Time's Echo: A CHRONOS Files Novella (4 page)

I glance at the framed embroidery pieces on the parlor wall,
each with a different picture or quotation, and count them. They do look
different, although I'd be hard pressed to say how they've changed.

"Five," I say.

Out of the corner of my eye, I see the bedroom door open.
Amelia is looking at Jess, her face filled with worry.

"There were six a minute ago. Two rows of three."
His voice is stronger now.
"One from each of my
granddaughters.
They made them as a Christmas gift two years back.
Remember, Amelia?"

She crosses over to where he's seated and crouches down next
to him, peering into his eyes.
"Jess.
You're
scaring me. You know we have ten grandchildren. A matched set—five boys and
five girls."

"Name '
em
," he demands.
"The girls.
Name the girls for me."

She gives me a worried glance and then does as he asks.
"Gladys, Mildred, Florence, and Ruth.
And Amelia, named
after me."

He shakes his head.
"And Irene.
Mary's oldest girl is Irene. She helped out in the shop until they moved to
Springfield. They had Irene and then Henry, Jr. and then Elmer."

"Jess, what is wrong with you? Mary has two boys. She
had Henry, Jr. the year after she married in…let me see, 1889. Maybe you're
thinking of Arnold Shelly's girl. Her name is Irene. Or maybe it's Eileen, I
can't remember."

"No." Despite the fear in his eyes, there's a
stubborn set to his jaw. "Irene. You met her in the store once, Kiernan,
when Mary's family was here last Christmas. She's about a year younger than
Kate.
Blonde hair, pretty girl.
She was fluttering her
eyes at you until I told her you were spoken for." He looks back at Amelia,
and his voice is shaking as he speaks.
"
Irene
,
not Eileen.
Mary's girl.
Dear God, woman, what
kind of grandmother forgets her own granddaughter?"

Amelia gives him a hurt look and turns toward me. "What
happened to him? Do you know?"

Yes, I know. Something about this time shift means that Jess
is down one grandchild. He shouldn't remember the girl any more than Amelia
does. But I was leaning against him as the shift happened, and he was a hair's
breadth away from the CHRONOS key.

 I shake my head firmly. "I was getting up to
leave and something just seemed to come over him."

Jess's eyes narrow and I can tell he's calling me all sorts
of traitorous names in his head.

"Can you help me get him to bed, Kiernan?" she
asks. "Maybe a good night's sleep…"

I nod and grab his elbow, but he yanks his arm away from me.

"I can get myself to bed. You go on home."

I turn to Amelia. "Would you get him a glass of water?
And see if you can find him some aspirin."

She would normally huff at me for bossing her about in her own
house, so I'm a bit surprised when she gives me a frightened half nod and heads
into the kitchen.

I follow Jess into their room and find him sitting on the
edge of the bed. Although he still seems shaken, he's
more
angry
than anything else.

"I told you, I'm fine," he says.

"I know you are, Jess," I say in a low voice.
"Listen, I've got to check on Kate, but you're
not
going mad, okay?
Irene—well, you do remember her. So do I. Amelia's not going to believe you,
however, and if you keep talking about it, they'll be carting you off to
Danvers in a straightjacket. I'll explain it all tomorrow, but we can't talk
about it in front of Amelia."

"Why not?
What happened to me?
To both of us, 'cause I know you saw it, too."

Amelia's silhouette blocks the glow of the lamp from the
parlor. I glance over my shoulder, and then turn back to him.

"Jess, I think you need to listen to Mrs. Jessup.
Everything will be much clearer after a good night's sleep. You were probably
half asleep when I came in, and this is just the tail-end of a dream you were
having."

He gives me a long, hard stare.
"Could
be.
I guess that could be. But you
be
sure
and stop by the store tomorrow. I need a hand with that shipment of Black
Cavendish that came in today."

I nod and squeeze his shoulder. "I'll be there, Jess. I
promise. Get some sleep and I'll stop by to help you in the morning."

Amelia walks me to the front door, her fingers worrying at
the tip of the braid hanging over her shoulder. "I'm sorry about your
head, Kiernan, but I'm awfully glad you were here tonight. You seem to have
calmed him down." She raises one thin hand and rests it against my cheek
for just a moment. "Thank you."

