Hey lady … haven’t heard from you for a while. Just checking in.
Everything OK? Can you text me back, please?
Annie and I wanted to do dinner with you soon. Tomorrow night? Let me know.
Are you mad at me or something?
You know, it’s really not that hard to text someone back.
Okay, I’m officially freaking out. Text me. Or call me. Or stop by.
Are you dead or something? This is getting really old. CALL ME!
Unwilling to face the hour-long interrogation that would undoubtedly result from a phone call, I sent my relentless friend a text: Sorry Cara. I’m fine. Just been busy with my mom and the excavation prep. Let’s definitely do dinner soon. It wasn’t what she wanted to hear, but the words would at least decrease her calling frequency for the night.
When I reached my apartment, Alexander was already waiting in the hallway outside the door. We’d planned to meet up at six o’clock, and I was a few minutes late.
“Sorry! I got held up on campus. Have you been waiting long?” I asked, letting him into my little home.
He smiled kindly. “Not a problem. I brought dinner,” he announced, setting a huge bag of Chinese take-out on the kitchen table.
“Alexander, you’re a genius! You just might be the best grandpa ever!” I exclaimed as I retrieved plates and silverware. “What would you like to drink? Beer? Wine?”
“Water is fine. It’s unwise to venture into the At while inebriated. When we do, our subconscious starts to take over and it becomes too easy to end up seeing something unintentionally. There are some things you can’t unsee, no matter how hard you try,” he explained, giving me my first important lesson.
“Okey-dokey, water it is,” I said, setting two full glasses on the table. Dinner passed pleasantly, both of us downing generous portions of fried rice, sweet and sour prawns, beef with broccoli, and egg rolls. We swapped stories, me telling Alexander about how I came to love archaeology, and Alexander telling me about his childhood in Herculaneum and his modern life as an explorer of sorts. He’d been traveling around the world, never stopping in one place for more than a year, since he’d left Grandma Suse almost twenty-five years ago. It was nice to learn more about him.
“So, what’s on the agenda for tonight? More shocking family revelations? History lessons?” I asked, finally dropping my fork onto my plate with a clink. I was blissfully stuffed.
“Hmm … I thought I might answer some of your questions,” Alexander said. “If you’re anything like me, which I suspect you are, you have hundreds buzzing around in your head.”
I straightened, excited by the prospect. Where to start? “Is there a limit to how far we can see into the future or past?”
Alexander tensed one side of his mouth. “Well, other than the pesky solstice issue, which prevents anyone from seeing into the At beyond the twenty-first of June, it completely depends on the individual’s strength. Only a few years after I manifested, I could see thousands of years behind and several years ahead. The weakest Nejeret I’ve ever known could only see a few hundred years into the past. Seeing the future has always been the more difficult and rare talent—that’s what we call our unique gifts—and those with that talent are called seers.”
“I can do it,” I said. “I mean, I did it once, but it was only a few days in the future and it definitely wasn’t on purpose.”
He nodded, apparently expecting no less from a granddaughter of his.
“How many of us are there?” I asked.
Alexander frowned. “I don’t know, exactly. Our governing body, the Council of Seven, isn’t as well-organized as it once was. The Council used to keep records on all our people, but they haven’t been very successful in tracking the births or deaths in a few of the familial lines for at least five hundred years. There could be any number of thousands, maybe even tens of thousands.”
“What changed?” I asked, thinking that a people who could literally take a peek into the past shouldn’t have too hard of a time with a species-wide census.
“There was a disagreement,” Alexander explained. “Half of the members of the Council believed we should force the prophecy and bring the savior, the Meswett, into existence.” He said “prophecy” like it was a particularly foul obscenity. “The other half believed we should avoid the cursed thing at all costs. After a while, reconciliation was impossible and the Council split.”
“Were you on the Council?” I asked, suddenly curious about my grandpa’s standing among our people, and through him, my standing.
Shaking his head, Alexander said, “The seven seats on the Council are reserved for the patriarchs of the seven strongest familial lines. There’s Heru and Set, though Set disappeared more than a thousand years before I was born, so there are really only six members.”
“Did Set die?” At the edge of my mind, I realized that Heru, the man Alexander had set up as my watchdog, was on the Council of Seven … which was crazy. It was like learning the President of the United States had been my bodyguard for who-knew-how-long.
My grandpa shook his head again. “There’s also Moshe, Sid, Dedwen, and Shangdi.”
I whistled. “Assuming Moshe and Sid are who I think they are”—Moses and Siddhartha, central figures in two of the world’s largest modern religions—“that’s quite a list of mythical people. Not so good at keeping a low profile, are we?” I asked sardonically.
Alexander laughed. “A fault of our species.”
“That was only six, by the way,” I informed him.
“Ivan, my father, is the leader of the Council, though they haven’t officially met for some time.”
I was momentarily stunned—my great-grandpa was the leader of our people. With a dry chuckle, I said, “So I really wasn’t far off with the whole ‘more shocking family revelations’ thing?”
“You seem to be adjusting well to the phenomenon.”
