The Art of Stealing Time: A Time Thief Novel (19 page)

I escaped before the man could go any further. I felt oily just by association, and hurried back to my tent with my plate, where I found Seith sitting outside.

“Hungry?” I asked him.

He nodded. I gave him my plate.

“Doesn’t your dad feed you?”

“Aye, but I’m always hungry. Dad says I’d eat his horse if he let me.” The boy shrugged, then scarfed down the salmon and veggies.

“Well, enjoy. You wouldn’t happen to know where I can take a bath, would you?” I rubbed my arms. Even through the mail, my skin felt dirty.

“Ladies have baths in their tents. The men use the stream.” He got to his feet, cheeks stuffed, chipmunk-style, with food. Little bits of rice flew out as he said indistinctly, “I’ll fetch it for you.”

“That would be lovely, thank you.” I entered the tent and began to unhook all the armor and mail strapped to my body, wondering where Gregory was and whether he would manage to find me before the night was over.

I certainly hoped so. I had many things to tell him . . . and more things to
do to
him.

G
regory Faa was a man annoyed.
Again.

“Faugh,” he said as he shook his cell phone, then swore under his breath. He’d never been the sort of man who said “faugh,” and yet there he was, standing in the middle of the Welsh afterlife, saying not only words like “faugh,” but coming perilously close to adding a
tch!

“And I’ll be damned if I turn into the sort of man who
tch
es at the drop of the hat,” he growled to his phone, and shook it again as if that would make it function. “Connect, damn you!”

The notification across the screen remained
NO SIGNAL
for most of the time, but once in a while,
CONNECTING TO NETWORK
would tantalize him, only to immediately return to the previous state. Damn it, he had hoped the king had been exaggerating the isolation of Anwyn from modern computer networks. Reluctantly, he gave up the idea of trying to contact his cousin to find out what was going on in the real world.

“Peter’ll have me drawn and quartered for staying here,” he muttered to himself, guilt making his skin itch in an irritating manner. He emerged from the edge of a forest to consider the scene spread out in front of him. To the left, across the stream, lay Aaron’s encampment. Even now Gwen was probably busily being kitted out to do her warrior thing.

He smiled at the thought of her reluctance to fight anyone, then became distracted—and aroused—at the idea of stripping armor off her one piece at a time. When he was down to nothing but her bikini underwear, he shook himself, told his erection to relax and hold on until that evening when he could allow it free rein with Gwen’s lady parts, and tried to make a plan of action.

He sat down with his back against a tree while he planned, and woke up some time later to find the sun slanting across the sky at an angle that indicated early-evening hours.

“That’s what I get for staying awake the night before watching over Gwen,” he told himself sternly, and deciding that he’d wasted enough time, he marched into the camp of Aaron’s enemy.

“I’m looking for Amaethon,” he said, stopping the first person he saw.

“Lord Ethan always swims before supper,” the young woman told him, nodding to his right. Through the tents, he could see a glimmer of water, probably a pond.

He thought of Gwen in the lake and had to once again mentally chastise his penis. That done, he made his way through the dogs, people, and tents to what was indeed a smallish pond. It was lined with irises and daffodils, and Gregory thought to himself how much Gwen would enjoy the location. Two women walked along one edge of the shoreline, while about fifteen feet out, water splashed in a rhythm that indicated a swimmer.

“—care what he says, I can’t possibly have that volume done before Samhain. I’ve yet to tackle my angsty teenage years, and volume twelve follows that. Make a note that I still need a title for that,” the swimmer called out, pausing to add, “Here, who’s that next to you?”

“My name is Gregory Faa. I take it you’re Ethan?”

“Faa? Faa? Do I know a Faa, Pervanche?”

“No, m’lord,” one of the two women answered, barely giving Gregory a glance. “You know a Fern, though.”

Ethan began to emerge from the water. He was nude, and Gregory noted that the water must be very cold indeed.

“What title would you give a book about your angsty teenage years?” Ethan asked him, accepting a towel from the woman named Pervanche.

“I don’t believe those years were particularly angst-riddled. At least, not in my case.”

“Bah. That’s not going to help me. I need something emotional. Portentous. Meaningful.” He dried his hair brusquely with a second towel, and with the first one wrapped around his waist, started toward the tents. “What are you doing here if you’re not going to help me with titles?”

Gregory decided that the direct approach was the best. “I’m here to collect the king’s dog, roebuck, and lapwing.”

