The Loved and the Lost

by Lory Kaufman

  “Well, have you?” Hansum asked.

  “I’m not supposed to tell. . . I might change the . . . oh this is more complicated than I . . . I didn’t truly understand . . .”

  “What’s he saying?” the captain demanded in Italian. “Who’s he working for?”

  “He’s from our home country,” Hansum lied. “I think he was alone, just lost in the woods, trying to make it from one city to the other.”

  “There are signs of others in the wood,” Lieutenant Raguso said from his saddle. “My men are searching for them.”

  “Alone, eh,” the captain scoffed. “Call all the men and scour the woods!” he shouted. “There are spies about. Take this one to the Podesta. We’ll find out what he knows.”

  Parmatheon was grabbed by several more soldiers and yelped as they started dragging him toward the manor house. The younger Lincoln took hold of the older man’s arm, looking like he was helping guard him.

  “Where and when are you from, pally?” Lincoln whispered in Earth Common.

  Parmatheon looked at him with wide eyes.

  “I . . . I can’t tell,” he said pathetically. “I’m, I’m not supposed to . . . Oh dear. What are they going to do to me?”

  “They’re probably going to stick a pike up your . . .”

  Chapter 7

  “I think this is Master Calabreezi’s carriage,” Shamira said. She, Kingsley, Lincoln and Medeea had just site transported to the front of the della Cappa home. “This is when he came and we found out the Podesta had hired Devlena to poison Guil.”

  “Good Gia,” Kingsley said. “I just can’t get my head around poisoning someone.”

  “It wasn’t that uncommon among nobles,” Sideways put in, “and with their primitive knowledge of chemistry, it was hard to guard against.”

  The door to the house opened and Master Calabreezi walked out, closely followed by Agistino and a younger Shamira. She was in her kitchen-girl clothes, including a veil covering her hair. A very solemn Calabreezi turned and took Master della Cappa’s hand.

  “Remember, my friend,” Calabreezi advised, “We must not mention the fact we have discovered Devlena is working on behalf of the Podesta, or that I was even here. The safety of both our families depends on it.”

  “You have my word, Master Calabreezi,” a somber Agistino answered, crossing himself to seal his oath.

  “And you, Carmella,” Calabreezi said to the younger Shamira. “If you still think it absolutely necessary, write your note to Romero and take it to the courier I suggested. And when all this settles down, I shall introduce you to some fresco masters. Your talents must be put to better use.”

  “I look forward to meeting you again, Master,” the younger Shamira answered.

  “Farewell then,” Calabreezi said.

  The older Shamira and the others watched as Master della Cappa and the younger Shamira went back into the house.

  “Amazing, Sham,” Kingsley said, “Master Calabreezi thought you were good enough to put you in the circles of church painters.”

  “It was the first and last time I ever met him. He’s going to die in a few hours of a heart attack.”

  “Okay, back at it,” Lincoln said. “Medeea and I will check on Guil. You two, young Shamira, the Signora and Master.”

  They walked through the door into the house. The younger Shamira was already sitting at the table, writing her note. Master della Cappa was almost up the steps, going to his girls.

  “I’ll watch here for a minute,” Shamira said while Lincoln and Medeea followed the Master.

  Kingsley went over and leaned close to the younger Shamira. The older one went to the other side of herself and looked at Kingsley, who had a big grin on his face.

  “When I was a kid and saw you dressed like this, I had such a crush on you.”

  “You like the younger girls, do you?” Shamira teased.

  “I was ten, so you were an older woman,” he replied, and then put his hand where the younger Shamira’s cheek was. It went right through. She scratched an itch.

  “I’m going to marry you, little girl,” Kingsley said.

  Lincoln and Medeea were in the doorway to Guilietta’s sickroom, watching Master della Cappa standing over his sleeping daughter. The family had just found out the truth about Guilietta being poisoned and then saved by her mother’s delusion of the Archangel Michael. Agistino was standing, head bowed and face buried in his hands, reciting his Hail Marys. His hands lowered and he stared at his daughter, tears accentuating a look of wonder in his eyes. It was the look of a man appreciating something he had taken for granted — the life of his child.

