The Time Roads (30 page)

“I would not expect it,” I said. “I was hoping to undo the future.”

That arrested her attention, and her brother’s, too.

“What has happened?” she demanded.

I told them, giving as much details as I dared. The explosions. The confusion. The contradiction between my memories and the later reports of those who had survived. The even more unsettling reports from those who had seemingly died, yet nevertheless reappeared alive and untouched.

Síomón closed his eyes and listened, his mouth drawn into a thin line. Gwen let her gaze drift upward to the ceiling with its patterns etched in plaster and paint. When I mentioned the discrepancies between one report and the next, her brother twitched, but she did not.

“You believe they have achieved mastery of time?” Gwen asked.

“I don’t know,” I said. “I only know they threaten us all—Éire, Anglia, and everyone throughout the world—with chaos.”

“And what do you wish from us?”

I had spent much of the past day considering how to phrase the request. What I wanted, after all, was such a nebulous thing. “I want the opportunity for peace,” I said softly. “Not just for myself and my queendom, but for the world. I told you I wanted to change the future, but not with weapons or armies. For that I must know which decisions are the right ones. The best ones. That is my wish.”

Wish. A word chosen from dreams and intentions both, but Gwen Madóc did not smile at my words. “You need us to investigate the future,” she said. “To see where the time roads lead.”

“Yes,” I said. “But all of them, you understand.”

She held out a hand. I clasped hers in mine, wondering at her strong grip, the chilled flesh, the strange intent gaze she lifted to mine.

“I understand,” she said. “More than most.”

*   *   *

I gave them the same suite of rooms that Breandan Ó Cuilinn had once occupied, twelve years ago. And like that previous, that once innocent time, I never questioned their demands. They brought truckloads of their own equipment. I supplied them with clerks, equipment, reams of paper, and the newest mechanical calculators for their research. Aidrean Ó Deághaidh did not approve of their presence—there was a curious tension between him and Síomón Madóc—but he never openly objected, and after a few days, even that first tension had vanished.

“What do you think?” I asked him.

“I don’t know.”

“You always know.”

His mouth flickered into an all-too-brief smile. The crease remained even after the humor had left his face. It made me think of shadows, and a time when I had once trusted, and loved, and laughed.

*   *   *

Three weeks passed in a strange and oppressive calm. Throughout the day, I conducted all my ordinary duties as queen. I continued with the plans for my Union of Nations, with over thirty countries to attend our first session in August, which was to be held in a new hall outside Osraighe. Over dinner and through the evening, I met with Commander Ábraham from the Queen’s Constabulary, or with Aidrean Ó Deághaidh and Lord Ó Duinn, whose investigations had proved frustrating.

“My agents have kept watch over the members of the delegation,” Ó Duinn replied when I asked. “Without exception, they have all returned to their ordinary lives. Merchants. Professors. Booksellers. Physicians. Unless they have constructed a series of secret tunnels underneath the streets of Londain, they conduct their daily affairs in public and remain at home during the night.”

“We’ve considered the possibility of their passing messages to each other,” Aidrean said. “Our people have intercepted all their letters, but the contents have proved annoyingly mundane. The Constabulary has assigned a cipher team to examine them, just in case.”

“What about our guest?” I said. “Has the great Peter Godwin resigned himself to his quarters?” In the days immediately after the disaster on the airfield, I had dismissed my so-called guest from my thoughts, but now I thought it curious that Godwin had not inundated me with demands.

Ó Duinn glanced up from his sheaf of notes. “I thought I had mentioned in my reports—No, Godwin returned to the Dependencies along with the others. It is Michael Okoye who remained behind. He’s a quiet young man. He spends his days writing—letters, poetry, for the most part. They tell me he has a talent in that direction.”

I gave an exhalation of surprise. “Okoye. I would not have expected—Why did they choose him, do you suppose?”

“I suppose nothing, Your Majesty,” Aidrean said. “Not even that Godwin and his associates are guilty. We know of a dozen organizations outside the Districts who are addicted to violence.”

