The Spacetime Pool (4 page)

“And my world is the
second clock?” Dominick asked. “Time goes from noon to midnight here?”

“Yes!” It gratified
her that he understood so fast.

“The time here and
where I found you was the same.”

“I know. I don’t mean
my world and yours are literally related by a twelve-hour difference. Just that
they’re in some way out of phase with each other, like three in the morning is
different than three in the afternoon, even though they’re called the same
thing.”

He was quiet for a
while. Then he said, “So the branch cut to your universe is located at a
certain phase. It’s like saying the gate opens only at a certain time.”

“That would be my
guess.”

“To go around this
metaphorical clock and return to the branch cut must take longer than twelve
hours. The disk never worked before.”

“How long have you
been trying?”

“About forty years.
Since I was very small.”

Forty! That wasn’t
what she wanted to hear. “Every
day?
”

“Well, no.” He
sounded embarrassed. “I should. Max does more than I do, and we’ve both tried
more as we’ve grown older, with the pressure to settle this matter and produce
heirs.” He hesitated. “It just all seems so fanciful.” Then he added, “Seemed.”

She agreed. At least
if he didn’t always check, he could have missed the gate. She hoped that was
why he hadn’t found her before this. Or she could be wrong about the whole
thing. “I need to read about the theory.”

“Such studies are for
monks.” He sounded surprised.

Janelle had no
objection to being considered monkish if it would get her home. What she lacked
in savvy about this world she could make up for in her ability to solve problems.
“Do you have books about the gates?”

“In my library.”

“Maybe I can learn to
make one.” Or find a more logical explanation for all this.

“If it pleases you to
look, you may.”

She wondered if
reading would be a problem. “But Dominick.”

He bent his head,
bringing his lips next to her ear. His breath tickled the sensitive skin there.
“Hmmm?”

“Oh.” She forgot what
she had been about to say. His scent surrounded her, a combination of saffron,
thyme, and sweat. She was suddenly conscious of how close they were sitting on
the biaquine.

He spoke against her
ear. “I like your hair. You look like a forest sprite.” He brushed his lips
across her cheek.

“Stop.” She was
almost stuttering.

He exhaled. But he
lifted his head and straightened up. The night air cooled her cheek.

“What did you want to
ask me?” he asked, more formally.

“Your speech.” She
wasn’t certain what unsettled her more, his kiss or that she had liked it. But
he was going too fast. “When you speak to your men, you don’t use English.”

“Yes, I do.”

“What do you call
what we’re speaking?”

“Erst. No one uses it
anymore.” His voice lightened. “As a youth I complained greatly about having to
learn a dead language. I’m glad now I did.”

“It’s not dead to me.”
She hoped.

“Then I’m gratified I
know it.”

“Tell me something,”
she said. “Why didn’t you expect to find me?”

“I guess I assumed
that if you existed, it would lead naturally to your coming here. I didn’t
think it would happen by mistake,
only
because I looked for you.”

She rubbed her eyes. “Talk
about a self-fulfilling prophecy.”

“Apparently so. We
will have to marry as soon as possible.”

“
What?
” He had
just taken “too fast” to “light speed.”

“My brother.”
Dominick paused as Starlight picked his way across a gully that cut across the
trail. “If he finds out what happened, he will come to get you.”

Janelle’s head ached.
“Let me see if I have this straight. If you and I marry, you become emperor and
he dies. If I marry him, he stays emperor and
you
die. If either of you
kills me, he dies.”

“Unfortunately, yes.”

“If no one marries
me, do things stay as they are now?”

“I think so.”

“The answer is
simple, then. I go home.”

“And after that?” he
asked. “My men know about you. So will the monks who check your hair. If you
are who I believe, how long before Max finds out? If you go home, he might find
you someday. I did.” Then he added, “That assumes you can go back.”

“I have to believe it’s
possible.”

“I understand. But as
long you are here, I will risk neither my life nor yours.”

Janelle wondered why
she couldn’t have normal problems, like fixing the plumbing or finding a job. “If
we marry, won’t your brother die?”

“I don’t want his
death.”

“But you want his
title.”

“I would be a better
emperor.”

“Why?”

“Maximillian is
brutal man.”

“What makes you any
different?”

He gave a terse
laugh. “I can think of no one else who would dare ask me such a thing.”

Well, tough. “It’s a
fair question. You two are brothers.”

“Your questions are
too personal.”

She let out an
exasperated breath. “You say we have to marry so you stay alive and I don’t get
brutalized. That’s pretty personal.”

Silence.

Janelle bit back her
impatience. She knew too little about Dominick to judge when to push and when
to bide her time. But push she would, if that was what it took to find her way
home.

