Valley of Decision (17 page)

Seizing upon this moment of contrition, Maggie asked, “Why did you create a diversion so my mother and I could get away that night I was sick?”

The question took him by surprise. He gave a humble half shrug. “It was the right thing to do.”

“I saw what the soldiers did to those who couldn't get away. What you did was very brave, Barek.”

“Don't think me a better man than I am.” His gaze met hers briefly, then drifted past her and the walls of the villa. From the pinch of his brow she suspected Barek struggled with the memories of that horrible night the soldiers came in search of her father in the same way she was tortured with the slow-motion replay of his mother being flung about by an angry bull.

After a few seconds he said, “I told myself, ‘Why not sell the writs? What would it hurt the one God for someone to say they'd burned a pinch of incense upon the altar of a pagan god when they didn't mean it?' ” He took a sharp breath. “But I was wrong. Those writs of libellus destroyed everything. As all lies do.”

Maggie grimaced at the prickle of her own guilt. “Everyone lies.” The note she'd scribbled in the airport and intended to mail was still in her backpack. “Maybe not with words, but with the lack of them.”

“But not everyone fails his own mother.” Barek's eyes held neither judgment nor pity. “Cyprian had done so much for me, and I was such an ungrateful cur I couldn't see it. Saving you and your mother doesn't make up for half of what I have done. But it's a start.”

Maggie envied how his confession rolled off his tongue—bravely. He'd screwed up and he knew it, but he was going forward, trying to make a difference no matter the consequences. The last time she'd done anything halfway noble, she was five and vowed never to play with dolls again. Who did that help? Her sacrifice did not give Ruth back to her son. No wonder she still felt guilty.

Eggie gasped and then coughed so hard he spit up blood.

“He's choking!” Maggie raced to the bed, flung back the tent flap, and tried to lift their patient into a sitting position. Eggie's body coiled out from under her grasp like limp spaghetti. “He can't catch his breath. I don't know what to do.”

“I do.”

The clear, intelligent, matter-of-fact voice that came from behind Maggie sent her heart plunging into the dark pit of her already upset stomach. The woman who belonged to this voice always knew what she was talking about and she loved to make sure Maggie knew it.

Maggie turned slowly. “Mom?”

“I've told you a hundred times not to leave your backpack lying around.” Her mother tossed her the bag she'd left in her father's villa. “Don't just stand there.” Her mother's skilled hands clasped Maggie's shoulders and moved her aside. “We've got a lot to do before we go home.”

T
HE ELATION OF FINDING
Maggie alive and scared half to death had dialed back Lisbeth's anger by several notches.

Hopefully her strong-willed girl had witnessed enough suffering that she'd never want to venture into this world again. Ever. Convincing Mama to leave was going to be tricky enough. She didn't need Maggie bucking their return as well.

Lisbeth pulled her stethoscope buds from her ears. “You nailed the measles diagnosis, and your vaporizer is well made.”

Maggie dropped her backpack and inched in closer. “Then why isn't he getting better?”

“Complications are what every doctor fears. He could have just as easily developed pneumonia and a severe ear infection while under my care.” She looped her stethoscope around her neck. “I'll give him a round of antibiotics, some Tylenol, and typhoid vaccine just in case. We'll have to keep the vaporizer going and pump him full of liquids until he's out of the woods.”

“Is he going to live?” Maggie cowered beside Barek. Lisbeth couldn't help but notice Ruth's son's protective hand resting on her daughter's tense shoulder.

“He's strong.” She pulled off the gloves she'd put on before conducting her exam. “Once his fever breaks I'll feel better about his prognosis. But know this: he's alive because of you.”

Maggie let out a surprised breath. “But he'll recover because
you're
here.”

As Lisbeth considered the best way to navigate the land mines between her and Maggie, Cyprian jumped in. “Young lady, I think your mother and I deserve to know why
you're
here.”

Maggie's fists clenched in preparation for war. So much for any hope of a truce. Lisbeth braced, but to her surprise, Maggie turned and deployed her first missile at Barek. “Were you with my father when he found my mother?” Her frustration carried as far as the kitchen, drawing Naomi and Laurentius to the door. “Well?”

