A Discovery of Witches(218)

“We?” I’d asked in surprise. “Won’t I just meet you there?”

“Not unless there’s no alternative. I wasn’t the same creature then, and I wouldn’t entirely trust my past selves with you.”

His mouth had softened with relief after I nodded in agreement. A few days ago, he’d rejected the idea of timewalking. Apparently the risks of staying put were even worse.

“What will the others do?”

His thumb traveled slowly over the veins on the back of my hand. “Miriam and Marcus will go back to Oxford. The Congregation will look for you here first. It would be best if Sarah and Emily went away, at least for a little while. Would they go to Ysabeau?” Matthew wondered.

On the surface it had sounded like a ridiculous idea. Sarah and Ysabeau under the same roof? The more I’d considered it, though, the less implausible it seemed.

“I don’t know,” I’d mused. Then a new worry had surfaced. “Marcus.” I didn’t fully understand the intricacies of the Knights of Lazarus, but with Matthew gone he would have to shoulder even more responsibility.

“There’s no other way,” Matthew had said in the darkness, quieting me with a kiss.

This was precisely the point that Em now wanted to argue.

“There must be another way,” she protested.

“I tried to think of one, Emily,” Matthew said apologetically.

“Where—or should I say when—are you planning on going? Diana won’t exactly blend into the background. She’s too tall.” Miriam looked down at her own tiny hands.

“Regardless of whether Diana could fit in, it’s too dangerous,” Marcus said firmly. “You might end up in the middle of a war. Or an epidemic.”

“Or a witch-hunt.” Miriam didn’t say it maliciously, but three heads swung around in indignation nonetheless.

“Sarah, what do you think?” asked Matthew.

Of all the creatures in the room, she was the calmest. “You’ll take her to a time when she’ll be with witches who will help her?”

“Yes.”

Sarah closed her eyes for a moment, then opened them. “You two aren’t safe here. Juliette Durand proved that. And if you aren’t safe in Madison, you aren’t safe anywhere.”

“Thank you.” Matthew opened his mouth to say something else, and Sarah held up her hand.

“Don’t promise me anything,” she said, voice tight. “You’ll be careful for her sake, if not for your own.”

“Now all we have to worry about is the timewalking.” Matthew turned businesslike. “Diana will need three items from a particular time and place in order to move safely.”

Sarah nodded.

“Do I count as a thing?” he asked her.

“Do you have a pulse? Of course you’re not a thing!” It was one of the most positive statements Sarah had ever made about vampires.

“If you need old stuff to guide your way, you’re welcome to these.” Marcus pulled a thin leather cord from the neck of his shirt and lifted it over his head. It was festooned with a bizarre assortment of items, including a tooth, a coin, a lump of something that shone black and gold, and a battered silver whistle. He tossed it to Matthew.

“Didn’t you get this off a yellow-fever victim?” Matthew asked, fingering the tooth.

“In New Orleans,” Marcus replied. “The epidemic of 1819.”

“New Orleans is out of the question,” Matthew said sharply.

“I suppose so.” Marcus slid a glance my way, then returned his attention to his father. “How about Paris? One of Fanny’s earbobs is on there.”

Matthew’s fingers touched a tiny red stone set in gold filigree. “Philippe and I sent you away from Paris, and Fanny, too. They called it the Terror, remember? It’s no place for Diana.”

“The two of you fussed over me like old women. I’d been in one revolution already. Besides, if you’re looking for a safe place in the past, you’ll have a hell of a time finding one,” Marcus grumbled. His face brightened. “Philadelphia?”

“I wasn’t in Philadelphia with you, or in California,” Matthew said hastily before his son could speak. “It would be best if we head for a time and place I know.”

“Even if you know where we’re going, Matthew, I’m not sure I can pull this off.” My decision to stay clear of magic had caught up with me again.

“I think you can,” Sarah said bluntly, “you have been doing it your whole life. When you were a baby, as a child when you played hide-and-seek with Stephen, and as an adolescent, too. Remember all those mornings we dragged you out of the woods and had to clean you up in time for school? What do you imagine you were doing then?”

“Certainly not timewalking,” I said truthfully. “The science of this still worries me. Where does this body go when I’m somewhere else?”

“Who knows? But don’t worry. It’s happened to everybody. You drive to work and don’t remember how you got there. Or the whole afternoon passes and you don’t have a clue what you did. Whenever something like that happens, you can bet there’s a timewalker nearby,” explained Sarah. She was remarkably unfazed at the prospect.

Matthew sensed my apprehension and took my hand in his. “Einstein said that all physicists were aware that the distinctions between past, present, and future were only what he called ‘a stubbornly persistent illusion.’ Not only did he believe in marvels and wonders, he also believed in the elasticity of time.”