Necessary Evil (Milkweed Triptych) (17 page)

Demigoddess as voyeur.

… And sees something entirely new: the futures lose their cohesion, melt into an indistinct blur. Her willpower outraces the birth cries of this hatchling time line! The ripples of creation have yet to perturb the inchoate primordial fog. It takes time to break the perfect symmetry of infinitely homogeneous, infinitely isotropic maybes.

She pulls back. There is much to do in coming days, many paths to explore in these first hours. In eleven minutes they will meet Raybould, her Raybould, in the park:

“You came for me,” she will say. “I knew you would.”

And he will say, “You fucking evil bitch. I didn’t do it for you.”

No. Not nice.

“It’s you,” she will say. “You came for me.”

And he will say, “It’s
you
.”

That’s better.

Raybould sheds little eddies of change with everything he does. Every blade of grass bent underfoot in St. James’, every exhalation of sweet masculine breath while they wait in the car. Tiny perturbations at first, but they will grow.

Snowflakes will beget avalanches. A fallen tree will divert a stream, alter a tributary, reshape a river, etch a new topography into the vast, wide continent of time.

When she gazes upon Raybould through the shimmering tapestry of possible futures, he becomes a shadow, a silhouette limned with kaleidoscopic diffraction. The pattern is a framework, the garden trellis through which she will weave the vines of her Willenskräfte. Together they will grow a new axis mundi, a world tree strong enough to warp the universe to her liking. She and he are as Eve and Adam to this new time line. It is their offspring, the fruit of their labors. He, the man who traveled through time. And she, the woman whose vision transcends it.

She peeks again. But the leaden cloud bank of pre-creation still shrouds the far future.

No matter. She knows what she will see when the fog clears. The future no longer ends with the Eidolons.
She
no longer ends with the Eidolons. She and Raybould will be together. Given time, she can make him love her. There will be no Eidolons, no farm, no warlocks, no Götterelektrongruppe to pull them apart. No troublesome war to interfere with her desires.

Nothing to distract Raybould. No freckled whore. No mewling brat.

seven

15 May 1940

53° 55' 41" North, 8° 14' 6" East

“It’s impossible,” said Marsh.

He ducked through a hatchway as he followed Gretel through the cramped confines of the U-boat. She had changed out of her faded peasant dress when the watch officer announced they would arrive in port in a few hours’ time, just a bit after midnight. Now she wore a crisp gray SS uniform clearly tailored for her petite frame. Three diamond pips on the left collar, one on her shoulders: SS-Obersturmführer, roughly equivalent to what the Royal Navy called a sub-lieutenant. So far, Liddell-Stewart’s information was dead on target. But the tab on her right collar was something Marsh had never seen in any briefing: a skull cleaved by SS
siegrunen
. Marsh reckoned it symbolized the Götterelektrongruppe.

Kriegsmarine submariners made way for Gretel, though whether that was deference to her rank or revulsion at her wires, he couldn’t tell. It seemed they didn’t recognize the Götterelektrongruppe insigne any more than Marsh did. The gypsy girl and her brother drew no end of wary glances from the crew. As did Marsh, though he earned those by virtue of being a hated Englishman.

It was frightening to walk among his enemies so openly. He carried the pretense of being a defector, but these sailors would be a fool to trust him for that. In theory, they didn’t dare touch him, in case he truly was important to the Reich. But in practice his only beard was an inscrutable girl with “mongrel blood.”

That was the most disconcerting thing of all. Liddell-Stewart had grown adamant when he spoke of Gretel.
She’ll play innocent. She’ll try to charm you. She’ll even flirt with you. But never forget this: You are nothing more than a tool to her. Never trust her.
Yet somehow, for all that, he believed Gretel would protect Marsh.

Slipping an agent into the Reichsbehörde? Not even at their most wistful, their most brandy-sozzled, had Marsh and Stephenson dreamed of this. The commander had offered the one lure strong enough to drag Marsh away from his family.

And so his life was in Gretel’s untrustworthy hands. Meaning his slim chance of survival hinged upon how well he understood the girl. So he kept tight on Gretel’s heels as she sauntered through the cramped submarine.

