Alternate Wars

by Gregory Benford

  “Your—”

  “Get out! I never want to see you again! If I am in hell, let there be one less demon!”

  Lambert slipped from her monitor to run down the corridor. Culhane flew from the room; behind him the sound of something heavy struck the door. Culhane slumped against it, his face pasty around his cheek dye. Lambert could almost find it in herself to pity him. Almost.

  She said softly, “I told you so.”

  “She’s like a wild thing.”

  “You knew she could be. It’s documented enough, Culhane. I’ve put a suicide watch on her.”

  “Yes. Good. I … she was like a wild thing.”

  Lambert peered at him. “You still want her! After that!”

  That sobered him; he straightened and looked at her coldly. “She is a holy hostage, Lambert.”

  “I remember that. Do you?”

  “Don’t insult me, intern.”

  He moved angrily away; she caught his sleeve. “Culhane—don’t be angry. I only meant that the sixteenth century was so different from our own, but—”

  “Do you think I don’t know that? I was doing historical research while you were learning to read, Lambert. Don’t instruct me.”

  He stalked off. Lambert bit down hard on her own fury and stared at Anne Boleyn’s closed door. No sound came from behind it. To the soundless door she finished her sentence: “—but some traps don’t change.”

  The door didn’t answer. Lambert shrugged. It had nothing to do with her. She didn’t care what happened to Anne Boleyn, in this century or that other one. Or to Culhane, either. Why should she? There were other men. She was no Henry VIII, to bring down her world for passion. What was the good of being a time researcher if you could not even learn from times past?

  She leaned thoughtfully against the door, trying to remember the name of the beautiful boy in her orientation lecture, the one with the violet eyes.

  She was still there, thinking, when Toshio Brill called a staff meeting to announce, his voice stiff with anger, that Her Holiness of the Church of the Holy Hostage had filed a motion with the All-World Forum that the Time Research Institute, because of the essentially reverent nature of the time rescue program, be removed from administration by the Forum and placed instead under the direct control of the Church.

  She had to think. It was important to think, as she had thought through her denial of Henry’s ardor, and her actions when that ardor waned. Thought was all.

  She could not return to her London, to Elizabeth. They had told her that. But did she know beyond doubt that it was true?

  Anne left her apartments. At the top of the stairs she usually took to the garden, she instead turned and opened another door. It opened easily. She walked along a different corridor. Apparently even now no one was going to stop her.

  And if they did, what could they do to her? They did not use the scaffold or the rack; she had determined this from talking to that oaf Culhane and that huge ungainly woman, Lady Mary Lambert. They did not believe in violence, in punishment, in death. (How could you not believe in death? Even they must one day die.) The most they could do to her was shut her up in her rooms, and there the female pope would come to see she was well treated.

  Essentially they were powerless.

  The corridor was lined with doors, most set with small windows. She peered in: rooms with desks and machines, rooms without desks and machines, rooms with people seated around a table talking, kitchens, still rooms. No one stopped her. At the end of the corridor she came to a room without a window and tried the door. It was locked, but as she stood there, her hand still on the knob, the door opened from within.

  “Lady Anne! Oh!”

  Could no one in this accursed place get her name right? The woman who stood there was clearly a servant, although she wore the same ugly gray-green tunic as everyone else. Perhaps, like Lady Mary, she was really an apprentice. She was of no interest, but behind her was the last thing Anne expected to see in this place: a child.

  She pushed past the servant and entered the room. It was a little boy, his dress strange but clearly a uniform of some sort. He had dark eyes, curling dark hair, a bright smile. How old? Perhaps four. There was an air about him that was unmistakable; she would have wagered her life this child was royal.

  “Who are you, little one?”

  He answered her with an outpouring of a language she did not know. The servant scrambled to some device on the wall; in a moment Culhane stood before her.

