Once Every Never Part 15

"And, again, there you lose me." Clare huffed with frustration. "Because y'see, Stu, I don't know where Boudicca's grave is."

"But don't you see, Clarinet?" Stuart Morholt smiled an icy smile. "Boudicca does."

15.

Clare stared at Stuart Morholt. What a totally creepy thing to do. What a brilliant totally creepy thing to do. Through her he could glean firsthand knowledge of treasure troves that hadn't even been discovered yet. That might never be discovered. It was an archaeologist's dream.

Still, the thought of using her newfound gift to conduct what was, essentially, a scouting mission for a grave-robbery was positively stomach-turning to Clare. She had to stall.

"I won't do it. Not unless you let Al out of the storage locker."

"No."

So much for stalling.

"No more bargaining, Clare. Miss McAllister's welfare is only your concern, insofar as she won't have any welfare if you don't behave."

"Then at least let me back in." Clare crossed her arms across her chest and waited, set and purposeful.

"Why?"

She fingered the sleeve of Morholt's jacket. "Tweed really isn't my style. Before I go back I'm going to need to switch clothes with Al. I almost froze to death this last time."

"Right. This last little unauthorized time."

"Unauth-Oh, get over yourself!" Clare spluttered. "Who do you think you are?"

"I think I am the last of a long line of very powerful mystics, Miss Reid, and you would do well to remember that. I am the closest thing to Boudicca living today. I am a Druid. I am-"

"You are delusional!"

Morholt's lip lifted in a sneer. "You wouldn't say that if you knew what I knew. If you'd seen what I am capable of. I'd tell you to ask your aunt Magda about it, but I'm sure she'd tell you it was all nonsense. She's in denial and has been for years. Not that I blame her, of course. Fear is the hiding place for the weak-minded."

Maggie? Weak-minded? Definitely delusional, Clare thought. "If you're so all-powerful, what the h.e.l.l do you need me for?"

"Don't you understand? That is the very nature of my gift-the thing that has brought us to this juncture. The Fates have tied the threads of our destinies together, my dippy little time-tripper, so that I may further my ends. You are meant to be my window into the past. A tool to use as I see fit to further my aims of restoring the Celtic peoples of this isle to their former glory!"

"You think?"

"Don't you?"

It was weird. Stuart Morholt didn't actually look insane ...

He smiled at Clare coldly and moved toward the storage locker. With a twist and slide of the bar lock, he swung the door wide and gestured her in like a maitre d' at a fine restaurant. Clare walked past him, shrugging out of his jacket as she went.

"Make it quick," Morholt said. "We've got work to do, my young apprentice."

"Oh super," Al said dryly from where she stood, jammed as far into a corner of the compartment as she could get. "Now he's talking like a Sith Lord. Clare, please tell me you won't go over to the Dark Side."

"Not unless they have cookies," Clare said as the door closed behind her. Morholt waited outside as the girls went about the business of switching clothes, trying to avoid looking in the direction of the opposite corner where a rat the size of an Alsatian hound perched on the rim of an empty barrel.

"It won't stop staring at me," Al said. "It showed up while you were dawdling and now it won't stop staring at me." As swiftly as possible, she pulled Clare's flimsy sundress on over her head.

"I wasn't dawdling and, you know, that actually looks cute on you. You should wear florals-"

Outside, Morholt pounded on the door. Clare slipped her arms into Al's many-pocketed, military-style jacket and said, "Hold your shorts-we'll be out in a minute. Jeezus."

"I'm getting just a little sick of him," Al muttered.

Clare pushed the door open but remained standing in the locker. "Al's not staying in here with Ratzilla. I wasn't kidding when I said I needed her. She's my anchor to the present. My homing beacon. Don't ask me how-it's magic. But it means I need her rabies-free and able to concentrate. Like it or lump it, Stu. Let her out. Or else I. Don't. Go. Back." Clare jammed one tightly balled fist on her hip and stood with her feet apart. "But hey, you're a clever guy. Good luck finding Boudicca's tomb all by your own d.a.m.n self!"

Morholt glared at her and his gun started to drift up again.