I shrugged. “Adapt, or die.” I wondered if I was exhibiting some other, hard-to-pinpoint characteristic of our kind—extreme adaptability. It would make sense, considering that our regenerative abilities allowed us to live for thousands of years while the world went through endless changes. Live for thousands of years … me … unbelievable.
I plucked another question out of the miasma. “So, besides some of us being stronger than others, some of us being able to see into the future, and some of us being able to smell in the echoes, are there any other differences between Nejerets?”
“Yes, many.” Alexander took a deep breath before diving in. “Some of us are ‘tied down,’ meaning we have to be physically in the place of the echo we’re viewing, and some aren’t. For example, if you were tied down and you wanted to see something that happened last year here in this apartment, you’d have to enter the At from this apartment.” He paused for a moment. “Some Nejerets can follow an object through the At, viewing all that has or might happen in its presence. Some can do the same in relation to a specific individual. That is called ‘finding.’ Some can track another Nejeret’s projected self, their ba, through the At, following them from echo to echo.” Again, he paused. “Some can manipulate the At itself, forever changing what other Nejerets see when viewing a particular echo, or creating false echoes—things that never actually happened. Manipulating is a very dangerous talent—permanently altering the At is forbidden, though on rare occasions we’re allowed to create temporary false echoes for training purposes. Related, but not completely forbidden, some can cloak their At-selves or even entire portions of the At containing their past and potential futures. That is how Set disappeared; he’s created a series of blank spots in the At.”
I considered Set and the idea of cloaking in the At. I was fairly certain I’d seen a “cloaked” person in the At before—the man who’d saved me from Mike. With sudden excitement, I wondered if the long-lost Set was my mysterious savior, but my excitement soured almost instantly. The ancient Egyptian god, Set, was often called “Seth” by modern people … and “Se
th” had been the name attached to the sender of a pretty damning text message on Mike’s phone. Use the lip balm to make her compliant, then complete the mission. Was Mike’s Seth the vanished member of the Council of Seven? Did Mike know about Nejerets … about me? It seemed like too much of a coincidence.
“That’s all I can think of right now,” Alexander said, interrupting my wild conjecturing. “I suppose we should write this down in a handbook—it would make training quite a bit easier.”
“It’s okay,” I replied, my head spinning both from the influx of information and my improbable deductions. I didn’t know if I could handle anything else at the moment, but I was a staunch believer in the whole “knowledge is power” bit, so I asked another question. “Hmm … so if someone alters the At, does it change what actually happened? Like, will the history books suddenly say something different?”
“No. Since we don’t actually travel through time, we only view what has been or what could be, only the moment’s reflection in the At, its echo, is changed,” he said decisively. “Besides, humans would be unaware of the change in the At—only Nejerets would be able to see it, so history would remain the same.”
I frowned. “Then why is it such a big deal? If it doesn’t actually change anything … ?”
A bitter laugh escaped from Alexander. “Nejerets depend on the echoes, and we tend to hold pretty high positions, even in the human world. If we base some decision on what we saw in the At, and what we saw was false, then the consequences could be devastating for Nejerets and humans alike.”
After a moment of thought, he said, “Someone—we have guesses but we don’t know who for sure—manipulated the future At, completely removing all traces of echoes surrounding a certain ambitious member of the Nazi Party. Nejerets in power throughout the world made political decisions based on what they saw in the At, unaware that an entire life had been erased from view. It just so happened that that life would prove extremely influential, but because it had been eradicated from the At, Nejeret seers couldn’t see the potential horrors it might cause.”
Alexander was shaking his head in disbelief. Was he one of those seers? I wondered as I took in his state of dejection.
“By the time we noticed the anomaly in the At, it was too late,” he continued. “Events had already been set in motion. We did what we could, but …” Alexander suddenly looked at me, into me. “You must understand that we did what we could. You must,” he pleaded. “But the horrors … the death … those poor humans …”
Reaching across the corner of the table, I squeezed his hand. I had no words, but at least I could comfort him with that.
“Whoever manipulated the At …” He turned over his hand to grip mine almost painfully. “You study history, Alexandra. You know about power and corruption. Our kind walks a very thin, unsteady line. We may feel like them sometimes, we may even be named for them, but we’re not gods. Remember that, granddaughter. We. Are. Not. Gods.” Alexander’s tone was vehement.
Gravely, I said, “I understand.” After Alexander nodded, I waited, taking a few contemplative breaths. “So which, um, ‘talents’ do you have?”
His grip on my hand relented, and I retracted my arm, setting both of my hands in my lap. “Let’s see,” he said. “I can see very far into the past At and a short way into the future At, and I can smell in echoes, like you. I’m not tied down—I can view any echo within the past several thousand years from anywhere. Though looking further back, tens or hundreds of thousands of years, does require proximity to the echo’s place of origin.” He leaned toward me as if confessing a secret. “That’s why I was in Antarctica for the past few months. I’ve always wondered what was under all of that ice. Also, I’m a finder—I can search the At focusing on a specific object or individual.”
