Post by Lorpius Prime on Mar 22, 2009 21:52:59 GMT -5
The bird hopped from its perch and fluttered down to the stone floor in front of Jay.
"I…" Jay started, but he shut his mouth when he realized he had nothing to say.
The raven looked at Jay.
"I'm not as good as my brother was at this sort of thing," it said. "Memory is a powerful tool indeed, but it is not so helpful for predicting the future." The bird turned its head to one side. "And so I worried."
Jay worked his jaw, "You're…"
"Muninn," the raven raised one wing for a moment before folding it down again, "pleased to meet you."
"Uh, yeah, but," Jay shook his head rapidly a few times. "You're a bird," he said finally.
Muninn just looked at him for a moment. Just when the silence was becoming awkward he said, "So do you think I'm more or less strange than the dragon you were talking to two days ago?"
Jay's eyes lost focus on the raven as he thought about the dragon, Richard. He had previously been trying very hard not to think about Richard.
"About the same, I suppose."
"Well you can hardly blame me for your ignorance." Muninn pointed a wing at Jay like an accusing finger. "You're the one who'd rather pretend we don't exist."
"And I don't suppose there's any chance that I'm dreaming?"
The raven turned and took a few tiny steps away from Jay, like he was pacing.
"Fortunately not," he said, then turned back around. "I understand that you may not see it that way yet. But I do hope to convince you of just how important you really are to our cause."
Jay sighed. So I'm talking to a bird now. Fine. Just grand.
"All right," he shook his head, resigning himself to yet another excursion into the bizarre. "What is it you want to tell me?"
Muninn nodded his head, a sharp, jerky motion. "I'll get to that in a few moments, Mr. Blake. But first I'd like you to do something for me."
Of course you do. "Yes?"
The raven extended his wings and beat them against the air. He leaped from the floor just a little too quickly to be called graceful, but the motion was still smooth and confident. He landed on Jay's left shoulder.
Jay jerked a little, but managed not to shout or try to push the bird away with his hand. Instead he stared into the raven's tiny black eyes as Muninn leaned in towards his ear.
"Remember," the raven hissed.
Martin woke slowly. Part of him wanted to continue sleeping, part of him was happier that way and struggled against waking. But another part of Martin was very unhappy indeed.
Eventually, he stopped fighting it and opened his eyes, then waited for them to achieve focus. It was not completely dark in the room; a lamp was still burning in another room beyond the hall, providing some slight illumination. Martin didn't care; he would have been just as capable in the dark.
The warmth by his head and shoulder was unusual, but not unpleasant. For a minute, Martin wished he could go back to sleep and enjoy that warmth a while longer. That was impossible, however. Reality was going to catch up with Martin very soon, and he had to figure out what he was going to do about it if he ever wanted to feel this warm and happy again.
Carefully, Martin sat up. He put his feet on the floor and stood up in a gentle motion so as not to disturb the bed too much. He set about gathering up his clothes to give himself something to do while he considered his situation.
He quickly decided that he couldn't let Margaret know the original purpose of his mission. Martin had never exactly lied to her, but he had allowed her to believe something quite different from the truth, which was nearly as bad. He had been stupid to lead her on this long, Martin forced himself to admit, but there was no turning back from it now. Trying to explain himself at this point would just lead to disaster.
That hardly solved his problem, however. It was going to be tremendously difficult, if not impossible, to get Margaret's brother out of Germany and back home without being discovered and detected by the Security Service. Martin was astonished that Blake had made it this far without capture, but that luck was not going to hold out. And a confrontation with Martin's associates was just going to put him right back in the difficult position of explaining what he had really been doing all along. Even if he could convince the Service to leave her brother alone, Margaret was never going to trust him again.
If she wasn't around when Martin called off the manhunt, then he might be able to keep Margaret from finding out what had been going on. But Martin had no idea how he could convince Margaret to part company for a while. Martin couldn't leave Jay Thomson alone until this was resolved, lest he get seized and killed. And Martin almost certainly wouldn't be able to do anything until he was back in England, since the Military Intelligence staff appeared to have been wiped out here in Bavaria. They were most likely to encounter the Service shortly after stepping off an airship back in Britain, but Margaret certainly wasn't going to want to leave her brother to make the return journey alone. Or at least, not if Martin was the one trying to convince her. Her brother, on the other hand…
Martin glanced back at the large bed as he buttoned up his shirt—a difficult task with only one useful hand. Could he use Jay Thomson to make his argument for him? Margaret was a stubborn woman, but she might be more willing to listen to her brother, especially after this ordeal.
Martin pulled on his coat as he tried to work out a scenario. He didn't know Margaret's brother well at all, but he had to be reasonably intelligent to write for a newspaper. He wouldn't like it if Martin told him about the Service's operation, but the two of them could still probably come to some sort of cautious understanding. Jay Thomson needed Martin to get back home alive; he could be convinced to keep Margaret away from the negotiations which would make that possible. And afterwards… afterwards Martin still had plenty of negotiating tools beyond simple quid pro quo.
On some level, Martin knew that he was being far too optimistic. But at the moment, he didn't much care. This was something that he needed to get done. And Jay Thomson Blake was going to help Martin do it because he was the one that could.
Martin pushed the door to the room open quietly, and then closed it behind him after stepping out into the hall. At the very least, he had a place to start. He could work on the details once he had a better feel for Jay Thomson's attitude.
He walked over to the newspaper correspondent's room and tapped lightly on the door with the back of his hand.
"Mr. Blake?"
The door drifted open; its latch had not properly closed. Martin blinked and took a cautious step inside the room, which was still fully lit. No one was inside.
"Shit."
Martin backed out into the hall and felt for his gun inside his jacket. Then, with a frustrated growl, he set off at a jog towards the staircase.
Jay was still standing in the same place. And yet, somehow, he was not standing. Jay's body had become insubstantial. He could no longer move his arms or legs, and when he tried to look down at them, they were gone. This did not frighten Jay; he had an awareness that this was not real, that he had not actually disappeared. Still, it was uncomfortable.
