Time's Demon

by D. B. Jackson

  “I suppose I should be on my way,” she said, after the silence had lengthened uncomfortably.

  “I can’t tell what it is,” the girl said in a voice both childlike and knowing. “Can you?”

  The boy shook his head. “Not at all. At least not beyond the obvious.”

  “Its years are all–”

  “Who are you?” she asked. “Why are you talking about me that way?”

  “We’re having a conversation,” the girl told her, as haughty as a court noble. “And you’re interrupting. That’s rude.”

  She had to smile. “Isn’t it just as rude to talk about someone in their presence, as if they aren’t there?”

  The two shared a look, worry in their ghostly eyes.

  “Yes, it is,” the girl said, chastened. “Please forgive us.”

  “Children shouldn’t be out alone in the streets. You should go home.”

  The girl hid her mouth with a thin hand, her laughter as clear and musical as the splash of a brook. “We’re not children. You should know that.”

  She stared at one and then the other, puzzled now. If not children… Were they creations of her mind, symptoms of her madness? She thought she understood the depths of this Walkinginduced insanity. What if she was wrong, and it continued to worsen? What if these two marked the beginning of a slide into hallucination?

  “You’ve confused it,” the boy said. “Maybe it doesn’t know as much as we hoped.”

  She scowled. “Stop referring to me as ‘it.’”

  “What else would we call you?”

  “‘She,’ of course.”

  He shook his head. “You’re not a she, are you? You’re not really anything at all.”

  “I don’t–”

  “We tasted your years when you were still on the sand,” the girl said. “That’s why we called for you. We sensed the confusion in you, and we wanted to know exactly what you are. But you don’t know yourself.”

  We tasted…

  “You’re Tirribin,” she said, drawing on a memory from so long ago, it could have been a different life. She took a step back from them. “That’s why…” She stopped herself from mentioning the smell. “Why you could taste my years from so great a distance.”

  The girl glowered, appearing to know what Lenna intended to say.

  “That’s right,” the boy said. “We’re Tirribin.” To his sister, he said, “Maybe she knows more than we thought.”

  Suspicion lingered in the girl’s glare. “I’m not so sure. You don’t need to fear us,” she said, a rasp underlying the words. “Your years are muddied. We wouldn’t feed on you any more than a human would drink seawater. It would do more harm than good.”

  “Why? What’s wrong with them?” She feared their answer.

  “Don’t you know?”

  Of course she did. Tirribin didn’t prey on Walkers because their years were less pure. She remembered a time demon explaining this to her when she was a child in Windhome. Before a boy died and another was sent away. Now she was here, fourteen years out of her time, twelve days out of another, half-mad from having met herself. Whose years could be less pure than hers?

  “Yes,” she said. “I know. But that doesn’t make me less than human, and it doesn’t excuse you calling me ‘it.’”

  “You’re a creature outside of time,” the girl said with relish. “There are too many of you, and your years are beyond repair.” She made a small gesture, indicating the lane and the houses. “You bear little resemblance to the humans I sense around me.”

  “Maeli…”

  The girl rounded on the other demon. “Don’t tell me I’m being rude. She was going to say something about the way we smell. Humans do that a lot, and I grow tired of it.”

  “What should I do?” Lenna asked, drawing their attention once more.

  The girl laughed again, the sound uglier than before. “Do?”

  “Don’t you intend to help me? Isn’t that why you called to me?”

  “We’re Tirribin. We’re predators, and while your years would be disgusting to us, that doesn’t make you more than prey.”

  The boy frowned but held his tongue.

  “And even if that weren’t so, there would be no helping you. You are what you are, and can’t be changed or redeemed. You didn’t exist before today. I can tell. Yet you have all these years. Confused, corrupted, but years nevertheless. We didn’t call you here to help. We called to see you. We sensed you, and we wanted to see what sort of being could have such years.” The girl raked her up and down with her gaze. “Honestly, I thought you would be more interesting than you are. You seem no different from other humans.”

