Plotting music, he thought. I need plotting music.
He selected Beethoven’s Symphony No. 7 from his vast selection of mental music and listened to it as he thought.
Good choice. Somber yet uplifting. Inspiring stuff.
Artemis paced the carpet, almost unaware of his surroundings, lost in ideas and possibilities.
Holly recognized this mood.
“He has a plan,” she said to Foaly.
The centaur pulled a long face, which wasn’t difficult. “Why am I not surprised?”
Holly took advantage of Artemis’s distraction to seal her helmet and speak privately to Foaly. She walked to the window and peered out at the estate through a gap in the curtains. The sinking sun wavered behind tree branches, and clumps of dahlias flashed red and white like fireworks.
Holly allowed herself time for a sigh, then focused on the situation.
“There’s more at stake here than Artemis’s mother,” she said.
Foaly switched off the television so that Artemis could not hear him.
“I know. If there is an outbreak, it could be a disaster for fairies. We don’t have any antidote left, remember?”
“We need to interview Opal Koboi. She must have kept records somewhere.”
“Opal always kept her most valuable formulae in her head. I think she was caught off guard by the jungle fire; she lost all her donors in one fell swoop.”
Koboi Industries had attracted the Madagascan lemurs by setting a sonix box in the Tsingy of Bemaraha. Virtually every lemur on the island had responded to the box’s call, and they had all been wiped out by an unfortunate lightning fire. Luckily, the fairies had already treated most of their infected, but fifteen more fairies had died in quarantine wards.
Artemis stopped pacing and cleared his throat loudly. He was ready to share his plan, and he wanted the fairies’ complete attention.
“There is a relatively simple solution to our problem,” he said.
Foaly reactivated the television, his face filling the flat screen.
“Our problem?”
“Come, Foaly, don’t pretend to be obtuse. This is a fairy plague that has mutated and spread to humans. You have no antidote and no time to synthesize one. Who knows how many cases of Spelltropy are incubating right now?”
Including my own, thought Artemis. I used magic on my mother, so therefore I probably have the disease.
“We will quarantine the manor,” responded Foaly. “So long as no one uses magic on your mother, we can contain this.”
“I seriously doubt that my mother is patient zero. That is simply too much of a coincidence. There are other cases out there, who knows how far along.”
Foaly grunted, his version of conceding a point. “So tell me, Artemis, what is this relatively simple solution?”
“I go back in time and save the lemur,” said Artemis, smiling brightly as though he had suggested a pleasant summer dip.
Silence. Complete silence for several moments, broken eventually by a strangled whinny from Foaly.
“Go back ...”
“. . . in time, ” completed Holly incredulously.
Artemis sat in a comfortable armchair, steepled his fingers, and nodded once.
“Present your arguments, please. I am ready.”
“How can you be so smug?” wondered Holly. “After all the tragedy we have seen, after all the havoc your plans have wreaked.”
“I am determined, not smug,” corrected Artemis. “There is no time for prudence here. My mother has hours left, and the Fairy People don’t have much more.”
Foaly was still gaping. “Do you have any idea how many constitution committee meetings we would have to sit through just to allow us to bring this issue to a Council meeting?”
Artemis wagged a finger dismissively. “Irrelevant. I have read the People’s constitution. It does not govern humans or demons. If No1 decides to help me, technically you have no legal power to stop him.”
Holly joined the discussion. “Artemis, this is lunacy. Time travel was outlawed for a reason. The potential repercussions for the slightest interference could be catastrophic.”
Artemis smiled mirthlessly. “Ah yes, the trusty time paradox. If I go back in time and kill my grandfather, then shall I cease to exist? I believe, as Gorben and Berndt did, that any repercussions are already being felt. We can only change the future, not the past or present. If I go back, then I have already been back.”
Holly spoke kindly; she felt sorry for Artemis. Angeline’s illness reminded her painfully of her own mother’s final days.
“We cannot interfere, Artemis. Humans must be allowed to live their lives.”
Artemis knew that to ram home his next argument he should stand and theatrically deliver the accusation, but he could not. He was about to play the cruelest trick of his life on one of his closest friends, and the guilt was almost unbearable.
“You have already interfered, Holly,” he said, forcing himself to meet her eyes.
The words made Holly shiver; she buzzed up her visor. “What do you mean?”