Barek grabbed hold of the finger she jabbed in his chest. “I didn't know you'd run away until just a few minutes ago.”

“If you were any kind of friend, you would have told me
she
was here.” Maggie's tears were being held in place by a wall of anger.

For all her travels across the centuries, Dr. Lisbeth Hastings knew one truth to be timeless: some people were like dangerous pathogens—unrelenting when it came to doing whatever they needed to survive. Her daughter was one of those people. She needed space. Whenever she felt trapped, she was willing to gnaw off her leg or worse, someone else's head, to get free.

Lisbeth stepped in to spare Barek the bloodletting that Maggie wanted to aim at her. “I asked him not to tell.”

“Why is it always like that with you, Mom?”

“What are you talking about?”

“You can't keep me in that sterile box of yours forever.”

“I did what I thought was best.”

Maggie's hands flew in the air, her glare expanding the distance between them. “Were you ever going to tell me that my father would die a horrible martyr's death?” Hurt palpitated from her pursed lips.

“Cyprian's going to die?” Barek ripped his dagger from his scabbard. “When?”

“Everybody calm down,” Cyprian said.

“My mother hates me for taking her from you!” Maggie's face blazed with accusation. “Admit it, Mom.”

“How could I ever hate you? You're the best of both of us,” Lisbeth answered.

“If I hadn't gotten sick, you could've stayed and stopped all of this.”

There it was. The guilt Papa had alluded to, the sin from which Maggie sought absolution. What a fool she'd been to let the infection fester all these years. “Listen to me.” Lisbeth gripped Maggie's shoulders. “If anyone is to blame for the way things turned out the last time we were here, it's me. When I brought you to the third century, I failed to take the proper precautions. I knew the dangers of a near drowning. I should have administered antibiotics the minute we climbed out of the well. But I didn't. By the time your typhoid vaccine failed, I'd given away my entire stock. You were dying. Aspasius was coming for us. Your father sent us back to save us both.”

From the dagger stare Maggie was hurling her way, nothing she'd said had penetrated her daughter's hard head. Lisbeth sighed. “Hate me if you must, but I'd do it all again, exactly the same way.”

Maggie's gaze shot between Lisbeth and Cyprian, evaluating this new information. “Even keep me from my father?” She snatched her backpack and stormed out.

Exasperated, Lisbeth turned to Cyprian and said with a sigh, “That went well, don't you think?”

A
FTER A SLEEPLESS NIGHT
sitting beside Eggie's bed, Lisbeth spent the next day hiding her parenting frustrations in the work of treating Eggie. Maggie spent the day avoiding everyone.

For the first time in her life, Lisbeth understood exactly how difficult it must have been for her mother when Lisbeth brought her anger and unmet expectations to their reunion. She was so angry at Mama for having to grow up without her that she wanted to hit something. She would have too if her mother hadn't been extremely patient.

Lisbeth wiped her hands. If only she had time to adopt the same tactic. But she didn't. Fall was coming, and with it, Cyprian's execution. While his hardheaded attitude angered her, she'd come to terms with his decision to face whatever lay ahead. Maggie obviously had not. There was only one way to prevent the emotional heartache her daughter would suffer if she had to witness her father's death and that was to extricate her from this place. Sooner rather than later.

Lisbeth forced her concentration on the task of lining up bundles of dried fennel, turmeric roots, and all-purpose margosa leaves on the kitchen table.

“Lisbeth?” Cyprian's voice was quiet, his arms careful as they
slipped around her waist. His nose nuzzled the back of her neck. “This can wait until tomorrow.”

Her body stiffened against a maelstrom of emotions she'd been fighting all day. Not because she didn't want to satisfy the longing she'd seen every time their eyes met, but to protect her own heart from being torn to pieces. Which was exactly what would happen when he had to go his way and she had to go hers. “I'm almost finished.”

He came around and faced her. His eyes searched hers as he took the root bundle from her hand and laid it on the table. “You're finished for tonight.” He picked up the oil lamp and offered his hand.

