Page 20 of Kiss Across the Universe
Veris’ posture was unrelenting. His jaw flexed. “He’ll have gone back to a time that he’s comfortable with. One he knows well and likes.”
Brody leaned forward. “Did you look at his theses? The ones he wrote for his minor degrees? What were they on?”
“Kieren?” Cáel said, with an apologetic note in his voice.
Kieren frowned, clearly dredging his memory.
“Kieren is one of the co-captains leading the hunt,” Cáel added.
Kieren’s frown smoothed out. “Fifth and sixth century Britain. I remember thinking the man was a one note wonder. It’s not a popular destination for touristsoracademics. After he got his doctorate, he moved onto eras for which funding was more certain.”
Brody sat back. “That’s where he is, then.”
“Not possible,” Kieren said flatly. “We turned that time upside down.”
Veris lifted a finger. “You turned the place upside down for the time you could stay there, which is how long?”
Kieren’s jaw rippled. He glanced at Cáel.
“We’ve had travelers last for over nine months, if they were fresh and their symbiont well rested,” Cáel said carefully and slowly. “But they were exceptions, not an average. The travelers who managed it were highly motivated. They knew to take it easy, to not exert themselves overly much, to stay as healthy as they could, to avoid even minor infections—which is harder than you think.”
“In any era, and for any of us,” Veris said, his tone still smooth. “But Kieren’s people were actively hunting a man and there are no interwebs there to track down his social accounts.”
Cáel blinked.
“Neural nets,” Kieren said softly.
Cáel nodded, his puzzlement evaporating.
Kieren turned to look at Veris. “We lasted six weeks.” His tone was almost apologetic.Almost.
Veris got to his feet, which meant everyone could see him. “We can stay there for years, if we need to. We can spend months travelling up and down Britain and across Europe, hunting down every little hint or rumor.” He was looking at Cáel and Nyara. “And Brody and I know that time and place. We lived through it.”
Brody sat up straighter. His expression was still controlled but Alannah could almostfeelhis eagerness.
Her mother was smiling, her gaze upon Veris, her eyes shining.
“Wewill find Rufus Shore,” Veris finished.
Chapter Nine
When everyone realized that Verismeant to leave immediately, the interior of the house took on a frantic air. Kieren was sent back to the future to gather information that would pinpoint an exact date for Taylor to aim for, even though Taylor and the other jumpers in the house said that she didn’t need the data—the bookmark would already be there on the timeline, if she was meant to go there.
Cáel and Nyara—who suddenly seemed a lot more sober than she had before Veris’ announcement—consulted with Veris and Taylor and Brody over by the kitchen door, their voices low.
Everyone else busied themselves with clearing the dinner tables, and cleaning up the meal and the dishes. Every now and then, Veris would call out to someone as they passed, and include them in the conversation. David was one of them, and he remained in the small group, his head down, speaking as softly as the others.
Alannah cleared the tables, then volunteered to wash the dishes that wouldn’t fit in the dishwasher. Anything to keep moving and not have to think about the time jump her parents were about to make…or the possibly years-long search they would undertake at the other end of the jump.
They wouldn’t have to contend with being separated when they arrived, because Taylor would complete a compound jump, taking their contemporary bodies across the timescape, instead of mentally inserting everyone into their bodies in the arrival time. They couldn’t risk a linear jump like that because Brody might be inserted into the body of a young boy, and Veris could very well still be in what would become Norway, or Saxony, where he went when his village drove him out for killing his beloved wife, Tyra. Who had been Taylor, who had disappeared when she had returned to this time.
Oh, the complications of time travel!
Alannah had grown up listening to the tales of doom and disaster that her parents, and Alex and Rafe and Sydney and even Neven and Remi and London had shared.
So she kept herself busy, not letting her mind rest for too long on the risks her parents were facing.
Taylor found her in the butler’s pantry, carefully stacking the piles of dinner plates and flatware that were used only for big family gatherings like this one…and were used more often than one might think.