As she closes the door, I catch one more look at her braids
and realize that the bows at the end are now red, not blue. I just stand there
for a moment, stunned, wondering what element of the time shift trickled down
to change the color of the ribbons that Amelia Jessup chose tonight.

∞4∞

I'm still dizzy, either from the blow to the head or the
time shift or both, and I keep a firm grip on the iron railing. I make it to
the bottom step, then turn my back to the sidewalk and reach down the front of
the borrowed pants, yanking the CHRONOS key free of the bandage on my thigh.
Even though the streets are mostly empty this late, I'm glad Jess has an extra
few inches at the waist so that I can grab the medallion without having to drop
trousers.

I pull up my room on the display, setting the time for a few
minutes before eight, about when Jess said Kate left the store. The lamp isn't
lit, which means she's probably not there, but Jess might have had the time a
bit off. And if I beat her back to the apartment, she'll have less time to
worry. She's going to have a few dueling memories of the past hour or so, but
at least this will minimize the confusion.

I blink once to initiate the jump, and nothing happens.
Taking a deep breath, I try again, hoping that the multiple jumps at my
audition haven't drained me to the point where I'll have no choice but to walk
home.

This time when I open my eyes, I'm in the apartment, a few
feet away from the bed, which Kate straightened at some point during the day.
In the dim light of the medallion, I see the quilt is pulled up and the pillows
are fluffed. Her phone and a copy of Conan Doyle's
Hound of the Baskervilles
sit on the nightstand, next to the open tin of mints.

I change out of the borrowed clothes and toss them into the
corner of the room that Kate cordoned off as a makeshift closet. Then I stretch
out on my side of the bed, closing my eyes. Something feels off and I open them
again a second later. There's a faint buzzing sound, almost like a fly in the
room. I sit up and light the lamp to get a better look, but I don't see
anything. And although that could be the result of having my head whacked about
earlier, I keep my eyes open just the same.

A few minutes later, I'm starting to worry, both about
Kate's absence and the possibility that the damage to my head is greater than
I'd thought. While Kate might have jumped straight to Katherine's house when
she left the store, I can't remember her ever leaving her phone here, let alone
leaving it out in the open like this. That bloody thing is a permanent
appendage; even here in my time when there's no signal she seems to feel lost
without it.

As for my head, the buzzing noise is constant. It increases
every now and then, eventually fading a bit but never letting up entirely. And
the nausea I felt during the time shift is still lurking in the pit of my
stomach, bad enough at one point that I drag the basin from under the bed, just
in case the sandwich and cookie that Amelia fed me decide to make a hasty exit.

I curse myself for not dialing back to seven o'clock rather
than eight, because it doesn't seem likely that I can make another jump tonight.
Even though I'll have to wait for Kate to come to me, at least I can use the
medallion to figure out when she left.  I scan the CHRONOS display for
this room at seven, when Kate should have been waiting here. The room is dim,
with only a tiny bit of sun coming in, but the apartment seems empty. Then the
picture blurs and I can see her momentarily, sitting on the edge of the bed,
before it blurs again and the room is empty. I shake the medallion, even though
I know it's more likely a problem with my head than with the CHRONOS key. I
look back about half an hour, and again see the bed, the room a bit brighter in
the daylight. The Conan Doyle book is fully open, and the display on the phone
next to it is lit up like it is when Kate checks the time or plays a game. I
watch for a few minutes and the picture flutters several times, and I see a
blurry afterimage stretched out on the bed. Later, a stray breeze flips a page
in the book.

I scroll to locate the stable point for Kate's room, the
only room at Katherine's house that I have set on my key. The display doesn't
waver at all, even though the stable point seems to fade in and out. It's
weird. I've never seen the key act this way and I wonder if it was damaged when
I was mugged. The image stabilizes for a moment, and I catch a brief glimpse of
Kate's room. The curtains are pulled and there's no light. If she's at
Katherine's, she's somewhere else in the house.

