“You’re going to give us the files, and then you’re going to receive your payment. A straight transaction. All fair,” Hazel said.
Kurzen appeared to be thinking it over. “And if I don’t?”
It was a foolish thing to say. There were ten Neils now, according to Hazel’s count, though there might be others outside. And Kurzen only had four burly goons plus his own skinny self. Why would he try to refuse them?
“There’s no need for any unpleasantness,” said Hazel.
“See, here is what you do not understand,” said Kurzen. “If a dealer could simply appear with more firepower or manpower and take what’s mine, I would not be running this section of town. I’m not giving you the files. No deal. Now leave.”
Hazel made eye contact with the Neil in charge. She did not need to say anything, as she knew that he’d understand her thoughts. She liked this part of their deals, when they didn’t need to speak.
“Check your back left pocket,” said Neil to Kurzen.
“What do you mean?”
“Just check it. Your answer is there.”
Kurzen reached into his pocket, pulling out a piece of paper. He unfolded it and Hazel watched his eyes dart over the lines.
“What the hell is this?” he cried and threw the paper onto the desk as if it were alive.
Hazel glanced at it. It was an exact transcript of everything they had said since the Neils entered the room. She tried not to laugh.
“Here is how it will work,” said Neil. “You will give us the files, immediately. If you do not, you will wake up with something worse than a letter opener beside your pillow. Remember this morning, how you wondered why your toothbrush was on the bathroom counter instead of propped up in the cup? Why your clock was ten minutes fast, when normally it keeps perfect time? I can come visit you any time I like. We don’t take kindly to those who won’t honor agreements.”
Kurzen glared at them and told one of the guards to call off the men. Apparently dealing with them was more trouble than it was worth.
Five minutes later, all but one of the Neils dispersed to return to their original times and Hazel walked back to Skidbladnir beside the remaining one.
The ship waited a quarter mile offshore, its red and white sail hanging loose and the crew of monkeys lined up along the railing, waiting for their captain. Mr. Escobar must have taken the ship out to prevent Kurzen’s men from boarding it. No guards waited at the dock. The place was eerily quiet.
Mr. Escobar sat high up in the ship’s rigging, watching. At a wave from Hazel, the ship turned its dragon-headed prow toward shore, the row of round, spiked shields along its sides glinting in the afternoon sunlight. Hazel shoved her hands in her pockets and watched Skidbladnir approach, admiring her beauty.
The dragon was sentient and could move herself along independently, but a crew at the oars or sails was necessary to make good speed. The monkeys rowed the ship up to the dock and then lowered the gangplank. They unloaded the boxes of implantable devices, leaving them on the dock where Kurzen’s men could retrieve them.
“We should hurry,” said Neil. “I hear someone coming.”
An instant later, the crew must have heard it too, because they leapt back onboard. Hazel didn’t hesitate, but took her place on deck. They pulled away, and as the dock receded, eight armed men appeared.
The men took aim and Hazel shouted a warning as she flattened herself on the deck. The crew leapt to the deck as bullets struck the wood siding of the ship and the metal shields along its sides. The crew pulled at the oars and Hazel pulled out her pistol and lined up a shot.
Neil touched her shoulder. He did not need to say anything. The men were lowering their weapons as the ship moved out of range, and Hazel had no need to kill them. The ship sailed on until they were in open water.
“I don’t think we’ll be able to deal with Kurzen again,” she said to Neil as they sailed north along the Chinese coastline.
“Likely not.” Neil pulled a tiny device from his pocket. It contained the files on the Librarian. “That trick only seems to work once. Then they hire better security for their living quarters. I’ll miss visiting Kurzen though. He’s adorable when he’s asleep.”
It was one of Neil’s rare jokes, and Hazel smiled. He offered her the data storage device.
“You keep it. We’ll look at it once we’re away from the coast.” She gave orders and the ship moved eastward.
“I wonder how you do it,” she said. “How you can appear beside yourself.”
No one else in the Time Corps could exist within ten miles of themselves. They had tried, many times, but always hit an invisible wall. They could only exist once in any geographical area. If they had not been limited in this way, they could travel back in time over and over again, just as Neil had, and change the course of history. As it was, only Neil could do it.
The two of them had no secrets, not since she had told him about the strange lettering that she had spotted on the roof of his mouth. Since he was now in his forties, on his personal timeline, that was twenty years ago. For her, it had been five.
“He’s dead, you know,” she said to Neil, knowing he was thinking of his former boss, the man who somehow had been able control him with a word.
“I know.”
“And you’re not what he wanted you to be.”
That would be a murderer. Neil had worked as a time-traveling assassin, tricked by Mr. March into thinking he was only killing murderers and people who bent the course of history toward evil. He had killed evil people, but there had been others who may have been innocent and Neil had refused to continue.
Neil sighed and looked back toward the coastline, shrouded in early evening fog. They had been traveling together for weeks, seeking the information that might help them get Elliot out of the Library. She was a Southern girl from Louisiana during the Civil War who should have been married by now. He was a strange creature of unnatural strength and speed who thought he had been born in the 1970s, though he had few clear memories. Like the rest of the Time Corps, circumstances and strange events had thrown them together.