  “I must attend to your saintly mother,” Agistino said to his sleeping daughter. “She sleeps in the other room. I fear I have much to make up to her.” As the contrite husband turned to the door, Lincoln felt as if Agistino’s eyes looked right into his.

  “We’re here to save them, Master,” Lincoln said, and the old man walked right through his former apprentice.

  As Lincoln and Medeea turned to watch the Master go to the other bedroom, Kingsley and Shamira were coming up the stairs.

  “Nothing seems to be changed here,” Lincoln said. “No anomalies, as far as I can tell.”

  “My younger self just took the letter to the courier with Bembo,” Shamira reported. “That’s the same as it was before too. We’ll sit with the Master and Signora for a bit, to check on them.”

  “If you get a chance with the Signora alone, try to take her out of phase,” Lincoln said. “If you can, that should mean we’ve found a nexus point. We’ll do the same with Guil.”

  “Right,” Shamira answered.

  “Lincoln and I shall walk around the neighborhood, checking for anything untoward,” Sideways added. “Then I shall return to Master Hansum. Darn it all, this is much less efficient than having hundreds of cameras.”

  “It’s the best we can do,” Lincoln said pragmatically. “C’mon. Let’s go.”

  After walking around the neighborhood, Lincoln and Medeea returned to Guilietta’s room. Sideways transported back to Hansum. The sleeping Guilietta had a small smile on her lips.

  “Maybe it’s because Master Calabreezi told her she’d recover,” Lincoln mused.

  “I bet it’s because a note’s been sent to Hansum, telling him to come home right away,” Medeea countered.

  “Could be. I’ll try to bring her out of phase,” Lincoln thought, and he opened up a small portal and reached through. “No luck,” he grimaced.

  Guilietta became restless, running her tongue over her parched lips.

  “She looks thirsty,” Lincoln said to Medeea. “Should I pour her some water, for when she wakes?”

  Medeea looked over at Lincoln, her impish, sixteen-year-old face grinning at him.

  “Okay. But let’s put a drop of me in her too. I’d like to get to know her. And then you can be in her head too.”

  “Naw. You go ahead, but don’t connect me,” Lincoln replied. “Guil’s like a sister to me. It would be too weird.” Lincoln tapped his node and created a small portal. Then he reached through and poured some water from the jug on the table into a wooden cup. “How can we get her to wake up and drink without seeing us?” he asked.

  “Don’t put me into the water.” Medeea thought back. “Just let a drop fall on her lips and I’ll enter through the skin. I’ll use my powers of suggestion to have her wake up and take a drink.” Lincoln took out Medeea’s tear vessel and held it carefully over Guilietta’s mouth. As the single drop fell between her slightly parted lips, he gingerly pulled his hand back and snapped his fingers, making the portal disappear. Guilietta moved her head as the liquid touched her tongue. “Ah,” Medeea said, smiling as she read the sleeping girl’s mind. “She really is a sweet person. Oh, but she’s tougher than she lets on. I’d love to get to know . . .” but before she could finish the sentence, Medeea’s eyes went wide.

  “What is it?” Lincoln started to ask, but then he saw what Medeea did.
/>
  “Guilietta. She’s . . . pregnant.”

  Chapter 8

  The out-of-phase Hansum followed as the soldiers manhandled Parmatheon into the planning room and started working on him in earnest. The once-haughty bureaucrat was tied to the same chair Hansum had seen Master Bernarius trussed up in before Podesta della Scalla ordered him killed. Parmatheon’s shirt was stripped off and they were about to slash his chest to make him speak. Podesta della Scalla was standing next to the captain and several other soldiers. General Chavelerio had taken over screaming in Parmatheon’s face.

  “Stop pretending you don’t understand what we are saying,” he shouted, spittle flying on to the bound prisoner. The tip of his dagger was already pressed onto Parmatheon’s chest and a trickle of blood was running down his front. The general looked to the Podesta, asking permission to proceed with the torture. Mastino nodded.

  “Excellency,” the younger Hansum interrupted. “Before you do this, allow me to talk with him. We speak the same dialect.”

