Arrows of Time (11 page)

‘Drayco, this seems uncomfortably familiar to me.’

The temple cat didn’t answer. He bristled, staring up into the tree.

Rosette followed his gaze. ‘What, Dray? What’s up there?’

A man with a sword.

‘Shane?’

‘Rosette?’

What’s happening?
She and Drayco said the words at the same time, looking at each other, then back up the tree as Shane dropped down to the ground in front of them. ‘This is more than déjà vu,’ Rosette said, looking from her familiar to Shane. ‘I think we’re going in circles.’

‘
D
id you hear that?’ Jarrod asked. Selene stopped for a moment, cocking her head. A gust of wind rustled in the bare branches, shaking the twigs like nervous fingers. A raven cawed in the distance. ‘Hear what?’

‘Sounded like an explosion.’

‘You’ve got good ears,’ she said, moving on again. ‘It’s probably a shaker. We get them a lot this time of year.’

‘You mean an earthquake?’

Selene frowned. ‘I don’t know. Do I?’

‘The ground rolls like the ocean.’ Jarrod waved his hand through the air in undulations. ‘Teacups fall off the shelves, mountains slide, trees uproot, bridges fall.’

‘That’s a shaker. What do you call it again?’

‘Earthquake.’

‘Did you hear one?’

‘I think so, from back the way we came.’

Tremors rolled underfoot.

‘That’d be one, for sure,’ she said. ‘Worried about your friends?’

He pushed his hair off his forehead. ‘I’m…concerned.’

‘Semantics,’ she said. ‘I can see the worry on your face.’ She stared at him. ‘We can’t go back.’

‘What about Shane? Don’t you
worry
about him?’

Her face smoothed. Whatever she felt about the man was suddenly pushed away. ‘What about him?’ she asked, her tone void of inflection.

Jarrod shrugged. ‘It’s possible he was caught in the earthquake. That doesn’t concern you?’

‘It certainly doesn’t concern you.’

‘Right.’ Jarrod wondered at her response. ‘I just thought he might be…’

‘He’s fine.’ She cut him off with a wave.

Definitely some tension there.
Jarrod decided to change the subject. ‘Can I ask where we’re headed?’

‘T’locity.’

‘Person, place or thing?’ he queried, looking at the bleak surroundings. It was hard to imagine a township in this terrain. The landscape was one huge quagmire.

‘Place.’

‘Village?’

‘City. It’s quite grand. You’ll see.’ Selene adjusted her sword belt and led him on. ‘This way.’

Eventually the mire gave way to a firm dirt road, the dead oaks and rotten stench replaced by fragrant groves of pines with sticky-sweet resin dripping down the trunks and dark green needles poking skyward. The trees were interspersed with the red branches and peeling bark of Manzanita in full bloom. The white velvet bell blossoms were rimmed in blood-red and they dangled on the twisted branches—puppets bobbing in the breeze. Sunlight filtered through the canopy, turning Selene’s face golden. The landscape
had radically altered from decayed to fecund, reminding him of her abrupt change of mood. She was definitely of this land, both dark and light.

There were still plenty of Corvids about, though once out of the stark background, they looked more like curious friends following the travellers’ progress than ominous scavengers waiting for mishap. There were other birds as well, all contributing their songs, verse and chorus, to the atmosphere. Tiny blue fairy wrens and red spotted finches chattered in the undergrowth, teetering on brambles and vines, searching for grasshoppers and grubs. A raptor whistled above. Jarrod didn’t recognise the call, though it sounded similar to that of a black falcon. A large family of magpies chortled back and forth, flapping and swooping about them. It made him feel quite at home.

‘We’ll stop for a wash.’ Selene’s voice jarred him out of his musings. She was pointing towards a line of trees at the side of the road.

‘Where?’ he asked, seeing only a deeper forest.

‘There’re hot pools at the bottom of that ravine.’

‘I wouldn’t mind a drink and a wash.’

‘It’s not about what you would mind or not mind,’ she said. ‘It’s about presenting well to the Caller. You probably don’t realise how you smell.’

‘That bad?’ Jarrod rolled up his sleeves as he followed her along a winding path towards the water. ‘The swamp was noisome…’

She spun her head around and smiled so briefly that he wasn’t sure if he’d imagined it. ‘Exceedingly,’ she said. ‘I’m sure I don’t smell any better.’

