Timeline. Part 41

He was saying, Turn on your earpiece.

Marek tapped his ear.

After a brief crackle as the sound came on, he heard nothing. He shrugged at Chris, who held up his flat palms: Wait. Marek waited. Only after a few moments of quiet listening did he become aware of the soft, regular sound of a person breathing.

He looked at Kate and held his finger to his lips. She nodded. He looked at Chris. He nodded, too. They both understood. Make no noise at all.

Again, Marek listened intently. He still heard the sound of quiet breathing in his earpiece.

But it wasn't coming from any of them.

Someone else.

Chris whispered, "Andre. This is too dangerous. Let's not cross the river tonight."

"Right," Marek whispered. "We'll go back to Castelgard and hide out for the night outside the walls."

"Okay. Good."

"Let's go."

In the darkness, they nodded to each other, then they deliberately tapped their ears, turning their earpieces off.

And they crouched down to wait.

In a few moments, they heard the soldiers start to move, once again running through the underbrush. This time, they were going up the hill-back toward Castelgard.

They waited another five or six minutes. And then they headed down the hill, away from Castelgard.

It was Chris who had put it all together. Climbing down the hillside in the night, he had brushed a mosquito away from his ear, and the movement had inadvertently turned his earpiece on; not long afterward, he had heard someone sneeze.

And none of them had sneezed.

A few moments later, they had come upon the pig, and by then he was hearing someone panting with exertion. While Kate and Marek, in the darkness beside him, were not moving at all.

That was when he realized for certain that someone else had an earpiece-and thinking it over now, he had a pretty good idea where it had come from. Gomez. Somebody must have taken it from Gomez's severed head. The only problem with that idea was- Marek nudged him. Pointed ahead.

Kate gave the thumbs-up sign and grinned.

Broad and flat, the river rippled and gurgled in the night. The Dordogne was wide at this point; they could barely see the far sh.o.r.e, a line of dark trees and dense undergrowth. They saw no sign of movement. Looking upstream, Chris could just make out the dark outline of the mill bridge. He knew the mill would be closed up at night; millers could work only during daylight hours, because even a candle risked causing an explosion in the dusty air.

Marek touched Chris on the arm, then pointed toward the opposite bank. Chris shrugged; he saw nothing.

Marek pointed again.

Squinting, Chris could barely discern four wisps of pale smoke rising into the sky. But if they came from fires, why was there no light?

Following the riverbank, they moved upstream, and eventually came upon a boat tied to the sh.o.r.e. It thunked against rocks in the current. Marek looked toward the opposite sh.o.r.e. They were now some distance from the smoke.

He pointed to the boat. Did they want to risk it?

The alternative, Chris knew, was to swim the river. The night was chilly; he didn't want to get wet. He pointed to the boat and nodded.

Kate nodded.

They climbed aboard, and Marek rowed them quietly across the Dordogne.

Sitting next to Chris, Kate found herself thinking of their conversation while crossing the river a few days earlier. How many days had it been? It must be only two days ago, she realized. But it seemed like weeks to her.

She squinted at the far sh.o.r.e, looking for any movement. Their boat would be a dark shape on dark water against a dark hill, but they would still be visible if anyone was looking.

But apparently no one was. The sh.o.r.e was closer now, and then with a hiss the boat moved into the gra.s.s along the banks and crunched to a soft stop. They climbed out. They saw a narrow dirt path that followed the edge of the river. Marek held his fingers to his lips, and started down the path. He was going toward the smoke.

They followed cautiously.

A few minutes later, they had their answer. There were four fires, placed at intervals along the riverbank. The flames were surrounded by pieces of broken armor atop mounds of earth, so that only the smoke was visible.

But there were no soldiers.

Marek whispered. "Old trick. Fires give false position."

Kate wasn't quite sure what the "old trick" was meant to accomplish. Perhaps to indicate greater strength, greater numbers, than you really had. Marek led them past the row of untended fires, toward several others ranged farther along the riverbank. They were close to the water, hearing the gurgling of the river. As they came to the last fire, Marek abruptly spun on his heel and dropped to the ground. Kate and Chris dropped, too, and then they heard voices, singing a repet.i.tive drinking song; the lyrics were something about "Ale makes a man slumber by fire, ale makes a man wallow in mire...."

It went on interminably. Listening to the lyrics, she thought: This is "Ninety-nine Bottles of Beer on the Wall." And sure enough, as she raised her head to look, she saw half a dozen soldiers in green and black sitting around a fire, drinking and singing loudly. Perhaps they had been ordered to make enough noise to justify all the fires.

Marek pointed for them to go back, and when they had moved a distance away, he led them off to the left, away from the river. They left behind the cover of trees that lined the river, then were again slipping through open, cleared fields. She realized that these were the same fields where she had been that morning. And sure enough, now she could see on the left faint yellow lights in the upper windows of the monastery as some of the monks worked late. And the dark outlines of thatched farm huts, directly ahead.

Chris pointed toward the monastery. Why weren't they going there?

Marek made a pillow with his hands: Everybody sleeping.

Chris shrugged: So?

Marek pantomimed waking up, startled, alarmed. He seemed to mean that they would cause a commotion if they went in in the middle of the night.

Chris shrugged: So?

Marek wagged a finger: Not a good idea. He mouthed, In the morning In the morning.

Chris sighed.

