The Time Collector

by Gwendolyn Womack

  Next to the kitchen was a breakfast room filled with indoor plants, a mixture of blooming bromeliads and philodendron vines that thrived in luminescent light. “The laundry room is upstairs and there’s a computer room back here with a scanner, printer,” Roan was explaining, “and an exercise room with some weights and equipment.… Feel free to use anything. My office is in the warehouse.”

  So basically he’d built a self-contained universe he never had to leave. All that was missing was other people. He was also talking like she’d be staying here alone without him, which didn’t make sense. Of course he’d be here.

  He led her upstairs. “House, lights on, second floor.” The lights in the hallway turned on. “I’ll show you how to activate all the voice controls.”

  “But I can just turn on the lights by hand, too, right?” she clarified, nodding to the light switch on the wall right next to him.

  He actually laughed at that. “Yes, of course.”

  He just chose not to touch the light or power switches, not even in his own house. Everything electronic was hardwired and controlled by a state-of-the-art voice-activated computer system.

  He moved down the hallway. “There’s two spare bedrooms. I thought Parker could take this one.” He opened the first door and then the next. “You can have this one.”

  Both bedrooms were elegant with queen beds and minimalistic art on the walls. Decorative Japanese screen lamps made of wood and rice paper sat on the night stands, giving the rooms a tranquil feel.

  “Thank you for letting us stay,” she said, touched by his generosity.

  Roan brushed off her gratitude with a hint of embarrassment and continued down the hall to the end door. “There’s a special room I want you to see.” The door had an electronic keypad for a lock and he entered in a long code.

  A nervous bubble of laughter rose within her and almost escaped. With a line like that she hoped it wasn’t his bedroom.

  When he opened the door and she walked inside, all the laughter inside her died. She couldn’t believe what she was looking at.

  28. THE COLLECTION

  “I CALL IT THE TIME ROOM.” Roan smiled because he wasn’t joking.

  Melicent stood beside him speechless. He was beginning to relish the moments when he surprised her. He didn’t question the fact that he wanted to show her the gallery tonight. There might not be another time.

  He’d spoken with Sun on the plane while Melicent had slept. She’d gotten his message. Sun was in Korea, making sure the young psychometrist who’d been about to join the group was safe. She believed it was impossible that Gyan was involved in Stuart’s kidnapping or the fires, but Roan needed to make that judgment for himself. He had to meet with Gyan.

  Gyan also had Descartes’s ring, and Roan needed to hold it again. He believed it could be the key to understanding the map.

  Sun agreed to arrange a meeting for him. The challenge was that the man lived in India.

  Melicent wouldn’t like being left behind, but Roan had no choice. It was too dangerous for her to go with him. She and Parker could stay at the warehouse while he was away.

  He’d decided not to tell her his plan. He didn’t want to ruin their one evening alone together. In the morning when she woke up and Holly arrived with Parker from the hotel, he’d already be gone. A twinge of guilt circled around his mind but he pushed it aside. He wanted this night with her.

  “After you,” he said, motioning for her to go ahead of him.

  A cast-iron staircase spiraled down to the ground, creating an observation deck above. The gallery had a high ceiling and took up the whole back corner of the warehouse. It was the largest space in the house, two times the size of his living room.

  Roan’s private collection was filled with the creations of the pioneers who had sought to understand the mechanics of time. Roan had been collecting timekeeping inventions all his life in his quest to understand the force that had shaped him. The room held every kind of clock and device imaginable from the earliest sundials to the world’s tiniest atomic watch. Roan knew all of their stories and considered their creators to be his friends. He often came to this room to clear his mind.

  They descended the staircase and first Roan showed Melicent a stunning collection of obelisk shadow clocks, water clocks, and sundials from ancient Egypt, China, Babylonia, and Greece that varied in sizes. The pointed pillar of the tallest shadow clock ascended to the ceiling, and the largest sundial was a gorgeous copper plate raised on a dais as big as a park fountain.

