Emerald Green

We reached the library unnoticed, and when Lucas had closed the door and locked it behind us, he breathed a sigh of relief. “We made it!” The room itself was much the same as in my own time, except that the two armchairs by the fireplace had different covers, a Scottish plaid pattern in green and blue instead of the present cream roses on a moss-green background. There was a teapot on a warming plate on the little table between the chairs, plus two cups and—I closed my eyes, and when I opened them again it was true, it wasn’t a hallucination—there was a plate of sandwiches! Not dry biscuits, but real, nourishing sandwiches! I couldn’t believe it. Lucas dropped into one of the armchairs and pointed to the other one.

“Do sit down, and if you’re hungry, help yours—” But I already had helped myself. I was digging my teeth into the first sandwich.

“You’ve saved my life,” I said with my mouth full. Then something occurred to me. “They’re not pastrami sandwiches, I hope?”

“No, ham and cucumber,” said Lucas. “You look tired.”

“So do you.”

“I still haven’t quite recovered from all the excitement yesterday evening. Just now, like I told you, I had to have a whisky. Well, two whiskies. But now two things are clear to me … yes, help yourself to another sandwich, and take the time to chew it properly. It’s quite alarming to see you bolt them down like that.”

“Carry on,” I said. Oh, how good the food tasted! I felt I’d never in my life eaten such delicious sandwiches. “What two things are clear to you?”

“Well, first, good as it is to see you, our meetings must take place much farther in the future if they’re to produce results. We should meet as close as possible to your date of birth. By then, perhaps I’ll have understood what Lucy and Paul are planning and why, and I’ll certainly know more than I do now. That means next time we meet should be in 1993. Then I’ll also be able to help you over this business with the ball.”

Yes, that sounded logical.

“And second, none of it will work unless I make my way much farther into the Guardians’ center of power, right into the Inner Circle.”

I nodded vigorously. I couldn’t say anything because my mouth was too full.

“So far I haven’t felt very keen on that kind of thing.” Lucas glanced at the Montrose family’s coat of arms hanging above the fireplace. A sword surrounded by roses, and under it the words HIC RHODOS, HIC SALTA, meaning something like “Show what you can really do.”

“I certainly started out from a good position in the Lodge—after all, representatives of the Montrose family were among the founder members in 1745, and I’m also married to a potential gene carrier from the Jade line. However, I didn’t really intend to commit myself to the Lodge any more than necessary.… Well, that’s all changed now. For you and Lucy and Paul, I’ll go so far as to butter up Kenneth de Villiers. I don’t know whether I’ll succeed, but—”

“Oh, yes, you will! You’ll even get to be Grand Master,” I said, brushing crumbs off my pajamas. I only just managed to suppress a satisfied belch. It felt wonderful to have a full stomach again. “Let’s think; in the year 1993, you’ll be—”

“Ssh!” Lucas leaned forward and put a finger on my lips. “I don’t want to hear it. Maybe it’s not very sensible of me, but I don’t want to know what the future has in store for me unless it will help where you’re concerned. I have thirty-seven years to live before we meet again, and I’d like to spend them as … well, as free of anxiety as possible. Can you understand that?”

“Yes.” I looked at him sadly. “Yes, I can understand it very well.” In the circumstances, it probably wasn’t a good idea to tell him that Aunt Maddy and Mr. Bernard suspected he hadn’t died a natural death. I could always warn him about that when we met in 1993.

I leaned back in my chair and tried to smile. “Then let’s talk about the magic of the raven, Grandpa. Because there’s something you don’t yet know about me.”

London is still under attack. Yesterday and the day before, German squadrons were flying overhead all day, dropping bombs which severely damaged the entire London area. The London County Council has now made vaults under parts of the City and the Royal Courts of Justice accessible for use as public air raid shelters. So we have begun walling up some of our passages, we have tripled the number of guards on duty in the cellars, and we have armed them with contemporary as well as traditional weapons.

The three of us elapsed from the documents room to the year 1851 again today, after going through the security process. We all brought books, and if only Lady Tilney had shown a little more sense of humor regarding my jocular remarks on her reading matter, instead of starting a quarrel again, everything would have gone smoothly. I stand by my opinion that the works of this modern German poet Rilke are sheer nonsense, one cannot understand a word of them, and furthermore it is unpatriotic to read German literature when we are in the middle of a war. I hate it when anyone tries to make me change my mind, which Lady Tilney is intent upon doing. She was just trying to explain a particularly confused passage about withered hands hopping about, damp and heavy like toads after rain, when there was a knock at the door. Of course … and so

FROM THE ANNALS OF THE GUARDIANS

2 APRIL 1916

“Duo quum faciunt idem, non est idem” (Terence)

Marginal note: 17/5/1986

Page obviously rendered illegible by spilt coffee. Pages 34 to 36 missing entirely. I would like to see a rule introduced to the effect that novices may read the Annals only under supervision.