  “Very well. General,” Mastino said.

  Everyone stepped back as the young savant took another chair and sat before Parmatheon. Making like he was straightening his brown hat, he pressed the language node again. Parmatheon’s jaw was trembling in terror.

  “So, what are you doing here?” Hansum asked. “You’d better tell me so I can figure out a way for all of us to get back home, you with your skin.”

  Parmatheon could barely get words out. When he did, he stammered. “It, it, it . . . it looked so simple . . . to make de . . . decisions . . . f, f, from, from a seat on . . . on the Council.” The captain kicked the chair and the prisoner yelped.

  Hansum held up a hand to ask the captain to refrain. “What Council?” Hansum asked.

  “The, the . . . the History Camp Time Travel Council.”

  The younger Hansum looked confused, as did Lincoln.

  The out-of-phase older Hansum realized his younger self had been sent back before the announcement that the 24th-century scientists had already discovered rudimentary time travel and were secretly working with the people from the future. The younger Hansum looked back at Parmatheon.

  “You mean a Council from Elder Arimus’s time?”

  Even his present predicament couldn’t cause Parmatheon to hide his disdain for Arimus.

  “That troublemaker? No. Not from his time. Our time. Yours and mine.”

  ‘Oh no,’ the older Hansum thought. ‘If I find out about all this earlier, who knows how it can screw things up more.’

  The younger Hansum looked to Lincoln, to see if this was making any sense to him. Lincoln shrugged.

  “You better make something up for the Podesta, though,” Lincoln said.

  “Excellency,” Hansum said. “Apparently this fellow was just coincidentally walking through the woods when he ran into some, I guess, real spies. He says he was an indentured servant in Mantua, sold by some slavers from around . . . Greece. This fellow escaped and was trying to make his way back to Venice, to hopefully find a ship to get home on.”

  “He’s not speaking Greek,” Mastino della Cappa said. “And how the devil would he get from Greece to here?”

  The Hansum in the brown hat looked worried. He turned to Parmatheon.

  “Just say something. Babble for a minute, like you’re telling me something,” he said.

  “I’m the head of the Time Travel Council,” Parmatheon said. “I come from about a year after you came back. Your other, older self is trying to get back and save your wife.” The younger Hansum and Lincoln looked at each other, shocked.

  “Save Guilietta? Why? What’s wrong?” the younger Hansum asked.

  The older, out-of-phase Hansum was shaking his head in despair. Mentioning Guilietta was probably the worst thing to do. That could really spook the younger Hansum. He looked intently at his younger self, who was staring at Parmatheon, obviously trying to weigh what he should say and how he should act.

  “Well? Tell me what’s going on!” the Podesta demanded.

  The younger Hansum looked purposefully at the Podesta. “I believe him,” he said with resolve. “He says he doesn’t speak Greek. He speaks . . . Atlantean.” Hopefully Mastino didn’t know his Greek myths that well. “It’s an island in the Aegean Sea. We only saw this fellow because, as he was trying to stay unseen walking through the forest, he ran into whoever was really spying on us. They made chase after him and that’s when we saw him.” He pressed his node again and asked Parmatheon, “Who was up there with you?”

  “You were,” Parmatheon answered, which caused young Hansum to startle. “And apparently somebody named Feltrino was about to attack you.” Hansum really looked shocked now, but didn’t have time to react because the door to the room pounded open and Lieutenant Raguso came in.

  “We’ve found many tracks, Excellency. Many horses and men, but they are gone. We didn’t pursue because I was following with far fewer men. I thought it best to return and post patrols around the property instead.”

  “You didn’t pursue?”

  “Whoever they were, they had heavy horses and many men. Perhaps three times as many as I had in my unit. They must be far away by now.”

  “Well, they left one,” the captain said, obviously not convinced by Hansum’s story.

  “Look, look at his hands, Excellency,” Hansum said to Mastino. “They are soft. Uncalloused. He can’t be a soldier. And his footware.” Although Parmatheon’s ordeal had left him with only one shoe, it was made of woven hemp, the sole, the upper and the laces. It was a fashion back home.