The hallway had changed, too. It was much brighter. Sunlight was shining down from the two passages at the end of the hall, and the torches in their racks burned with a golden fire that was brighter than a gas lamp.
Jay had only a moment to wonder at these changes before the heavy doors at the end of the hall swung open. Jay spun to watch as about a dozen soldiers in two columns began to march through the doors. They were wearing absurdly colorful uniforms and helmets with long crests of dyed horsehair. Each one also carried some sort of bladed pole weapon in his hands. The soldiers marched in perfect step down the hallway, the ones on the right passing within a foot of Jay's invisible presence. They lined the walls and then turned as one practiced unit to face inward, and then were still.
Colorful as the soldiers were, however, they were dull compared to the person who passed through the doors next. He was a huge man, and his size was made only more impressive by the tremendous fur coat he wore. The coat was a pale royal blue, but the rest of his clothes were white and gold, and they were the very definition of excess. His hair fell from his brow in wild curls, but did not detract from his dignified appearance.
This was Ludwig, Swan King of Germany. Jay had seen countless portraits and photographs of the man, but they could hardly do justice to his actual appearance, and certainly not to the way he moved. For all that he had been a terrible enemy of Jay's country, it was impossible not to be awed by him.
The Swan King strode urgently forward down the hall. The long tails of his coat glided across the floor, passing through the spot where Jay's feet should have been. Jay started to turn to follow the Swan King, but just as Ludwig reached the middle of the hallway, yet another person came through the doors.
He was an older gentleman in a military uniform that was clearly made in the same pattern as the guards along the walls, but slightly more subdued. He was a thin man with receding white hair, and he looked familiar to Jay as well, but Jay couldn't quite place his identity. He hurried through the doors and after Ludwig.
"Mein König!" he called. He jogged forward until he was just a few steps behind and to one side of the Swan King.
"Mein König," he said again, "der Krieg!"
Ludwig finally stopped a yard or two short of the archway at the end of the hall. It looked just as it had when Jay first entered the room, but without the large bird's nest at the top. The Swan King let out a booming laugh, then turned and put a hand on the older man's shoulder.
"Keine Angst," the Swan King said, his voice was deep and rich. "Ich komme immer zurück."
The older man—Jay thought he had to be one of Ludwig's generals—pursed his lips in a frown, but nodded. The Swan King gave him a reassuring tug on the shoulder, then turned back around.
He stared meaningfully at the big stone archway, and Jay wondered what it was that he meant to do. That question was answered, however, when the Swan King walked straight forward into the stone wall beneath the arch and disappeared.
No one else in the room seemed terribly surprised by this, but if Jay had had a jaw at the moment, it would have been hanging open. Ludwig had passed right through the wall as if it wasn't there. But if it wasn't, then it was a perfect illusion.
The general who'd chased after the Swan King shook his head slightly, then turned to walk back out of the hallway through the doors. The soldiers stayed frozen at their posts.
Jay's concentration on the mystery of the archway was broken by Muninn's voice coming to him from… somewhere.
"That was the last we ever saw of him," the raven said.
"The… the Swan King?" Jay asked when he found that he could still speak. "Where did he go?"
"That's a good question. Let me show you something else."
Jay blinked, and the hallway in front of him changed. He was still in the same place, but most of the guards were gone, leaving only the two closest to the archway still standing at attention. It was also much dimmer, the sun was setting outside and less light was pouring in at the back of the hall.
The doors at the back opened again, and this time two men stepped through. They were both wearing dull brown coats and trousers, and Jay took them for palace servants. They walked up the hall side by side in silence.
They made it just about halfway towards the archway before one of the guards at the end shouted "Halt!" in a stern voice and tapped the but of his pole arm against the floor.
That was when the servant on the right took an enormous revolver out of his coat and fired it at the guard. The shot sounded like a cannon, and before the echoes died down, he pivoted carefully and fired a second time.
Shocked, Jay turned around to see both guards had fallen and were losing a sickening quantity of blood onto the floor. The man who'd shot them kept his gun raised, and turned around to point it at the door behind him while his companion kept walking forward.
"What do you think?" asked the man without the gun.
"I think that you had better know what you're doing," said the other man, keeping his weapon aimed towards the door.
Jay realized they were speaking English, and his stomach tightened slightly.
"Well there was damn-all else that we could do," said the first man. "This is what everyone told us."
"Still, I suggest you hurry up," the armed man told him.
"Patience, Thomas." The first man stepped forward towards the archway and considered it for a few moments. Then he reached out to touch the wall beneath it.
As soon as his hand reached the stone, it passed right through, and the man fell forward. He disappeared without a sound.
"Got anything, Willie?" asked the man with the gun.
When his partner didn't respond, he muttered and turned around. He stared at the empty hallway for a moment. Then he ran towards the archway.
"Of all the blasted… Willie!" he shouted. He reached the arch and kept his gun-hand extended behind him, glancing over his shoulder every few seconds.
He ran his free hand along the surface of the arch, and then on the wall. Like the others, his arm passed into the stone as if it wasn't there. The man blinked, and looked down to where his elbow had disappeared into the wall. After a brief pause, he stepped forward into the wall and then he, too, was gone.
Jay was still trying to figure out what had just happened when the hallway changed again. Now it was almost completely dark, only two of the torches were lit, and the walls had become dusty and grimy. The bodies of the two guards were gone, but dark stains on the floor still marked the spots where they had died. No new guards had replaced them.
In the center of the hall, just in front of the archway, there were two ravens. Both birds were facing the stone wall, watching it as if they were waiting for something to happen.
Muninn's voice spoke again, coming from somewhere just out of sight behind Jay.
"We had no choice," he said. "The war was going out of control, the Army was collapsing, and our King had not been seen in days. The people were losing all hope and none of us knew why."
"So, this is 1886?" Jay asked. "Seriously?"