  “You said you didn’t want to see me, Your Grace. But I was closest to answer Kiti’s summons…”

  Anne looked at him. It seemed to her that she looked clear through him, to all that he was: Desire, and pride of his pitiful strange learning, and smugness of his holy mission that had brought her life to wreck. Hers, and perhaps Elizabeth’s as well. She saw Culhane’s conviction, shared by Lord Director Brill and even by such as Lady Mary, that what they did was right because they did it. She knew that look well: It had been Cardinal Wolsey’s, Henry’s right-hand man and chancellor of England, the man who had advised Henry to separate Anne from Harry Percy. And advised Henry against marrying her. Until she, Anne Boleyn, upstart Tom Boleyn’s powerless daughter, had turned Henry against Wolsey and had the cardinal brought to trial. She.

  In that minute she made her decision.

  “I was wrong, Master Culhane. I spoke in anger. Forgive me.” She smiled and held out her hand, and she had the satisfaction of watching Culhane turn color.

  How old was he? Not in his first youth. But neither had Henry.

  He said, “Of course, Your Grace. Kiti said you talked to the Tsarevitch.”

  She made a face, still smiling at him. She had often mocked Henry thus. Even Harry Percy, so long ago, a lifetime ago … No. Two lifetimes ago. “The what?”

  “The Tsarevitch.” He indicated the child.

  Was the dye on his face permanent, or would it wash off?

  She said, not asking, “He is another time hostage. He, too, in his small person, prevents a war.”

  Culhane nodded, clearly unsure of her mood. Anne looked wonderingly at the child, then winningly at Culhane. “I would have you tell me about him. What language does he speak? Who is he?”

  “Russian. He is—was—the future emperor. He suffers from a terrible disease: You called it the bleeding sickness. Because his mother, the empress, was so driven with worry over him, she fell under the influence of a holy man who led her to make some disastrous decisions while she was acting for her husband, the emperor, who was away at war.”

  Anne said, “And the bad decisions brought about another war.”

  “They made more bloody than necessary a major rebellion.”

  “You prevent rebellions as well as wars? Rebellions against a monarchy?”

  “Yes, it—history did not go in the direction of monarchies.”

  That made little sense. How could history go other than in the direction of those who were divinely anointed, those who held the power? Royalty won. In the end, they always won.

  But there could be many casualties before the end.

  She said, with that combination of liquid dark gaze and aloof body that had so intrigued Henry—and Norris, and Wyatt, and even presumptuous Smeaton, God damn his soul—I find I wish to know more about this child and his country’s history. Will you tell me?”

  “Yes,” Culhane said. She caught the nature of his smile: relieved, still uncertain how far he had been forgiven, eager to find out. Familiar, all so familiar.

  She was careful not to let her body touch his as they passed through the doorway. But she went first, so he could catch the smell of her hair.

  “Master Culhane—you are listed on the demon machine as M. Culhane.’ ”

  “The … oh, the computer. I didn’t know you ever looked at one.”

  “I did. Through a window.”

  “It’s not a demon, Your Grace.”

  She let the words pass; what did she care what it was? But his to
ne told her something. He liked reassuring her. In this world where women did the same work as men and where female bodies were to be seen uncovered in the exercise yard so often that even turning your head to look must become a bore, this oaf nonetheless liked reassuring her.

  She said, “What does the ‘M’ mean?”

  He smiled. “Michael. Why?”

  As the door closed, the captive royal child began to wail.

  Anne smiled, too. “An idle fancy. I wondered if it stood for Mark.”

  “What argument has the church filed with the All-World Forum?” a senior researcher asked.

  Brill said irritably, as it were an answer, “Where is Mahjoub?”

  Lambert spoke up promptly. “He is with Helen of Troy, Director, and the doctor. The queen had another seizure last night.” Enzio Mahjoub was the unfortunate project head for their last time rescue.