“You never told anyone, did you?” Neil asked. “About the letters in my mouth?”
Hazel glanced at the dragon head on the ship. Skidbladnir was alive and always listening. Hazel’s quarters were below decks, and no one would hear them there. She tipped her head a fraction and then had a word with Mr. Escobar, giving him instructions, before she headed down the steps into the dark of the ship’s interior. Technically, the ship was too shallow to have a below-decks. But her ship was not ordinary, and possessed a few small rooms and a cargo hold.
“You should ask Yukiko,” said Hazel. “She might know what the letters mean.”
Yukiko was an on-again off-again member of the Time Corps. She was also a Kitsune, a Japanese fox spirit who had lived most of her life in California. She was young for a Kitsune, but old compared to humans.
“Don’t you dare tell her,” said Neil. “No one can know.”
“One of them might know what the letters mean. Pangur Ban is old as well, and well traveled. Julius does nothing but read all the time. One of them might have a clue as to what it means.”
“It doesn’t matter. Mr. March is dead, and I’m free.”
While Hazel turned on her computer and inserted the data device, Neil picked up a book from Hazel’s shelf and flipped through it. The book was from her own time and she had brought it with her from the nineteenth century. It sat beside an e-reader, an ancient stone statue with unreadable words carved into its base, pieces of driftwood and other oddments of a life lived asynchronously.
“If you’re free, then how can any knowledge be harmful?” she asked. “It might help you understand why you can’t remember so much of your past. It might give you peace.”
“It won’t. All I’m going to learn is that I’m a killing machine or a monster. And what then? What happens if Santiago tells someone at one of his parties? Or if the Seelie or Unseelie or psychopomps or whatever the hell other supernatural beings are out there find out about it? What if I’m something worse than just an assassin?”
“It won’t matter! Because we know you and we love you. Me and Elliot especially. He’s your partner, and neither of us cares what you were made for, only what you are now.”
She went through the files, glancing at the images. There was only one painting, photographed at various angles. An enormous pair of white wings with black tips folded around a man. Or she thought it was a man. The only part of his body visible were two clawlike hands, reaching in anguish to the sky. Flames surrounded him, engulfing him.
For a moment she thought of Lucifer, the angel cast down from heaven. But if that was what the painting depicted, then the whole trip was for nothing. She glanced through the commentary. This was supposedly an image of the Librarian and the woman who painted it was described alternately as a seer, a prophetess or a madwoman. She hoped that Julius would have more luck deciphering any clues in it since it didn’t seem to have any usable information on reaching Elliot.
“I think I know,” said Neil. “I know why I can travel within the same space as myself.”
His tone was different, and she knew they were on dangerous ground. Hazel’s stomach dropped and she took in breath to interrupt him. A thought had occurred to her once in a while, but she had tossed it aside. Neil loved art and music and reading. He was kind and good and ethical, most of the time. He had friendships and loved people. He had even kissed her once.
“It’s because of Mr. March,” she said with more assurance than she felt. “He must have done something to you. Back when he blurred your memories and tattooed the roof of your mouth, it must have been then. It’s just because—”
“No. Stop. We both know why. It’s because I have no soul.”
Chapter 5
The boy’s name was Gopan, and he explained to Astrid that, like her, he was a psychopomp and a Door.
Astrid only stopped to grab her purse and leave the pretzel cart cash drawer with the man running the arcade prize counter. She then left the cart abandoned, its pretzels spinning on their metal hooks in the orange glow of the heat lamp. If Mr. Augustus, the man who ran the park, had a problem with that, he knew where to find her. His brother, Julius, owned the Time Corps safe house in Los Angeles.
“Not every death requires a psychopomp,” said Gopan. “We’d be far too busy if they did. Some souls are, how should I put it? More sticky. We keep them moving. We keep the gears lubricated. We exist for people who might have become geists, so it’s a win-win for them, for people, for stability of the world and the barriers between worlds. Healthy doors open and close at the appropriate times, regulating passage.”
“And that man back there was a sticky soul?”
“Apparently, or I wouldn’t have needed to come.” He looked around as they walked, and he asked her for money to purchase an ice cream sandwich. She gave it to him.
“Where are your parents? Are they around here?”
“No, they’re back in India. I live there too. I normally handle most deaths around my area, so it’s nice to be visiting this part of the world. Normally, the only part of the United States I see is in Nebraska.”
“Why Nebraska?”
“That’s where Jeff’s bookshop is. He’s our supervisor. We’ll go meet him in a little bit.” He checked his watch and counted on his fingers to account for the time change. “Yes, we still have a while before we have to go.”
“How many of us are there?”
“Right now, including you, there are five. Jeff owns the bookshop and generally runs interference between us and the higher-ups. Robin is from Ghana. He and Graciela are good friends. She’s from Argentina.”
“Does that mean I’m in charge of North America?”
