The Master of Time

by David Wingrove

  ‘Okay. Tell me straight, from the top. How you met this Katerina, and why you’re trapped in this so-called cul-de-sac of Time.’

  And I tell him, and his eyes show a pained understanding. I talk about the two great Masters, and the great war in Time and about Katerina and the girls … even about Reichenau and Kolya. And I know it sounds real whacko, but Phil just nods and listens. And then, when I fall silent, he tells me about his own VALIS experience and about the figure at the end of his bed. And he says all this despite the cameras watching, recording it all.

  ‘I understand now,’ he says finally. ‘This reality of ours wasn’t meant to be, was it? You shifted it.’

  ‘Yes,’ I say, understanding it for the first time ever. ‘By loving her.’

  ‘Then find her again. And save her.’

  I’m silent a moment, then, ‘Did your agents take my charts?’

  ‘Charts?’ He looks up, knowing that they’re listening in.

  A voice answers him. ‘No, Mr President. There were no charts of any kind in the apartment.’

  Phil looks to me again. ‘Are they important?’

  ‘Maybe,’ I answer cryptically. Only I know the solution is there, somehow, among my loose endings.

  I look to him again. ‘What are you going to say? To the press, I mean.’

  Phil smiles. ‘We’ll make something up. And hey … it’ll even have an element or two of the truth in the mix.’ He pauses, then, ‘You know … you solved a big problem for us today, Otto. The guys you killed … the Mafiosi. We think they were behind the assassination of President Reagan, only we couldn’t prove it. Now we don’t have to.’

  ‘Phil?’

  ‘Yes, Otto?’

  ‘Can you place me back there? In DeSario’s apartment.’

  ‘Are you sure that’s where you want to be? If this Kolya fellow is watching you …’

  But I’m certain now that he is. Or one of his agents.

  ‘Can you?’

  Phil hesitates, trying to work me out, and then he smiles. ‘Okay. But we’ll have to smuggle you out on the graveyard shift. We’ve half the world’s press out there, clamouring for answers. Oh, and Otto …’

  ‘Yes, Phil?’

  ‘It must be real neat, going to all those times and places, meeting all those great men and women. Making changes.’

  ‘Then you believe me?’

  But Phil doesn’t answer that. Maybe it’s too incriminating. Instead he gets up, then leaves the room, the snowy owl fluttering on his shoulder as he goes.

  332

  That night, an hour before the dawn, I am in DeSario’s apartment, stretched out on the big double bed, pretending to be asleep, when a ghostly figure appears in the room. It’s no one I know, but I know who he’s working for. Kolya. It can be nobody else.

  Through half-lidded eyes, I watch him quickly search the room, and as he turns to go through into the living room, I spring up and grab hold of him. He tries to shake me off, but I cling on for dear life.

  And as I do he jumps … out of that cul-de-sac world and back …

  To Four-Oh. And it’s there that he finally manages to shake me off, and immediately jumps again. Leaving me alone. Only I’m suddenly not alone. Because Freisler is there, like he’s been expecting me all along. And he hands me a handwritten note from myself with a set of time coordinates on it. And I turn and see that Zarah too is there, and she takes the note from me and keys it in, before wishing me ‘Strength’.

  And I jump, not knowing where I’m going or why, simply trusting to my future self.

  The crazy man. The mafia killer. But more than any of these, the Reisende once more. And I grin, even as I move between the worlds. And, remembering my buddy Kavanagh, offer a thanks to the air. Three lives. I owe the man three lives.

  Part Twelve

  Perpetual Change

  333

  And jump into darkness, the smell of wet grass and campfires filling my nostrils. For a moment I stagger, unable to keep my balance, then steady myself, even as a tall figure appears from the other side of the clearing, cloaked and brandishing a fluttering torch.

  As he comes towards me, I raise a hand to protect myself, then let it fall, laughing, astonished.

  ‘You!’

  It is indeed ‘me’. Or some future version of myself. Older. Greyer. Hopefully more wise.

  ‘Where are we?’ I ask.

  ‘Russia,’ I answer.