  He picked up a smaller metallic sundial, one of his favorites, with intricate astronomical and zodiacal carvings. “It was the Babylonians who first divided the day into hours, minutes, and seconds. They were magnificent astronomers and could look at the stars and know the time to the nearest fifteen minutes.”

  He motioned to the little carved owl sitting within the center of a tubelike contraption. “Here we have the clepsydra. This particular water clock may well have been the world’s first cuckoo clock, made by the Greek mathematician Ctesibius, an imaginative fellow. He invented the pipe organ, too.”

  “And this?” Melicent asked in a hushed tone, taken by the collection. She pointed to a more complicated-looking sundial.

  “In the thirteenth century, Abu Ali al-Hasan al-Marrakushi invented a dial to finally measure equal hours throughout the day. Before that the length of an hour depended on the time of year, and they were never the same.” Roan led her to the next table. He had set up the room to progress from the oldest timekeeping pieces to the newest.

  “And what about this quill? Why is this here?” Melicent signaled to the ornate quill pen and inkpot.

  “This mighty quill,” Roan said, picking it up with a smile, “took away ten days from the world. It belonged to Pope Gregory XIII, who in 1582 decided the calendar had to be fixed because the year was too long. So he informed Europe—which in his mind meant the world—that they had to lose ten days all at once. It was better to get it over with just like that.” Roan snapped his fingers. “With this quill, he signed an edict that after Thursday, October 4, 1582, it would be Friday, October 15.” Roan thought about the headaches this decision had caused. “All of the countries were in an uproar, feeling very cheated.” He put the quill back down. “It took Britain two hundred years to finally change their calendar.”

  Roan slipped his hand in hers, savoring the feel of her palm against his. Her hand fit perfectly and he could sense her wonder and excitement in her touch.

  Tonight felt like a first date. Instead of walking through a park, they were strolling through a room of clocks. It made him want to laugh and a feeling of serenity struck him.

  Next they moved to a collection of maritime watches that looked like steampunk brass contraptions, with assorted wheels and gears. “Having the correct time became vital to seafaring. It allowed sailors to calculate an exact longitude,” he explained. “So in 1675 King Charles established the Royal Observatory at Greenwich on the River Thames. Sailors would set their watches before a sea voyage, but no matter how hard they tried, the watches couldn’t keep accurate time at sea. Then John Harrison came along and perfected the chronometer.” He showed her. “I have one of the originals he tested on a voyage to Jamaica.”

  Melicent bent down to study it, keeping her hand tucked in his.

  “He was a fascinating man, a self-taught watchmaker from Yorkshire who was also a carpenter. John Harrison went up against the whole astronomical society to revolutionize maritime timekeeping.”

  Roan knew every one of the scientists, mathematicians, and philosophers in this room. They had all stood on the shoulders of the giants who had come before them, allowing the next generation to come closer to unraveling the mystery of time.

  He found himself confessing, “Sometimes when I’m in this room, my ability doesn’t feel like a burden anymore.”

  Melicent’s eyes were bright. She squeezed his hand in understanding.

  It made the words pour from him as he tri
ed his best to describe time’s evolution. “First it was ships, then it was trains that made towns and cities want to synchronize with each other. Next came airplanes, and Universal Coordinated Time was created, connecting countries on a bigger scale. Starting with the Industrial Revolution, time became ‘public time.’ Overnight people didn’t have time to themselves anymore because suddenly time equaled money. Technology made everything speed up.”

  He showed her one of the last tables, filled with the most modern timekeeping gizmos and gadgets. “Now we have fast food, speed dating, instant delivery, instant everything, with twenty-four time zones around the world synchronized to the vibration of a cesium atom. The smallest clock in the world is the size of a grain of rice.”

  He showed her his atomic clock, which in fact looked smaller than a grain of rice.