“Not to mention Thomas Austen’s more radical followers,” Ó Duinn added. “And they would have nothing to do with anything as diplomatic as petitions or delegations. The puzzling thing is that none have the funds or the connections to create such a device. Or so we believe.”

A complicated set of puzzles, I agreed. Letters that meant nothing. Dissidents who seem to have given over their activities. And a young man writing poetry while he waited for release from his richly appointed captivity.

*   *   *

My meetings with Síomón and Gwen Madóc were less fraught, but ultimately just as frustrating. They had mapped the time fractures around the airfield and discovered key differences between them and the ones Breandan Ó Cuilinn had described in his research.

Accidental
is the word Síomón used to describe the older fractures. Just as there were faults in the Earth’s crust, there were natural cracks in the fabric of time. The causes for the original fractures were yet unknown, but Gwen had a theory connecting the fractures with upheavals in the far, far past. “As the universe expanded, worlds might have replicated themselves, much as cells do, but as they separated, they weakened the fabric of time.”

“But these are different,” I said.

“Very much so,” Gwen said. “The term I would apply here is
deliberate
.”

“How can you tell?”

“We’ve measured the patterns of activity. Electrical and radioactive readings generally signal the presence of time fractures. We compare those readings with ones from our own devices. Those around the airfield and the experiment your Constabulary conducted are far too regular, compared to the accidental ones.”

“But why?” I said.

I later said the same to Aidrean Ó Deághaidh.

“Perhaps it was meant to frighten us,” I said.

“Perhaps it was an experiment,” he replied.

*   *   *

The second attack came an hour past midnight, on a cold clear March night.

My secretary roused me from sleep. Aidrean Ó Deághaidh was only a few steps behind. He delivered his report while I drank the strong tea my steward provided. “A single attack using three devices,” Aidrean was saying. “Two others we cannot confirm. You understand the difficulty.”

“I understand.” I thrust the mug back into my steward’s hands. “More tea for us both. And water.” To Aidrean, I said, “Continue. And tell me everything, even the uncertainties.”

The account was chilling. Three more devices had been set in the harbor district of Loch Garman, a port city on the Éireann Sea. The explosions had killed two dozen dockworkers and sailors. Several dozen more had been more gravely injured by falling debris and the fires that broke out in the warehouses, and on board the ships closest to the explosion.

“We have also received a message,” Aidrean said.

My heart paused, then stumbled on at a faster pace.

“From whom?” I demanded. “The Anglians?”

He hesitated and glanced around my bedchamber. With a gesture, I dismissed my maids and secretary and steward. Once they had gone, I repeated, “Tell me. What did the message say?”

Aidrean blew out a breath. He was shaken—truly shaken—a thing I had believed to be impossible. “The reports are incomplete. However, this much I know. An officer discovered a letter nailed to the door of the main Garda station in Osraighe.” He paused and licked his lips. “The letter was addressed to you.”

“Ah.” I found my own breath not so steady.

“It accused you of tyranny. It said there could be no true Union of Nations, while you held other nations in bondage. It then said that Éire herself would pay in blood and fire and tears that night for your actions. We telegraphed all the chief stations throughout the kingdom, but we were too late.…”

He rubbed a hand over his eyes.

“You had no way to know,” I said.

“I did, and I did not,” he replied. “We knew about these new devices. We had word of disaffected groups throughout Éire and all four Districts. We had spies wherever we could place them. But Áine … Your Majesty. We cannot police every citizen of Éire and its Dependencies. And to speak honestly, I should not want to hear you give such an order. I do not want to witness here what I have in Austria and the Prussian Alliance, where safety
has
become an excuse for tyranny.”

He smiled, a faint and pensive smile. “Perhaps I am no longer suited for your service.”

“You are,” I said softly. “Because you are honest with me.”

That smile flickered into life again, only to fade just as quickly. The electric light was not kind to his features—the angles of his face seemed thinner and sharper, the shadows deeper, and the impression of the flesh worn away to bones was even stronger than before. He had come to me old; the past month had made him older still. Older and more weary.