"Yes, Mr. Blake," Muninn said without a hint of sarcasm. "Even I was frightened, which is not a feeling that I often experience. My brother and I decided that we had to find out what had happened; we had to bring the King back from wherever he had gone. Which meant one of us had to pass through the doorway."
"And I guess it wasn't you."
"My brother was always the bolder one," Muninn said. And as soon as he did, the rightmost of the two ravens on the floor fluttered its wings and flew straight at the archway, disappearing into the wall as everyone else had. The remaining raven remained where it was. "We had seen others pass through the doorway," Muninn continued, "but the only one who ever came back was the Swan King himself. Neither of us had any idea what was on the other side."
The hallway changed a final time, and Jay was himself again. His body had returned, and the bird on the floor was back on his shoulder, staring at him.
"Um, so… what was it?" Jay asked. It was awkward talking to someone only a few inches away from one's face.
"I don't know," the raven said, "Huginn never returned."
Jay sighed. "All right, well, that was certainly interesting. But did it have a point? Everything you've been talking about happened one hundred and twenty years ago. What does it have to do with me in particular?"
"Well, Mr. Blake," the bird said, "I thought you might like to know what your government had done to us. But since you're so curious, let me show you what they have done to you."
Martin was on his tenth repetition of a long cycle of curses that he had started on several minutes ago. The Palace was simply too large and Martin had too little information about to really make an effective search for Jay Thomson—if, indeed, the man was even still in the complex.
There were three possible explanations for Blake's absence. In the optimal scenario, he had simply gone wandering around in an insomnia-driven excursion. Martin hoped that was the case, because it would mean that his current anxiety was unnecessary. A less ideal alternative was that Blake had been kidnapped by forces unknown—potentially the same rebellious agents with whom he had been travelling. And in the absolute worst case that Martin could think of, Blake had sought out such forces on his own, and the man was an honest-to-God traitor. If that turned out to be true, Martin was going to have to rethink all of his plans for dealing with Blake and his sister.
Of course, first he would have to find the blasted man.
Martin decided that he had thoroughly searched this wing of the Palace. It was time to move on to other locations. He turned and made for the doors which would take him to the central building.
It took Jay a while to figure out where he was. The hallway had melted away and been replaced by a rain-soaked city street. Cobblestones and buildings loomed in the green shadows of twilight and anonymous individuals shuffled quickly past one another in silence, hiding beneath their raincoats.
After a few minutes, Jay realized that he was in London. He was standing on the north side of High Holborn, just a few blocks down from Gray's Inn Road, where the Times had its offices. Just what Jay was doing here, he couldn't say. But just as before, he seemed to have lost his visible body and with it any real control over location. He couldn't move from his spot. At least he wasn't becoming wet from the rain this way, though.
Jay felt his attention called to someone walking across the street in his direction. A man was coming up from Chancery Lane, and looking cautiously to either side to avoid being hit by carriages. He looked like any of the other dozens of people walking by, but Jay focused on him nonetheless.
The man made it across the street unharmed and skipped up onto the raised sidewalk. As he did, Jay saw who it was, and he felt his stomach tighten.
The man turned east, heading for Gray's Inn. He had only made it a couple of steps, however, when three men who had been standing about behind Jay detached themselves from the buildings against which they had been leaning and fanned out in front of the first man. Each of them wore the same black raincoat and had the same black hat pulled down to conceal their eyes. The man who had crossed the street stopped when his path was blocked.
"Can I help you, gentlemen?" he asked. Jay shivered at the familiar voice.
"John Mills?" asked the center of the three black hats. Jay was shocked to recognize his voice as well.
Mills cocked his head, "I'm sorry, do I know you?"
The lead black hat stepped forward, forcing Mills to take a step back in turn. "Mr. Mills, do you have any idea what sort of trouble you can get into for stealing state secrets?"
The other black hats closed in around their leader, and the group of them kept moving forward, forcing Mills back. "What is this?" he demanded.
"We can lock you up forever for making those copies, Mr. Mills," the black hat continued. He kept his hands buried in his pockets, but he jostled Mills with his elbows effectively enough. Mills stumbled, but managed to stay upright. "You could even be hanged," the black hat said. "So why don't you just give us those copies you made?"
"What are you talking about?" Mills pleaded. Jay had never heard the man sound so frightened. There was something unnatural about it. After all, who would want to harass John Mills? "The Public Records are public information; I've got a right—"
"Why don't you give them to us right now."
Mills looked desperately around him, but no one else on the streets seemed to be paying any attention to the little cluster of people. He took another cautious step backwards. "Now see here—"
The two black hats on the flanks dashed forward and grabbed Mills by the arms. Mills gasped, but was apparently too shocked to just start screaming. His assailants tore open his coat, and probed him with their arms.
"He's got nothing," the black hat on the left said.
The one in the center, who still had his hands in his pockets, pursed his lips. He nodded.
The black hats let go of Mills. He tore his arms away from them just as soon as he could.
"Just what the hell do you think—"
Mills stopped talking and his eyes went wide. The black hats had been forcing him to step further and further backwards, and this time, as he pulled away from their grasp, John Mills' left foot failed to find a purchase.
Even as he fell down the stairs of the Chancery Lane Underground station, John Mills didn't scream. A single surprised "Oh" was the last thing he said. He tumbled backwards on the stone steps, losing his hat and getting tangled in his open coat on the way down. He landed at the bottom as an unmoving, broken lump.
The black hats gazed down at the dead man for only a second or two before turning around and walking away as if nothing had happened. The handful of other people Jay could see on the street didn't seem to have noticed anything, either. The black hat in the center finally took one hand out of his pocket to adjust the brim of his hat, then brushed rainwater from his brow.
"We're going to have to find out where he sent them," Colonel Holland said. He shook off his hand and returned it to his pocket. His companions said nothing. They walked on down the road, leaving Jay behind.
The London street vanished and the Jay returned to the orange torchlight of the hallway. His mouth was hanging open and his breath was coming in short, irregular bursts. Jay looked at the raven on his shoulder, but couldn't think of anything to say. Muninn said nothing either, but after a minute, Jay found himself confronting a new vision.
