I may have trapped myself. If I am to try and get back, it must be now. There is nothing I can do to stop things. I’ve spent the last few days turning money into gold and gems—gems mostly, they’re lighter—and what antique coins of the period the dealers have on hand. I made up a story about a costume party and had a couple of outfits made, plain, wool, fourteenth-century style, wimple, veils, shoes. It took me an hour to find this book and Mama’s box and my cloak and boots where I’d hidden them when I moved into this apartment. I’ve sewn the gems into the seams of the cloak. I keep thinking I’m hearing things, someone here with me. Grumpkin is in my pocket with the coins. We’re going to try.
24
EARLIER: LATER
I didn’t think the first jump moved me at all. I was looking at my watch, thinking the date would have moved significantly. After a moment, I realized the first jump had only taken me back two minutes. I didn’t look around. I was standing next to the desk where a previous me was sitting, writing, and I knew the other me was there, at the desk. I didn’t dare look. I fixed my eyes on the floor and walked into the next room before I tried again. The second jump moved me four minutes, the third a little over eight. I hadn’t been in the kitchen all evening, so I went in there in order not to run into myself. The fourth jump took me back half an hour. The fifth a little over two hours. I lost count of how many it took to get me to the sixteen hundreds where the magic was strong enough to bring me back all the way. The huge mound of Westfaire looms against the stars. The smell of magic is strong. The smell of trees is like wine. I’m going to lie down wrapped in my cloak and sleep. I’m very tired, very sore. I feel very old.
LATER: SHORTLY AFTER DAWN
I look very old, at least my hands and arms do. Luckily, I had a good haircut shortly before I left, and that seems to have stayed with me. So did my manicure, nail sealer, no polish. My new clothes fit. I haven’t lost any more weight, at least. I’m just a nicely groomed, quite-old woman, miles from anywhere. I have no idea what year it is. Grumpkin was hungry so he caught a mouse or mole, something small and gray, and ate it. He didn’t offer to share it. It’s all right. I have protein crackers in my pocket, enough to last several days. Someone is bound to come along, sooner or later.
[“She’s back,” I said inadequately.
“So I see,” said Israfel. He was as weary as I. “Do you think she’ll go back there again?”
“No. She’s done everything she can do. You were right. It’s grown into her. The two of them have become one thing, and she when she fought for it, she was fighting for her own life. I can’t blame her. I’d have done the same.”
“What do we do now?”
“Let her alone for a while. While we try to see what’s going to happen next.”
“She looks very frail. I could send a cart, at least.”
“Do that. Send a cart.”]
ST. CYRIL’S DAY, MAY, YEAR OF OUR LORD 1417
A cart came by midmorning, driven by a tinkerish sort of man, with a blowsy woman and several snot-nosed children along. I begged a ride, offering him a halfpenny, which he respected. I was glad of that, not wanting to use magic unless it was absolutely necessary. It was he, the tinker, who told me the year. Fifty years have passed since I was last here. Seventy since the curse fell on Westfaire. By the count of elapsed years, I am eighty-six. There must be some kind of rule in travel of this sort. It doesn’t seem to be the lived time that counts, but some other chronological measure. I don’t feel eighty-six. Or as I imagine eighty-six should feel!
Elly’s daughter, my granddaughter, will be a middle-aged woman, possibly with children of her own. I will introduce myself as an elderly aunt. A wealthy, elderly aunt. Wealthy relatives are always easier to take. That is, if I can find her. If the little kingdom is still there. The tinker says there has been no plague for a considerable time. Still, there may have been a war. Indeed, there is a war. The war that was going on when I was a girl is still going on. The English against the French. Our King trying to take lands there, or reclaim lands there, or hold onto lands there. Their King trying to drive us out, or keep us out. One would think someone could put an end to it, though as I recall from references I picked up in the twentieth, it is to go on for decades yet.
Henry V is King. He will not be king long, poor boy. Edward III was King when I left in 1350. He was succeeded by his grandson, Richard II, and he by his cousin, Henry IV, and he by his son. This current King Henry will die of a flux of the bowels in France, and his son will die in the Tower, having spent a good deal of time, on and off, as a madman. However, Henry Five’s widow will have a grandson who will be Henry VII, and it is all very interesting and complicated. I must be careful not to mention any of this lest I seem to prognosticate. According to the tinker, they are still burning poor old women whenever some