To his utter and complete surprise, Ethan made a rude gesture. Before Gregory could react, Ethan grabbed the hand that was flipping Gregory off and held on to the wrist, saying as he did so, “You’re welcome to ’em, the whole lot if you can find them. The dog’s dead, but you can have one of her approximately eight hundred descendants. They’re all over the camp. Had to make a rule that everyone owned one, just so the bulk of them would have care.”

Gregory eyed him. Ethan appeared to be fighting with his own arm. “And the roebuck and lapwing? Where are they?”

“No idea. Pervanche, strap. Diego is being obstinate again. Consuela!”

They stopped as Pervanche slipped a black leather strap over his shoulder, angling it across his chest like a sling. Gregory watched in silence as, with a slight battle, Pervanche and Ethan managed to get his wrist bound, effectively strapping his arm to his torso.

“Er . . . Diego?”

“My hand. It’s always stroppy in the afternoon. It gets that way until it’s had a little nap. Ah, there you are.”

A lovely woman with long golden hair popped up beside them. “Yes, my lord?”

“Bring supper to my tent. I have to prepare for the photographer. I need several new author photos.”

“As you will, my lord.”

Gregory, feeling a bit bemused, was convinced that despite appearances, Ethan had more information than what he was telling. He followed as Ethan went straight to the largest tent. The inside looked like something out of the Arabian Nights, what with the silken hangings, scattered pillows, and low beds (three) that dotted the massive interior. There were also a handful of desks, one of which Ethan sat down at, flipping open the lid to a laptop. He looked up when Gregory stopped beside him. “You still here?”

“I am.”

“Speak quietly, then. Diego is sleeping, and I don’t want him woken up early. He’s hell the rest of the night if he doesn’t get his proper nap.”

Gregory glanced at the arm. “I hesitate to ask . . .”

“Then don’t.”

Gregory thought about that a minute and decided that the advice was sound. Who was he to point out just how odd it was to treat one’s own arm as if it was a cranky toddler? “I was sent to find the lapwing and roebuck. I’d appreciate help in finding them.”

Ethan sighed, and leaned sidewise to peer around Gregory. “Consuela!”

The woman entered the tent, followed by three men bearing platters of food and drink. “You bellowed, my lord?”

“Where’s the deer?”

She gestured for the men to set down their trays, waiting until they’d done so and left before asking, “What deer would that be?”

“This man”—Ethan gestured at Gregory—“keeps going on about a deer. You must know where I put it.”

“Would that be Lord Aaron’s deer, the one you stole from him almost a millennium ago?” Consuela asked, giving Gregory a look that didn’t contain so much as one iota of curiosity.

“That would be the one,” Gregory answered.

She pursed her lips and thought. “I’m not sure. I haven’t seen it since . . . I would say approximately the year 1415. I can have one of the boys look for it, if it’s important.”

“It’s very important,” Gregory said before Ethan could say otherwise. He needn’t have worried. Ethan was pecking away at the laptop’s keyboard with one finger. “And the lapwing?”

“What’s that?” Consuela asked.

“A bird.”

“Ah. My lord?”

“Eh?”

“This gentleman wishes to know where is the bird that you stole along with Lord Aaron’s dog and roebuck.”

“Gone,” Ethan said without looking up from the screen.

“Dead?” Gregory asked, his spirits sinking. Perhaps, like the dogs, there was a descendant that he could bring Aaron.

“No. Just gone. Flew the coop, so to speak. Ha! Pun. What do you know about angsty teen poetry? It shouldn’t be too difficult to write, should it? I mean, it’s mostly just all dreck, isn’t it? Lots of bad imagery, and depressing self-examination, and a morbid fascination with death and destruction, yes?”

“Unfortunately, I’m unfamiliar with angsty poetry, teen or otherwise. You have no idea where the bird escaped to? Did it have any distinguishing marks?”

“Would ‘My soul was like a one-legged eagle, brought to the harsh, dying earth by the willful, unending ignorance of those around me’ be a metaphor or a simile?”

“It’s a simile. A bad one. Do you even remember the bird?”

Ethan looked up, obviously catching the harsh edge in Gregory’s voice. “Of course I remember her. Aaron let her have free run of the castle. I remember that most distinctly, because he doted on the little thing, ignoring important visitors in order to feed her succulent bits of food when he should have been offering them to me.”

“You were at Aaron’s castle?”

Ethan looked down his nose at him. “Who are you that you are so ignorant of my past? I am the slayer of many beasts! The ruler of all of Wales! I am the bringer of war to Anwyn! I lead an army that my brother raised from the trees and shrubs and plants across the breadth of my realm! Can you doubt that when I entered Anwyn, Aaron groveled at my feet in an attempt to placate me?”