Slowly, being careful of my aching head, I slide to the
floor and reach under the bed, prying up the loose floorboard. Maybe she left a
note in the diary? I'm grasping at straws now; she's never left a note there
before and sure enough, there's nothing new. The buzzing noise peaks again and
I feel this odd tingle, almost like an electrical charge running through my
body. And then, as quick as it came, the sensation is gone and the buzzing
levels off.

I toss the diary onto the bed next to the Conan Doyle book.
Then, I reach back under the floorboards. I move the little box that holds the
rest of my cash from the Marvin Hart bet and grab another bandage and a small
plastic bag, pushing the dozen or so pills inside the bag around with my finger
until I locate two of the round red tablets Kate takes when she has a headache.
I dry swallow them, wishing I had some water to wash away the slightly sweet
aftertaste, but there's none in the room and I'm not up for a trek down the
hall. I reach for the open tin of mints, not even looking, and my fingers hit
the top of the container. I stare at the box for long time. It was open when I
arrived.
Wasn't it?

The odd tingle hits me again, disconcerting, almost painful,
but fleeting. My peripheral vision catches a movement to the right of me. When
I turn everything is in the same place. Even though there's no one in the room,
I still can't shake the feeling I'm not alone.

Is paranoia a side effect of concussion?

The medallion is still in the palm of my hand and I pull up
today at 12:20, ten minutes before the alarm on the cell phone went off. It's
no longer a matter of idly wondering what time Kate left. I need to see her,
even if I can't reach her.

The room is so dark that I can barely make out our shapes in
the bed. Kate's head is near my shoulder, her left hand on my chest. I pull in a
shaky breath, relieved, and then the image distorts, and I can't see her. I'm
there, but she's not.

I scan a few minutes back and stare at the display,
unwilling to look away until she appears. Finally, I see her body next to mine
in the bed, a few strands of her hair crisscrossing my arm. I snap my eyes shut
instantly, silently praying that I can make the jump. But it's wasted effort.
I'm rooted to this time and whatever is going on, I can't change it. I can't
warn her.

For the next twenty minutes, I can barely move, barely
breathe. Although I hear the buzz occasionally and look toward the sound, I
don't see anything unusual. Then I catch a movement out of the corner of my
eye. It's Kate, standing by the window. At least I think it's her, until I turn
my head and nothing is there.

All I can do is
wait
for the time
shift. And hope against hope that I'm wrong, that wherever and whenever Kate
may be at nine-twenty seven tonight, she's under the protection of a CHRONOS
medallion.

That reminds me that we're down one key now, thanks to the
muggers in the alley. Except…they weren't muggers. That fact hits me all at
once, with total certainty. The timing is much too close to be coincidence.
Someone wanted me to have no memory of the previous timeline.

But why?

The buzzing picks up again, the sound moving first toward
the door, then back toward the bed. For a moment, it looks like the door jumps
out at me. And it's not a single buzz now. I hear three or four separate
noises, each a slightly different pitch.

There's a momentary ripple of shadow and color at the room's
center and for the tiniest second, I think I see a hand.
Kate's
hand, reaching toward me.
But before that thought even registers, I see
that nothing's there.

The noise soars until it's nearly a roar. I pull my arms up
to my ears to shield myself from the deafening whine. I crouch, eyes closed,
head down, until the sound tapers off and the room is totally, eerily silent.

I look up, and as I do, I realize something isn't right with
the door. It's pulled shut, but the frame is cracked near the deadbolt and it's
off the top hinge. The wood was old, so I never had any illusions that the
deadbolt would stop a determined intruder. Its only purpose was to give us a
few minutes' warning. I push myself up to standing so I can get a closer look.
Although it's just four steps from the bed to the door, before I'm halfway
there, I see the odd rippling effect and the door is whole again. There's no
cracked frame and it's firmly on both hinges.

I reverse quickly until the back of my legs bumps the edge
of the bed and half sit, half fall onto the mattress. I stay there for a
moment, and then run my fingers across the CHRONOS key—it's nine twenty-four.
I've never jumped back after a timeline shift to the point just before the change,
so I'm not sure what to expect. I brace myself and count down the seconds to
nine twenty-seven, never quite taking my eyes off that door.