He was on an open, grassy hill under a clear morning sky. In front of him, staring off into the distance were two men. Jay recognized each of them, as well. The first was a stocky man who was wearing a simple cap and a leather jacket. He held up a hand to his forehead for a moment, then pointed in to the sky with his other hand. Jay followed his arm, and could just see a black speck against the field of blue.
"There it is!" the man in the leather jacket shouted. He turned to the man beside him, and nudged him with an elbow.
"Hey, there it is," he said again.
The other man was much taller. He wore a severe gray uniform and a tall helmet that doubled the size of his head. He looked down at the first man with a disgusted expression.
"I'll say again that I am utterly opposed to this course of action," the tall man said. "I hope you'll note that in your official record."
The stocky man looked up, thoroughly unimpressed. "I'll be more than happy to log your opposition, Captain. But I have orders from London," he patted one pocket of his jacket, "and I'm not so eager to disappoint my own superiors. Colonel Holland wants this done, and you're going to carry out his instructions. Understood?"
The man whom Jay had met as Captain Diener of the Prussian Army sneered, but the man Jay knew as Major Farragut held his grown. Eventually, Diener turned. Hands clasped behind his back, the Prussian walked across the hilltop to a small cluster of soldiers.
The soldiers had been waiting in stony silence around an enormous artillery piece. Captain Diener stopped in front of them, and looked at each one in turn. After a minute, he nodded towards the sky.
"You may fire," he said.
The men did not hesitate, but set about immediately to working their gun. The long cannon traversed quickly, until it was pointing in the same direction as Farragut's arm a few moments ago. In the distance, the black speck had grown only slightly larger.
The cannon spat flame and the ground shook. Several of the Prussians plugged their ears, but Major Farragut just watched the sky and grinned like a hungry animal.
"Jack was right," Jay said. His voice was beginning to quaver.
"Indeed he was," Muninn said, and the hill outside of Donauwörth was replaced by the Palace hallway once again.
"I…" Jay held a hand to his forehead and leaned against one wall, forcing Muninn to flutter from his shoulder. He was beginning to feel nauseous, partly because of the shifting images but more because of what he was learning. Even after all he had been through, he just couldn't believe that anyone would have wanted John Mills dead, or wanted him dead for that matter.
"And all those people on the Rover," he said aloud. Jay shifted his arm to look at the raven, who had returned to the floor. "You really think this Holland fellow would have them all killed? Just like that."
"I don't speculate, Mr. Blake," Muninn said, "I know it. And it did not end with the airship."
Before Jay could ask, the hallway disappeared yet again. Apparently Muninn could create these visions even without whispering straight into Jay's ear.
Jay recognized his new location at once. He was in the middle of his family orchard back home, just below his favorite tree in the center. Jay's chest tightened as he realized just how much he missed this place. He had been away far too long.
Two men came walking into sight from the path. The first one was Colonel Holland again, looking almost as he had when Jay met him, but without one arm in a sling. Jay had barely a moment to wonder what Holland was doing in his orchard when he recognized the man behind Holland, and the bottom dropped out of his stomach.
"No," Jay whispered.
It was Sam Reynard, he was holding a telegram.
"No," Jay said again, louder. He could already tell what was going to happen, and he tried to move forward, to somehow reach through the vision and stop it all.
But Jay was not really there, and he could do nothing. He could not even look away as he watched the Colonel punch Jay's colleague in the stomach. Then Holland seized Sam's head and wrenched it violently to one side, breaking his neck like a wet branch. Sam collapsed and was still. Holland flexed his hands and looked at the body for a moment, then bent down and picked the telegram. It was the letter which Jay had sent to Sam. The letter which had brought Sam to the Blake manor, and his death.
The orchard vanished before Jay had to watch anymore. Jay found that he had slumped completely against the wall, and was crying. He and Sam had never gotten along very well, but their rivalry was a friendly one. And Jay had sent his warning to Sam because he trusted the columnist to have enough integrity to pass the message on. Apparently, he had.
Jay's stomach heaved, but he managed not to vomit.
"All right," Jay croaked. He turned his eyes up to the raven on the floor. "All right," he said again, "so all of you people have been right all this time. What is it you're going to do?"
"I can do nothing, Mr. Blake," Muninn said. "This is a matter you must solve."
"I don't want any part of this! I just want to be let alone again."
The raven took a few tiny steps forward, to look directly into Jay's eyes. "You no longer have any choice, Mr. Blake. I don't think you realize just how personal your stake in all of this is."
Muninn and the hallway disappeared once more as Jay entered another of the bird's visions. This time he was in one of the Palace apartments, one almost like the bedroom in which he had awoken perhaps half an hour ago. But it was not his bedroom, and Jay's whole body seized at what he saw. He wailed. It was as if this Colonel Holland was systematically blackening every piece of Jay's life, his friends, his family, everything.
This vision faded quickly, and Jay was in the hallway, huddling in a ball and sobbing out of fear and disgust and rage. The raven in front of him regarded him coldly.
"Just stop it already," Jay pleaded. "What is it that you want me to do?"
Muninn walked forward again, until he was only inches away from Jay's face.
"Mr. Blake, the entire time that you have been in this country, you have done nothing but follow on the heels of others like a loyal dog." The raven tilted his head slightly to look up into Jay's eyes again, "But there is no one left for you to hide behind. I cannot give you your answers, Mr. Blake. But you must do something."
Muninn extended his wings and flew into the air, up and out of the range that Jay's eyes could follow. As the raven disappeared, Jay felt a slight rush of air. The doors behind him were opening again.
Martin let out a long sigh of relief as he pushed open the heavy door and saw his charge in the hallway beyond. Blake was sitting on the floor and leaning against the wall.
"Here you are, thank God," Martin called to him. He walked through the doorway toward the other man. "I was beginning to worry that you had—"
Martin stopped abruptly and his eyes narrowed as Jay Thomson turned around.