A short way into the woods they came to a gorge, nestled between the trees like a temple garden. A path wound down to the bottom where head-high boulders stood sentry around the river basin. Some rocks had miniature pine trees and tiny oaks growing from cracks
in their sides, reminding him of the bonsai grown on the Isle of Lemur. Steam rose from the water where it pooled in deep green eddies. The mist hung about, as it did over the swamp, but the smells here were fresh and aromatic—thyme, pine needles and eucalyptus blossoms—a welcome change.

Jarrod knelt in the white sand, cupping his hands to sip the sparkling water. ‘It’s icy!’ he said, turning to her, his lips tingling from the touch.

‘Not in the depths,’ she answered.

‘Subterranean thermals?’

Selene raised one eyebrow. ‘You speak our language, but there are some words I don’t recognise.’

‘I mean underground fissures that vent…’

‘Underground, yes. I’ve got to wash properly,’ Selene said, cutting into his sentence as if the rest of what he had to say held no interest. She unbuttoned her cloak and sword belt.

Jarrod didn’t bother explaining more but watched her strip naked and wade out into the water. It lapped around her waist, sending goosebumps over her back. She submerged her body, coming up with a gasp, water running off her face and glistening over the serpents tattooed on her forearms. Across her heart, between her breasts, was a wide red scar. It didn’t look new.

‘It’s warm here, in the depths,’ she said, swimming out into the middle of a large eddy. ‘Come on.’

He didn’t move but simply watched.

‘I’m not bringing you to the Caller stinking of the Black Swamp.’ She spoke before diving under the surface again.

Jarrod started unlacing his boots as she came up for air.

‘Who’s the Caller, exactly?’ he asked.

‘She’s the one who sent for you, the one we’re going to T’locity to meet.’

Jarrod had a fleeting intuition that Selene might have it all wrong, that he may not be the one the Caller wanted to see at all. He sent a silent plea to Drayco and Rosette while stepping out of his clothes, but there was no reply. If Rosette didn’t show soon, he’d have to think up a new set of possibilities.

Selene scrutinised him as he entered the stream. ‘You have no scars,’ she said, a frown crossing her face. ‘And no tattoos?’

‘The first is right,’ he smiled. ‘No scars on this body, but…’ He turned his back to her, revealing a solar disk between his shoulder blades, held up by wings that spanned his broad shoulders, the tips extending down the backs of his arms. Two cobras draped the length of his spine, rearing up at the small of his back.

‘Oh.’ Selene’s mouth formed the shape of a circle. ‘What creatures are those?’

‘The cobras? They are similar to yours,’ he said, indicating her forearms as he waded deeper into the river. ‘Ah, here’s the warmth.’ He gave a brief smile before diving. When he came up for air, she was right in front of him, ready with another query.

‘What do they mean?’

Jarrod hesitated. He didn’t want to reveal too much to this woman. The more time he spent with her, the more he felt curiously uncomfortable. Something didn’t seem right. ‘Cobras are guardians.’

‘Guardians?’ She said the word slowly.

‘Protectors.’

She nodded, dipping her chin under the water as she did, treading to stay afloat. ‘And what is it they guard? Is someone after you?’

He winked. ‘Not at all, now that I have my cobras.’

Selene didn’t look impressed. They trod water in silence, staring at each other before swimming back to shore. She asked no more about it. He got the feeling
she was making up her mind about him. He hoped her conclusion would be beneficial.

The sun came out fully as they emerged from the pool, warm against bare skin. They busied themselves with tasks—drying hair, shaking out their clothes and washing away the worst of the caked mud from cuffs and hems.

‘Hungry?’ Selene asked, reaching into her cloak pocket. She pulled out a pouch filled with slices of dark bread laced with fruit and nuts.

‘Not right now.’ Jarrod shook his head. ‘Thanks anyway.’

She looked at him sideways. ‘What kind of man are you?’

‘A different kind,’ he said. He could eat, and happily, but he didn’t want to. He certainly didn’t need to. His body was a tulpa, made and held together by thought, and as long as his thoughts were healthy, so his body would be, regardless of whether he fed it or not.
Energy follows thought,
he mused.