Nine twenty-seven comes and goes, without the gut-punch that
usually follows a time shift. I slowly release the breath I've been holding.

And that's when I see it. Or rather, I
don't
see it.
Kate's phone is gone. Her pillow, the squishy one she brought from her time, is
also gone, along with the tin of mints. The diary is still there, on top of the
Conan Doyle book where I tossed it earlier. So is her dress, still hanging from
its
hook.
I frantically search the space under the
floorboard, but it's empty, aside from a few odds and ends of my own. I glance
around, and aside from the diary and the dress, every trace of Kate's existence
has vanished from the room.

I don't know how long I sit there, my mouth moving, but no
sound coming out. After a moment, I lean my head back and look up at the
ceiling, the same dull, stained gray as the walls, and that's what totally breaks
me.

Not a single one of Kate's stars remains in our sky.

∞

Green light coming from the corner of the dark room wakes
me. I'm in bed, although I can't recall getting here. My eyes are swollen and
my vision still blurry from sleep, but I see a shape with long dark curls
emerge from behind the curtain in the corner.

I
suck
in a breath. "Bloody
hell, where have you—"

My eyes have adjusted a bit and I see it's not Kate. It's
Prudence. And, unfortunately, it's not a young Pru. The younger versions are a
lot easier to handle. I can't tell for certain in the glow from her CHRONOS
key, but I'd say this Pru is as old as I've ever seen her.
Thirty-five,
maybe.
If past experience holds true, I'll need to watch my step to
avoid setting her off.

Why didn't she send a younger version of herself like she
usually does? Maybe she's finally wised up and realized that reconciling so
many conflicting memories is turning her brain to mush. Or maybe she's so far
gone by this point that she doesn't care.

Pru tilts her head to the side and eyes me with suspicion.
"Were you expecting someone else, Kiernan?"

"I was dreaming, Pru.
Thought you
were me mum at first."

Starting out with a crack about her age
might
not
have been best move. For a few seconds, her expression reminds me of this
character in one of the Harry Potter movies I watched with Kate. I can't
remember the name, but she was one of the bad witches, dancing through a field
of flames, screaming that she'd killed Harry's uncle or something. The fact
that Pru is in a black dress and her hair looks like it hasn't seen a comb in
several days makes the likeness downright creepy.

Her eyes flash daggers at me as she reaches behind her back
and gets a handful of red fabric. She yanks the curtain downward, ripping out
both of the nails and a bit of plaster from the wall, before dropping it to the
floor.

"I should be the one asking where in bloody hell
you've
been." She sits down on the edge of my bed, resting her hand on my foot.
"You knew we had an adjustment scheduled. You were supposed to report to
Estero."

I sit up as an excuse to pull my foot away. Her thumbnail
scrapes across my ankle as I do. I've no clue what's been changed in this time
"adjustment," as she likes to call them, aside from the possible
removal of Kate. My jaw tightens at that thought. There's no way I'm accepting
that Kate no longer exists. Maybe the time shift just keeps us from meeting?

"Kind of hard to get to Estero when my key's been
stolen, Pru. The last thing I remember is getting my head bashed in the alley
by a bunch of thugs. They took my stuff, including my medallion. I'm not even
sure how I got here."

She lets out a dramatic sigh. "I had no idea! I told
Simon to peek in on you a few hours ago when you didn't arrive. All he could
see was shadows through something red, so he called me." She points to the
curtain, now strewn across the floor. "Why was that thing blocking the
view?"

"How would I know? I don't remember putting it up, Pru.
If I did, it's probably because I don't like Simon or anyone else watching me
while I sleep."

The main reason I put it up was Kate's distrust that Pru
would keep clear of us. I made Pru erase the stable point she'd set for this
room from her CHRONOS medallion when she found out about Kate—my equivalent of
asking her to return the key to my apartment, I guess. The curtain was just a
bit of insurance. You can't hear what's going on when you preview a stable
point before a jump—just see it—so a curtain actually afforded us a bit of
privacy. Pru must have had Simon or someone break in and reset it. Probably
when they busted down my door…something my mind still insists happened, even
though I can see that the frame is unbroken.