a concert at the Met in September, a night of Bach, but the only question is whether or not this blasted timeline will straighten out again before then, and weave you back into my days in time for us to go together.
Oh God. Of course the timeline would restore that moment to the best of its ability—she clearly wasn’t a part of the concert, but what were the chances that she and Alice had still gone—that she had heard the sounds of the passage—that she had bumped into Sophia and followed it…? Fairly good, if she had to guess.
But if something should happen before then, or if you are reading this years and years from now and I’ve merely kicked it from age and whatever else life has decided to throw at me, I wish to tell you only this: I love you and your mother beyond time and space.
Etta read and reread the letter before returning it to its envelope. She arranged it at the center of the circle of documents she’d laid out and began to consider her options.
The passage was closed. Whether there was another one in this year, or any forthcoming year, remained to be seen.
If any still exist at all.
Her mother, as far as she knew, was not here. Nicholas was not here. The only name she had that might be able to help was a lawyer named Frederick Russell, and what news he had about this supposed trust, this apartment, might turn out to be bad. Alice and Oskar had done well for themselves, but neither was astronomically wealthy. This fund would not last forever.
But it might last long enough to get her through school. Until she found a job to support herself.
Don’t be afraid, she told herself. It will be okay.
She would do what any traveler would in a foreign place and time. She would blend into the life around her, to the best of her ability. She would disappear into it, observing, learning, living.
Etta would wait.
The only question now was…for what?
NICHOLAS AWOKE WITH A MOUTHFUL of dirt and the sounds of fife and drums battering out a march nearby. Despite the rawness, the crustiness of sleep, he cracked one eye open to take in the gray, hazy light. The dirt beneath him had soaked through his robe and his shirt, and created a freezing cast over his skin.
Cold, he thought.
Pain, his body relayed back.
It was as if that one word was enough to wake it in him, the agony. His left hand burned as he flexed it, bringing it up to wipe the dirt from his face. Looking directly at the wound, he discovered, only made it bloom hotter and quicker. He turned the palm of his left hand up, staring in horror at the slices that ran from the base of his fingers to the heel of his palm, and the mutilated flesh of the burns that covered the rest of it.
Nicholas drew it closer to his face because—yes, there. The swelling had yet to subside, and the tender pink of the raw flesh seemed to burn its way down to his bones, but he saw the pattern in it. He recognized the looping lines and nonsensical symbols, the mysterious secrets they held. He carried a nearly perfect brand of the astrolabe on his flesh, and, if his past history with scars was any indicator, likely would for the entirety of his life.
The white light—
All at once, the memory pierced him and he jerked up out of the mud with a desperate gasp. He ripped the white robe, or what remained of it, off his person and threw it as far as he could manage with an arm that felt like mortar. It fluttered like a great white bird, sailing over the edge of the land, into the familiar gaping mouth of the river.
His right arm swung freely, with a strength it hadn’t had in weeks.
“No,” he breathed out. “It cannot be….”
The ring was missing from his finger.
Nicholas turned and turned again, his gaze passing over the trees around him to the lively sounds of war emanating from the Royal Artillery Park just beyond. From where he stood, he could make out the lines of drilling soldiers, their red coats made more vibrant by the odd, stormy gray light. He searched out the passage, strained to pick up its usual rumble.
He could not hear a thing.
Holy God.
Gone, as if it had never been there at all.
He paced through the small spread of trees in circles, as if expecting it to pop up like a snake disturbed from its hole.
He’d done it. The pressure at the center of his chest sharpened, unbearable.
It is finished.
And Nicholas wasn’t just alone now; he was alive. He was whole, as if the closing of the passages had burned the poison from his body, wiped the last weeks away like a stain on his life. He found himself instinctively reaching for his memories, to cradle them close on the off chance they might be taken. Carried off, the way the crimson and gold leaves falling around him were eased along by the wind.
Nicholas stood still, simply breathing, trying to grip the life around him. All of his decisions…they had all been based on hypotheticals, speculation. Knowing that death was walking two steps behind him, it had felt somewhat like trying to shape air. The actuality of what would come had never felt substantial until this moment.
He could not simply reach for Etta, or turn to Li Min or Sophia, or make certain Julian had come through it all unharmed. He could do nothing but stand there, his thoughts drifting through the growing void inside of him like clouds.
It had to be done. It had to end.
Perhaps Sophia was right, and he was a coward for giving up on his life, even to serve this end. He certainly was a coward for choosing this finality while he believed he wouldn’t live to see it affect him.
“You there!”
Nicholas looked up, meeting the gaze of a regular patrolling the edge of the Artillery Park. The man was young, younger than himself, and while there was suspicion embedded in his expression, there was also genuine concern.
“What business do you have here, sir?”
Nicholas straightened, clearing his throat. “I…came to appreciate the view. My apologies.”
“I see,” the soldier said, but a new tone in his voice left Nicholas wondering what, precisely, he saw.