I bit the inside of my lip, digesting his response. “So, on a scale of one to ten, one being the weakest weakling and ten being …”
“Nuin?” Alexander supplied.
I shrugged. “Sure. So on that scale, where would you rank in strength?”
“Hmm … perhaps a seven. My father would be a nine, certainly, as would the rest of the Council. They are all very powerful, just not to the level of the Great Father.”
Too many questions bounced around in my skull, like my head had turned into a pinball game comprised of flesh, bone, and synapses. “Can you teach me how to be a finder?” There were a few people I wanted to follow through the At, but one stood out from the rest in my mind. The mental image of that person glared deadly daggers at the others, commanding them to wait their turn.
“I can try. But it’s a rare talent, so I wouldn’t get your hopes up,” he cautioned.
“Great! Let’s do it!” I said with a small bounce in my chair.
“Hang on—one step at a time. First you need to learn how to enter the At at will. How have you done it so far?”
I explained the basics behind my first few unintentional dives into the At, then described how I’d gained some control using my emotions and focusing on what I needed at the moment. I didn’t, however, tell him the subjects of the echoes, especially not the one about my criminal father. I needed to know more about that particular element of my nefarious parentage before I shared it with anyone. If I ever shared it with anyone. It was creepy … and weird.
As I spoke, Alexander nodded, sometimes looking surprised and sometimes proud. “You’ve made a good start of it,” he told me after I finished. “If you can gain control over your ability to enter the At while awake this evening, then I’ll test you for the finding talent before I leave.”
“Okay. So, what do I do?” I asked eagerly.
“Aim for when you opened the door yesterday evening and first met your magnificent grandfather,” he said, puffing up jovially as he spoke, which earned a wry laugh from me. He grasped my hand again. “Now, holding that moment in your mind, close your eyes and clear out all other thoughts.”
It seemed to be an impossible task, but, I needed it to work … I needed to track a very specific person. Needed.
“Open your eyes, Alexandra.”
When I did, I thought I’d succeeded … but then the door burst open. Two unsteady people stumbled into the apartment.
Oh no! No, no, no! I needed to get away.
In a flash of colors, the scene shifted to the night with Cara and Annie and the three bottles of wine. The other me was explaining her hesitations about going on the date with Mike, to which Cara and Annie responded with protestations and confusion.
“Damn it!” I hissed. I felt a hand squeeze mine and remembered that Alexander was with me.
“Concentrate, Lex,” he encouraged gently. “You’re doing fine. Focus on the night you met me.”
I remembered opening the door—the stunned moment when incomprehension faded to impossible recognition. The scene flickered.
The other me hurried to the door, obviously excited. She opened it, and seconds later, was lying on the hardwood floor. I’d fainted from the shock of finding my grandpa, alive and young, standing in the hallway.
“There must’ve been a better way for you and Grandma Suse to have done that,” I told Alexander. I was watching the other version of him carry my limp form to the couch.
He shrugged. “At least you didn’t hit me.” After a pause, he said, “Now, do you remember what you did to get here?”
I nodded, recalling how concentration had surpassed need. I’d felt much more in control.
“Good. Pick out another moment in this apartment, something that happened further back, and take us there.”
It was hard to think of anything memorable that hadn’t happened in the last month. Part of me felt like my life hadn’t really started until that devastating conversation with my mom. Finally, I settled on a moment and concentrated. The flicker of colors lasted a tiny bit longer than it had the previous time, but it was nothing like the protracted swirl that had surrounded us when we’d viewed Alexander’s home in Herculaneum.
Another version of me was sitting on the couch with a cardboard animal carrier on her lap. The creature inside the carrier emitted a rhythmic string of tiny, frantic meows. The other me opened the box and out popped a softball-sized ball of gray and brown fur.
“Thora,” I murmured as I watched the awkward kitten thoroughly sniff first me and then the couch.
“The day you brought your cat home. Good choice. The echoes revolving around our loved ones are both the easiest and hardest to view,” he said briskly, shaking me out of my kitten reverie. Baby Thora was stalking a pen that had fallen on the floor, wiggling her little behind clumsily. “Now, I think you’re ready for your finder test.”
“Really?” I asked, suddenly giddy with excitement.
Alexander nodded. “Pick someone you know of, but you don’t know, like a celebrity.”
I frowned, squinting my eyes.
“Do you have someone in mind?” Alexander asked.
I nodded, picturing John Jakim, the lead singer of my favorite band, Johnny Stopwatch.
“Good. Now, this time you’re going to aim for the When, instead of the Where.”
“The When?” I repeated.
“Yes, the When. If we don’t know the Where, we must start with the When,” he explained. “Open yourself up to the At, thinking only about the world thirty minutes ago. Don’t think about a place. Instead, imagine being everywhere in the world at once, at half past nine this evening.”
It took nearly twenty minutes to enter the placeless At—the When. For someone used to living in the Where and watching the When go by, readjusting perspectives was unbelievably difficult. My very understanding of time and space had to be melted down and remolded into a more malleable thing.
Echo in Time: A Time Travel Romance (Echo Trilogy, #1) Page 16