Given his (admittedly slight) knowledge of Aaron, Gregory did actually doubt that, but he knew better than to express that thought. “I don’t believe I ever learned why you did steal the dog, deer, and bird from Aaron.”

“Oh, that.” Ethan sniffed, and focused his attention on his laptop screen again. “I fancied the bird, and Aaron wouldn’t let me have her. So I stole her, and the dog followed me.”

“And the deer?”

“My brother liked deer.” He made an odd sort of face. “A little too well, if you know what I mean.”

Gregory decided that he preferred ignorance on that subject. “There’s nothing you can tell me to help me find the bird and roebuck? Nothing at all?”

“The deer’s around here somewhere. Bound to be. Gideon never could throw anything away. The bird, as I’ve said, has long since left. Does a sonnet have fourteen or sixteen lines?”

Gregory murmured the answer and left the tent before he was caught in any more of Ethan’s self-absorption. He almost bumped into the woman Consuela as he exited, apologizing when she jumped back.

“I have a record here that shows a listing for ‘roebuck, one, large marble’ in the last inventory, made sometime around the turn of the twentieth century.” She held the paper out to him. “It appears to have been relegated to Lady Dawn’s herb garden. You will find that to the northwest, just beyond the apothecary’s tent.”

“Thank you,” he said, bowing slightly to the woman. He couldn’t help but indulge in a bit of curiosity. “Is it true that everyone here—Ethan and his family excepted—are plants?”

She gazed at him steadily, but once again, without any sign of emotion about the oddness of his question. “The warriors are all trees and shrubs, turned to human form by Lord Gideon. I am not of their ilk, however, if that was going to be your next question.”

He smiled his most charming smile, the one that his cousin’s wife said could drop a nun at fifty paces. Consuela didn’t so much as bat an eyelash. A sudden longing for Gwen swept over him. Gwen would love his most charming smile. She would swoon, and leap on him, and touch him in places that made other places hard and demanding. She would never stand and stare at him as if he were no more interesting than a plate of boiled eggs. “I see. Thank you for the help. If you hear anything about the lapwing, I’d be grateful for news of that, too.”

She inclined her head and then entered the tent.

“Odd woman,” he murmured to himself, then studied the paper she’d given him. “Marble? It’s a statue?”

He went off to see if, in fact, the roebuck was an actual statue, and not a depiction of the infamous animal in marble, and after an hour’s search through a weed-choked wilderness that had obviously once been a garden, he uncovered a stained, broken statue of a stag.

“It’s a statue. How . . . odd.” He picked it up, staggered a little at the weight, then retrieved the leg and one set of antlers that promptly fell off, and with them under his arm, headed for the camp across the stream.

He wanted to see Gwen. He wanted to tell her about Ethan’s plant warriors, and the odd woman who didn’t seem to have any emotions, and how his very best smile had failed so miserably. He wanted Gwen to reassure him that she thought he was still sexy, and charming, and desirable. He wanted to make love to her, rest for a reasonable amount of time, then make love to her again.

He just wanted her.

“Here, don’t I know you?”

He stopped at the edge of Aaron’s camp and turned to see who had spoken. A woman picked her way across the fallen tree trunk that served as a bridge over the stream. She paused at the end of it, her expression turning black. “Oh, it’s you! The one who stole my time! Well, I have a thing or two to say to you!”

Dammit, it was Death’s reclamation agent. Since he hadn’t seen any sign of her or the two neckless wonders, he’d assumed they had given up on finding Gwen and had left Anwyn.

“Why are you here? Anwyn is outside of your master’s domain.” He wasn’t exactly sure that was true, but he assumed that if the Watch had no power here, then neither would any entity other than the ruler.

“Just because I can’t take that which rightfully belongs to me doesn’t mean I can’t persuade the subject to leave this place.” The woman stepped off the log and looked around her with obvious distaste, moving toward him as if she were walking in a minefield. “Ugh. Is that a cat? What is it with these people and cats? They were everywhere at the king’s palace, and now there’s more here. Not to mention the dogs in the other camp. It’s enough to make a person deranged.”

Being a Traveller meant that Gregory had grown up believing that animals were unclean and not to be associated with. He didn’t hold any personal animosity toward pets, but he didn’t see a need to fill his life with them, either. And yet despite that fact, he was irritated by this woman’s blatant hostility toward the cats that roamed Aaron’s encampment. It was almost as if he felt the need to defend them. “They’re just cats. They aren’t doing anything to you. If they bother you so much, you’d do best to leave.”

“Ha! You’d like that, wouldn’t you?” She stopped in front of him and transferred her glare from the nearest cat to him. “You owe me for my time, Traveller.”