Likely thinks I’ve escaped to freedom. The state of his clothing, his wounds; they all spoke to that very notion. The thought sent a prickle of alarm from the base of his skull down his spine. He hadn’t merely returned to this era, he had been swallowed by it, sent back to drown in all of its hypocrisies, its cruelty. To be…muzzled by it. What proof did he have to offer this man if he was pressed on the matter?
His freedom papers, which he had carried with him every moment of his life after Hall had procured them on his behalf, were gone. Unless the original timeline was severely altered to something beyond what he’d known, the only copies were with the captain, presumably out at sea or imprisoned, and in his former employer’s office in New London, Connecticut.
The all-too-familiar bitterness rose in Nicholas’s throat like bile, and he fought to keep his expression neutral. He had faced darkness, shifted the timeline, and traveled to the ends of the world, and yet—his word would never satisfy those who believed he should still be in chains.
But Nicholas did not cower. He did not turn and run, though his instincts begged him to reconsider. He was a freeman—here, now, and everywhere. Any man who dared to question the point would be met with equal malice.
“Move along, then,” the soldier said, returning Nicholas’s nod with one of his own.
And so he did. What spare gold Ironwood—Ironwood!—had insisted he carry on his person as heir bought him a clean shirt, a buttonless coa
t, a skin for water, and a bottle of whiskey—the latter both for courage and, moments later, to clean the searing wound on his hand. The fact that he remained standing long enough to bind it with a clean cloth and did not soil himself in front of the entirety of the Dove was a miracle in its own right. The Dove’s innkeeper was none too pleased to see him reappear, and all too happy to send him on his way again with the small bag of belongings he had abandoned in his hurry to follow Etta through the passage to London.
“Here it is,” the man said, tossing it to him. “Kept everything you and your party left behind. Wouldn’t dare to cross that man.”
Nicholas lifted a brow. It looked full, but he had no doubt what few valuables were inside had been carefully assessed and possibly taken. Still, he thanked the man profusely, shifting the bag to his left hand to dig in his pocket for one last gold coin.
The flash of color and sight and sound at that touch blew him back off his feet. A crack of thunder whipped through his skull. He saw the tanner in Charleston he’d purchased the bag from years ago, as if the old man were standing directly in front of him. The shop began to take form, as if dripping into place around him, smearing down over the tavern’s tired walls. There was the pressure, the insistent tugging at his core….
Holy God.
He dropped the bag to the floor, feeling as if his bones were on the verge of turning to sand. The Dove’s owner leaped back at the moment Nicholas did, his eyes narrowing in suspicion.
“Thought I heard…a rat,” he said, his voice sounding far away. “In the bag. Just now.”
The man tilted his head toward the door. “Best be off, then.”
Nicholas stooped, hesitating a moment before picking the bag up again, this time with his right hand. When he was sure the world wasn’t about to shatter to pieces around him, he made quick strides toward the door and stepped out into the cold grip of the late-October air. His skin felt as if he had been sitting too close to flames, and rather than see his original plan through—wait and see if he might be able to convince a passing wagon to let him trade work for a ride in the direction of Connecticut—he wandered farther down the road, away from the Dove, from the Royal Artillery Park, until the only sounds were the birds in the old oak above him and his thrumming heart. He pressed his back against the tree, sliding down until he sat again, his palms turned up against his knees.
That was a passage.
Impossible.
With considerable care, he went about the work of unwrapping his burned hand again, laying it side by side with his right one. He looked at the mark of the astrolabe on his skin, the raw, blistered, and scabbed image of it. I saw the past.
More than that, there was no other way to describe it, except to say he had felt himself begin to go. The world had shifted around him, and if he had only reached out, held on, the darkness would have reached out and taken him.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” he said, because Sophia was not there to.
But…how to test this? He needed to prove himself wrong. Remus Jacaranda’s explanation for the astrolabe rose in his memory, creating a quake of horror in him: to create a passage, legend holds that you must have the astrolabe, but you must also have something from the time and year you wish to go.
He sorted through his bag, searching for something he might have procured in Nassau over the past year. The weapons were gone; the buckle from his shoe, sold; everything—
Everything except the thin leather cord around his neck, the one that held Etta’s earrings and a small, broken bead. He reached up with his aching hand and closed his fist around it, letting his eyes slip shut.
The first drip of color brought the turquoise of the clear, pristine water; the next, the ivory sands of the beach; the third, the unstoppable, vibrant green of the palms that had shaded him and Sophia on their spot at the beach. The air began to stir, pinching at each of his muscles, until, in the distance, that dark spot appeared, twisting, flying toward him. Nicholas forced himself to stay in place, to meet that darkness as it came alongside him, gripped him by the collar, and dragged him forward.
There was nothing to do save surrender himself to the sensation of being buried alive. The darkness was as oppressive as the nudging pressure that raced toward him from every direction, and the high whistle accompanying it trilled ceaselessly, even after he was launched forward into sunlight and sand, the briny scent of the ocean rising to greet him.
“Bloody hell!” he swore, staggering to his feet. The tide rushed in behind, crashing against the beach and sending up a spray of foam that whipped him back to his senses.