"And, in case you hadn't worked this one through, Mastermind?" Clare snarled. "Shooting one or both of us will do absolutely zip to further your cause."

"You know ... it'd almost be worth it just to shut you up." Morholt begrudgingly stepped aside to let Al out. "Alas, not worth as much as that treasure h.o.a.rd."

SURPRISINGLY, Morholt began to treat Clare with some small degree of respect. They actually had a reasonably snark-free discussion of Clare's s.h.i.+mmering abilities, dissecting the details of where and how she had turned up in the past. It seemed that it usually-at least, after those first fluky tries in the restoration room-corresponded vaguely to a proximity to whichever object she used as a trigger and, in some way, to whatever she was thinking of at the time she s.h.i.+mmered.

Clare had to admit that she was kind of looking forward to s.h.i.+mmering again. And, with Morholt approaching it in an a.n.a.lytical, game-plan kind of fas.h.i.+on, she was almost able to forget his ultimate nefarious purpose. The dude had been an archaeologist at one point, she gathered as he talked. He and Maggie had known each other. Worked together. And maybe more than that ... but Clare's mind had veered sharply away from making any further connections on that score.

When she felt close to ready, Clare asked Morholt to spread out the velvet cloth on the upturned milk carton and lay the gleaming, golden neck ring in the centre. As she neared the torc she almost thought she could feel the thing pulling her back into the past before she even laid her hands on it. It seemed a much stronger trigger than the other artifacts. Stronger even than Comorra's brooch.

Morholt instructed Clare to concentrate on trying to appear sometime close to the end of Boudicca's life, but Clare had a different idea. Instead she would concentrate on Boudicca as she had first seen her-when Connal had handed her the golden torc on the riverbank. Right around when Comorra was taken by the Roman soldier. Maybe, Clare thought, she could get there in time to do something to save her. Or at least let someone know what had happened so that they could maybe help her ...

Something. Clare knew that this was in no way any kind of exact science. Or exact magic, rather. It was more like directed dreaming-she could try her hardest to influence an outcome, but she didn't really understand the mechanics. She just had to hope for the best.

"This might take more than one trip," she said as she kneeled on the concrete floor in front of the torc. She pushed up the sleeves of Al's jacket and wiggled her fingers like a magician about to perform a magic trick-only without the "trick" part.

Morholt shrugged. "Yes, well. We've got all the time in the world now, don't we?"

"What if I can't exactly get an audience with the queen?" Clare tried to keep her nerves under wraps while stringing Morholt along. "Any bright ideas, Stu?"

"I'm sure she's not the only one who knows where she'll be buried with her h.o.a.rd. You're a clever thing-keep your eyes open. And your ears." Morholt smirked. "Maybe not your mouth, so much."

Clare chose not to dignify that with a response. Instead she turned to Al. "Any pointers from Research Central?"

"You want pointy?" Al murmured, head down over her laptop, scrolling through more of her Boudiccan research. Her voice was tight with tension. "How about swords? And spears? Maybe some sharpened stakes? Especially if you happen to land smack in the middle of the Iceni rebellion. A plethora of pointy, that's what you'll get." Al tended to hyper-quip when she was nervous.

Morholt peered over her shoulder at the computer screen. Al glared up at him indignantly. "Do you mind? I'm trying to work. And, by the way, your lair tech is sadly lacking. The wi-fi here at Casa de Villain sucks."

Morholt rolled his eyes and wandered off, pulling a cell phone from his pocket and tapping on the screen.

"What happened after Boudicca's flogging, Al?" Clare said, tying back her hair and making sure Al's borrowed sneaker laces were done up tight in double bows, just in case. She felt like a covert-ops mission commander getting briefed by the team field specialist. "Gimme the Coles Notes."

"Let's see ..." Al's fingers danced over the keyboard and scroll pad as she called up offline versions of the research she'd done the night before. "Just the third-period highlights, right? The king-Prasutagus-dies. Rome calls in all his debts plus big-time interest. Boudicca responds with a cheery 'sod off' or words to that effect. Rome, as you know, considers that uppity and has Boudicca flogged."

"Yeah. I know. I saw the scars." Clare shuddered at the memory.