  ‘More precisely?’

  ‘Poltava … Where else?’

  Where else indeed. For Poltova is where it’s won or lost. For us in Time, and for Peter in his reality.

  Yes, the emperor, Peter, otherwise known to history as ‘The Great’, that six-foot-seven giant among his diminutive fellow Russians.

  ‘When’s the battle?’

  ‘This morning,’ he says, and I know from that that it is the twenty-sixth of June, 1709, and that the fate of two great empires is to be decided in the next twelve hours.

  I look around me, taking it all in properly for the first time. There’s a force of close on fifty thousand men encamped upon the low hillside overlooking the valley, and it’s an uncomfortably warm night.

  I turn to him again. ‘Okay. But why here? What’s happening?’

  ‘The Russian agents are fighting among themselves.’

  ‘Fighting?’

  ‘Yes. It’s civil war.’

  That, more than anything, surprises me. ‘Why now? I mean, what’s going on?’

  ‘I … Look … they’re waiting for us.’

  ‘Waiting? Are you sure this isn’t a trap?’

  And then I realise that in all probability he is sure. Only he can’t tell me, because I’ve got to experience this – as he already has – before we move on in the loop. And any doubts I have about these renegades falls away. If I’m alive in the future, then it means that I’ve lived through this once already. Then why do it? Why have my future self there to greet me? Maybe so that I don’t just jump straight out of there?

  The inn’s a mile away. There, in the cramped back room, three Russian agents are waiting for us. I know all three well. I’ve fought them many a time. Bobrov, Zasyekin and Svetov. They are dressed like peasants from the late Tsarist period, as if they’ve come directly from that time.

  ‘Okay,’ I say, looking from one bearded face to the next, as suspicious of them as I could possibly be. ‘What the fuck is going on?’

  I expect some kind of angry counter from them, telling me, perhaps, where I can stick my question, but all I get from them is respect. A respect that borders on reverence. And that, more than anything, makes me think something’s badly wrong.

  ‘So just what do you want?’ I ask, after an awkward silence.

  Bobrov looks to the other two, then back at me. ‘We need to know what to do.’

  I laugh. ‘You want me to tell you what to do?’ And I look to my other, future self, to see if I heard it right, or whether I’ve started hallucinating. Only he seems as serious as they.

  ‘What’s happening?’ I ask him a second time. Then, to Bobrov and the others. ‘You want to surrender to me, is that it?’

  My future self looks to the Russians, then answers me. ‘That’s not it, Otto. That’s not it at all. You see, the rules have changed. The Game … it’s ending. Not everyone can accept that, but it’s true. That’s why they’re here. To begin the process.’

  ‘Process?’

  ‘Of making the peace between us.’

  I stare back at my older self, open-mouthed, not quite able to believe what he’s just said, even though it’s me who’s said it.

  ‘It’s true,’ Svetov says, his eyes imploring me to accept the situation. ‘This now … this meeting … this is the start of something. Where it goes we don’t entirely know just yet, only …’

  ‘Only I don’t trust you.’

  Their heads go down, like they’re disappointed.

  ‘Only you must,’ my future self says, reaching out to hold my arm. ‘
You have to trust them. There’s no going forward without that.’

  I want to jump right out of there. To see Hecht to discuss this. To argue it through. Only Hecht is dead and I’m Meister now.

  I turn back. ‘How many of you are there? Just you three?’

  Svetov smiles. ‘No. There’s more than fifty of us. And more joining by the hour. Word’s getting round …’

  ‘Word? Word of what?’

  ‘Of what you did, at Cherdiechnost.’

  That stops me dead. They know about Cherdiechnost? The mere thought of it terrifies me. And I jump. Back to Four-Oh, praying that there’s something I can do.

  334

  Back on the platform, Old Schnorr is waiting for me, bristling with excitement.

  ‘Look, Otto!’ he says, thrusting a bulky file at me. ‘They’re coming back. Dozens of them. Ours and theirs.’

  ‘I haven’t time—’ I begin, only Old Schnorr interrupts me.