It wasn’t easy; the walkways were inches wide in places, and crates of provisions had been crammed into every available space. The boat reeked of diesel fumes, boiled cabbage, and other men’s breath. The submariners slathered themselves in deodorant and cologne to mask the reek of body odor. The U-boat had been in port to take on Klaus not many days earlier, but that had been a rapid detour in the middle of a long patrol. Even the officers were unshaven.

Marsh laid a steadying hand on a cold steel reinforcement rib and shifted his weight as the decking tipped underfoot. The hull gave a long, low groan as the boat sliced up through the waters of the North Sea on its final approach to Bremerhaven. He had a good pair of sea legs, but he’d honed them on surface craft; it wasn’t the same on a submarine.

Gretel hopped into her fold-down cot. (And it was hers. She was the only person on board, excepting the captain, who wasn’t subject to hot-bunking. A point of much grumbling among the crew, especially the officer she had displaced. Worse still, the boat hadn’t fired any torpedoes on this run, meaning nobody could bunk in the forward torpedo room.) She reclined on her side, one hand resting on her thigh and the other propping up her head. Such informality might have been considered inappropriate, were a ranking officer to have seen this. Then again, so were the braids that hung well past her shoulders. And her gender, for that matter. But the Götterelektrongruppe received special dispensation, and Gretel in particular. Which brought him back to the topic at hand.

“Impossible? Do tell, Raybould.”

Crossing his arms for warmth, Marsh leaned against the pressure hull. “If you knew the future, everything slated to happen, it would mean everything is predestined.”

“How do you know it isn’t?”

“That would imply there’s no such thing as free will.”

Gretel frowned as though he’d just said something obtuse. She said, “
I
have free will.”

“Right. And so do I.”

A queer little half smile played on her lips as she regarded him. “Are you certain?”

“Of course I am.”

“I knew you’d say that.”

Klaus stumbled through the hatchway, forehead beaded with sweat. He passed between Marsh and Gretel without saying a word, then folded down the cot he shared on rotation with Marsh and two seamen. His chest rose and fell with long, slow breaths. He’d been ill almost since the U-boat descended into the Channel.

The hull creaked. Klaus clenched his eyes shut.

Marsh asked, “What’s wrong with him?”

“Claustrophobia,” said Gretel. “It’s a side effect of the doctor’s training methods.”

“I thought you lot do what you do with those things.” He pointed to the battery on her waist.

“The batteries are a tool toward a means. Not the means itself.” She fingered the tab pinned to her collar. “We do what we do through acts of willpower, energized by what the doctor calls the Götterelektron.” That explained the insignia she and her brother wore. Divine lightning energizing the Willenskräfte. “But first the willpower must be honed. In brother’s case, it was through the supreme desire to escape his coffin.”

Marsh had yet to hear a single thing about Herr Doktor von Westarp that didn’t suggest the man was a sadistic, first-class nutter. But he’d see for himself soon enough.

“In Reinhardt’s case it was the cold.” Gretel shook her head. “Junkman hates the winter so.”

“What about you? How’d he train you to see the future, if that’s really what you do?”

Gretel leaned forward. “I’m different from the others,” she whispered.

“How did you know about Liv? And our girls?”

Gretel’s expression clouded over. She tried to cover—she did have one hell of a poker face—but she couldn’t hide the way her eyes flicked down to her battery. He’d managed to instill the tiniest bit of doubt in her, but it was fleeting. She looked up, turned an icy gaze at him. Had she looked into the future to put the lie to his trick?

“Gotcha,” he said. “That’s twice now. Didn’t think you’d fall for it the second time.”

If before her expression was icy, now it was arctic. Perhaps goading her hadn’t been such a good idea.

“Would you like me to tell you about your son?” That caught Marsh off guard. And she saw it. “Oh, yes. There are time lines where you and Olivia have a son. His name is John. He doesn’t take after his father.” He recovered, but she pressed the point. “Tell me, Raybould: What first drew you to Olivia? Was it the freckles? Or her voice?”

“You don’t know anything about Liv.”

“On the contrary. I know quite a bit about your family. I know you were married in John Stephenson’s garden. A small service. William was your best man. He—”

Marsh said, “This is all guesswork.”

“Hardly. Olivia told me herself.”

“You’ve never met Liv.”

