by Perrin Briar
“What’s that?” Jera said.
“It’s dried salted meat,” Mac said. “From a couple of days ago.”
“What kind of meat?”
“Centaur,” Blake said. “No better meat in the whole kingdom. They tried to capture us and cart us off somewhere, but we managed to get the drop on them.”
A smile curled Jera’s lips. She bit into the jerky with great ferocity and chewed with relish.
“So far as we can tell,” Mac said, “time doesn’t skip the same for everybody. It’s like the ripples in a pond and we’re all in boats. We’re affected by them, but at different strengths and at different times.
“We’ve kept track of all the time and places we’ve skipped to, but we can’t distinguish a pattern. I’ve skipped four times. I’ve seen a lot of things, not a lot of it good. Everything we experience in the future ends up happening exactly as it was supposed to, no matter how we try to avoid it. It just goes to show, you cannot avoid the inevitable. So you might as well enjoy life while you can. But it’s been a good experience. A lot of learning and self-development.”
“That’s one way to look at it,” Felix said. “I look at it as a giant waste of time. I’d sooner time skip to the end, and be done with it.”
Blake picked up his knife.
“I can do you that favour, if you like,” he said.
“You know what I mean,” Felix said. “It’s the not knowing what’s going to happen next that bothers me.”
“Excuse me,” Mac said, standing up. “I need to go to the little boys’ bush.”
“I think I might join you,” Felix said.
“Just so long as you don’t think you’ll be aiding me.”
“Mac’s a nice guy, isn’t he?” Jera said as Mac and Felix disappeared into the woods.
“The nicest,” Blake said. “And the bravest too.”
“What do you mean?”
Blake looked at Jera out the corner of his eye.
“Nothing,” he said. “Forget I said anything.”
“No, what is it?”
Blake let out a breath.
“Promise you won’t say anything to Mac?” he said.
Jera nodded.
“Once, about three weeks ago now, Mac skipped,” Blake said, “and when he came back he was quiet and forlorn, like he hadn’t had such a good experience this time. Later he told us what happened.”
“What did happen?” Jera said.
Blake took a swig from his water can.
“He saw himself die,” Blake said.
Jera blinked.
“Oh,” she said. “How does it happen?”
“He was a bit sketchy on the details, but he said it was quick and painless, like falling asleep. He takes a bullet to the chest. Here.”
Blake touched his heart.
“That’s awful,” Jera said.
Blake shrugged.
“It’s the way he always thought he’d go,” he said.
“Isn’t there any way to stop it?”
Blake shook his head.
“You heard what he said,” he said. “There’s no way to avoid the future. What will be, will be.”
Jera tossed the last of her centaur jerky aside, suddenly not very hungry. Mac and Felix emerged from the foliage.
“Shall we get going, then?” Mac said.
Chapter Thirty
The town was a sprawling mass of block buildings that converged on the two roads like flies on a rotting corpse. There was a haze over the town as the shoppers’ feet kicked up dust from the unpaved streets.
“Welcome to Crossroads,” Mac said. “The crossroads to the entire kingdom.”
A steady trickle of people on horseback, on their feet, and in carriages funnelled in and out of the town in endless spasmodic lines.
Blake growled under his breath. He scowled, and then hopped off his horse. He ran to a tree and began to pummel it with his fists.
“Wow,” Jera said. “He really hates trees.”
“It’s not the tree,” Mac said. “It’s what’s on the tree that angers him.”
Out of breath and hair askance, Blake wiped a hand across his nose and climbed back onto his horse.
“I swear, if I ever get my hands on him…” Blake said.
“You’ll have to beat him with something other than your fists,” Felix said. “They’re ruined.”
Blake kissed his bloody knuckles.
“I lost all feeling in them twenty trees ago. He won’t know what hit him.”
“They’ll never catch him if you keep beating the posters down, you know,” Felix said.
“I don’t want them to catch him. I want to catch him.”
“Sorry, I’m lost,” Jera said. “Catch who?”
“Stump,” Blake spat. “Elian Stump.”
“Stump?” Jera said. “What did he do to you?”
“He’s a lying backstabber, that’s what he is.”
“That’s as may be,” Mac said, “but he’s unlikely to be anywhere around here. Now, if you’ve quite finished drawing attention to yourself, shall we move on?”
A wagon pulled past them. It was barrel-topped and painted in bright colours. It swayed side to side each time it hit a pothole.
“I’ll get my revenge on him,” Blake said, turning his horse toward the town, “you just wait and see.”
To either side of the road was a large expanse of wheat fields. The wind blew and made it move like an ocean in stormy seas. The town had grown so fast over a sort amount of time that it had burst through the earthy-rust coloured walls that encircled it. Cleary progress was more important than safety. Many of the newer buildings were built from borrowed bricks from the wall. Forty feet from the entrance the voices of a thousand merchants rang out from the entrance. Felix pulled to a stop.
“This is as far as I go,” he said.
Mac patted Felix on the back.
“Are you sure?” he said. “You can’t avoid the future, Felix. What will be, will be.”