  ‘Agents, Otto. That’s what I’m talking about. Reisende. Coming back from the future.’

  ‘But they can’t … It isn’t possible.’

  ‘Things are changing fast, Otto. Someone must have come up with some new time equations. Something that allows this new phenomenon.’

  I glance through the file, noting the endlessly repeated faces. Old Schnorr is not wrong. It’s actually happening. Only how is this tied in to the renegade Russian agents – to Svetov and the rest of them? And why are they asking me what they should be doing?

  ‘Oh, and Otto … one more thing. One of them came back here, to Four-Oh. He says he knows you. He’s waiting for you in your rooms right now.’

  335

  I step inside, not knowing who it might be. And pull up sharply, shocked.

  ‘How in Urd’s name …?’

  Because it’s not an agent, it’s Saratov. Sergei Ilya Saratov, who I last saw in northern Russia in the thirteenth century. Saratov the native guide, who helped us make our way upriver.

  He is beaming. The same smile I remember so well.

  ‘I’m sorry I had to conceal things from you, Meister, but I was under strict orders. We had to keep you alive, you see. If we hadn’t …’

  And he too hands me a file – a report on the journey through northern Russia we made with him.

  Only it isn’t. The report is different in a number of important ways. This charts a journey I didn’t make. Or rather, one I don’t remember making. One that was erased from Time, the only record of it here, and maybe in Sergei Ilya Saratov’s mind.

  ‘This happened?’ I ask, looking up from the final page.

  Saratov nods. ‘As I said. We had to keep you alive. That was our priority. Because without that …’

  But Saratov can clearly say no more. I ask him on whose orders and he’s quiet a moment, before finally telling me.

  ‘On yours, Master.’

  I frown at that use of my title. ‘So what now?’

  ‘You have to become Master.’

  ‘But I am Master.’

  ‘No. Yastryeb is dead. You must be the Master now. Master of Russia and Germany.’

  336

  And so I go back, to Poltava, to meet my future self again and debate what must be done.

  It is only four in the morning, yet the battle has already begun. The Swedes, under Rehnskjold and Lewenhaupt, have already advanced beyond the first two of the big earth redoubts Peter has had thrown up to delay them, meaning to gain the advantage of surprise over a Russian force twice their size. But the fatal mistake lies ahead. That is, if this is how things originally were, and circumstances have not been radically changed. For, you see, last time I was here – here under Hecht’s strict orders – things had changed in four or five utterly critical ways, and Peter – against all historical precedent – was about to lose.

  I know both men, of course I do, that’s my job, only this once I am not there to meet with either of them, but to find out just how deeply Reichenau is involved in all of this.

  I know immediately where we are – five miles north of Poltava, where Charles has his headquarters, on the hillside near the tiny village of Yakuvtsy. Menshikov’s forces are to our west, strung out in a long line behind the redoubts, while to the north are Peter’s forces.

  My future self steps out from the trees behind me, cloaked and empty-handed. He greets me with a smile, but I can see the weariness in his eyes. He, much more than me, has clearly had a long day.

  ‘And so it begins,’ he says.

  There’s much that does not need to be said. He knows all that I know, after all. But there are things he needs to say, simply to feed the loop we are all in.

  ‘Reichenau is here,’ he says. ‘Somewhere. At least … we think he is. We almost captured one of his men.’

  ‘Anyone we know?’

  He shakes his head. ‘No. But they’re clearly the ones who’ve been meddling. With a little help from our friends, the renegades.’

  ‘About the renegades …’ I begin. But my older self, of course, already knows, and answers what I would have asked.

  ‘It’s the older agents, mainly. Those of them who find it hard to adapt to the new order of things. The new guys – from the future – they don’t have any problem with it. And it’s them – a core of them, anyway – who are driving this. But the older men … well, it’s hard to persuade them that it’s all been one huge mistake. They don’t like it. It invalidates their whole lives. All those long years of struggle. All of those deaths. For that to mean nothing … that’s a hard notion to swallow.’

  ‘I can see that.’