  “Then maybe you’re wrong about me.”

  The Tirribin shook her head. “I’m not.”

  Lenna checked the street, mostly to avoid looking the girl in the eye. Her words stung like sand in a hard wind. She didn’t want to believe what the girl had said, but Tirribin understood time as few creatures did. And this one had no reason to lie to her.

  The clarity of her own reasoning surprised her.

  “My thoughts are clearer around you,” she said. “Might that mean something?”

  The girl tipped her head. “Clearer in what way?”

  “I… I can’t really say. They make more sense. I can reason and understand. I haven’t been able to do that since I met myself earlier. I’ve been following the voice.”

  “The voice?” the boy asked.

  She searched for the right word. “Intuition.”

  He nodded.

  “Doesn’t that mean you might be wrong?” she asked them. “Isn’t it possible that I can get better?”

  “You can do nothing about your years,” the girl said. “The rest… Perhaps your mind can heal itself. I don’t know. They’re hunting you, and I don’t believe you have much…” She bared needle teeth in a harsh grin. “Much time, remaining.”

  “I can take care of myself. I won’t let the soldiers hurt me. I want a life. What was it you called me before? A creature outside of time? Maybe I am. You’re right: before today I didn’t exist. Or I did, but as someone else.” She shook her head, knowing that wasn’t right either. “I don’t have the words. The point is, every bell that passes makes me more… myself. They want me to go back to being part of the other Lenna, the other me. I don’t want that.”

  “They can’t make you go back, can they?” the boy asked.

  “They can send back the other Lenna, and she can see to it that none of this happens. That will be the end of me. She’ll continue, I’ll go back to being her, and I won’t be this person anymore.”

  “You’re mad,” the girl said. “Wouldn’t it be better for all if you went away?”

  “Maeli!”

  She threw a scowl her brother’s way but faced Lenna again.

  “That’s what they think,” Lenna said. “Is it so surprising that I don’t agree?”

  “I suppose not.” Maeli turned to the boy. “I’m bored. I want to feed now.”

  “Wait! Help me, and I can tell you where you might find someone to feed on. Easy prey.”

  This caught the girl’s interest.

  “Who?”

  “A man. He’s on the strand between here and the Notch. Unconscious, yours for the taking.”

  “Is he young?”

  She did the arithmetic in her head. “He has twenty seven years. Not exactly young, but strong. And he’s a Spanner.”

  Disapproval creased the girl’s brow. “Why would that matter? We’re not Belvora. We don’t feed on magick.” She considered Lenna. “Still, you have made payment of a sort. If he’s still there.”

  “You’ll help me then?”

  “I’ve told you: there isn’t much we can do. I will say, though, that if you continue in a different time from the other you, your mind might heal itself. I wouldn’t have thought so, but if being around us – if being near what you would call our ‘magick’ – makes you feel better, there is a chance.”

 
“A chance,” she repeated.

  “That’s right. About the same as the chance that your strong man will be waiting on the strand.”

  “Yes, all right.”

  The Tirribin didn’t wait for her to say more. They exchanged glances and blurred away toward the Notch.

  Left alone, she eyed the buildings around her and the lanes sloping upward from the waterfront to the castle.

  That’s where we ought to go. The voice.

  She sensed the stirring of an idea. Already, with the Tirribin gone, her thoughts were fracturing again. Only a thread remained, one she could follow from what the demon had said to what her heart desired.

  She set out for the castle. Before she had gone far, she heard the scrape of boots on cobble. Soldiers.

  Don’t be afraid. We have trained for this.

  She pressed herself to a shadowed wall as the guards approached. Several of them carried torches, but their glow didn’t reach to her hiding place.

  When they had passed, she stole after them, using the beat of their footsteps to conceal her own. She had done something like this before, but couldn’t recall the circumstances. So she trusted her instincts and the wisdom of the voice.