"I…" Jay started, but he shut his mouth when he realized he had nothing to say.
The raven looked at Jay.
"I'm not as good as my brother was at this sort of thing," it said. "Memory is a powerful tool indeed, but it is not so helpful for predicting the future." The bird turned its head to one side. "And so I worried."
Jay worked his jaw, "You're…"
"Muninn," the raven raised one wing for a moment before folding it down again, "pleased to meet you."
"Uh, yeah, but," Jay shook his head rapidly a few times. "You're a bird," he said finally.
Muninn just looked at him for a moment. Just when the silence was becoming awkward he said, "So do you think I'm more or less strange than the dragon you were talking to two days ago?"
Jay's eyes lost focus on the raven as he thought about the dragon, Richard. He had previously been trying very hard not to think about Richard.
"About the same, I suppose."
"Well you can hardly blame me for your ignorance." Muninn pointed a wing at Jay like an accusing finger. "You're the one who'd rather pretend we don't exist."
"And I don't suppose there's any chance that I'm dreaming?"
The raven turned and took a few tiny steps away from Jay, like he was pacing.
"Fortunately not," he said, then turned back around. "I understand that you may not see it that way yet. But I do hope to convince you of just how important you really are to our cause."
Jay sighed. So I'm talking to a bird now. Fine. Just grand.
"All right," he shook his head, resigning himself to yet another excursion into the bizarre. "What is it you want to tell me?"
Muninn nodded his head, a sharp, jerky motion. "I'll get to that in a few moments, Mr. Blake. But first I'd like you to do something for me."
Of course you do. "Yes?"
The raven extended his wings and beat them against the air. He leaped from the floor just a little too quickly to be called graceful, but the motion was still smooth and confident. He landed on Jay's left shoulder.
Jay jerked a little, but managed not to shout or try to push the bird away with his hand. Instead he stared into the raven's tiny black eyes as Muninn leaned in towards his ear.
"Remember," the raven hissed.
* * *
Martin woke slowly. Part of him wanted to continue sleeping, part of him was happier that way and struggled against waking. But another part of Martin was very unhappy indeed.
Eventually, he stopped fighting it and opened his eyes, then waited for them to achieve focus. It was not completely dark in the room; a lamp was still burning in another room beyond the hall, providing some slight illumination. Martin didn't care; he would have been just as capable in the dark.
The warmth by his head and shoulder was unusual, but not unpleasant. For a minute, Martin wished he could go back to sleep and enjoy that warmth a while longer. That was impossible, however. Reality was going to catch up with Martin very soon, and he had to figure out what he was going to do about it if he ever wanted to feel this warm and happy again.
Carefully, Martin sat up. He put his feet on the floor and stood up in a gentle motion so as not to disturb the bed too much. He set about gathering up his clothes to give himself something to do while he considered his situation.
He quickly decided that he couldn't let Margaret know the original purpose of his mission. Martin had never exactly lied to her, but he had allowed her to believe something quite different from the truth, which was nearly as bad. He had been stupid to lead her on this long, Martin forced himself to admit, but there was no turning back from it now. Trying to explain himself at this point would just lead to disaster.
That hardly solved his problem, however. It was going to be tremendously difficult, if not impossible, to get Margaret's brother out of Germany and back home without being discovered and detected by the Security Service. Martin was astonished that Blake had made it this far without capture, but that luck was not going to hold out. And a confrontation with Martin's associates was just going to put him right back in the difficult position of explaining what he had really been doing all along. Even if he could convince the Service to leave her brother alone, Margaret was never going to trust him again.
If she wasn't around when Martin called off the manhunt, then he might be able to keep Margaret from finding out what had been going on. But Martin had no idea how he could convince Margaret to part company for a while. Martin couldn't leave Jay Thomson alone until this was resolved, lest he get seized and killed. And Martin almost certainly wouldn't be able to do anything until he was back in England, since the Military Intelligence staff appeared to have been wiped out here in Bavaria. They were most likely to encounter the Service shortly after stepping off an airship back in Britain, but Margaret certainly wasn't going to want to leave her brother to make the return journey alone. Or at least, not if Martin was the one trying to convince her. Her brother, on the other hand…
Martin glanced back at the large bed as he buttoned up his shirt—a difficult task with only one useful hand. Could he use Jay Thomson to make his argument for him? Margaret was a stubborn woman, but she might be more willing to listen to her brother, especially after this ordeal.
Martin pulled on his coat as he tried to work out a scenario. He didn't know Margaret's brother well at all, but he had to be reasonably intelligent to write for a newspaper. He wouldn't like it if Martin told him about the Service's operation, but the two of them could still probably come to some sort of cautious understanding. Jay Thomson needed Martin to get back home alive; he could be convinced to keep Margaret away from the negotiations which would make that possible. And afterwards… afterwards Martin still had plenty of negotiating tools beyond simple quid pro quo.
On some level, Martin knew that he was being far too optimistic. But at the moment, he didn't much care. This was something that he needed to get done. And Jay Thomson Blake was going to help Martin do it because he was the one that could.
Martin pushed the door to the room open quietly, and then closed it behind him after stepping out into the hall. At the very least, he had a place to start. He could work on the details once he had a better feel for Jay Thomson's attitude.
He walked over to the newspaper correspondent's room and tapped lightly on the door with the back of his hand.
"Mr. Blake?"
The door drifted open; its latch had not properly closed. Martin blinked and took a cautious step inside the room, which was still fully lit. No one was inside.
"Shit."
Martin backed out into the hall and felt for his gun inside his jacket. Then, with a frustrated growl, he set off at a jog towards the staircase.
* * *
Jay was still standing in the same place. And yet, somehow, he was not standing. Jay's body had become insubstantial. He could no longer move his arms or legs, and when he tried to look down at them, they were gone. This did not frighten Jay; he had an awareness that this was not real, that he had not actually disappeared. Still, it was uncomfortable.