  ‘Good. Then be patient with them. Oh, there will be some – many, even – who will never be able to accept what is happening, who will fight on, in the old fashion. But the majority will come around.’

  ‘And our role in all of this?’

  ‘Our role … or my role, if you’d prefer … is to be the focal point, the gathering point of the new order. To be the figurehead of this new movement. To which end, we’re convening a conference, to formulate policy and cement relationships.’

  ‘When is this to be?’

  My future self smiles again, brighter this time. ‘When better than right now? The table’s already set, dear self.’

  ‘And where will it be held?’

  His smile broadens. ‘On neutral ground, Otto. In Tannenberg.’

  337

  We jump through, to a vast, sloping field with a panoramic view of broad, steeply trenched valleys and bright-running rivers, and, more distant, mountains, stretching away into the haze of the south. The grass is waist high, and when I turn, to look up the slope, I see, for the first time, framed against the backdrop of the pine forest, the massive dark wood farmhouse and, on the spacious deck that extends from beneath the building, two large wooden tables that have been pushed together to seat the two dozen guests who will shortly be arriving.

  The sky’s a dark slate East Prussian blue, great fists of cloud drifting slowly from one horizon to another. It could be any time, any year. Otto wishes me luck, then jumps again. And is gone. Leaving me singular.

  Tannenberg. The very name resounds with our dark history. It was here, in 1410, that the Polish and Lithuanian armies took on the might of the Teutonic Knights under Hochmeister Von Jungingen. And beat them, leaving 18,000 dead on the battlefield. It was here also, in the first week of the Great War of 1914, that the German Eighth Army under Von Hindenburg and Ludendorff, took on the Russian Second Army under Marshal Alexander Samsonov. And destroyed them, taking 92,000 prisoners, and killing or wounding 78,000. Rather than report the defeat to his Tsar, Samsonov committed suicide. And here, too, in July 1944, a vast Russian army took on the combined battalions of the German SS and eventually defeated them, losing between two and three hundred thousand men in doing so, compared to twenty thousand German losses.

  Men have fought and died here. And for what? To prop up kings and tsars. To defend the notion of empire. So much suffering and sorrow. For every man dead, a d
ozen grieving.

  Well, now we had a chance to put an end to that. To forge another way.

  There is a moment – seconds turning slowly into minutes – when I am alone there. When, as I am wont to, I think of Katerina, and whatever joy I have in life is bleached from me, leaving only a great dull ache. For without her what is there? She is my world.

  And then they come, homing in from Time itself. From far and wide, and times innumerable.

  The first to appear is Ernst, dressed in his Russian furs.

  We embrace warmly. ‘I’m sorry—’ he begins, but I shake my head. ‘Not now. There’ll be time. Later.’

  They follow quickly after that. Bobrov, Nemsov and Svetov, Meisner and Schmidt, my old friend Burckel, and my much older foe, Dankevich, whom I thought dead. Two Russian women are next, strong beauties in matching scarlet dresses – Irina Yusupov and Alina Tupayeva – accompanied by Igor Kurdin. They are followed by two more of my compatriots – Old Schnorr himself and Hans Zieten.

  And then, totally unexpected, but why so? Zarah and Urte appear arm-in-arm from the air, grinning at the sight of me.

  When we’re done, there are twenty-four of us, including myself. Twelve Germans and twelve Russians, eighteen men and six women, fifteen old-timers and nine from Up River. The core of our new movement. An assembly that, a mere three weeks ago, would have been unthinkable.

  Most, I note, have not even stopped to change. They are in the garments and uniforms of two dozen times, two dozen ages. Summoned back from history.

  I greet each one of them in turn, though some more warmly than others. My future self is right. It’s hard to trust those you’ve been at war with for the best part of two centuries.

  Dankevich especially.

  I take my seat at the centre of it all, like Christ at the last supper, and we begin. I go to speak, only Arkadi Svetov, seated at the far end of the table, to my left, stands and, looking to me, speaks to the gathered company in his rich, deep voice, his whole weight resting on his hands, which press palm-down against the tabletop.