  Brill ran his hand over the back of his neck. His skull needed shaving, and his cheek dye was sloppily applied. He said, “Then we will begin without Mahjoub. The argument of Her Holiness is that the primary function of this institute is no longer pure time research but practical application, and that the primary practical application is time rescue. As such, we exist to take hostages, and thus should come under the direct control of the Church of the Holy Hostage. Her secondary argument is that the time hostages are not receiving treatment up to intersystem standards as specified by the All-World Accord of 2154.”

  Lambert’s eyes darted around the room. Cassia Kohambu, project head for the institute’s greatest success, sat up straight, looking outraged. “Our hostages are—on what are these charges allegedly based?”

  Brill said, “No formal charges as yet. Instead, she has requested an investigation. She claims we have hundreds of potential hostages pinpointed by the Rahvoli equations, and the ones we have chosen do not meet standards for either internal psychic stability or benefit accrued to the hostages themselves, as specified in the All-World Accord. We have chosen to please ourselves, with flagrant disregard for the welfare of the hostages.”

  “Flagrant disregard!” It was Culhane, already on his feet. Beneath the face dye his cheeks flamed. Lambert eyed him carefully. “How can Her Holiness charge flagrant disregard when without us the Tsarevitch Alexis would have been in constant pain from hemophiliac episodes, Queen Helen would have been abducted and raped, Herr Hitler blown up in an underground bunker, and Queen Anne Boleyn beheaded!”

  Brill said bluntly, “Because the Tsarevitch cries constantly for his mother, the Lady Helen is mad, and Mistress Boleyn tells the church she has been made war upon!”

  Well, Lambert thought, that still left Herr Hitler. She was just as appalled as anyone at Her Holiness’s charges, but Culhane had clearly violated both good manners and good sense. Brill never appreciated being upstaged.

  Brill continued, “An investigative committee from the All-World Forum will arrive here next month. It will be small: Delegates Soshiru, Vlakhav, and Tullio. In three days the institute staff will meet again at oh-seven hundred, and by that time I want each project group to have prepared an argument in favor of the hostage you hold. Use the prepermit justifications, including all the mathematical models, but go far beyond that in documenting benefits to the hostages themselves since they arrived here. Are there any questions?”

  Only one, Lambert thought. She stood. “Director—were the three delegates who will investigate us chosen by the All-World Forum or requested by Her Holiness? To whom do they already owe their allegiance?”

  Brill looked annoyed. He said austerely, “I think we can rely upon the All-World delegates to file a fair report, Intern Lambert,” and Lambert lowered her eyes. Evidently she still had much to learn. The question should not have been asked aloud.

  Would Mistress Boleyn have known that?

  Anne took the hand of the little boy. “Come, Alexis,” she said. “We walk now.”

  The prince looked up at her. How handsome he was, with his thick, curling hair and beautiful eyes almost as dark as her own. If she had given Henry such a child … She pushed the thought away. She spoke to Alexis in her rudimentary Russian, without using the translator box hung like a peculiarly ugly pendant around her neck. He answered with a stream of words she couldn’t follow and she waited for the box to translate.

  “Why should we walk? I like it here in the garden.”

  “The garden is very beautiful,” Anne agreed. “But I have something interesting to show you.”

  Alexis trotted beside her obediently then. It had not been hard to win his trust—had no one here ever passed time with children? Wash off the scary cheek paint, play for him songs on the lute—an instrument he could understand, not like the terrifying sounds coming without musicians from yet another box—learn a few phrases of his language. She had always been good at languages.

  Anne led the child through the far gate of the walled garden, into the yard. Machinery hummed; naked men and women “exercised” together on the grass. Alexis watched them curiously, but Anne ignored them. Servants. Her long, full skirts, tawny silk, trailed on the ground.

  At the far end of the yard she started down the short path to that other gate, the one that ended at nothing.

  Queen Isabella of Spain, Henry had told Anne once, had sent an expedition of sailors to circumnavigate the globe. They were supposed to find a faster way to India. They had not done so, but neither had they fallen off the edge of the world, which many had prophesied for them. Anne had not shown much interest in the story, because Isabella had, after all, been Katherine’s mother. The edge of the world.