“It might be,” Felix said, spitting on the ground, “but that doesn’t mean it has to be today.”
Mac sighed.
“All right,” he said. “We’ll meet you by the north gate.”
Felix turned to walk around the town to the north side, while the others continued on toward Crossroads.
“Where’s he going?” Jera said.
“He’s worried in case this is the town he saw when he skipped,” Mac said.
“I thought it happened at night?”
“It does. In which case he’s worried he gets caught or trapped in the town and there’s no escape.”
“But he might get caught outside town and taken into it.”
“I know,” Mac said, chuckling, “but there’s no telling him. He’s avoided every town we’ve come across. At some point he will go into a town, but it’s going to have to be a very good reason to force him to enter one. I’m sure I don’t know what that could be.”
The town of Crossroads was built on top of a giant pair of roads, one leading north to south, the other east to west. Restaurants from every corner of the world were here, offering delicacies such as squid balls marinated in a sweet sauce, roasted griffin from the Isle of No Hope and even deep fat fried legs from the fabled golden-fleeced goat that stalked the upper reaches of the Dreary Mountains.
The streets heaved with people, travellers dressed in togas from the Western Isles, in fur-lined coats from the icy northern tundra. There were beautiful voluptuous women with plunging necklines that the men couldn’t take their eyes off, and severe women dressed in sharp black suits, hair cut short and brushed back, looking like men. Jera had never seen such an assortment of people.
“I’m going to go look for a gift for Persephone,” Blake said.
He lowered his head and bowed from his saddle.
Someone behind Blake shouted: “Hey! What’s the hold up here? Some of us have places to go!”
Blake turned and glared at the man behind, whose bottom
lip buttoned up his top, and looked at the ground. He steered his horse around Blake, who continued to glare at him. When Blake looked at Jera again, he had a smile on his face.
“Sara,” he said, “it’s been a pleasure.”
Jera nodded back to him. Blake melted into the throng of people. Jera and Mac continued on through the town.
“What happened between Elian and Blake?” Jera said.
“I’m not sure if I should say,” Mac said.
“Which means you should.”
Mac smiled and took a deep breath.
“Just over a month ago,” he said, “Blake was in Stump’s crew. They were in the Capital carrying out a job on a rich family.”
“Which family?” Jera said.
“The Ascars.”
Jera nodded.
“They were carrying out the job,” Mac said, “everything was going to plan. Stump was in the treasure room with the item they’d intended on stealing – a mysterious gold object, Blake said. But then Stump had a sudden change of heart. He decided not to pick up the item and instead went after something else. He abandoned their plan, and his crew. He broke the number one rule on any job: ‘stick to the plan’.”
“Why did he do that?” Jera said.
“No one knows. It was the score of a lifetime. It could have set the whole crew up for ten years. More, probably. But Stump traded it all in for God knows what. That’s why Blake’s so angry.”
“His family should be in a comfortable house somewhere. Instead, they’re struggling to survive. Soon after that we all got busted for stealing a sheep to feed our families. We had no choice but to run or get sent to prison. Who would take care of our families then?”
Jera frowned, puzzling over this new information. A child ran out in front of her, but the mule she rode was well-trained and didn’t react.
Children from a dozen cities played with a stuffed pig’s stomach in the street, kicking it to one another. The horses and their carriages’ speed was matched only by the children’s ability to deftly avoid them. A child would about to be run down by a giant wagon wheel, Jera about to shout out a warning, when the child would perform a move, a twist of his hips, or a leap back, and avoid the carriage by centimetres. The children said, “You’re no Carriage Clipper, Clipper! You’re no Carriage Clipper!” Jera learned not to look at them.
Jera and Mac came to a street with fancy glass windows and wooden stalls on wheels out front, and merchandise sold by men bellowing at the top of their lungs. Next came a procession of mystics and soothsayers and Tarot card readers who lined the streets in their covered multi-coloured tents on the side of the road. Queues of people stood outside, waiting their turn, clutching their money in preparation.
“Everyone wants to know the future,” Mac said. “The irony is, if they wait a few days, they’ll know for free.”
They pulled up to a general supply store.
“Well,” Mac said, “this is where we part ways. If I can impart any wisdom I’ve learnt from this whole time skipping business, it’s this: things happen for a reason. There are no such things as coincidences. Someone or something put you, put all of us, on our path for a reason. Things happen for a reason. You would be foolish to ignore them. They are a sign.”
“From God?”
“From the universe. Some people would say that’s God, others simply the nature of things. You mustn’t ignore them. The universe tells us things. We just have to be receptive to them.”
They tied up their horses.
“You guys are the kindest thieves I’ve ever heard of,” Jera said.
“Everyone’s kind when you get to their heart,” Mac said.
“I only know one thief,” Jera said, “and he isn’t like you. He’s selfish.”
“We’re all of us a bit selfish,” Mac said. “Don’t be so harsh on your friend. I’m sure if you knew the reasons for the way he was, why he is the way he is, you wouldn’t be so quick to judge.”
