Romani Armada (Beloved Bloody Time)

by Tracy Cooper-Posey

  “How bad is it that you’re back here now?” he said simply.

  Marley clenched her jaw for a second. When she was sure she could speak evenly she said, “I got fired.”

  He glanced at his watch. “Okay....” He put the jeweler’s screw down and got to his feet. “Alright.” She could see his mind whizzing faster and faster behind the clear grey eyes. Gawain didn’t wear glasses, which seemed odd only in retrospect.

  He was about five-eleven and lean, as only a guy who spends his time repairing and obsessing over computer technology can be. But she had seen him stripped and he had a useful amount of muscle hidden under the layers of tee-shirts and jeans. He was a committed Converse fan. She had never seen any other shoes on his feet. She had no idea where he found them for Converse had stopped making their famous shoes years ago. Gawain’s Chucks were all second-hand and refurbished models that he had traded for. But even in snow conditions they were all he would wear and today he wore the grunge-green pair.

  Gawain pushed an uneasy hand through his shaggy hair. He called himself a redhead, but Marley privately thought of him as a strawberry blond. His family name was Italian, but genetics said someone had slipped a bastard or two under the family blanket somewhere along the line, because Gawain’s coloring defied the typical Italian markers. She was never going to find out though, because Gawain’s past was an untouchable subject, never to be raised in conversation. Verboten.

  Well, she had her own touchy subjects and Gawain and she were too alike for Marley to get upset about the off-limits topic. Besides, they had a more immediate crisis, apparently.

  “Why are you looking at the clock?” she asked him.

  “Sonya’s going to be here in less than twenty minutes, looking for the rent.” Gawain tugged at his full lower lip thoughtfully. “I figured I could hold off your half at least until you came back from work. But with you here, she’s going to want the lot and you don’t have it. Do you?” he added, cocking his head a bit.

  Marley shook her head.

  “I have a client that’s supposed to be paying me next Monday...but that’s next Monday.” Gawain sighed.

  Marley dumped her bag on the table and dug for her wallet. “Let’s see.” She emptied it of everything in it, including rumpled LRT passes in the deep corners. She smiled grimly at the sight of them. The LRT had been in Los Angeles, two years and what felt like a whole millennium ago. Then she went through her bag for change and added that to the pile. The heap looked pathetically small.

  Gawain dug in his pockets, added the few notes from his bill clip, coins from the bottom of his pockets, then opened his wallet, emptied it and added the handful of bills from that, too. He turned to his desk and lifted a double handful of pencils and pens out of a ceramic oversized coffee mug with the inscription “WTF?” in large letters and dumped them on the desktop. He tipped the coffee mug upside down on top of the heap of notes on the table, tipping a big pile of credits onto the growing collection.

  “You start counting,” he suggested. “I’ll keep looking.” He headed for his bedroom.

  “We’re going to pay her with clinking credits?” she said, a gusty laugh of disbelief wheezing out of her.

  “You got a better idea, doc?” He didn’t stop to wait for her answer, because he’d been over this ground already. In the few seconds when she’d told him she’d been fired, the logic processing center that Gawain had for a brain had figured out all the possible alternatives, discarded them and come down to this. They were going to scrounge for the rent and face down Sonya no matter the cost to their combined pride, because anything else would be worse.

  Grimly, Marley started lifting the curling edges of the linoleum to see if there were forgotten coins lying beneath.

  After seven years of slogging her guts out through pre-med, medical school, internship and residency, she’d finally hung her doctor’s shingle and joined the ranks of the demi-gods she had worshipped all those years: real doctors. Marley had thought she’d left behind forever the trash-can lifestyle of medical students and medical residents – on the run, short on time, sleep and money, constantly in debt and wondering how to pay this month’s bills and still eat.

  As she delicately nudged aside grimy, years-old muck in search of forgotten coins, she reflected that she had come full circle and then some. Who’d’ve called that?

  Not her. Not in a million. For that, she’d need someone who could read the future.