  The gate ended with a wall of nothing. Nothing to see, or smell, or taste—Anne had tried. To the touch the wall was solid enough, and faintly tingly. A “force field,” Culhane said. Out of time as we experience it; out of space. The gate, one of three, led to a place called Upper Slib, in what had once been Egypt.

  Anne lifted Alexis. He was heavier than even a month ago; since she had been attending him every day he had begun to eat better, play more, cease crying for his mother. Except at night. “Look, Alexis, a gate. Touch it.”

  The little boy did, then drew back his hand at the tingling. Anne laughed, and after a moment Alexis laughed, too.

  The alarms sounded.

  “Why, Your Grace?” Culhane said. “Why again?”

  “I wished to see if the gate was unlocked,” Anne said coolly. “We both wished to see.” This was a lie. She knew it. Did he? Not yet perhaps.

  “I told you, Your Grace, it is not a gate that can be left locked or unlocked, as you understand the terms. It must be activated by the stasis square.”

  “Then do so; the prince and I wish for an outing.”

  Culhane’s eyes darkened; each time he was in more anguish. And each time, he came running. However much he might wish to avoid her, commanding his henchmen to talk to her most of the time, he must come when there was an emergency because he was her gaoler, appointed by Lord Brill. So much had Anne discovered in a month of careful trials. He said now, “I told you, Your Grace, you can’t move past the force field, no more than I could move into your palace at Greenwich. In the time stream beyond that gate—my time stream—you don’t exist. The second you crossed the force field you’d disintegrate into nothingness.” Nothingness again. To Alexis she said sadly in Russian, “He will never let us out. Never, never.”

  The child began to cry. Anne held him closer, looking reproachfully at Culhane, who was shifting toward anger. She caught him just before the shift was complete, befuddling him with unlooked-for wistfulness: “It is just that there is so little we can do here, in this time we do not belong. You can understand that, can you not, Master Culhane? Would it not be the same for you, in my court of England?”

  Emotions warred on his face. Anne put her free hand gently on his arm. He looked down: the long, slim fingers with their delicate tendons, the tawny silk against his drab uniform. He choked out, “Anything in my power, anything within the rules, Your Grace…”<
br />
  She had not yet gotten him to blurt out “Anne,” as he had the day she’d thrown a candlestick after him at the door.

  She removed her hand, shifted the sobbing child against her neck, spoke so softly he could not hear her.

  He leaned forward, toward her. “What did you say, Your Grace?”

  “Would you come again tonight to accompany my lute on your guitar? For Alexis and me?”

  Culhane stepped back. His eyes looked trapped.

  “Please, Master Culhane?”

  Culhane nodded.

  Lambert stared at the monitor. It showed the hospital suite, barred windows and low white pallets, where Helen of Troy was housed. The queen sat quiescent on the floor, as she usually did, except for the brief and terrifying periods when she erupted, shrieking and tearing at her incredible hair. There had never been a single coherent word in the eruptions, not since the first moment they had told Helen where she was, and why. Or maybe that fragile mind, already quivering under the strain of her affair with Paris, had snapped too completely even to hear them. Helen, Lambert thought, was no Anne Boleyn.

  Anne sat close to the mad Greek queen, her silk skirts overlapping Helen’s white tunic, her slender body leaning so far forward that her hair, too, mingled with Helen’s, straight black waterfall with masses of springing black curls. Before she could stop herself, Lambert had run her hand over her own shaved head.

  What was Mistress Anne trying to say to Helen? The words were too low for the microphones to pick up, and the double curtain of hair hid Anne’s lips. Yet Lambert was as certain as death that Anne was talking. And Helen, quiescent—was she nonetheless hearing? What could it matter if she were, words in a tongue that from her point of view would not exist for another two millennia?