  “And time’s shortest interval is no longer the millisecond, the microsecond, or the nanosecond. It’s picoseconds, femtoseconds, and attoseconds, a quintillionth of a second.”

  He turned to face her. “So you see, Time has its own journey alongside ours. It runs through our bodies and affects everything we do.” He trailed his finger from her ear to the pulse at her neck and felt her shiver. “Even our brain has its own clock.” His fingers traced a line from her neck up to her forehead and drew a lazy circle. “The suprachiasmatic nucleus, a twenty-thousand-cell cluster no bigger than a pea.”

  Still holding her hand, he led her to a single watch displayed under a glass case. “There’s one more thing I want you to see.” He took great pleasure in watching her face startle with surprise when she leaned in to study it.

  “You have a Breguet.” She looked at him in astonishment.

  The pocket watch was one of Abraham-Louis Breguet’s first. Roan would never sell it, not when he had the watchmaker to thank for leading him to Melicent.

  He took both of Melicent’s hands in his and their fingers folded together like a perfect braid as he leaned down to kiss her.

  * * *

  If the mind dreams twenty-four hours a day and the world records it, Roan wanted this moment to never end, the feeling of Melicent against him, their bodies entwined.

  In all his mental travels through time, he had been privy to countless love stories. He’d been an accidental voyeur to the passions of the heart, the triumphs, the joys, the sorrow, the longing. He’d heard the poems—good grief, the poems embedded in centuries of parlor room writing tables.

  What if he allowed his and Melicent’s love story to be told? What if they left their imprint behind for a future world to find?

  Objects held on to the love that never died. Lovers lived on through their rings, their lockets, their picture frames.

  Their picture frames.

  His parents had had such a love, until he’d come between them. It was the one regret of his life. He’d witnessed their bitter separation as a teenager and would never wish that heartache on anyone. He also never thought he’d find a person who could understand him or touch his heart until Melicent.

  After they made love they lay in each other’s arms. Melicent rested her head on his chest and their hands playfully came together to create mudras.

  “I love your hands,” he said. Her hands were truly beautiful, delicate yet precise. The hands of an artist. She tried to mirror his gesture and laughed at her clumsiness. “The Kalesvara.” He showed her. Their fingers curved, resting palm-to-palm to create a heart shape.

  “What does the name mean?”

  “Lord of time. It’s an ether mudra to ground you in the moment.” Their hands came together again, and he started massaging her palms in an upward motion, finding each of her acupressure points. He could feel two tiny knots in her palm. “Do you know we carry knots in our hands like our shoulders?” He tried to work the kinks out. Her face startled when he zeroed in on the nerve bundle. “The major meridians terminate at the tips of the fingers. You should give your hands a workout every day. Practice the mudras. They’ll help. I promise.”

  He took her left hand and made it cross his at their wrists. Then he lined up the backs of their hands and wrapped each of their fingers together except their ring fingers, which came down to touch the tip of the thumb.

  “Which one is this?” she asked, fascinated.

  “The Fearless Heart.” He kissed her.

  Their hands still joined, they made love again, their bodies becoming a part of each other, and their minds touched, melding together.

  They held each other, not wanting to dispel the magic, until sleep came to draw a blanket around them.

  Melicent smiled and closed her eyes and in that moment looked like Botticelli’s Birth of Venus with her hair spread out on the pillow. Roan brought his fingertips to her cheek in a light caress and watched her fall asleep.

  Soon their evening would come to an end and leave an imprint on the pillow. Tomorrow would be a new day, one that would bring consequences when Melicent woke up to find him gone.

  When Roan knew she was sound asleep he touched her hand in farewell. Then he got out of bed, quiet as a whisper, and began to pack.

  He was going to see this nightmare with Stuart through to its end and make sure Melicent would never be harmed again.

  29. THE NOTE

  ROAN’S NOTE RESTED ON THE BED. Melicent read it in disbelief. Her mind rejected every word.