They rode for a while
with only the thud of hooves on the trail to break the silence. But eventually
he did answer. “My father raised my brother. He ignored me because I wasn’t his
heir. I spent my childhood with my mother. I had her love. Maximillian had
whippings.” Tension corded his muscles, and his hold tightened, though she didn’t
think he realized it. “Father intended to ‘shape’ Max into a man like himself.
He succeeded. Max is exactly like him.” Anger honed his voice. “My mother is
dead. I couldn’t protect her. But I won’t let my brother do the same to you.”

His words had so many
painful implications, she hardly knew what to say. She spoke softly. “I’m
sorry.”

He clenched the reins
so hard, his knuckles whitened. “Max and I were close as boys. He has hardened
over the years. I mourn the loss of the brother I loved, but I hate what he has
become.”

“It must be difficult
for you both.”

“You are generous, to
offer sympathy to those who put you in this situation.”

She had no answer for
that.

“Janelle.” He spoke
thoughtfully. “Make a bargain with me.”

“How do you mean?”
she asked, wary.

“Marry me, and I will
do what I can to help you return home. If you get back, who is to say the
marriage exists in that universe? You can resume your life without me.”

Given her lack of
options, he could have demanded she do what he wanted. It mattered that he
asked her consent and offered his help. But she knew too little about him. So
far he had acted with honor, and a kindness incongruous with his obvious
capacity for violence, but she had no guarantee that would continue. Nor did
she doubt his offer came with strings; he wasn’t talking about a marriage in
name only. Her face heated. Yes, she found him attractive. But that wasn’t
enough. She needed to know him better. To trust him.

“I’m not ready,” she
said.

“We don’t have the
luxury of time. This is the best way I know to protect us both.”

What to do? Given how
little she knew about life here, going it alone didn’t seem particularly
bright. After a moment, she said, “All right. I accept your bargain.”

It wasn’t until his
rigid hold eased that she realized how much he had stiffened. He said only, “Good,”
which relieved her. She wasn’t ready for any heart-to-heart talks with the
fiancé she had just acquired.

They rode higher into
the mountains, and the fog thinned until they were traveling under a sky
brilliant with stars, far more than she saw in the city of Cambridge where she
lived. The day’s warmth had fled. When Janelle shivered, Dominick reached to
the bags he had slung over the flanks of his biaquine. He folded a sheepskin
around her shoulders, with the fleecy side against her skin.

“Thank you,” she
murmured.

As they rode, Janelle
mulled over his words. She couldn’t fathom why she would figure in anyone’s “prophecy.”
Her only talents were writing proofs and solving equations. She smiled wryly.
Maybe she could subdue the nefarious Maximillian with Bessel functions.

Up ahead, peaks rose
out of the fog, dark against the sky. Then she realized it was a cascade of
onion-bulb towers, each topped by a spire. Dominick’s party approached a cliff
that stood about ten feet high—no, not a cliff, a great wall that curved away
in either direction, topped by crenellations.

Eerie whistles broke
the night’s quiet as the biaquines gathered before the wall, stamping and
snorting. A gate swung outward, huge and dark, groaning. Torchlight flickered
beyond, where men were cranking giant wheels wound with rope as thick their
burly arms. Past the gate lay courtyards, and past them, a huge building
surrounded by smaller structures. The layout resembled a European castle, but
the architecture evoked the palaces of Moorish Andalusia that Janelle had
visited when her family lived in Spain. Icy moonlight edged it all, turning the
spires, domes, and delicate arches into frozen lace.

As much as the scene
enthralled Janelle, it also bewildered her. Who had settled this land? Dominick’s
men spoke a dialect of English, but their names sounded Mediterranean, Arabic,
or Near Eastern, with English more rarely in the mix. That described their
appearance, too. Maybe the Ottoman Empire had spread farther across Europe in
this universe. If East and West had blended more, the mix of colonists who
settled the New World here could have been different than in her world.

They rode to a
courtyard in front of the palace. An immense horseshoe arch framed the entrance
of the building like the keyhole for a giant antique key. Its sides rose in
pillars, and at the top, an onion-shaped arch curved out and back around to a
point. Mosaics tiled the pillars and glistened like silver in the moonlight.

As their party
dismounted, stable-hands swirled around them. The biaquines were taller than
most horses, but Dominick swung off with little effort. He reached up, offering
his arms to Janelle. She hesitated, staring at his harsh features, which were
blurred by moonlight and the hint of mist in the air. Then she pulled her leg
over and slid down. She ached everywhere. He eased her to the ground, his hold
solid after the swaying gait of the biaquine.

The sheepskin had
fallen off, and she shivered. Dominick pulled her close, under a jacket he had
donned earlier. It was fur lined, not as warm as the skin, but soft and thick
against her arms. For just a moment, she gave in to her fatigue and buried her
face against his shirt as if that would hide her from his world.