The hallway had changed, too. It was much brighter. Sunlight was shining down from the two passages at the end of the hall, and the torches in their racks burned with a golden fire that was brighter than a gas lamp.
Jay had only a moment to wonder at these changes before the heavy doors at the end of the hall swung open. Jay spun to watch as about a dozen soldiers in two columns began to march through the doors. They were wearing absurdly colorful uniforms and helmets with long crests of dyed horsehair. Each one also carried some sort of bladed pole weapon in his hands. The soldiers marched in perfect step down the hallway, the ones on the right passing within a foot of Jay's invisible presence. They lined the walls and then turned as one practiced unit to face inward, and then were still.
Colorful as the soldiers were, however, they were dull compared to the person who passed through the doors next. He was a huge man, and his size was made only more impressive by the tremendous fur coat he wore. The coat was a pale royal blue, but the rest of his clothes were white and gold, and they were the very definition of excess. His hair fell from his brow in wild curls, but did not detract from his dignified appearance.
This was Ludwig, Swan King of Germany. Jay had seen countless portraits and photographs of the man, but they could hardly do justice to his actual appearance, and certainly not to the way he moved. For all that he had been a terrible enemy of Jay's country, it was impossible not to be awed by him.
The Swan King strode urgently forward down the hall. The long tails of his coat glided across the floor, passing through the spot where Jay's feet should have been. Jay started to turn to follow the Swan King, but just as Ludwig reached the middle of the hallway, yet another person came through the doors.
He was an older gentleman in a military uniform that was clearly made in the same pattern as the guards along the walls, but slightly more subdued. He was a thin man with receding white hair, and he looked familiar to Jay as well, but Jay couldn't quite place his identity. He hurried through the doors and after Ludwig.
"Mein König!" he called. He jogged forward until he was just a few steps behind and to one side of the Swan King.
"Mein König," he said again, "der Krieg!"
Ludwig finally stopped a yard or two short of the archway at the end of the hall. It looked just as it had when Jay first entered the room, but without the large bird's nest at the top. The Swan King let out a booming laugh, then turned and put a hand on the older man's shoulder.
"Keine Angst," the Swan King said, his voice was deep and rich. "Ich komme immer zurück."
The older man—Jay thought he had to be one of Ludwig's generals—pursed his lips in a frown, but nodded. The Swan King gave him a reassuring tug on the shoulder, then turned back around.
He stared meaningfully at the big stone archway, and Jay wondered what it was that he meant to do. That question was answered, however, when the Swan King walked straight forward into the stone wall beneath the arch and disappeared.
No one else in the room seemed terribly surprised by this, but if Jay had had a jaw at the moment, it would have been hanging open. Ludwig had passed right through the wall as if it wasn't there. But if it wasn't, then it was a perfect illusion.
The general who'd chased after the Swan King shook his head slightly, then turned to walk back out of the hallway through the doors. The soldiers stayed frozen at their posts.
Jay's concentration on the mystery of the archway was broken by Muninn's voice coming to him from… somewhere.
"That was the last we ever saw of him," the raven said.
"The… the Swan King?" Jay asked when he found that he could still speak. "Where did he go?"
"That's a good question. Let me show you something else."
Jay blinked, and the hallway in front of him changed. He was still in the same place, but most of the guards were gone, leaving only the two closest to the archway still standing at attention. It was also much dimmer, the sun was setting outside and less light was pouring in at the back of the hall.
The doors at the back opened again, and this time two men stepped through. They were both wearing dull brown coats and trousers, and Jay took them for palace servants. They walked up the hall side by side in silence.
They made it just about halfway towards the archway before one of the guards at the end shouted "Halt!" in a stern voice and tapped the but of his pole arm against the floor.
That was when the servant on the right took an enormous revolver out of his coat and fired it at the guard. The shot sounded like a cannon, and before the echoes died down, he pivoted carefully and fired a second time.
Shocked, Jay turned around to see both guards had fallen and were losing a sickening quantity of blood onto the floor. The man who'd shot them kept his gun raised, and turned around to point it at the door behind him while his companion kept walking forward.
"What do you think?" asked the man without the gun.
"I think that you had better know what you're doing," said the other man, keeping his weapon aimed towards the door.
Jay realized they were speaking English, and his stomach tightened slightly.
"Well there was damn-all else that we could do," said the first man. "This is what everyone told us."
"Still, I suggest you hurry up," the armed man told him.
"Patience, Thomas." The first man stepped forward towards the archway and considered it for a few moments. Then he reached out to touch the wall beneath it.
As soon as his hand reached the stone, it passed right through, and the man fell forward. He disappeared without a sound.
"Got anything, Willie?" asked the man with the gun.
When his partner didn't respond, he muttered and turned around. He stared at the empty hallway for a moment. Then he ran towards the archway.
"Of all the blasted… Willie!" he shouted. He reached the arch and kept his gun-hand extended behind him, glancing over his shoulder every few seconds.
He ran his free hand along the surface of the arch, and then on the wall. Like the others, his arm passed into the stone as if it wasn't there. The man blinked, and looked down to where his elbow had disappeared into the wall. After a brief pause, he stepped forward into the wall and then he, too, was gone.
Jay was still trying to figure out what had just happened when the hallway changed again. Now it was almost completely dark, only two of the torches were lit, and the walls had become dusty and grimy. The bodies of the two guards were gone, but dark stains on the floor still marked the spots where they had died. No new guards had replaced them.
In the center of the hall, just in front of the archway, there were two ravens. Both birds were facing the stone wall, watching it as if they were waiting for something to happen.
Muninn's voice spoke again, coming from somewhere just out of sight behind Jay.
"We had no choice," he said. "The war was going out of control, the Army was collapsing, and our King had not been seen in days. The people were losing all hope and none of us knew why."
"So, this is 1886?" Jay asked. "Seriously?"
"Yes, Mr. Blake," Muninn said without a hint of sarcasm. "Even I was frightened, which is not a feeling that I often experience. My brother and I decided that we had to find out what had happened; we had to bring the King back from wherever he had gone. Which meant one of us had to pass through the doorway."
