uses, to me they merely serve as a means of getting from one ley to another.” He walked on a little farther, then continued, “The next ley is a few miles distant, and between the one we have just used and the next one there are no towns or villages, farms, or what-have-you that I have ever seen.”
“How did you know to come here?”
“My dear,” he said, offering her a sardonic smile, “I am not without resource, you know. I have been about this business for some considerable time. The parts I know, I know very well.”
“Such as those in Egypt.”
“Yes,” he agreed. “Egypt in several of its epochs-at least, the ones that interest me.” He walked on a few steps, then added, “So far.”
Although Lord Burleigh did not use any external references for travelling to places he knew, Haven was making her own map. Using Sir Henry’s green book as an inspiration, she had begun writing down descriptions of the places she had visited, the locations of the leys, and any salient features she deemed important to remember. As yet it was a fairly wordy affair with directions and orientations for setting and location and such, but she was working on a way of coding the information in a more compact and precise form.
It was a good mental exercise, and she had the distinct feeling that it would prove useful in days to come. If nothing else, it filled the idle hours when she was alone-which happened more frequently than she liked. Burleigh did not take her everywhere; most of his journeys were made without her and for reasons he kept to himself. For despite whatever he might say to the contrary, the earl maintained a fierce secrecy around his plans and doings. Far from discouraging her, it only made her the more determined to discover what he knew that he did not care for her to know, or was not prepared to share.
What Burleigh hoped to gain from their liaison was also something of a mystery. As yet, he had not made any untoward demands or advances on her; he seemed content to allow their rapport to develop in its own good time- an expectation Haven was happy to encourage so long as it proved a useful ploy.
They walked along beneath a low grey sky into a freshening wind. The air was clean and cool and laden with the scent of rain. At the edge of the wood they came to a rise, which led up and out of the shallow river valley and onto a grassy plain. Far in the distance a range of low hills rose in a ragged line, but on the plain itself there was nothing to be seen save the grass undulating in waves like a wide green ocean.
Haven took one look at the formless expanse and asked, “However did you find a ley out there?”
“I have my ways, my dear.” He put his head down and started out into the prairie.
By that she thought he meant a map, though she had never seen him use one. She followed in his wake, listening to the swish of their feet through the tall grass. After a time, they came to a narrow crevice-a vee-shaped cleft in the ground like a miniature fault line running west and east, cutting through the plain in an unwavering line.
“Here it is,” Burleigh said, holding out his hand. “Hold on. This won’t take long.”
She took his hand, and they walked a half-dozen steps. While physical contact was not strictly necessary, she had learned that it made for more accurate leaps. Or at least lessened the chance that they might become separated. Why this should be, she had yet to discover.
In the space of those first steps, the sky seemed to dim and the prairie grew hazy around them. The wind gusted, flattening the grass, driving down along the fault line. Rain spattered, sharp and heavy. There came a shriek from a great height-as if the sky were being torn-and then all turned black.
She landed with a jolt that sent a tremor up through her bones. The gorge rose in the throat, but since she had nothing to throw up, she gagged it back, swallowing hard. She wiped the rain from her eyes and looked around. The landscape was dark, the evening stars bright in the east. They seemed to have arrived on a promontory above a crescent bay. There were boats lined up on the beach below, and at the point of the cove some distance ahead she could see the lights of a village kindled against the gathering evening gloom.
“Time is against us today,” Burleigh said. “We’ll have to stay there tonight and get an early start in the morning. The ley is a few miles the other side of that headland.”
“The village,” said Haven as they started towards the lights, “does it have a name?”
“Trondheim, I think.”
“We’re in Norway?”
“They speak Danish-or some dialect of it, so far as I can tell-but we’re not in Norway… too far south. I suspect it is a trading colony established by Danish settlers-something like that. Fishing boats call in here for supplies and water. There are two inns and several taverns. The people are friendly enough, for all you can understand them.”
“What will they make of us?”
“Who knows? I pay in good silver, that is all they care about.”
True to form, they were welcomed at the inn and enjoyed a hearty supper of fish pate on brown bread, followed by stewed mutton and greens. They were given rooms at the top of the house, which was quiet enough, though Haven, alone in her lumpy bed, was kept awake by raucous singing late into the night. The two travellers slipped out of the inn and were back on the trail again before sunrise. Burleigh located the ley and, as the first rays of the new morning broke over the hilltop to the east, they made the leap to Bohemia.
Burleigh had marked the ley using small white stones in a line beside the trail, which was delineated by a standing stone, a burial mound, a notch in a distant hilltop, and, of all things, a gallows beside a lonely crossroads. The earl had calibrated the leap precisely-Haven heard him counting off the steps under his breath as they walked briskly along the line. There was a blur of cold mist and a screech of wind, and they landed on a quiet, sunny hillside a few miles from the city of Prague. They walked through a countryside of young green fields and arrived at the city just as the gates were being opened for the day.
Once on the road, they fell in with the ordinary traffic of merchants and travellers arriving for the day’s business; they passed through the city walls, down some narrow streets, and across a wide and handsome bridge, where Burleigh stopped at last.
“It is very like London,” observed Haven, gazing around approvingly. “Smaller, and better paved. Cleaner, to be sure. But not without similarities.”
“The palace is up on the hilltop,” he said, indicating the bulking eminence commanding the high point of the town. “Who is the emperor?”
“Rudolf the second,” replied Haven crisply. “Everyone knows that. I am astonished you should ask.”
“I was just making sure you knew.” He started off again just as the bells in the cathedral tower began to ring. Within moments, every other church bell throughout the city began chiming as well, urging the faithful to attend Mass.
“Will we see His Majesty?” asked Haven after a moment. “I should very much like to.”
“It is possible,” Burleigh allowed. “If he happens to hear that I have come for a visit, he may demand an audience. He fancies himself leading a renaissance of science and likes to keep a finger in every pie.”
“Is that why you have chosen Prague to have this instrument made?”
Burleigh cast a quick sideways glance at his companion. She was a quick-witted lass; beneath those russet curls was a mind as quick and supple as any he had ever met. “Very good, my dear. Yes, the science here is in its infancy, but their craftsmanship is more than adequate to my purpose. They are amenable and do not ask many questions.” He paused, then added, “Unlike yourself.”
“You flatter me, sir,” she replied brightly.
The street rose steeply before them and began winding its way up the hill to the palace precinct, passing rows of tidy houses and shops. The people going about their business seemed reasonably well-dressed and prosperous and, above all, clean. The front steps of the dwellings were washed, the windows too-even the streets were swept, and the rubbish left in neat little piles for the refuse cart to collect.
As they walked along, Haven kept an eye out for the coffee shop, hoping to inveigle Burleigh into stopping for a cup of the fashionable elixir. But she did not see it, and they climbed higher into the city, very soon arriving at the palace gate, which was open to allow visitors to pass through unimpeded. They crossed the yard and were met by two guardsmen in gleaming silver breastplates and helmets. They crossed their long pikes in a ceremonial barring of the way until Burleigh, speaking in rough German, stated his name, title, and business.
Whatever he told them, the guards raised their weapons and allowed the two visitors to continue; they passed beneath the statue of Saint George slaying the dragon and into the great vestibule of the palace. There they were intercepted by one of the imperial ushers-youths whose duty it was to conduct the emperor’s guests to their
