She believed Lady Kendall’s oath, believed in the honesty of it. She didn’t swear to never hurt Jane again. That was naive, not to mention impossible. She swore she would never mean to, a promise she would need to strive to keep every day. A promise of time. Of love.
Beatrix reaches for her cloak. She has mended the black wool a few times, but it isn’t threadbare yet. It will last through the cool damp of spring, at least. She folds it neatly and drapes it over the leather case.
It is time for her to go.
She takes Jane’s traveling cloak from the wardrobe, the vibrant green of oak moss in summer. It will be warmer than her own but more noticeablein a crowd. She pulls the hood over her braided hair, down low over her face. She’ll sell it the first chance she gets.
Beatrix grabs the old black cloak and travel case from the bed and slips through the door into the hall. The clink of utensils on fine china pierces the heavy silence. She slinks down the back staircase and out into the night.
Beatrix deposits the case and cloak into the back of Lady Kendall’s carriage, just as they discussed. Soon, the earl would retire to his study with Jane’s latest suitor, and Prue and Jane would escape the manor and the city and the country, all the way to the-middle-of-nowhere Scotland.
Beatrix doesn’t know what her future holds. Maybe she’ll find another job as a maid, or set herself up at a tavern, challenging hapless travelers who think they can outdrink her. If she is lucky—if the plan works—they’ll bring gossip of Lady Jane DeSallowe’s impending marriage to a reclusive Scottish laird no one has ever heard of, but whom everyone will pretend they have. And then, she hopes, she’ll hear nothing. The news will turn stale. The earl will go along with it, to be free of his burdensome daughter, to save his reputation from hers. He’ll let her go. She’ll live happily ever after.
It’s the sentiment of fools, but then again, this entire plan hangs on a fool’s hope.
Two fools’ hopes.
Three.
June 7, 2202Boston, Massachusetts
Lucy activates the trans-temporal chamber with her palm. The display flashes to life, and she swipes through to the coordinates. “Let’s see, today you’ll be visiting…” Her brow furrows.
Oliver fidgets with the quarter in his jacket pocket. “It’s the first modern ballet performance in history.”
“I see,” Lucy says, in a way that means she doesn’t see at all.
His stomach twists. Is this going to be worth waiting six years for? Is he?
Lucy’s hand hovers over the confirmation button. “Are you sure? I could substitute a preapproved destination for you. Mozart in Vienna is a client favorite.”
But Beatrix won’t be in Vienna, and she hasn’t waited six years for him to blow her off for Mozart. Besides, he wants to see the first ballet. He wants to see it with her. “I’m sure.”
“Suit yourself.” Lucy confirms the coordinates with a tap on the screen. “Give me ten minutes to run the safety protocols while you change, and we’ll be ready to go.”
Oliver leaves Lucy to adjust her screen full of readings. He weaves his way through a dozen other travel stations—some occupied by technicians and travelers, some empty—and scans his palm on a glass panel next to a steel door. It slides open, and he steps into an elevator. There aren’t any buttons to select. There’s only one destination: The Vault.
The first time Lucy mentioned it, Oliver thought it sounded like the villain’s lair from a bad heist movie. Officially, it is General Outfitting and Accessories. The Vault is a nickname from Aevum’s early days at MIT. Back then, it was a lecture hall that had been converted to house racks of garments in a somewhat climate-controlled environment. The nickname stems from the tight security the school used to deter thetheater department. Because the outfits aren’t costumes. The Vault is a priceless archive of clothes from across time and across the world, each piece carefully cataloged and meticulously maintained.
In the time it takes the elevator to reach the floor below, three outfits approved for Oliver’s excursion have been loaded into the 3D display, courtesy of Lucy. A full-size projected hologram of each rotates on a raised platform at the center of the bright white room, waiting for him to make his choice.
He feels ridiculous, standing in a room cooled to precisely 70 degrees Fahrenheit, trying to decide which eighteenth-century finery he should wear to meet a woman he hasn’t seen in five days or six years, depending on who you ask.
Is this a bad idea? It feels like a bad idea.
A signal for an incoming call lights the band on Oliver’s wrist:Theo Rhodes. He almost picks up this time.
A message pops up:Call me. Please.
He lets it disappear into the graveyard of his unread messages. It joins at least a dozen from Luke and Zoë—mostly from Zoë. Not that Luke cares any less than she does. He can just sense—since they were kids—when Oliver needs space.
He sighs. It’s not like he knows what to say to any of them anyway.
Oliver selects an outfit, and something in the wall clunks and grinds. Long lines of black garment bags whizz along tracks, across the ceiling, and down into the room. A bag stops in front of him, swaying with the momentum of its journey.
He takes it to a dressing room and changes out of his T-shirt and jeans. When he’s done, he slips his quarter into his waistcoat pocket—he is wearing a waistcoat now—and shoves his own clothes into a locker with his sneakers and wristband and glasses. Aevum has given him contacts for the trip, since his glasses aren’t period appropriate.
He takes the elevator up to the lab. Lucy has his travel chamber primed and ready.