"And I guess it wasn't you."
"My brother was always the bolder one," Muninn said. And as soon as he did, the rightmost of the two ravens on the floor fluttered its wings and flew straight at the archway, disappearing into the wall as everyone else had. The remaining raven remained where it was. "We had seen others pass through the doorway," Muninn continued, "but the only one who ever came back was the Swan King himself. Neither of us had any idea what was on the other side."
The hallway changed a final time, and Jay was himself again. His body had returned, and the bird on the floor was back on his shoulder, staring at him.
"Um, so… what was it?" Jay asked. It was awkward talking to someone only a few inches away from one's face.
"I don't know," the raven said, "Huginn never returned."
Jay sighed. "All right, well, that was certainly interesting. But did it have a point? Everything you've been talking about happened one hundred and twenty years ago. What does it have to do with me in particular?"
"Well, Mr. Blake," the bird said, "I thought you might like to know what your government had done to us. But since you're so curious, let me show you what they have done to you."
* * *
Martin was on his tenth repetition of a long cycle of curses that he had started on several minutes ago. The Palace was simply too large and Martin had too little information about to really make an effective search for Jay Thomson—if, indeed, the man was even still in the complex.
There were three possible explanations for Blake's absence. In the optimal scenario, he had simply gone wandering around in an insomnia-driven excursion. Martin hoped that was the case, because it would mean that his current anxiety was unnecessary. A less ideal alternative was that Blake had been kidnapped by forces unknown—potentially the same rebellious agents with whom he had been travelling. And in the absolute worst case that Martin could think of, Blake had sought out such forces on his own, and the man was an honest-to-God traitor. If that turned out to be true, Martin was going to have to rethink all of his plans for dealing with Blake and his sister.
Of course, first he would have to find the blasted man.
Martin decided that he had thoroughly searched this wing of the Palace. It was time to move on to other locations. He turned and made for the doors which would take him to the central building.
* * *
It took Jay a while to figure out where he was. The hallway had melted away and been replaced by a rain-soaked city street. Cobblestones and buildings loomed in the green shadows of twilight and anonymous individuals shuffled quickly past one another in silence, hiding beneath their raincoats.
After a few minutes, Jay realized that he was in London. He was standing on the north side of High Holborn, just a few blocks down from Gray's Inn Road, where the Times had its offices. Just what Jay was doing here, he couldn't say. But just as before, he seemed to have lost his visible body and with it any real control over location. He couldn't move from his spot. At least he wasn't becoming wet from the rain this way, though.
Jay felt his attention called to someone walking across the street in his direction. A man was coming up from Chancery Lane, and looking cautiously to either side to avoid being hit by carriages. He looked like any of the other dozens of people walking by, but Jay focused on him nonetheless.
The man made it across the street unharmed and skipped up onto the raised sidewalk. As he did, Jay saw who it was, and he felt his stomach tighten.
The man turned east, heading for Gray's Inn. He had only made it a couple of steps, however, when three men who had been standing about behind Jay detached themselves from the buildings against which they had been leaning and fanned out in front of the first man. Each of them wore the same black raincoat and had the same black hat pulled down to conceal their eyes. The man who had crossed the street stopped when his path was blocked.
"Can I help you, gentlemen?" he asked. Jay shivered at the familiar voice.
"John Mills?" asked the center of the three black hats. Jay was shocked to recognize his voice as well.
Mills cocked his head, "I'm sorry, do I know you?"
The lead black hat stepped forward, forcing Mills to take a step back in turn. "Mr. Mills, do you have any idea what sort of trouble you can get into for stealing state secrets?"
The other black hats closed in around their leader, and the group of them kept moving forward, forcing Mills back. "What is this?" he demanded.
"We can lock you up forever for making those copies, Mr. Mills," the black hat continued. He kept his hands buried in his pockets, but he jostled Mills with his elbows effectively enough. Mills stumbled, but managed to stay upright. "You could even be hanged," the black hat said. "So why don't you just give us those copies you made?"
"What are you talking about?" Mills pleaded. Jay had never heard the man sound so frightened. There was something unnatural about it. After all, who would want to harass John Mills? "The Public Records are public information; I've got a right—"
"Why don't you give them to us right now."
Mills looked desperately around him, but no one else on the streets seemed to be paying any attention to the little cluster of people. He took another cautious step backwards. "Now see here—"
The two black hats on the flanks dashed forward and grabbed Mills by the arms. Mills gasped, but was apparently too shocked to just start screaming. His assailants tore open his coat, and probed him with their arms.
"He's got nothing," the black hat on the left said.
The one in the center, who still had his hands in his pockets, pursed his lips. He nodded.
The black hats let go of Mills. He tore his arms away from them just as soon as he could.
"Just what the hell do you think—"
Mills stopped talking and his eyes went wide. The black hats had been forcing him to step further and further backwards, and this time, as he pulled away from their grasp, John Mills' left foot failed to find a purchase.
Even as he fell down the stairs of the Chancery Lane Underground station, John Mills didn't scream. A single surprised "Oh" was the last thing he said. He tumbled backwards on the stone steps, losing his hat and getting tangled in his open coat on the way down. He landed at the bottom as an unmoving, broken lump.
The black hats gazed down at the dead man for only a second or two before turning around and walking away as if nothing had happened. The handful of other people Jay could see on the street didn't seem to have noticed anything, either. The black hat in the center finally took one hand out of his pocket to adjust the brim of his hat, then brushed rainwater from his brow.
"We're going to have to find out where he sent them," Colonel Holland said. He shook off his hand and returned it to his pocket. His companions said nothing. They walked on down the road, leaving Jay behind.
The London street vanished and the Jay returned to the orange torchlight of the hallway. His mouth was hanging open and his breath was coming in short, irregular bursts. Jay looked at the raven on his shoulder, but couldn't think of anything to say. Muninn said nothing either, but after a minute, Jay found himself confronting a new vision.