Al nodded. "Well, our redheaded girl rebels and sends out a call for all the oppressed tribes in the surrounding kingdoms to come join in the fun. Her war party, which was really more like a ma.s.sive mob, burns three cities-including London-to the ground. Except, of course, it was called Londinium back then and they were really more like towns than actual cities. Anyway. Boudicca and her army rampage mightily and are only stopped when the governor-"

"Seutonius Paulinus?" Clare interrupted. "I thought he was off campaigning against the tribes in the west."

Al glanced up, startled. "Uh, that's right, O Freshly Knowledgeable One. How did you ...?"

Clare waved it off. "It's not like I met him, or anything. I just, y'know, heard talk. And I happened to be sort of paying attention at the time. And not dawdling."

Al's jaw drifted open in amazement. Clare could hardly blame her. Every time she thought-actually gave real thought to the things she was doing and seeing-she felt pretty amazed too. When she wasn't scared pants-less.

"Go on, Al."

"Okay ... uh ... Boudicca is stopped by this Seutonius Paulinus guy only when he rallies virtually every available legionnaire he can get his hands on and rushes back east. He manages to crush Boudicca's far superior numbers due to strategic superiority and the unbeatable discipline of the Roman army." Al frowned, peering at the information on her screen.

"And thus began the systematic repression and debas.e.m.e.nt of the true peoples of this isle that, to this day, there has yet to be made a reckoning for," Stuart Morholt murmured as he walked back over to them. There was a faraway, fevered look in his eyes.

Clare and Al exchanged a glance and Al turned back to her screen. "Okaaay," she continued after a few moments, "our esteemed kidnapper does kind of have a point. This Paulinus guy was a machine. No wonder he thrashed the Iceni. He wasn't just off 'campaigning against the tribes in the west,' Clare. He was staging an a.s.sault on the Druid stronghold on the island of Mona, torching sacred oak groves and slaughtering Druids wholesale. It was a surgical strike aimed right at the heart of the spiritual foundations of the Celtic tribes. Jeez ... this guy was brutal. And smart. Boudicca really didn't have much of a chance."

"I don't know," Clare said, feeling the sudden, irrational need to defend the long-dead queen. "It seems to me she accomplished something no one else could have."

"Well, if by 'accomplish' you mean providing an all-youcan-eat buffet for a skyful of Andrasta's ravens, then yes, I guess she did."

"It sounds as though you'd rather the Iceni had just rolled over and let the Romans have their way."

"I didn't say that."

"And you wouldn't," Clare said softly. "Not if you'd seen what they'd done to Boudicca and her daughters in the first place."

Al didn't have anything to counter that. She gave Clare a long, grave look instead. "Good luck, pal. I'll be waiting here for you when you get back."

Clare nodded, not trusting herself to speak, and stretched out her hands toward the Great Torc of the Iceni Queen. She s.h.i.+vered as she traced her fingertips along the torc's contours. The warehouse around her went dim and sparkly, flashed with lightning, and then faded to black as Clare heard Boudicca's voice inside her head.

"Andrasta," the voice whispered. "Andrasta, hear my cries ..."

16.

War horns brayed in the air.

Drums beat and men and women howled out for blood as they beheld their queen, her body torn by Roman whips, holding in her arms the lifeless form of her eldest daughter, Tasca. Boudicca stood spear-straight and stone-still on a platform made from a large provisions cart. She was flanked by Macon and Connal. Clare saw that his handsome face was twisted with emotion-she couldn't tell whether it was anguish or rage.

A crowd of Iceni warriors surrounded the cart. Most held flaring firebrands that made the blackness surrounding the queen leap out behind her like a wind-blown cloak of shadows, or-Clare thought, s.h.i.+vering-the wings of an enormous raven. Boudicca's face was a death-white mask, rigid with rage and streaked with blood and grime. The brilliant mantle of her hair was a wild and tangled skein that caught and held the light like fireflies in a net.