“Not precisely. Jeff is in North America too, and I can’t do all of Asia by myself, as there are just too many people. We all get jobs all over, but we tend to stay in our geographical area.”
“But I only speak English.”
“When we’re on the job we can speak to anyone. Off the job, and we’re on our own.”
He paused in front of the Tilt-n-Whirl, cocking his head to one side. Astrid hoped he didn’t want to ride on it, as she wanted to meet this Jeff person and learn everything about being a psychopomp, including how to open Doors to other places. Places like the Library. Gopan turned and walked down the boardwalk, toward the exit.
“Pardon me for asking,” he said, “but do you have your aspect yet?”
“I’m not sure I even understand what that means.” She didn’t mention that she had heard the term before, from a being called the Piper, who informed her that she would receive her aspect soon. He had also told her that she had the sound of wings about her.
“Ah, it’s an alternate form, often an animal. It’s useful in a variety of ways. It’ll come to you in your sleep, most likely.”
“What’s yours?”
“You’re new, so you don’t know, but it’s considered very rude to ask someone what their aspect is.”
“But you just asked me.”
“No, I asked if you had one, not what it was.”
Astrid thought it was a distinction without a difference. She didn’t want to be rude, but curiosity got the better of her. She would never get the opportunity to ask again.
“Since I’m new, can I ask what yours is?”
“You’re looking at it.”
“You’re not really an eight-year-old boy?”
“Not hardly,” he said and finished off his ice cream sandwich, stuffing the wrapper into a trash can.
“But you said an aspect is an animal.”
“Most of the time it is. Mine is a child. I find it useful because almost everyone loves children. We’re nonthreatening. Hopefully yours will be useful too.”
Astrid wondered what sort of thing she might be. What animal did she resemble? She was introverted and shy, so perhaps a rabbit. But that would be a totally useless aspect.
“Some common ones are black dogs, horses and various kinds of birds,” Gopan said.
“Why is it rude to ask about someone’s aspect?” she asked.
Gopan got a thoughtful look. “Your aspect tells you about yourself, and it tells others about you. It’s a part of your nature that’s on display for others to see. If your aspect is, for example, the traditional black dog, it means you might be loyal and dutiful.”
Astrid caught Gopan looking at her from the corner of his eye.
“It’s more than just a piece of your personality,” he continued. “It’s sort of like appearing naked. In a way, your aspect is more you than you are. Your face, your body, you inherited them from your parents. Your aspect is about your interior self, your soul.”
Astrid’s face and body were merely copies of Sister’s. When they were infants, Sister was in danger of death and the Unseelie had swapped Astrid for Sister, making her into an exact copy of the infant she replaced. She had no idea what she had looked like before that, and her Unseelie mother had informed her that her current appearance would be hers for life.
“So, you see,” continued Gopan, “to ask about an aspect or to reveal it is to reveal a part of oneself that is invisible and secret, like the human soul.”
“You’re very philosophical about it.”
“My aspect is a human. They’re like that.”
Chapter 6
Huginn woke from his nap with a start when Pangur Ban spoke.
“Yukiko is home,” said the cat from her seat in the living room front window.
While Huginn, as a raven, preferred the best
perching spots around the house, Pangur Ban, like all cats, enjoyed sunbeams and windowsills. Sunlight backlit her white fur, illuminating her long, lean shape. Her two black and gray striped tabby kittens were somewhere about, most likely tearing toilet paper off the roll or climbing the bedroom curtains. They were old enough now to be mostly independent and were still learning to talk. He tried to remember their names, and it took a few moments. Diego was the male, and Frieda was the female. Astrid had named them after two of her favorite artists, Diego Rivera and Frieda Kahlo. Yukiko came in through the front door and tossed her purse onto the entryway table.
“Any word on the Library?” asked Pangur Ban.
“Nothing,” sighed Yukiko, dropping into a stuffed chair. “Red Fawn has asked a few people, but no luck. Julius isn’t having too much success either. Elliot is good and stuck.”
“I have an idea,” said Huginn. “Why don’t we consult with June in San Francisco? If Augustus, Julius and Red Fawn don’t know anything, maybe she does.”
Yukiko gave him a strange and pitying look. Pangur Ban said, “That was where Yukiko just returned from.”
Huginn searched his memory, but he could not recall. “Have we asked all of the Twelve?”
“All the ones who we can trust,” said Pangur Ban.
Huginn tried to count the members of the Twelve in his mind. There was Red Fawn, who had once been called May. She ran the Chumash Legends show at the Luna Park boardwalk. Then there was Augustus who ran Luna Park but used to have a music shop in New Orleans in the nineteenth century in Hazel’s home world. His sister, September Wilde, had lived there with him and was there still. Julius owned the safe house in Los Angeles in the hub world while June had a house in San Francisco. There were others, and he strained to bring them to mind.
“I’m going to talk with Astrid again,” said Yukiko. “All she has to do is make another Door to the Library and we’re done. I don’t think she’s trying hard enough. I think she’s afraid.”
The Time Corps Chronicles (Complete Series) Page 91