  “Why would an indentured servant have smooth hands?” Mastino asked. “What did he do for the Gonzaga?”

  Hansum looked back to Parmatheon, touching his node. “What can I say you did?”

  “I . . . don’t even know . . . what you’re talking about.”

  “He’s, he’s a mathematician, Excellency. Educated by the Saracens, so quite sought after. He was helping the Gonzagas design their buildings. That’s why they bought him.”

  “A mathematician for buildings?”

  “Excellency, this story is merda,” the General argued. “Let’s just cut this one’s throat and get all our men stationed around the property.”

  “I could use a good mathematician,” Hansum interjected. “Let me talk to him further.” Mastino hesitated. “I have larger cannon planned,” Hansum added, “but can’t do it without someone to help me calculate greater stress loads and longer trajectories.” The older Hansum was impressed by his younger self. He always could cook up convincing lies quickly.

  “Very well,” Mastino conceded. “Talk to him. But leave him tied. Captain, let’s get outside and reorganize the men. And General, you order more.” And with that he turned and left, followed by the soldiers.

  Lincoln closed the door. The older Hansum watched his younger self staring at Parmatheon.

  “Untie my hands,” the older man begged, “so I can touch my emergency escape sub-dermal.”

  “In a minute,” Hansum said. “First, tell me what’s going on.”

  “I . . . I’m not supposed to tell,” Parmatheon said, wide-eyed.

  “Well, okay then,” Hansum said, motioning for Lincoln to go to the door. As Lincoln turned, Parmatheon recanted.

  “Wait. I’m really not supposed to tell, but . . .”

  “Go on,” the younger Hansum urged.

  “We are trying to . . . well, at least some people, including both of you, are trying to . . .”

  The older Hansum couldn’t risk letting his younger counterparts know more than they already did. He quickly tapped on one of his emergency nodes and a small circle of blue static appeared in the air. It was about the size of a fist, and he thrust an arm through. He held his hand right in front of Parmatheon’s face in the universal sign for “Stop!”

  “What the . . .” Lincoln said.

  Hansum knew that, to his counterparts, his arm seemed to be floating in the air.

  “You see, I’m not
supposed to say anything,” Parmatheon said excitedly.

  “So, we’re being watched,” the younger Hansum said. “Why aren’t we being rescued? Why are they leaving us . . .” The older Hansum quickly rotated his hand and held it in the same position in front of his younger self, silencing him. Then he pointed to Parmatheon’s hands, as if to say to untie them. “Not until someone tells me what’s going on,” the younger Hansum insisted. The hand began to move towards Parmatheon’s neck.

  “Wait a minute,” Lincoln said, grabbing it. The hand grabbed him back. “I recognize this hand. Hansum, hold yours up.” The younger Hansum did. “It’s you, man, but with a honking big scar.”

  “Tell me what’s going on!” Hansum shouted.

  The hand pulled away from Lincoln’s grasp and disappeared back into the hole.

  “Come back here, whoever you are,” Lincoln shouted into the opening, which immediately shrunk to the size of a peephole. He put his eye to it and looked around. “I think he’s still in there. I think it really is you.”

  “But the scar on the hand . . .” Hansum looked at Parmatheon. “If you want my help, tell me what’s going on,” he ordered. “Now, before the others come back. They won’t be as nice as me.”

  “Hey!” a voice from the air said. The boys looked around. There was a familiar hazel eye looking at them from the small hole in the air.

  “Hansum, it is you!” Lincoln said definitively.

  “Let him go,” the voice from the hole said. “I’m trying to help, but things are going to get too complicated if that idiot stays here.”

  “Tell me what’s happening first,” the younger Hansum demanded.

  “I can’t,” the older one insisted.

  “This is ridiculous. Make this opening bigger!” and young Hansum poked his finger into the orifice. Static sparked brightly on the younger Hansum’s flesh and he pulled it back as if he were burned. “Ouch!” Then, with another pop, the blue ring of static shrank to nothing and was gone. Shaking his finger with pain, the young Hansum turned an angry gaze to the still-bound Parmatheon. “Where is he, me? Back in the future?”