When have I not seen him so?

Not since our first interview, fifteen years ago.

This was no moment for such memories. “Tell me about these other explosions. Or rather, these ghosts of explosions. Were they failed attempts, do you think?”

I had to wait a long moment before he answered. When he did speak at last, his tone was curiously hesitant. “I don’t know. The reports came from Osraighe. Several were quite specific—they listed the buildings destroyed, the names of the dead and wounded. Even more convincing, the reports gave details only a genuine witness would think to include. How they tried to call for help, but could hear nothing because the explosion had left them deaf and confused. The gardaí taking notes commented that their anger was most convincing. And yet, when our people dispatched forces to the site, they found no destruction, no one harmed—nothing out of the ordinary. My agents believe the reports to be deliberate mischief, an attempt by the rebels to sow further confusion.”

“But you do not.”

“I do not. I visited the site myself. It reminded me…” His gaze took on a diffuse quality. “It reminded me of the aftermath of that device in Montenegro. The explosion itself was terrible enough, but what truly frightened me was how I felt myself unanchored from time.”

He did not speak of that other, even earlier episode, when his memories had wandered through a past that no longer existed. We had all become unanchored, if only temporarily, while history altered its shape as the time fractures healed.

“There is another difficulty,” Aidrean said. “Peter Godwin has vanished. I telegraphed our agents in Londain to obtain a statement from him. He was last sighted entering a trolley car bound for the north end of the city. This was yesterday morning.”

The anger and fright had leached away by now, and I had a clear picture of what I might do. “Arrest Michael Okoye. He must know Godwin’s plans. Put him in one of the cells in the palace, not the ordinary prison. You and I shall question him together.”

“He might be innocent,” Aidrean said.

“He might be.” But my thoughts were on Éire and not my unwilling guest. “Send word to my ministers and your chief agents,” I said. “We shall meet early in the morning to plan our course. Meanwhile, I must see where this phantom attack took place. Then I shall go to the hospital in Loch Garman to visit the wounded. No, do not argue, Aidrean. I cannot have the Anglians say I hid in safety while my people died.”

I sent him away while I hurriedly dressed, but as soon as he had issued the necessary orders to his people, Aidrean returned, saying he must and would accompany me.

“You have never given over your post as my personal guard,” I said.

He made an impatient gesture with one hand. “It is my duty. Just as it is my duty to insist you remain at Cill Cannig, Your Majesty. It’s possible the Anglians set those devices in Osraighe as a trap. Your death would make a gift of confusion to our enemies.”

“I must,” I repeated. “I must go, Commander.”

He gave over arguing, but I could sense his reluctance all through the ride from Cill Cannig to Osraighe. Perhaps he knew me too well to continue his objections. Or perhaps we had once more resumed our roles as queen and minion, and not friend and friend.

The church bells were ringing two o’clock when we arrived at our destination. A dozen guards stood watch in the square. My own took their positions around me as I walked the circuit. Our footsteps echoed from the paving stones, and the air continued to vibrate from the clangor of bells, but the night was otherwise quiet and still. The sharp cold of winter had softened with the approach of spring, and even in this city square, there came the hint of green growing things. A full moon shone overhead, casting shadows ahead of me.

I knew the square well—it was one of the wealthier districts inhabited by the directors of Éire’s banking concerns, certain influential members of Éire’s Congress, and various heads of the great merchant and trade houses. With one terrible weapon, the Anglian rebels could destroy much of Éire’s economy and government.

At the northern edge of the square, I paused. Why had this attack failed? Or were these reports, and even my commander’s impressions, merely the product of terror itself?

I turned back toward Aidrean …

… the ground underneath me tilted. I fell backward into a deep pit. My guards had vanished. Torn bodies surrounded me, the earth was soaked in their blood. I tried to scrabble upward through the mass of dead, but the flesh dissolved into a mist between my fingers …

I staggered backward. Aidrean Ó Deághaidh caught and steadied me. My vision had blurred and it seemed the stars and moon had shifted in the sky. “Aidrean,” I whispered. “Did you see?”