Marek went past the farm huts, until he came to a burned-out farmhouse-four walls, and the black remains of timbers that had supported a thatched roof. He led them inside, through an open door that had a red streak across it. Kate could barely see it in the darkness.

Inside the hut was tall gra.s.s, and some pieces of broken crockery. Marek began rummaging through the gra.s.s, until he came up with two clay pots with cracked rims. They looked like chamber pots to Kate. Marek set them out carefully on one burned windowsill. She whispered, "Where do we sleep?"

Marek pointed to the ground.

"Why can't we go into the monastery?" she whispered, gesturing to the open sky above them. The night was cold. She was hungry. She wanted the comfort of an enclosed s.p.a.ce.

"Not safe," Marek whispered. "We sleep here."

He lay on the ground and closed his eyes.

"Why isn't it safe?" she said.

"Because somebody has an earpiece. And they know where we're going."

Chris said, "I wanted to talk to you about-"

"Not now," Marek said without opening his eyes. "Go to sleep."

Kate lay down, and Chris lay beside her. She pushed her back against his. It was just for warmth. It was so d.a.m.n cold.

In the distance, she heard the rumble of thunder.

Sometime after midnight it began to rain. She felt the heavy drops on her cheeks, and she got to her feet just as the downpour started. She looked around and saw a small wooden lean-to, partially burned but still standing. She crawled under it, sitting upright, again huddling together with Chris, who had joined her. Marek came over, lay down nearby, and immediately went back to sleep. She saw raindrops spatter his cheeks, but he was snoring.

26:12:01.

Half a dozen hot-air balloons were rising above the mesas in the morning sun. It was now almost eleven o'clock. One of the balloons had a zigzag pattern, which reminded Stern of a Navajo sandpainting.

"I'm sorry," Gordon was saying. "But the answer is no. You can't go back in the prototype, David. It's just too dangerous."

"Why? I thought this was all so safe. Safer than a car. What's dangerous?"

"I told you we don't have transcription errors-the errors that occur during rebuilding," Gordon said. "But that's not precisely accurate."

"Ah."

"Ordinarily, it's true that we can't find any evidence of errors. But they probably occur during every trip. They're just too minor to detect. But like radiation exposure, transcription errors are c.u.mulative. You can't see them after one trip, but after ten or twenty trips, the signs start to be visible. Maybe you have a small seam like a scar in your skin. A small streak in your cornea. Or maybe you begin to have noticeable symptoms, like diabetes, or circulatory problems. Once that happens, you can't go anymore. Because you can't afford to have the problems get worse. That means you've reached your trip limit."

"And that's happened?"

"Yes. To some lab animals. And to several people. The pioneers-the ones who used this prototype machine."

Stern hesitated. "Where are those people now?"

"Most of them are still here. Still working for us. But they don't travel anymore. They can't."

"Okay," Stern said, "but I'm only talking about one trip."

"And we haven't used or calibrated this machine for a long time," Gordon said. "It may be okay, and it may not be. Look: suppose I let you go back, and after you arrive in 1357, you discover you have errors so serious, you don't dare return. Because you couldn't risk more acc.u.mulation."

"You're saying I'd have to stay back there."

"Yes."

Stern said, "Has that ever happened to anybody?"

Gordon paused. "Possibly."

"You mean there's somebody back there now?"

"Possibly," Gordon said. "We're not sure."

"But this is very important to know," Stern said, suddenly excited. "You're telling me there might be somebody already back there who could help them."

"I don't know," Gordon said, "if this particular person would help."

"But shouldn't we tell them? Advise them?"

"There's no way to make contact with them."

"Actually," Stern said, "I think there is."

16:12:23.

s.h.i.+vering and cold, Chris awoke before dawn. The sky was pale gray, the ground covered by thin mist. He was sitting under the lean-to, his knees pulled up to his chin, his back against the wall. Kate sat beside him, still asleep. He s.h.i.+fted his body to look out, and winced with sudden pain. All his muscles were cramped and sore-his arms, his legs, his chest, everywhere. His neck hurt when he turned his head.

He was surprised to find the shoulder of his tunic stiff with dried blood. Apparently, the arrow the night before had cut him enough to cause bleeding. Chris moved his arm experimentally, sucking in his breath with pain, but he decided that he was all right.

He s.h.i.+vered in the morning damp. What he wanted now was a warm fire and something to eat. His stomach was growling. He hadn't eaten for more than twenty-four hours. And he was thirsty. Where were they going to find water? Could you drink water from the Dordogne? Or did they need to find a spring? And where were they going to find food?

He turned to ask Marek, but Marek wasn't there. He twisted to look around the farmhouse-sharp pain, lots of pain-but Marek was gone.

He had just begun to get to his feet when he heard the sound of approaching footsteps. Marek? No, he decided: he was hearing the footsteps of more than one person. And he heard the soft clink of chain mail.

The footsteps came close, then stopped. He held his breath. To the right, barely three feet from his head, a chain-mail gauntlet appeared through the open window and rested on the windowsill. The sleeve above the gauntlet was green, trimmed in black.

Arnaut's men.

"Hic nemo habitavit nuper," a male voice said. a male voice said.

A reply came from the doorway. "Et intellego quare. Specta, porta habet signum rubrum. Estne pestilentiae?" "Et intellego quare. Specta, porta habet signum rubrum. Estne pestilentiae?"