  The soldiers followed a winding path through the city, but she didn’t mind. Other companies in Sheraigh blue had no reason to approach this one. As long as she remained hidden from these guards she had nothing to fear.

  In time, they circled back toward the castle, and as they neared it, she slipped away and followed one lane after another to the West Gate. Fewer guards patrolled this end of the castle – usually only two at the outer portcullis. Those posted here hadn’t seen her leave. They might not know what color gown she wore.

  She walked to the gate in plain view, holding up both hands to show she wasn’t armed.

  “Have you seen her?”

  The two guards, a man and a woman, exchanged looks. “Seen who, my lady?” the woman asked.

  “The one who looks like me, of course.”

  “No, we’ve seen no one. Have…” She glanced at her companion again. “Have you?”

  “I’m afraid not. I searched the lanes and inns around the castle. I found nothing.”

  She had halted to speak with them. Now she walked on, passing between the soldiers and entering the gate. Neither of them stopped her.

  Nor did the guards at the inner west gate. Orzili would have been appalled.

  She entered the castle proper at her first opportunity and, following memories she couldn’t quite trace, navigated the twists and turns of the corridors to her chamber.

  She knocked, and at a word from within opened the door and stepped inside.

  The other Lenna rose from a chair by the hearth, the fire and candles casting shadows against every wall.

  She eyed Lenna, unable to mask her apprehension.

  “You’re alone.”

  “Yes.”

  “No one saw you enter the castle?”

  “Guards on the west side,” she said. “They think I’m you.”

  The other Lenna stepped away from her chair to an open expanse of floor. Better ground for a fight, should it come to that.

  “And you came…”

  “To talk.”

  The other woman nodded. “I’d like to believe that. Are you carrying a weapon?”

  “I am. And you and him – you’re the ones who spoke of killing me. I should be distrustful of you, not the other way around.”

  “Perhaps. Or it’s possible that, fearing for your life, you’ve come to harm me.”

  She shook her head. “I haven’t. You think me mad. And I suppose I am, though not so much as I was.” She gave her head another shake, trying to keep her thoughts clear. “I won’t hurt you. I give you my word. I want… I want us to find a way forward.”

  The other Lenna considered her. After a fivecount, she walked in her direction. Lenna tensed, but the other her opened her hands, a gesture of peace. She stepped around Lenna to the door and locked it.

  She regarded her again before walking back to the hearth and sitting. She indicated the chair beside her own.

  “You must be cold. You should warm yourself.”

  Lenna edged closer to the fire, but didn’t sit.

  “Are you hungry? I’d imagine you are.”

  She nodded.

  The other Lenna rose again, unlocked the door, and called for someone. She spoke briefly with a woman in the corridor, taking care to shield Lenna from view. After, she closed the door again and reclaimed her seat.

  “She’ll bring food shortly. You really ought to sit. You look exhausted.”

  Lenna hesitated, then lowered herself into the chair. She closed her eyes, savoring the warmth of the blaze.

  “Where is Orzili?”

  Her eyes flew open. She clutched her hands.

  The other Lenna narrowed her gaze. “What did you do to him?”

  “He… He followed me, and tried to bring me back. He grabbed me. So I… I hit him. Several times. I left him on the strand. He was… He wasn’t awake.”

  The other Lenna’s eyes went wide as well. “You beat him senseless?” At her nod, the other woman laughed aloud. “I’ve wanted to do that for more than a turn.”

  “After I left him, I met two Tirribin.” She stared down at her hands. “I told them where he was.”

  All mirth fled the other woman’s face. “Blood and bone.”

  “I didn’t know what else to do. He spoke of killing me. You and he spoke of it. And I knew that after I beat him he would be angry. I was scared.”

  “Do you know if they found him?”

  She shook her head. “There’s more. I killed a man. I took coin from him and a knife.”

  The other Lenna blew out a breath, but a knock at the door kept her from saying more.

  “Hide behind the dressing screen.”

  Lenna did as she was told and listened as people entered the chamber. A flurry of activity was followed by the click of the door.