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Chronometric Conservation Agency Headquarters, Villa Fontani, Rome, 2264 A.D.: Mariana dropped the reading boards she had been asked to deliver on one of the big tables near the door. She chose the table with the most surface area free of fabrics, tools, shears and more equipment that she had no idea was called or what its use might be, except that it had something to do with making clothes.

  Although describing what Cybelia and her team did as ‘making clothes’ was such an understatement.

  “Ciao Cybelia! Buongiorno a voi.” Mariana waved to the short woman with the pure silver hair. The hair was not a product of age, because Cybelia’s face was unlined and lean, the face of a much younger woman than the hair seemed to hint at.

  Cybelia raised her head from the table where she was standing watching the computer cut pattern pieces out of a bolt of royal blue silky something that shimmered in the sunlight pouring through the high windows that lined the big room.

  “Ciao Mariana,” she returned. “More mail?”

  “Bills,” Mariana told her. “Sorry. Nayara says they’re to come out of your budget.”

  Cybelia turned off the cutting equipment and moved to the table where Mariana stood. She picked up one of the reading boards and thumbed it on. After a few seconds she sighed. “Our expenses are so high right now,” she said and swallowed. “We lost everything when the station blew. All the garments we had collected from the past...hundreds of them. Those are prototypes we’ll never get back.”

  “Don’t you have their patterns stored?” Mariana asked, for she had begun to learn a little bit about Cybelia’s trade and knew that all the department’s patterns had been stored electronically.

  “Oh yes, but the construction of patterns can lose so much in translation if you don’t have a model to measure against and Nayara is not letting anyone travel for anything but commercial purposes right now...and there’s very few of those happening.” Cybelia put the board down and gave a small laugh. “It’s the small things that we miss the most. Scraps of lace, antique buttons, remnants of material, thread. Ribbons! Such a small thing, ribbons, but they are used on almost everything pre-dating the middle of the twentieth century. Those are things we had spent nearly two hundred years building into a useful resource. They’re almost impossible to replace. They can’t be duplicated and there’s no modern supplier or manufacturer.”

  “There has to be a way around it,” Mariana said.

  “More money is always useful.” Cybelia smiled. “But the coffers are empty at the moment. The refit and equipping of this villa took most of the Agency’s resources and there’s so few paying clients right now that it will be a while before we’re up to strength again.”

  “I know,” Mariana replied, for keeping track of the Agency’s budget and forecast was partially her responsibility.

  Cybelia reached over and plucked at Marian’s sleeve. “Speaking of buttons, you’re missing one.”

  Mariana looked down at the cuff. “Oh, I know. I keep meaning to find a replacement.”

  “You lost the button?”

  Mariana nodded as Cybelia tilted her head, looking at her. “How...um...where did you get that top, if you don’t mind me asking?”

  “China. Late twenty-first century.” Mariana pressed her lips together. “Well, I suppose I should say that I got it from you, because this was one of the tops they gave me to wear when I was back there.”

  “Just before the station blew, I remember,” Cybelia murmured, still studying her. “Why are you still wearin
g it?” she asked curiously.

  “I...” Mariana cast about for an answer. “These are the clothes I have,” she ended lamely. She looked down at the trousers. “They were clean and they fit, and people wander around the agency in togas and kilts anyway...”

  “Well, it might be clean enough,” Cybelia said gently. “But it doesn’t fit you at all. Have you lost weight?”

  Mariana stared at her. “Me?” She looked down at herself again. This time she really looked, and noticed what she had only been peripherally aware of until now. The pants clung to her hips, rather than hugging her waist like they should, which meant the hems were dragging on the ground. The shirt, which had been loose fitting to begin now felt like it was billowing around her waist.

  “You should wear heels if you’re going to keep your hems that long,” Cybelia suggested.

  “I didn’t...they never used to touch the ground.” She pulled at the waistband, lifting them up until the hems were just brushing the floor. Then she let the band go and they slumped back into soft accordion folds around her heels. “When did that happen? How did that happen?” She hadn’t been avoiding food at all.

