soldiers looking for us. Right now we can’t see that time, but our bodies are still in it, and some pretty bad things can happen, so we’ve got to do this fast.”
“Do what?” asked Olivenko.
“All of us hold on to you-onto your bare skin, a wrist or your neck will do-all at the same time. To root ourselves completely in this time. Two days before everything went wrong.”
Olivenko didn’t hesitate. He pulled up his sleeves and took off his cap. “Grab on.”
The two at the ends-the soldierly man and the boy-took hold of one of his arms, first with one hand each, and then, letting go of Rigg and Param, with both hands.
“Still here,” said the boy.
“And you’re still holding me in the past,” said Rigg to the boy. “Even though you’re no longer in the future. Maybe we-”
“Shut up and finish this,” said the old soldier.
Param and Rigg both took hold of Olivenko’s other arm, but they did not let go of each other.
“I know this is going to be awkward, but let’s see if we can make it down the stairs together,” said Rigg. “It’s possible that everybody but me will stay with you, Olivenko. If that happens, then please go ahead and take them out of town-not in a way that will leave any evidence. No riverboats, where there’ll be a record of booking passage. Something unobtrusive and without a trail that can be followed.”
“Where will you be?”
“Following after, as best I can,” said Rigg. “But me alone, I can probably get out much more easily than all four of us-five now-together. And maybe I won’t disappear on you. Maybe we’ve already made it. Ready?”
“More than ready,” said the old soldier. “You talk way too much, boy, when the time for talking hasn’t come yet.”
Olivenko found himself wanting to slap the old man around for that-talking to the son of Knosso Sissamik like that. But he didn’t know the relationships among these people. He only knew Rigg, and had caught glimpses of Param over the years. The rest he’d have to take on trust.
Awkwardly they went down the stairs, Olivenko walking in the middle, the others sidling slowly along, gripping his arm rather more tightly than was comfortable.
They could hear the clatter of booted feet coming down the stairs high above.
“Let’s hurry a little,” said Olivenko. “This picture’s going to be hard to explain.”
By the time they reached the bottom, the old soldier and Param had both let go of him completely-but they were still there.
Then the boy let go.
They were out on the street, with Rigg still clinging to his arm with both hands. The other three were watching him, and Olivenko could see that they really were worried. Whatever mad thing Rigg was frightened of, it scared them, too.
“Well, here goes,” said Rigg. “Either I’ll be in the city where they’re searching for me, or I’ll be here with you. But you’ll be fine either way, and I probably will, too. It’s not like I’m going to explode or anything.” He grinned at Param when he said that, though Olivenko couldn’t think why.
Rigg let go.
And there he still was.
“If you disappeared,” said Olivenko, “I’m hallucinating an exact image of you, right where you used to be.”
Rigg nodded. “There’s always the chance that my body is also still in the future, and if somebody catches me there, walking around like a blind man, I may get yanked away from you. But personally, right at the moment, I think that’s unlikely. I think we just found a way to move into the past.”
“I’m very impressed with us,” said the old soldier dryly.
“But the thing to keep in mind is, it’s irrevocable,” said Rigg. “Now that I’m here in the past with the rest of you, I can only see the paths that existed as of this moment. I can’t see Param and me walking through the tunnel, or where I handed her off to you. Those things haven’t happened yet.”
“Wasn’t that the idea?” asked the boy.
The old soldier glanced around. “Are we sure nobody’s going to recognize the two of you?” he asked Rigg and Param.
“Nobody knows what they look like,” said Olivenko. “Except a chosen few, and they won’t be looking for them here on the streets. Not today.”
“What I’m saying,” said Rigg, continuing the discussion of time travel, “is that I couldn’t go back into the future if I wanted to. I can only see paths in the past. Which means that if we ever do this again, only we don’t want to stay in the past, then we can’t let go of our link with the future. Which may not be me at all. It may be Umbo, or both of us together. As long as he and I are still existing in both places at the same time, and not tied to a living creature in the past, then we can return to the future. What do you think?”
“I think that either you’re right,” said Param, “or you’re not. What I don’t see is why it matters.”
“Because this is how we’re going to get through the Wall,” said Rigg. “We’re going to cross through it at a time before it existed. But on the other side, we’re going to want to come back to our time.”
“There was a time when the Wall didn’t exist?” asked the boy-Umbo? Yes, that was his ridiculous name.
“Twelve thousand years ago,” said Rigg. “And when the Wall didn’t exist, there were no humans here. If we get stuck that long ago, then we’ll be the only people in the world.”
“That’s how you’re going to do it?” asked Olivenko.
“I think it’ll work,” said Rigg, “better than knocking ourselves unconscious and floating through the Wall on a boat.”
“At least there won’t be anybody waiting to kill us on the other side,” said Olivenko.
“What are you talking about?” asked the old soldier.
So, as they walked along the busy streets of Aressa Sessamo, Rigg and Olivenko told the story of Knosso, Rigg’s real father, and how he crossed through the Wall, only to be murdered on the other side.
“And you want to take us through the Wall, knowing that somebody wants to kill us on the other side?” asked Loaf.
“The creatures that killed Father Knosso,” said Rigg, “lived in the water. We won’t cross through where there’s water.”
“But there might be other things that want us dead,” said Param.
“There might be. But one thing we can be certain of-there are people in this wallfold who want us dead, and they’re very good at killing people.”
“Well, then,” said Loaf, “Let’s give it a try and see if we live through it.”
“One thing,” said Rigg. “You don’t have to come, Loaf.”
“I don’t have to do anything I don’t want to.”
“I’m thinking of Leaky,” said Rigg. “She expects you to come home. I don’t know if we’ll ever be able to come back, once we cross over.”
“Leaky is like my heart or my brain,” said Loaf. “I can’t imagine living without her. But she also knows me. Knows that whenever I leave home there’s a chance I won’t come back. She knew it when she sent me with you. So if I go with you, and I get killed or for some other reason can’t get back, then she’ll grieve, and she’ll wonder what happened to me, but she’ll go on. She’ll make a life for herself in that town that’s named for her. One of us is going to die before the other-that’s how life goes. You see what I mean?”
Olivenko understood what he was saying, but could hardly believe that a man could mean it. It wasn’t like he didn’t care-Loaf was clearly more than a little emotional as he made that speech. He simply wasn’t going to let his feelings for the woman he loved stop him from following through with what he had committed to do.
Like a true soldier.
Like me, thought Olivenko.
“I’m with you, too,” said Olivenko.
“No, truly,” said Rigg. “All we need is your help out of town.”
“In about a half hour, I’m going to be absent without permission,” said Olivenko. “By the time you’re safely out of town, I’d better be with you and never come back, because I’ll be a deserter. They hang deserters.”
“Then you can’t come with us,” said Rigg. “It was selfish of me to ask. Just give us some ideas about