“Aye,” said a familiar voice behind him. “I think that’s about the right of it.”
Nicholas spun around, half-desperate with hope. There, standing less than three yards away, surveying the spot where he and Sophia had made camp, was Captain Hall.
His unruly whiskers had grown in, a stark contrast to the neat queue of his hair. The afternoon sun drove nearly all traces of silver from it, creating a crimson halo around his skull. Nicholas found himself choking on his next, surprised laugh. The Red Devil, alive and well and stalking toward him.
“What are you doing here?” he managed to rasp out. His legs had not quite steadied enough to gallop the distance between them as he wished. It was left to Hall to come to him, to take careful, obvious stock of Nicholas as he approached.
“Correct me if I’m wrong, Nick, but we were to expect you in New London ‘shortly,’ or am I misremembering?” His voice, while not harsh, bore an edge beneath its cheerful note that Nicholas recognized all too well.
“Did you receive any of my letters?” Nicholas asked in a ragged voice. He thought his heart might blow like a grenade in his chest. “Everyone—Chase—are they all alive? Sound?”
Hall took a step back, startled possibly for the first time in his life. “There have been a number of shifts; I’ve felt them all pass like storms. But, Nick, nothing’s happened to us. Not in this timeline, at least.”
Nicholas pressed his face into his hands and laughed and laughed until he was so near to tears he practically choked on them.
“Nick, my God, come here, come—is it as bad as all that?” Hall said. “We were worried for you. Tell me what’s happened!”
When he steadied himself, Nicholas said, “I ran into…unexpected circumstances.”
“Unexpected circumstances?” Hall placed his hands on his heavy belt, the flintlocks and flasks swaying as he began to pace. “All along, I’m hearing stories, terrible stories—the kind that put a guardian ill at ease. The winds of change over the later centuries were foul enough for word to reach me at sea. Imagine my surprise again, lad, as I arrived here to question Ironwood’s guardians about whether or not they’d taken you into their custody, only to find them all a-fluster over that very same passage disappearing. And then, here you are, appearing right out of the air.”
Nicholas fell back, shaking his head, staring down at his burned palm.
“God defend us!” Hall said, seizing his wrist, turning his palm up. “Lad—what is this? What’s happened to you?”
Nicholas blinked fiercely, trying to reconcile the torrent of disbelief. Hall wrapped an arm over his shoulder. “It is over now. All of it. He’s dead. The passages have closed.”
His adoptive father took his meaning instantly. Shock coursed through him.
“You’ll tell me on the way, then,” Hall said. “And tonight you’ll dine with Chase and the crew. They’ll be beside themselves to see you well. Nicholas, I am beside myself to see you whole.”
The emotion that wove through his heart at the thought made his chest impossibly tight. He had dreamt of that moment. But he had dreamt of many others as well.
“That is just it,” Nicholas said, looking down the beach. “I’m not sure I can rightly say that I am.”
THE STORY EMERGED IN FITS AND STARTS OVER THE COURSE OF WEEKS, as the Challenger prowled the Atlantic for new prey. Nicholas supposed some part of him felt that, if he d
id not acknowledge what had happened, the past weeks would eventually be consigned to memory and stop haunting his waking hours.
Of course, he was never so lucky.
The Revolution continued as it had before; the men of the crew sang songs as familiar to him as the sky; his routine of work became the very plaster that kept him together. Everything had a rhythm, he realized; a recognizable ebb and flow. Love, separation. Work, rest. Pain, rum.
Hall granted him a wide berth, with a patience that somehow shamed Nicholas into feeling like a child. But even that had its limits. His questions—about what had happened, about what would happen—became more pointed. Nicholas found himself grateful for the ever-constant presence of the crew. It provided him with cover, a legitimate reason to not speak of it. As a guardian, Hall was the only one who had ever possessed a key to their hidden world. And now, he was the only one who knew the girl who’d emerged in the smoke and chaos on the Ardent, the very same one who had charmed her way into the hearts of men who no longer remembered her.
So he smiled with Chase; he allowed the gentle rocking of the sea to cradle him; he relished the feeling of warm sunshine spreading its fingers through his dark coat as he walked the length of the deck on watch. The sea, he knew, was his remedy. And time, no longer an enemy, simply existed in tandem with him, not to vex him. Only occasionally did he feel the tug of something else deep inside of him, the burn of the healed scars in his hand.
But sometimes, when he was tired after a day’s work, or deep into his cups, or when he let the strict discipline of his heart lapse, he was clumsy with his words.
“Looks like a packet boat in the harbor port,” Chase said, handing him the spyglass. “They might have news of the war for us, then.”
The crew was restless for a night on shore in Port Royal, but Chase had grown hungry to track the progress of the war, and the growth—or lack thereof—of the Continental Navy. They’d narrowly escaped pursuit by a seventy-four-gun man-of-war only days prior, and Chase was still stewing in the disappointment of the missed fight. His fingers drummed now against the rail like a war summons. Impatient for something he’d yet to articulate.