Lisbeth scooped up eucalyptus leaves. “You could have said something. Helped me with her.”

Picking a fight with Cyprian was stupid. Her struggles with Maggie were not his fault. So why was she pulling the pin from the grenade? She knew why. Because, no matter what she told herself, coming here had disturbed the small seed of hope hibernating deep in her heart. The hope of becoming a family. Allowing this forbidden longing a chance to sprout was asking for her heart to be ripped out again. Their time together had limits. To pretend otherwise was setting herself up for a grief she would not survive a third time.

“It is herself she cannot forgive, Lisbeth.”

“You sound like my father.” Eucalyptus leaves crumbled to dust in her clenched palm. “I guess I'm tired of being her punching bag.”

Cyprian considered her words for a moment, and she knew from the flicker of confusion he was trying to picture a punching bag. “I seem to remember someone having a wrestling match with her own mother in the middle of my garden.”

Lisbeth hated how Cyprian could see the fear hidden in her
bluster. She made a feeble attempt at a smile. “That was different. Mama had stolen my stethoscope.”

“Your mother had disappointed you and you couldn't let it go.”

“How have I disappointed Maggie? I have given her everything.”

“But me.”

“I would have, but you made me promise never to bring her back.” Even as the words left her mouth she regretted how they sounded. “You didn't deserve—”

His kiss silenced her apology. “Your sacrifices have been great.” He offered his arm. “And that's what I told her. In the future, she's to direct her complaints to me.”

“Future?” Lisbeth brushed the eucalyptus from her hands. “You know I can't stay.”

“I know.”

She abandoned her herbs and roots, and threaded her arm with his. His hand came over hers. Warm. Strong. And trembling. A small tremor, but one that shook her to the core. He was as frightened of losing her again as she was of losing him.

When Lisbeth had lost Cyprian the first time, she told herself she was coming back someday. So every moment of their brief life together played like a classic movie she'd watched so many times she knew every line. She remembered everything: The scent of his skin, salty with a hint of the expensive octopus ink he used for his ledgers. The quizzical look that quirked his lips whenever she used modern terms he didn't understand . . . and her favorite, the way the curls that fell across his forehead twisted around her finger when she plowed her hands through his hair and drew him so close they breathed the same air. Remembering these things, especially as she gave birth to his child, had kept him close and eased the fear of raising Maggie alone.

This last separation had been far more difficult. She'd told herself the agony was normal. After all, she was struggling to raise her daughter alone. Keeping up with Maggie drained both her mental and physical reserves. But she knew the truth: She wanted to be with him and she couldn't.

Cyprian pulled her to him. “We have tonight. Let's not waste it.”

One night with this man she loved so much she ached inside was all she'd had on her last trip through the portal and it had not been enough. She would not put herself through that pain again.

His lips settled hers. He wasted no time pulling her close and she felt her heart melt. How could she live the rest of her life knowing she'd not taken advantage of the opportunity to make love to him again? She couldn't. When he finally released her, he smiled and offered his hand again.

Lisbeth laced her fingers with his and held tightly.

“You're limping,” he said as he guided her from the kitchen.

“It's nothing.”

“Let me take care of you for a change. I'll look at your foot when we get to our room.” They made their way through the dark house via lamplight, dodging all the occupied sleeping mats in the halls.

Cyprian led her up the back stairs to a door tucked under the eaves. “Titus set this up for us.” His eyes twinkled with anticipation and her heart quickened. There had been no one else for thirteen years.

“Wait until you see.” Cyprian opened the door and drew her inside the tiny room. “Not our honeymoon suite, but more comfortable than the pergola on the beach.”

Cyprian's lamp lit the details of the cozy space.

Titus had outdone himself. On the far side of the room, a plump double mattress covered in silky linens waited on the floor. Gauzy curtains billowed from the small window with a remarkable
view of the sea. Shiny dots of lavender oil floated in a basin of fresh water. Beside the bed, someone had left a luxurious layout of wine, cheese, and an assortment of sweet cakes.