He was on an open, grassy hill under a clear morning sky. In front of him, staring off into the distance were two men. Jay recognized each of them, as well. The first was a stocky man who was wearing a simple cap and a leather jacket. He held up a hand to his forehead for a moment, then pointed in to the sky with his other hand. Jay followed his arm, and could just see a black speck against the field of blue.
"There it is!" the man in the leather jacket shouted. He turned to the man beside him, and nudged him with an elbow.
"Hey, there it is," he said again.
The other man was much taller. He wore a severe gray uniform and a tall helmet that doubled the size of his head. He looked down at the first man with a disgusted expression.
"I'll say again that I am utterly opposed to this course of action," the tall man said. "I hope you'll note that in your official record."
The stocky man looked up, thoroughly unimpressed. "I'll be more than happy to log your opposition, Captain. But I have orders from London," he patted one pocket of his jacket, "and I'm not so eager to disappoint my own superiors. Colonel Holland wants this done, and you're going to carry out his instructions. Understood?"
The man whom Jay had met as Captain Diener of the Prussian Army sneered, but the man Jay knew as Major Farragut held his grown. Eventually, Diener turned. Hands clasped behind his back, the Prussian walked across the hilltop to a small cluster of soldiers.
The soldiers had been waiting in stony silence around an enormous artillery piece. Captain Diener stopped in front of them, and looked at each one in turn. After a minute, he nodded towards the sky.
"You may fire," he said.
The men did not hesitate, but set about immediately to working their gun. The long cannon traversed quickly, until it was pointing in the same direction as Farragut's arm a few moments ago. In the distance, the black speck had grown only slightly larger.
The cannon spat flame and the ground shook. Several of the Prussians plugged their ears, but Major Farragut just watched the sky and grinned like a hungry animal.
"Jack was right," Jay said. His voice was beginning to quaver.
"Indeed he was," Muninn said, and the hill outside of Donauwörth was replaced by the Palace hallway once again.
"I…" Jay held a hand to his forehead and leaned against one wall, forcing Muninn to flutter from his shoulder. He was beginning to feel nauseous, partly because of the shifting images but more because of what he was learning. Even after all he had been through, he just couldn't believe that anyone would have wanted John Mills dead, or wanted him dead for that matter.
"And all those people on the Rover," he said aloud. Jay shifted his arm to look at the raven, who had returned to the floor. "You really think this Holland fellow would have them all killed? Just like that."
"I don't speculate, Mr. Blake," Muninn said, "I know it. And it did not end with the airship."
Before Jay could ask, the hallway disappeared yet again. Apparently Muninn could create these visions even without whispering straight into Jay's ear.
Jay recognized his new location at once. He was in the middle of his family orchard back home, just below his favorite tree in the center. Jay's chest tightened as he realized just how much he missed this place. He had been away far too long.
Two men came walking into sight from the path. The first one was Colonel Holland again, looking almost as he had when Jay met him, but without one arm in a sling. Jay had barely a moment to wonder what Holland was doing in his orchard when he recognized the man behind Holland, and the bottom dropped out of his stomach.
"No," Jay whispered.
It was Sam Reynard, he was holding a telegram.
"No," Jay said again, louder. He could already tell what was going to happen, and he tried to move forward, to somehow reach through the vision and stop it all.
But Jay was not really there, and he could do nothing. He could not even look away as he watched the Colonel punch Jay's colleague in the stomach. Then Holland seized Sam's head and wrenched it violently to one side, breaking his neck like a wet branch. Sam collapsed and was still. Holland flexed his hands and looked at the body for a moment, then bent down and picked the telegram. It was the letter which Jay had sent to Sam. The letter which had brought Sam to the Blake manor, and his death.
The orchard vanished before Jay had to watch anymore. Jay found that he had slumped completely against the wall, and was crying. He and Sam had never gotten along very well, but their rivalry was a friendly one. And Jay had sent his warning to Sam because he trusted the columnist to have enough integrity to pass the message on. Apparently, he had.
Jay's stomach heaved, but he managed not to vomit.
"All right," Jay croaked. He turned his eyes up to the raven on the floor. "All right," he said again, "so all of you people have been right all this time. What is it you're going to do?"
"I can do nothing, Mr. Blake," Muninn said. "This is a matter you must solve."
"I don't want any part of this! I just want to be let alone again."
The raven took a few tiny steps forward, to look directly into Jay's eyes. "You no longer have any choice, Mr. Blake. I don't think you realize just how personal your stake in all of this is."
Muninn and the hallway disappeared once more as Jay entered another of the bird's visions. This time he was in one of the Palace apartments, one almost like the bedroom in which he had awoken perhaps half an hour ago. But it was not his bedroom, and Jay's whole body seized at what he saw. He wailed. It was as if this Colonel Holland was systematically blackening every piece of Jay's life, his friends, his family, everything.
This vision faded quickly, and Jay was in the hallway, huddling in a ball and sobbing out of fear and disgust and rage. The raven in front of him regarded him coldly.
"Just stop it already," Jay pleaded. "What is it that you want me to do?"
Muninn walked forward again, until he was only inches away from Jay's face.
"Mr. Blake, the entire time that you have been in this country, you have done nothing but follow on the heels of others like a loyal dog." The raven tilted his head slightly to look up into Jay's eyes again, "But there is no one left for you to hide behind. I cannot give you your answers, Mr. Blake. But you must do something."
Muninn extended his wings and flew into the air, up and out of the range that Jay's eyes could follow. As the raven disappeared, Jay felt a slight rush of air. The doors behind him were opening again.
* * *
Martin let out a long sigh of relief as he pushed open the heavy door and saw his charge in the hallway beyond. Blake was sitting on the floor and leaning against the wall.
"Here you are, thank God," Martin called to him. He walked through the doorway toward the other man. "I was beginning to worry that you had—"
Martin stopped abruptly and his eyes narrowed as Jay Thomson turned around.