“But I have.” Gretel leaned forward again, met his eyes. He glimpsed something unsettling in those dark depths. “Downstream,” she whispered.

Klaus hauled himself upright. “Would you two shut up?”

“I’m sorry, brother. I’ll be good.”

He stood, rounded on Marsh. Klaus shared the same olive complexion as his sister, but he hadn’t inherited the eyes. Marsh didn’t see insanity swimming there. Merely the cold-blooded fervor common to all true believers.

Klaus said, “She says you’re important for what’s coming. Pray that doesn’t change.” Marsh winced as sour breath wafted across his face. Klaus had been ill.

“Hand me to the RSHA, will you?”

“No, he won’t,” Gretel interjected.

“When the doctor decides to dispense with you, he’ll have you sent to the training field for practice exercises. Be thankful for that.” Klaus tapped a fingertip against Marsh’s chest. “I will make your death quick.”

Two voices vied for Marsh’s attention. One was Liddell-Stewart’s gravel-and-whiskey rasp rattling off the secrets of Klaus’s psyche:
This is how to gain his trust, turn him to your cause …
The other was Marsh’s own voice, and it countered with indignation:
Don’t let this goose-stepping tosser think he can intimidate you.

Stalemate.

Marsh cracked his knuckles against his jaw and drew himself to his full height. Klaus had a couple of inches on him. “Who are you, Klaus? When you’re not hiding behind your sister and that battery,” he said. And then, because he couldn’t resist, “Take it off someday, and then we’ll see who gets the quick death.”

Gretel hopped down from her bunk. “You’ve upset our guest, brother.” She patted Klaus on the cheek, then did the same to Marsh. “It is flattering that you two would fight over me. But now is not the time.”

*

Unterseeboot-115 could accommodate over fifty crew members under normal conditions. Even then, there wasn’t room in the cramped vessel for more than a fraction of the crew to eat or sleep at any given time. The presence of two SS officers plus an Englishman stressed the system. As did having a woman on board. The sailors might have made way for her, might have been unnerved by her, but that didn’t prevent the resentful glances. But most of those were reserved for Marsh, and usually when he queued up to receive his share of “rabbit,” which was what the crew called bread mottled with fuzzy white fungus.

Somebody sniffed loudly. “I know that odor.” Something nudged Marsh in the small of the back. “Ah, the pet Englishman.”

Another submariner said, “Is it true that Churchill sent you away after you failed to service him?”

“I think he was sent away because of the smell.”

You’re no bouquet of roses, Jerry.

The decking rattled underfoot as more sailors came to join the taunting.

“Perhaps he is a Jew,” said a third. The men taunting Marsh spoke variations on a Low German dialect. Frisian, from somewhere near the coast. It made sense they would join the Kriegsmarine if they’d grown up near the sea.

“Even a Jew isn’t stupid enough to come here. They say he’s a defector. I think he must be a spy.”

Marsh ransacked his store of evasions, searching for something that would deflate the brewing confrontation. Having a few words with Klaus was one thing, but getting jumped by a squad of Jerries wasn’t an auspicious start to the mission. It could be his death if he lost his temper and slugged one of the Jerries; there was no guarantee an officer would break it up immediately. Small boat. How long could they turn a blind eye? A stomping might last a good while before somebody called an end to it. Marsh’s fate rested on the Gretel’s word—implication, really—that he was crucial to the future of the Reich.

Marsh looked for a way to stop this. He came up short.

The first seaman, the one who had started the whole mess, squeezed in front of Marsh. Acne scars stippled his face. They boy looked to be about eighteen, twenty at the outside. Tufts of downy stubble covered his chin. Not particularly tall; the U-boat wasn’t designed to accommodate height. His calloused hands had a few bruises, though whether from labor or brawling, Marsh couldn’t tell.

“Which is it, Englishman? Are you a coward, or a spy?”

God damn you, Liddell-Stewart
. Marsh grasped for the script he’d hastily prepared for himself on the drive to the coast. Mentally ran through all the ways he’d devised to express disdain for Britain and fawning admiration for the Third Reich. Then he tossed it all out.

“Is this German discipline? I’d expected more from the future masters of the world.”

“Do you hear that? Englishman thinks we’re the masters of the world.”