  Cybelia smiled. “I suspect that Nayara has been overworking you and no one around here eats, so your own eating has suffered.”

  “But it hasn’t!” Mariana replied. “Even in China I ate...only constantly! There was always these stir fries available at the cafe, and the most beautiful fresh fruit...” She frowned.

  “Is that what you’re eating here?” Cybelia asked, her smile lingering.

  “I guess...yes.” Mariana bit her lip. “I eat on the run a lot. Handfuls, here and there. Things I can carry in one hand.”

  “Fruit, nuts, vegetables,” Cybelia guessed.

  “Yes, I suppose that’s mostly what I eat,” Mariana said slowly, thinking it through. “But I’m never hungry. I eat all the time.”

  “And swim. I saw you in the pool several times.”

  Mariana drew in a breath. “That wasn’t exercise. I just...like the pool. With the fountains and the garden at one end, and the waterfall, it’s hard not to want to dive in even when you’re fully clothed.”

  Cybelia picked up her hand. “Well, whatever you’re doing, you should keep doing it. In the meantime, let’s get you some more clothes. Something a bit more up-to-date than twenty-first century China.”

  “I don’t...I wouldn’t...” Mariana began, tripping over her words as alarm grew in her.

  Cybelia looked back at her. “What?”

  “It would be nice,” Mariana said carefully, “If I could have something to wear that didn’t look too much like Nayara’s...wardrobe.” The last thing she wanted to do was wear the outrageously sexy and flamboyant gowns and business suits Cybelia designed for Nayara. The evening gowns she wore to any public event were quickly copied and reproduced by garment companies the world over, along with the day wear she dressed up in for other functions. Mariana knew she would look like a heifer trying to dress like a calf. She would look ridiculous and feel even more self-conscious than usual.

  Cybelia smiled gently. “I can do much better than Nayara’s showy clothes. You’ll see. Come. Come.” She began to pull Mariana toward the back of the big room where half a dozen of her assistants were working with equipment and fabric. There were long sets of rails on wheels, holding up completed garments that would be sent to the hermetically sealed wardrobe, to be used for travelers and their clients, as needed.

  Ideas sprouted like a fireworks display and Mariana gasped, halting.

  Cybelia turned to face her. “Are you alright?” she asked.

  “Clothes!” Mariana breathed, trying to build a cohesive whole out of the bright blooming thoughts.

  Cybelia raised a brow. “Yes, clothes indeed,” she agreed gently.

  “You can make them. I mean, make more. Modern ones. For humans.”

  Cybelia frowned. “Why would I—”

  “For the money,” Mariana said flatly. “Why should all the copycat couture houses out there get all the credits for duplicating what you designed? You should get the money. Your department should get the money. You’re a fantastic designer and now that Nayara and Ryan’s book is such a big hit, everyone wants to be like vampires. You could make clothes for them. For everyone. Well, you would design them, then someone else could make them under your license.”

  “Prêt-à-Porter,” Cybelia said.

  “What?”

  Cybelia gripped Mariana’s wrist. “You’re talking about ready-to-wear. But we would need an entire factory to produce—”

  “Just make as many as you can. The rarity factor will raise the prices through the roof. As the money comes in you can expand. You’ll sell millions, Cybelia, I know you will. You’ll be able to afford to buy that factory once you’re rolling.”

  Cybelia’s fingers around her wrist squeezed. “It might work,” she said softly, to herself.

  “You would be doing contemporary clothing,” Mariana pointed out. “Designing it straight out of your imagination. That’s got to be fun, after doing tunics and togas for decades.”

  Cybelia smiled. “Oh, that was the first thought I had.” She tugged on Mariana’s wrist. “But first, we sort out your wardrobe, madam.”

  “I could do with a change of clothes,” Mariana confessed.

  “You’re going to get a whole new closet’s worth,” Cybelia told her. “And then I’m going to personally burn what you’ve been wearing and watch it turn to ashes. Come. Come!”