  “It’s all right.”

  She crept out from behind the screen. A platter holding cheese and bread, smoked meat and nuts rested on the table beside a carafe of wine.

  The other Lenna poured out two cups. She sipped from one and handed Lenna the second. She eyed it warily.

  “There’s nothing wrong with it. I give you my word. Where is Orzili? I have to send soldiers for him.”

  “He’ll be angry,” she said again. He might be dead.

  “Yes, I imagine so, if he’s alive. Where is he?”

  She described the place. Again, the other Lenna went to the door. This time she summoned a guard. They spoke for some time. At last she sat again by the fire, arms crossed, brow creased.

  “If they find him, they’ll bring him here,” she said, her voice low and tight. “We should know his fate soon enough.”

  “I don’t want to see him! I came to speak with you. No one else.”

  “We don’t even know… He won’t hurt you. I won’t allow it. Sit. Drink your wine.”

  After a moment she sat.

  “You say you killed a man.”

  “I needed money, and a weapon. He had both.”

  The other woman shook her head again. “None of this should have happened. It’s my fault, and Orzili’s. But I don’t want him dead, and I’m sure you don’t either. This thread of time can’t be allowed to continue. You understand that.”

  “I know you think so. You see me – he does, too – as more of you and that’s all. You think we’re the same. We’re not. I…” She frowned at the flames dancing in the hearth. It had been easier talking to the Tirribin. They gave her clarity. Being with this other Lenna – it was the opposite. Everything seemed hazed, as if her mind had caught fire. “I’m me,” she said, knowing the words were inadequate. “I’m not just you anymore. And I’m less that way with every bell.”

  “All the more reason for me to go back. Give me your chronofor. I can Walk back a few bells, fix everything, and return here. You w
on’t even know I was gone.”

  “Because I’ll be gone.”

  The other woman didn’t deny it.

  “We are alike,” she said after a pointed silence, determined to forge on despite the haze. “So I know what you really want.”

  The Lenna wearing blue appeared amused by this. “What do I really want?”

  “To go back into the future, of course. Not twelve days, but the full fourteen years.”

  The other woman stared, deadly serious now.

  “You want to go back to the Orzili we left there,” she continued. “You love him, not this one. If I’d told you what I did, and that the older Orzili’s life was at risk, you would have run to the strand yourself, even knowing you could repair history with a Walk. You might have killed me in a fit of rage.”

  “I love him in any time,” the other one said. The hand holding her cup of wine trembled.

  “You resent this one. You want to leave him and be with the other. I want that, too, but I want something else even more.”

  The other Lenna stood and moved closer to the hearth, her back to Lenna. “This isn’t… We were speaking of your chronofor. I need to use it, to make all of this right again. Your mind is… Meeting me made you go mad. Which is why you’re saying all of these things.”

  “When I was with the Tirribin it was better. My mind, I mean. It was clearer. They said that it might heal on its own. With time. I won’t be mad forever. And I don’t want to stop being alive.”

  “You wouldn’t stop living. You would just–”

  “Become you? That isn’t the same as living, is it? Not really. Not for me.”

  The other Lenna peered back at her. “No, it’s not the same. It’s all we have. You Walked here – I Walked here. Whatever the reason for that, we were wrong to do it. And now this with Orzili. So I have to fix it.”

  “Why do you need–”

  “My chronofor doesn’t work. There are two of them in this time, and – I’m guessing here – I think it likely–”

  “That Binder magick can only work in one device at any time.”

  The other woman studied her. “That’s right. Your mind is clearer, isn’t it?”

  “I told you. Give me the chance to live, and it will grow clearer still.”

  The other Lenna crossed to the table that bore the food and took some bread and cheese. Lenna joined her there, famished. For a while they both ate. Several times, they reached for the same sort of cheese simultaneously. The first instance, the other Lenna laughed. After the third or fourth occurrence, she pivoted sharply and walked back to the hearth, clearly unnerved.