The all-too-familiar bitterness rose in Nicholas’s throat like bile, and he fought to keep his expression neutral. He had faced darkness, shifted the timeline, and traveled to the ends of the world, and yet—his word would never satisfy those who believed he should still be in chains.
But Nicholas did not cower. He did not turn and run, though his instincts begged him to reconsider. He was a freeman—here, now, and everywhere. Any man who dared to question the point would be met with equal malice.
“Move along, then,” the soldier said, returning Nicholas’s nod with one of his own.
And so he did. What spare gold Ironwood—Ironwood!—had insisted he carry on his person as heir bought him a clean shirt, a buttonless coat, a skin for water, and a bottle of whiskey—the latter both for courage and, moments later, to clean the searing wound on his hand. The fact that he remained standing long enough to bind it with a clean cloth and did not soil himself in front of the entirety of the Dove was a miracle in its own right. The Dove’s innkeeper was none too pleased to see him reappear, and all too happy to send him on his way again with the small bag of belongings he had abandoned in his hurry to follow Etta through the passage to London.
“Here it is,” the man said, tossing it to him. “Kept everything you and your party left behind. Wouldn’t dare to cross that man.”
Nicholas lifted a brow. It looked full, but he had no doubt what few valuables were inside had been carefully assessed and possibly taken. Still, he thanked the man profusely, shifting the bag to his left hand to dig in his pocket for one last gold coin.
The flash of color and sight and sound at that touch blew him back off his feet. A crack of thunder whipped through his skull. He saw the tanner in Charleston he’d purchased the bag from years ago, as if the old man were standing directly in front of him. The shop began to take form, as if dripping into place around him, smearing down over the tavern’s tired walls. There was the pressure, the insistent tugging at his core….
Holy God.
He dropped the bag to the floor, feeling as if his bones were on the verge of turning to sand. The Dove’s owner leaped back at the moment Nicholas did, his eyes narrowing in suspicion.
“Thought I heard…a rat,” he said, his voice sounding far away. “In the bag. Just now.”
The man tilted his head toward the door. “Best be off, then.”
Nicholas stooped, hesitating a moment before picking the bag up again, this time with his right hand. When he was sure the world wasn’t about to shatter to pieces around him, he made quick strides toward the door and stepped out into the cold grip of the late-October air. His skin felt as if he had been sitting too close to flames, and rather than see his original plan through—wait and see if he might be able to convince a passing wagon to let him trade work for a ride in the direction of Connecticut—he wandered farther down the road, away from the Dove, from the Royal Artillery Park, until the only sounds were the birds in the old oak above him and his thrumming heart. He pressed his back against the tree, sliding down until he sat again, his palms turned up against his knees.
That was a passage.
Impossible.
With considerable care, he went about the work of unwrapping his burned hand again, laying it side by side with his right one. He looked at the mark of the astrolabe on his skin, the raw, blistered, and scabbed image of it. I saw the past.
More than that, there was no other way to describe it, except to say he had felt himself begin to go. The world had shifted around him, and if he had only reached out, held on, the darkness would have reached out and taken him.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” he said, because Sophia was not there to.
But…how to test this? He needed to prove himself wrong. Remus Jacaranda’s explanation for the astrolabe rose in his memory, creating a quake of horror in him: to create a passage, legend holds that you must have the astrolabe, but you must also have something from the time and year you wish to go.
He sorted through his bag, searching for something he might have procured in Nassau over the past year. The weapons were gone; the buckle from his shoe, sold; everything—
Everything except the thin leather cord around his neck, the one that held Etta’s earrings and a small, broken bead. He reached up with his aching hand and closed his fist around it, letting his eyes slip shut.
The first drip of color brought the turquoise of the clear, pristine water; the next, the ivory sands of the beach; the third, the unstoppable, vibrant green of the palms that had shaded him and Sophia on their spot at the beach. The air began to stir, pinching at each of his muscles, until, in the distance, that dark spot appeared, twisting, flying toward him. Nicholas forced himself to stay in place, to meet that darkness as it came alongside him, gripped him by the collar, and dragged him forward.
There was nothing to do save surrender himself to the sensation of being buried alive. The darkness was as oppressive as the nudging pressure that raced toward him from every direction, and the high whistle accompanying it trilled ceaselessly, even after he was launched forward into sunlight and sand, the briny scent of the ocean rising to greet him.
“Bloody hell!” he swore, staggering to his feet. The tide rushed in behind, crashing against the beach and sending up a spray of foam that whipped him back to his senses.
“Aye,” said a familiar voice behind him. “I think that’s about the right of it.”
Nicholas spun around, half-desperate with hope. There, standing less than three yards away, surveying the spot where he and Sophia had made camp, was Captain Hall.