  * * * * *

  Bushland, near Beechworth, Victoria, Australia, 1879: The tapping on her cheek was annoying. It even hurt a little. Every tap nudged her head just a fraction and set off a corresponding pounding in her brain that made her wince.

  She hurt everywhere, it felt like.

  “Look at me,” Justin murmured.

  “Open your eyes, Deonne,” Adán urged. “Please.”

  Then she remembered. Liping. The apartment building. The little man Justin had called Jury…no, Juris. Then, the explosion.

  “The bomb!” she cried and tried to open her eyes and sit up at the same time. It was a bad mistake. Her head tried to remove itself from her neck – or that was what it felt like from the way the pain expanded and intensified. Her head was going to blow up, just like their apartment building.

  She moaned and grabbed at her temple.

  “Slowly does it,” came a third voice. It sounded a lot like…

  She cracked one eye open by a sliver.

  Adán and Justin were looming over her. So was Ryan.

  Over their heads were the tops of trees that looked odd and pale. The sky beyond them was a washed out blue and utterly cloudless.

  Deonne opened her eyes slowly and warily. Adán sat back with a heavy sigh.

  Justin stroked her cheek. “You scared us.”

  “Why is Ryan here?” she asked and wasn’t surprised when her voice emerged as a croaky whisper.

  Ryan got to his feet, telling Deonne he had been on his knees. He was wearing the strangest garments. They were dusty, his boots were scuffed and run down, and his shirt was no longer the white it would have been when it was new. He had his cuffs rolled up nearly to his elbows, and the shirt didn’t have a collar.

  “I came to make sure the marker was clear and secure,” he told her. He looked at Justin. “I have some water. That will help offset her shock.”

  Justin nodded. “Thanks.” He helped Deonne to sit up and that was when she discovered she was lying on the ground. Well, not quite the ground. A stained and faded blanket lay folded beneath her.

  She looked around with interest. They were still in wooded countryside, but it looked nothing like the trees and undergrowth that had surrounded Liping. These trees were tall and their trunks slender and pale. The grounded was littered with fallen and rotting leaves.

  The leaves on the trees hung limp and still. The air itself seemed motionless. Nothing stirred but the four of them.

  It was stupefyingly hot,
too. The pulsing heat was a nice change from the crisp mornings at Liping, but Deonne knew the novelty wouldn’t last.

  Somewhere high up near the treetops, a crow gave a long, mournful call, making her jump in surprise.

  There was a campfire burning nearby, but they had placed her far enough away from the flames that the heat didn’t reach her. At the edge of the little clearing a horse stood with his head down, cropping at the grasses growing around the base of the trees. His reins were looped around a low branch. Ryan was digging in the horse’s saddlebag.

  On the same side of the clearing, there was a plainly visible path in the undergrowth, worn bare by many feet, snaking through the trees. A dozen yards further on, it ended. Through the gap in the trunks created by the path, Deonne glimpsed rolling green growth lit by brilliant sunlight and further way, more trees. The horizon was broken up by high, craggy and wooded hills.

  Ryan walked back toward the fire, carrying a flat leather container. Water. He held it out to Justin, who twisted the narrow lid and removed it. He held the container out to Deonne. “It’s not pure like you’re used to, but it is drinkable and you need it.”

  The thought of cool water in her mouth made her throat contract. She reached for the container and carefully drank. After the first glorious mouthful, she noticed the taste. Justin was right. It wasn’t water she was used to, but it was wet.

  Adán was standing by the fire, next to a small pile of clothing the same vintage and quality as Ryan was wearing. He was naked except for his trousers, which he was in the process of removing.

  “Where are we?” Deonne asked Justin.

  “Australia. The state of Victoria. It’s eighteen-seventy-nine.”

  She was now five centuries into the past. Deonne looked around the quiet clearing once more. “This is where you grew up?”

  “Not far from here,” Justin confirmed. He got to his feet. “There’s a town called Beechworth about three miles away, through the bush. In a shack at the edge of the town there’s a five year old version of me giving my mother grief, as usual.” His smile was strained.