Right now most of his thoughts and energy were focused on locating Rosette, and he didn’t want any distraction. He knew if Drayco had come through the portal, and Rosette had emerged from the cave, the temple cat would hear his mental messages. At least, he would if he were alive. Jarrod looked at Selene, smiling to hide his uncertainties.
Dwelling on this ‘what if’ certainly isn’t going to help
, he reminded himself.

Once she’d eaten, they dressed in damp but clean clothes and returned to the road. Eventually it merged into a paved thoroughfare that became increasingly trafficked, the congestion quite a contrast to the earlier part of their journey. Carts drawn by dappled horses passed them by, as did larger wagons pulled by teams of shaggy brown oxen with gold rings in their noses. They lifted their cloven hooves slowly, like great weights were
attached. From time to time, one would bellow, stopping suddenly to swing its head back to its flank, licking away swarms of flies. Long-haired alpacas, or creatures that looked much like them according to Jarrod’s databanks, were led placidly behind their owners, their backs strapped with mountains of colourful cloth and assorted boxes.

Selene was given a wide berth, and Jarrod wondered at the woman’s rank. She didn’t look to have anything that distinguished her, save the brooch at her throat. She made no eye contact, nor did she acknowledge the other people at all. And they were careful of her. There were no greetings, shouts or waves. There was only wary silence.

‘Popular in these parts?’ he asked, after a group of children skirted around them, the adults pulling them away.

She said nothing. He tried again.

‘How are you related to the Caller?’

‘I’m not.’

‘Then you are…?’

‘As I said, I’m the first marshal of the border scouts.’ She looked at him as if he were a slow learner.

‘I’ve no idea what that means,’ he said loudly, projecting his voice over the street noise.

‘I patrol the borders.’

‘The borders of what?’

‘Tensar.’

‘And that is?’

She frowned at him but didn’t answer. Perhaps she didn’t take it as a serious question.

‘And the Caller? What does she do?’ Jarrod persisted.

Selene turned to him, her hands on her hips. ‘It’s like this, Jarrod. The Caller keeps everything in sequence. The border scouts keep out the inflections. Get it?’

Jarrod checked his database to see if he had the word meanings correct. ‘What sequence?’

‘The sequence of time.’

‘Of course,’ he agreed as they continued walking. What was this woman on about? It startled him how he could understand the words but not the meaning of her sentences. ‘And the inflections?’ he asked.

‘Inflections are,’ she said, laughing at his quizzical look, ‘those like you.’

S
hane looked out over the swamp, scratching his head. If he thought he had problems with his love-life, this current situation made them insignificant. He sat down, his back to the granite wall, and pulled out his flute. His fingers shook. He knew what would happen next. What he didn’t know was how long it would take before it started or how long it would keep happening.

He suspected that the woman, Rosette, and her big black temple tabby had caused this strange and repeating sequence of events. She clearly wasn’t from T’locity and perhaps not even of Tensar itself. If so, it may have been a glitch in her travel methods—whatever those may be—that had snagged Time. He thought for a moment about killing her to see if it would break the cycle, but he didn’t like the idea. He’d never get past the feline, for starters, and he didn’t have the heart for it, or the stomach. She was lovely. Whatever the solution to their time-entrapment
problem was, they would have to work it out together. He needed to remember to discuss it with her again, as soon as she appeared. It wouldn’t be long now.

The mystery schools of T’locity had taught about these occurrences—rare snicks in the fabric of time where a sequence of events would play out in an infinite number of versions of itself. He felt nauseous just thinking about it. What bad luck to stumble into this mess. He had to figure out how to pull himself out. Rosette too, if he could.

He might be better equipped to manage such an anomaly had he not flunked out of the Darkwood Mystery School in his third term. That had been years ago and, as it was, he could only remember a listing of the proclivity of time, and not much about its management. If he’d stayed on, he might have some idea of how to deal with this.

As it was, he’d failed, not from a lack of intelligence or focus exactly, but from a lack of desire. His aptitudes, and his heart, lay elsewhere, in the lilting sounds of the flute and the driving rhythms of his guitar. Music to him was a mystery teaching of its own, and he’d followed it, away from the learned halls of Darkwood and into T’locity’s market festivals and pubs where he would play from early morning to late night and on into the morning again. It was his true calling, that he knew, but the price he’d had to pay for it was grave—Selene broke her bond with him. She said he was wasting himself on thin air. She shunned him like a trinket that had lost its shine.