Page 128 of Never a Hero

‘I don’t know about shouldn’t have or should have,’ Aaron said. ‘But my mother always used to say: From here on …’

There was a shade of vulnerability in his expression. He’d barely spoken of his mother in the previous timeline. Joan knew what it must have taken for him to quote her now. She nodded.

Aaron took a breath. ‘I’d better get the rest of the things on my list.’

Joan looked down at the dress he’d given her. She still had a few things to get too.

Joan found a jacket that matched the dress, an overcoat, a pair of shoes, and a cloche hat. Weapons next, she thought. But instead, she found herself walking over to the jewellery cabinets.

Three glass cases stood along the room’s shortest wall. From afar, the jewellery had looked like a museum display; closer, the pieces didn’t look cheap exactly, but they were eclectic: a statement necklace of enamel violets, a scarab ring, a milk-green jade pendant. Little handwritten stickers under each piece provided a price. The statement necklace had a small element built into the chain, next to the clasp: a gold rectangular frame with three rotatable numbers; it reminded Joan of a combination lock. The numbers read 100. It took her a full second to absorb the meaning. There were a hundred years of human life in that necklace. As the wearer travelled, they could rotate the numbers to show the remaining time.

Like the clothes, all the jewellery was neatly organised. The bottom shelf had plain charm bracelets. The shelves above held the charms themselves: cute enamel birds, enamel skulls, sigils from each family. Even the Hunt fox was there. Five years each. Joan pictured, with a roil of nausea, monsters discarding the used charms like throwing out food packaging.

Joan stepped back. The next shelf up had chain necklaces. Above them were red pendants: ten years each. Then green: twenty years. Black: fifty years.

Then the statement necklaces: one hundred years, two hundred years, five hundred years.

Joan took another step back. For a second, the cabinet was so clearly a display of corpses that it was like she could see people splayed out in death.

She felt rather than saw someone slip into the space beside her. She glanced up, expecting Tom or Jamie. Her stomach turned over. It was Nick.

‘Have you chosen a piece?’ he asked her.

Joan couldn’t suppress a shudder at the thought. He wasn’t looking at her but at the cabinet. His eyes were clear of influence and hard as flint. She glanced over her shoulder. Only Tom was visible among the aisles. ‘The Argent power didn’t work on you this time, did it?’ she said.

He didn’t react. He could have been a statue of himself. ‘I told you it wouldn’t.’

Joan’s chest tightened. ‘Unforgivable?’ It came out as a question, although she hadn’t intended that.

Nick looked at her directly—for the first time since the failed compulsion. Pain crossed his face, almost too briefly to read.

‘I thought you might kill us afterward,’ Joan whispered.

‘I gathered.’ Nick turned back to the cabinet of corpses. ‘How much life is in here?’ he wondered. ‘All these charms and pendants … Thirty charms times five years. That’s a hundred and fifty years.’ His lips moved as he quickly calculated the rest. ‘There’s nearly ten thousand years of human life on this wall, I’d say.’

Joan hadn’t done that calculation. Her stomach rolled.

‘That’s a hundred and twenty-five whole, long human lives from birth to old age,’ Nick said. ‘A massacre. But monsters don’t steal time like that, do they? You told me that they take it in small increments. So maybe we’re looking at ten thousand people dying a year earlier than they should have.’ Joan heard her own indrawn breath. He looked at her. ‘Life means something,’ he whispered to her. ‘When my dad died—’ His voice cracked. ‘After Dad died, I missed him more than I could ever have imagined. And I had fourteen years with him. My little brother Robbie only had two. Robbie doesn’t remember him. And … Dad was such a good man, you know? Just good. Kind. Wise.’ He swallowed visibly. ‘I would give anything for Robbie, for my little sister, Alice, to have a year more with him. For them to remember him.’ His eyes shone wetly. ‘I would give anything to see him again.’

Joan swallowed around the lump in her own throat. After her family had died, she’d had those same thoughts. She’d have given anything for a year more with them. For an hour more. Even a minute would have been enough to tell them that she loved them one more time.

‘I can’t do it,’ Nick said softly.

‘Can’t do what?’ Joan said. But some part of her already knew what he was going to say: Nick would never steal time from another human. Her eyes were already wet when he answered.

‘I can’t take anyone else’s life,’ Nick said.

Joan felt a tear fall. ‘Nick,’ she said. It came out with so much emotion that Nick seemed startled. ‘If you do this, you’re going to lose thirty-two years of life.’

He searched her face, as if trying to solve a puzzle. ‘I know,’ he said finally. ‘I understand.’

Joan’s heart hurt. The thing was, though, that he was right. All the little numbers in the cabinet weren’t abstract at all. These necklaces and charms carried the lives of people like Mr Larch. Like Margie. People who loved and were loved.

Never again, Joan had said to Nick, when he’d asked if she stole human life. She’d meant it then. Did she mean it still?

She took a deep breath. ‘I understand too,’ she managed. He was right. Life meant something.

She’d taken life from herself before—to escape from him. About thirty years, she guessed. Had that been reset when the timeline had changed? Or was she already thirty years down? Would thirty-two more mean she’d have lost more than sixty years of life by the end of this?

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