The Time Weaver

'No, I'll be better soon. I heal quickly, I promise. What did the note say?'

He gazed down at our hands, that odd, frozen aspect of him intensifying. 'Would you like to see it?' he asked slowly.

'Yes. You said I could, in fact. In the future.'

He'd kept it in a shirt pocket. The paper had obviously been crushed and then smoothed flat; it resembled a battered leaf. He turned my hand over in his—last night, his palms to mine, our fingers interlocked—and laid the note against my fingers.

I raised it close to my face. Without candles or lamps, the chapel was very dim.

A single sentence, and some unsettling blots of what could only be my blood. But my eyes went straight to that bold, slanted line:True hearts never lie.

A surge of heat took me, nothing at all to do with the blanket.

'What the devil is that supposed to mean?'

I was annoyed. I'd been expecting something along the lines of You Are Destined to Love Her, or She is the One, something grand and romantic. Not this, this enigmatic and frustratingly impersonal remark.

'Shall I tell you what it actually says?' asked the prince quietly, reclaiming my hand.

'Ah! Is it a code, then? Yes. Do tell me.'

'It's not a code, Honor.'

'Then .?'

'Listen, river-girl. Clearly you don't know everything about me yet. I'll tell you what it says, and you will tell me what occurred when you left me this morning. When you went ahead in time. Have we a deal?'

I had learned during my brief night with Future Alexandru. Every second, every movement and sensation had seared into my memory. So when I brought our joined hands up to brush my mouth, it was deliberate.

Without taking my eyes from his, I kissed his fingers, one by one, and watched his gaze begin to silver.

'I like it when you call me that,' I murmured. 'Deal.'

Chapter Fifteen

The hell of Versailles, Zane judged, wasn't just that Lia wasn't there with him to laugh and gasp at this feverish fantasia of a royal abode—although, all things considered, that was probably the worst of it. But the other hell, the constant, day-to-day ordinary hell that nipped at his heels here like a mangy, friendless dog was simply the food.

All the lovely, lovely food.

The residence of the king and queen of France seemed to be the center of the universe of flaky, buttery, savory, sauce-dripping grande cuisine .

The fact that he was meeting the leader of a sadistically murderous gang at one of most bedazzling locations on earth did not make the grounds any less spectacular, or the absinthe in his glass less heady with licorice, or the pate de foie gras on the plate set before him less enticingly creamy.

Murderers, as Zane knew very well, enjoyed a fine meal just the same as kings.

Certainly Versailles was a most elegant place to meet a killer, just as it was a most elegant prison for all the preening lords and ladies forced to dwell here. None of them looked too terribly miserable about it, despite the heat of the day and the fact that they were all seated outside in the Grand Garden awaiting the leisure of His Majesty, who was, naturally, late returning from yet another hunt. No one could dine before Louis, not even the queen, whom Zane had heard whispered was sequestered at her make-believe peasant village anyway, playing at being a shepherdess.

The notion of it gave him no little secret amusement. Marie Antoinette shedding her diamonds and satin to mingle with sheep, and Zane the thief donning the same to mingle with her courtiers.

None of whom, at the moment, were allowed to eat or even walk away from the banquet table because the king. Would . Arrive.

So the thirty-two roasted suckling pigs remained uncarved. The forty mauve-and-white iced cakes with their garlands of sugar roses and violets gleamed pristine. All the cheese platters were sweating. Seven of the fifty-five asparagus-and-truffle salads that he could see were beginning to attract flies, but royal pages in turbans had been stationed over them, fanning the insects away as best they could with giant ostrich feathers.

There was nothing to be done, however, about the ice sculptures. The one nearest Zane resembled a thinning, listing heart more than the pair of swans it had been an hour past.

He imagined that somewhere back in the kitchens of the palace was a gaggle of chefs near to weeping with fury.

It was a blinding autumn day, one of those days that had been so rare back in dear old London-town, with a sky like crisp blue linen, white clouds that never amounted to more than a few coy wisps. A company of acrobats was tumbling on the grass before the vast stretch of the table, the gilded horses of the Fountain of Apollo shining so brightly behind them the gold seemed to melt into the water.

At least alcohol was being poured. The trapped nobles surrounding him seemed content enough with that. And surely at least some of them realized how much safer they were here, at this feast they were not yet permitted to touch, than anywhere else in France these days.

Zane, who had been placed near the western end of it all, was pretending to be just as content. He was very good at pretending.

It was doubtful anyone but the murderer would have noticed how he never truly relaxed in his seat, how his eyes never ceased to take in his surroundings. How he'd refused wine entirely, or how the absinthe he'd accepted in its stead remained practically untouched.

As far as the lumbering machinery of Versailles was concerned, the closed-lipped gentleman in the second- to-last chair was a visiting Hungarian vicomte , wealthy enough to dine at the table of the king, unknown enough to be seated nowhere near his fat royal arse.

It suited him well. He'd been stewing here two months already, establishing his persona. Anticipating this day.

The marquise to Zane's right had spilled her claret twice so far. She was giggling about it, red-cheeked, the stuffed canaries decorating her enormous wig trembling in an alarming fashion. The dandy on her other side kept up a constant patter of droll wit, which made the lady laugh harder, which forced the birds to quake more. She hardly seemed to notice how the fellow was running an envious finger up and down the strand of rubies resting upon her ample bosom.

They were top-notch, Zane had to admit. Under other circumstances, he'd give the dandy a run for it, and win.

But the chair to Zane's left, the very last chair of the king's majestic table, remained empty, and that was what occupied most of his thoughts.

He was very much looking forward to discovering who would fill it.

This morning, the sixty-sixth morning of awakening in the cramped little cell he'd been assigned at Versailles, had at last delivered to him what he'd been trawling for. A discreet note slipped under his doorway, anonymous, informing the vicomte that He Whom He Most Desired to Greet would be awaiting the vicomte 's pleasure at the king's Garden Luncheon this afternoon. And to kindly wear the new lemon- satin garments the vicomte had commissioned in Paris three months past.

Merci beaucoup.

Zane was not astonished that they knew about the new clothes. He was not astonished by much in general, or by the sanf inimicus in particular. He'd spent too many years learning their ways, and he had, after all, gone to some rather extreme lengths to be noticed.

So he was wearing the lemon-satin rig. He did not mind the wig of expensive human hair that curled down to his shoulders, although it itched. He didn't mind the rouge on his cheeks and lips, or the kohl he'd applied with a practiced hand around his eyes—in fact, he rather liked the kohl. It sent his amber irises to yellow; he fancied it