D. Clarkson, archivist (sorely tried!)

FIVE

“OH, NO, you’ve been crying again!” said Xemerius, who was waiting for me in the secret passage.

I simply said yes. Saying good-bye to Lucas had been very hard, and I wasn’t the only one who had had to suppress a few tears. We wouldn’t see each other again for thirty-seven years, at least from his point of view, and that seemed an unimaginably long time to both of us. I felt like traveling to the year 1993 right away, but Lucas had made me promise to get a good night’s rest. If you could call it that—it was two in the morning, and I’d have to get up again at quarter to seven. Mum would probably have to use a crane to haul me out of bed.

As Xemerius didn’t answer back, I shone the flashlight on his face. I was probably just imagining it, but I thought he looked a little sad, and I realized that I’d neglected him all day.

“Nice of you to wait for me, Xemi … Xemerius,” I said, suddenly feeling a wave of affection. I’d have liked to stroke him, but you can’t stroke or pet ghosts.

“I wasn’t waiting, I just happen to be here. I’ve been looking around for a good place to hide that thing.” He pointed to the chronograph. I wrapped it in my bathrobe again and got it first balanced on my hip, then tucked under my arm.

Xemerius flew upstairs beside me. “If you break through the back of your wardrobe—it’s only plasterboard, you can do it easily—you could crawl into the space behind it. There are all sorts of possible hiding places there.”

“I think I’ll just put it under my bed for tonight.” I felt so tired that my legs were heavy as lead. I had switched off the flashlight; I could find the way to my bedroom in the dark. I could probably even do it in my sleep. I was half-asleep anyway by the time I was passing Charlotte’s room, so I almost dropped the chronograph when her door suddenly opened and I was caught in the light from inside.

“Oh, shit,” muttered Xemerius. “Everyone was fast asleep just now, honest!”

“Aren’t you a bit too old for Peter Rabbit pajamas?” asked Charlotte. She was leaning in the doorway, looking very pretty in a nightie with spaghetti straps, and her hair fell in glossy waves over her shoulders. (That’s the good thing about braided hairstyles—the braids act as built-in curlers, so you look like a Christmas tree fairy when you undo them.)

“Are you crazy, scaring me like that?” I whispered so that Aunt Glenda wouldn’t wake up as well.

“Why are you slinking along my corridor in the middle of the night? And what’s that you’re carrying?”

“What do you mean, your corridor? Do you expect me to climb up the outside of the house to reach my room?”

Charlotte moved away from the door frame and came a step closer. “What’s that under your arm?” she repeated, threateningly this time. It sounded even worse because she was whispering. And she looked so … well, dangerous that I didn’t dare to pass her.

“Uh-oh,” said Xemerius. “Someone has a bad attack of PMS. I wouldn’t want to tangle with her today.”

I had no intention of doing any such thing. “You mean my bathrobe?”

“Show me what’s inside it!” she demanded.

I stepped back. “You are crazy! Why on earth do you want me to show you my bathrobe in the middle of the night? Now let me by, please. I want to go to bed.”

“And I want to see what you’re carrying,” hissed Charlotte. “Do you really think I’m as naive as you? Do you think I didn’t notice those conspiratorial looks and all that whispering? If you want to keep something secret from me, you’ll have to be more subtle about it. What about the little chest that your brother and Mr. Bernard took up to you? Was what you’re carrying under your arm inside it?”

“She’s not stupid,” said Xemerius, scratching his nose with one wing.

At any other time of day, and if I’d been less sleepy, I’m sure I’d have thought up some story on the spur of the moment, but right now, my nerves just weren’t up to it. “None of your business!” I snapped.

“Oh, yes, it is,” snapped Charlotte back. “I may not be the Ruby and a member of the Circle of Twelve, but unlike you, at least I think like one! I couldn’t hear everything you lot were saying up in your room, the doors in this house are too thick, but what I did hear was quite enough!” She took another step toward me and pointed to my bathrobe. “So show me that this minute, if you don’t want me to take it.”

“You were eavesdropping on us?” I suddenly felt sick to my stomach. How much had she found out? Did she know that that was the chronograph? And it seemed to have doubled its weight within the last minute. I gripped it firmly in both hands for safety’s sake, dropping Nick’s flashlight on the floor with a clatter. By now I wasn’t so sure that I wanted Aunt Glenda to go on sleeping.

“Did you know that Gideon and I were trained in Krav Maga?” Charlotte took another step closer to me, and I automatically took one back.

“No, but did you know that at this moment you look like that crazy rodent in Ice Age?”

“Maybe we’re in luck and Krav Maga is just some kind of harmless smut,” said Xemerius. “Like Kama Sutra. Ha, ha, ha!” He giggled. “’Scuse me, I always think up my best jokes in desperate situations.”