“I suppose. I wanted to thank you for all your help. If you’re ever near the town of Time, ask for Lord Wythnos. Tell him how you met me, how you helped me, and he’ll help feed you, protect you, whatever you need.”
“And why would he do that, I wonder?” Mac said.
Jera looked up into his eyes. He smiled, his eyes gleaming.
“You know?” Jera said.
“Yes, we know,” he said. “Your picture’s everywhere. A few weeks ago the Force were out in, well, force, and came with dogs looking for a wealthy merchant’s daughter. When you turned up, it wasn’t too difficult putting two and two together. That, and the fact your face is on more wanted posters than us three put together. What we’d like to know is what you did that was so terrible to garner such attention.”
“I heard something I wasn’t supposed to.”
“Story of my life.”
Jera smiled.
“I want to give you something,” she said.
She took off the necklace Richard had bought her at Time market and handed it to Mac.
“Keep it close,” she said. “You can give it back to me when we meet again.”
Mac smiled.
“I will,” he said, putting it in his front jacket pocket. “You can come with us to the Capital, you know. We’ll keep you safe.”
“Thank you, but I need to check on my family. I have a sister. I need to make sure she’s all right.”
“I’m sure she’s fine.”
“I’d like to see her again, before anything bad happens.”
“What will be, will be,” Mac said. “And I have a gift for you too as it happens.”
“You already gave me this dress.”
“This gift is a little more… pragmatic than a dress.”
He came out with a pistol.
“It’s dangerous out there during these times of uncertainty and change,” he said, “especially for a young lady.”
“Thanks, but I don’t know how to use it.”
“Learn.”
He handed it to her, and a bagful of ammo.
“And there’s something else,” he said. “If you ever need me, go to the Troll Under the Bridge pub in the Capital and give this pistol to the barman. He’ll know what to do.”
“Thank you,” Jera said, tucking the pistol into her front dress pocket.
“Good luck out there,” Mac said.
They hugged and Mac went into the supply shop. Jera took a deep breath and turned and looked at the bustling town, the world congregated in one place. She walked through the over-crowded street, Puca balanced on her shoulder.
“Excuse me, Miss,” a man’s voice said.
She turned to find a small man with braided hair. He wore a shiny purple smock with flower patterns on the lapels.
“That’s a wonderful creature you have on your shoulder,” he said.
“Thank you,” Jera said.
“How much for him?”
“Excuse me?”
“How much for him?”
Jera looked past the man to his stall. It had shoes, handbags and accessories – all made of animal skin. Jera put her hand over Puca’s eyes.
“He’s not for sale,” she said.
The man smiled and opened his purse.
“Everything is for sale,” he said. “How much?”
Jera breezed past him.
“Excuse me, Miss!” said another voice.
This gentleman was middle-aged with a grey beard and matching suit.
“May I purchase your creature for our services?” he said.
Jera looked past him at his stall. Small animals were performing tricks before a group of children. Jera turned to Puca.
“Ever dreamed of a career in show business?” she said.
A child in the audience stood up, lumbered over to the animals and picked one up. It was chained by its foot to the table. The child pulled harder, and the poor little creature stretched by an inch.
“Maybe not,” Jera said.
“Excuse me, Miss!” ye
t another voice said.
Jera ignored the voice and moved to a stall selling hats. She bought a fedora and put Puca underneath it.
“Better?” Jera said.
A pair of white uniforms strolled down the boardwalk up ahead. Jera turned and pushed through the first door she came to. It was dark and dingy inside, with a thick layer of smoke. A few men sat at the bar bent over their glasses like squirrels protecting their nuts.
“What can I get you, Miss?” the barman said.
“Just a water, please.”
“We’ve got gin or whisky.”
“Your weakest gin, then,” Jera said.
The barman gave her the evil eye and then made her drink. Jera sat at the bar looking at the other patrons. They were beaten, low. She got the feeling they were never going to leave this bar and do something with their lives. Is that how she was going to end up?
Her drink came, and she tipped the barman, who didn’t give her so much as a smile. She sipped her drink. Her face scrunched up and her tongue lolled out. She pushed it away. The barman scowled. Jera pointed at the drink, smiled, and gave a thumbs up.
“What’ll we do now, Puca?” she said. “Head to the town of Time, I suppose.”
A tall man with a crooked smile ambled over to her. His pistol hung loose from his waist, his trousers a poor fit.
“Can I get you a drink, little lady?” he said.
“No, thanks,” Jera said. “I’m all right.”
The man edged closer, and Jera could smell the alcohol coming out of his pores.
“Then how’s about me and you just mosey on upstairs and get a little better acquainted? I’ve already got a room.”
Jera, cowed by his aggressive stance, looked away from him. He smirked, sensing easy prey.
Then Jera heard a sound like waves, rushing toward her. She looked around at the bar, but no one else reacted to it. A maelstrom engulfed her body and soul, and she skipped.
Chapter Thirty-One
Elian munched on a handful of berries, walking through the forest in an unhurried gait. The weather was nice and the birds were singing. It was a great day to be alive.