  Melicent,

  I’m sorry.

  It’s too dangerous for you to come where I’m going. I need for you to be safe.

  Touch anything of mine in the house that you’d like. A promise is a promise.

  My Breguet is yours.

  Always,

  Roan

  She sat on the edge of the bed, needing a moment to breathe. Angry tears pooled in her eyes. He’d gone without her. Without waking her. When had he decided? How could he have not said anything? Where the hell had he gone?

  He’d snuck out in the early hours like a bad morning after. She knew that hadn’t been his intention. He thought he was protecting her, but still it cut her to the quick.

  Yes, the situation was dangerous—for them both. Psychometrists were missing, maybe dead, and her and another woman’s house had been burned down. Now Roan had charged off like some kind of misguided knight. And he’d signed his note that she could have his Breguet—like a will, was all she could think.

  Because he didn’t know whether he was coming back.

  Overwhelming fear clawed at her. She ran to fish her cell phone from her purse and called him. Of course he didn’t answer. “Roan, it’s me. Call me back. Now.” She hung up and tried again. “I really can’t believe you just left! And all I have is a note? A note?!” Click. Again she dialed, her anger at a full boil. “If you don’t get back here I’m touching everything you own!”

  Her fingers redialed his number. She couldn’t believe she was leaving these crazy voicemails. She knew she sounded insane. But dammit—“Call me. I’m serious.” Nothing she said conveyed her feelings or the thoughts running through her head.

  He wasn’t going to call her. Even worse, he thought it was for her own good.

  There had to be something she could do. She wasn’t about to just sit there while he risked his life finding Stuart. She closed her eyes and tried to focus on the note in her hands, hoping to pick up an imprint, any bit of information as to where he might have gone. It had to be possible. Roan had pulled a phone number out of thin air for a lost little girl. Maybe she could discover his next steps with this note.

  She closed her eyes, centering her attention on the paper. Minutes passed as she tried to pick up a sensation. She began to feel Roan’s emotions emanating from the page: his guilt, his anxiety, his conviction. His love.

  He’d written the note without his gloves, knowing she would hold the paper in her hands. He wanted her to feel his heart behind the words and his intentions behind his actions.

  He’d left her behind because he loved her.

  She took that kernel of truth embedded in the page and all
owed it into her heart, and her anger defused like a storm at sea suddenly calm.

  She called him one more time, resolve in her voice. “Wherever you are, whatever you’re doing, I need you to be safe too. I want to help, however I can. I’m here.” She hung up and buried her face in his pillow. His scent was woven into the cotton like it held its own memories. She had to believe he’d return. This new life she’d been thrown into didn’t make sense without him.

  Her hand trailed across the place where he’d slept, the contours of his body now a lost shadow on the sheet. Their time together played in her mind and washed over her body like a wave. Last night hadn’t been a dream. They had shared themselves with each other, and it had meant as much to him as it did to her.

  Cocooned in the memory, she lingered there and then tucked it away in her mind. She got up and slipped on the shirt that he had tossed in the laundry basket yesterday. The tail hung mid-thigh and the arms devoured her but she didn’t care. She still wanted him on her skin to keep their connection alive.

  She went downstairs to the kitchen to make coffee before her shower. Holly and Parker would be there in an hour.

  Roan might have hidden her away in his home like some treasure, but he didn’t know her well enough yet if he thought she was going to just sit around and wait. She might not have the full scale of his abilities, but she did share his gift and she didn’t want to be afraid of it anymore. She would use this time alone while he was gone to get stronger.

  Banging cabinets around in the kitchen, she was too busy muttering to herself, “Just what century does he think he’s from?” to hear the front door open.

  “Mel?” Parker said, hesitant.

  Melicent whipped around to find Holly and Parker in the doorway. Melicent’s hand flew to the opening of Roan’s shirt at her chest to make sure the buttons were closed and her face turned beet red.