It looked to Clare as though the scene playing out before her was taking place very soon after she had first seen Boudicca on the riverbank. Enough time must have pa.s.sed since then for word of Boudicca's flogging to have spread like a plague among the Iceni. Clare spun around in a circle, surveying her surroundings. She stood just beyond the edge of the crowd that was gathering to hear Boudicca's words. Men and women, all of them armed with swords or spears or bows-some already painted with the spiralling blue designs that the Iceni wore into battle-streamed by her without so much as a glance. Clare was grateful for the veil of magic that rendered her invisible to all those she hadn't actually touched. Or maybe it was the other way around. Maybe the magic made her real only to those whom she did touch ...

Suddenly a burly, long-haired warrior wearing a checkered cloak and carrying an enormous two-headed axe went rus.h.i.+ng by-within a foot of pa.s.sing through what to him would have seemed empty s.p.a.ce. Clare deked out of the way. However the magic worked, suddenly appearing out of thin air to a guy like that couldn't be good, and so she headed for a stand of trees on a bit of high ground about thirty yards off. The vantage point would give her a good, safely distant place from which to gather intel, even though she was pretty sure this time-jump wouldn't give her any clues to Boudicca's grave site location. When she reached the trees she froze: someone was there, off to one side, crouching in the shadows. And Clare could feel their eyes on her.

She swung around-and let out her breath in a sigh of relief. "Comorra."

She was alive! Ever since Clare had witnessed her capture by the Roman soldier on the riverbank she'd feared the worst for the princess. But Comorra's tunic was torn and the hem of her skirt was in tatters. A blossoming purplish bruise shadowed her cheek and blood seeped from one of her nostrils. Although her eyes were empty of emotion, tears ran down her cheeks, leaving gleaming white trails in the dirt that smudged her pale skin.

"Comorra?" Clare knelt down beside her and put a hand gently on her shoulder. "Are you all right? That Roman ... The soldier. Did he ...?"

Comorra held up the little sword Clare had seen her earn on the night of her Warrior Making. The sharp edge of the blade gleamed red in the moonlight. "He tried."

Horrified, Clare put her arms around her. "Tell me, Clare," Comorra murmured in a soft, small voice. "Can you fly?"

"What?" Clare relaxed her hug a little and looked down at the princess who huddled against her like a poor wounded bird. Clare smoothed Comorra's hair with one hand while she gently pried the sword from her white-knuckled grip with the other. "What do you mean?"

"I have heard that there are those of the tylwyth teg who can grow wings and fly if they wish ... can you fly? Like Andrasta? Like her ravens?"

Clare felt a chill run up her spine at the mention of the G.o.ddess. "Uh ... sort of. I guess. Not on my own I can't, but we-in my world-we have ... um ... great big chariots with wings. They take us places. But I don't think that's what you mean. I did try hang-gliding once, two summers ago ... that was pretty cool."

Comorra tilted her head at Clare, not understanding.

Clare gestured with outspread arms, trying to put the experience into words that the Iceni girl could understand. "It's like strapping on a big pair of wings and jumping off a cliff into the wind. It picks you up and you soar. Just like a bird ..." Clare remembered the experience vividly. The sheer terror and the absolute, exhilarating freedom of it.

"It sounds wonderful." Comorra smiled a small, dreamy little smile.

"Yeah," Clare nodded. "It was pretty cool. I guess that's the closest I've ever come to really flying."

"I've dreamed of that ..." Comorra snuffled a bit and shook her head. "Of finding some way to take wing and soar above all this. Ever since the Legions came to this island, all I have wanted to do was to find a way to fly up into the sky. Where I would be so far away that I couldn't even tell which army was which. And it would no longer matter to me." She scrubbed at her face with a corner of her sleeve, wiping away the tears and most of the dirt. When she looked up at Clare she seemed to come back to herself and smiled a wan but genuine smile. "Is that silly of me, do you think?"

"I don't think so. But, then, I can be pretty silly sometimes, so I'm probably the wrong person to ask."

Comorra laughed a little.

"Besides, silly's not so bad."

"No." Comorra turned her head and gazed through the trees to where her mother's harsh, strident tones rang through the air. She was accompanied by a chorus of steadily rising shouts and cries from the gathering throng. "But that is ..."

"Yeah. That can't be good." Clare frowned, already knowing the outcome.

"War is never good." Comorra shook her head sadly. "Despite what my mother would say."