The Ship Beyond Time (The Girl from Everywhere #2)

 

 

“I don’t know. Do you?”

 

Inside, I struggled—knowledge was power, ignorance bliss. “What was it?”

 

“She told me . . . she told me that it’s possible. To change things.”

 

I stared at him, unmoored; the world swirled around me and I felt like small craft tossed on a wild sea—lost, lost, but strangely free. “How?”

 

He gave me a half shrug. “With enormous effort and great sacrifice. Even then, nothing’s for sure.”

 

“Fine,” I said, breathless. “But how? Does it take a special map? Or—or is it just a matter of finding the right time and making a different choice? How do you—”

 

“She never said more than that,” he interrupted. “Maybe it’s best I never figured it out.”

 

The words made no sense at first, not from him. “But . . . why?”

 

“Someday, Nixie.” My father peered at me, his blue eyes bleary, but on his lips—a dreamy smile. “Someday when I’m old and nearly gone, we’ll sail together for the last time. We’ll go together to the edge of the world. I’ll give you the helm, and you’ll give me the lifeboat. And I’ll take the map of Honolulu and sail to Byzantium like an old man should. You’ll be captain then. Captain of your own fate. And I’ll be ready to let go. But if I went now . . .” He shook his head. “What would I give to have her back, Nixie? What would I have to sacrifice?”

 

Though he’d only asked a question, I knew the answer: me. He would have lost me, as I was, here and now, trading a daughter who loved the sea for one born and raised on a golden shore. But that understanding did not chill me, not today. I was already numb. The words echoed in my head: enormous effort. Great sacrifice.

 

But change was possible. And looking at Slate, his bent shoulders, his hollow eyes—I knew I could not let it happen to me. I would not end up like my father.

 

What must I do? What must I sacrifice? How would I stave off my fate? I needed answers—answers my father had never been able to discover, in all his years searching. But Slate was erratic, an addict, driven by demons, pulled along on his whims. I was more methodical. I had to be.

 

So where to start? Where did people go to seek knowledge?

 

Ideas bubbled up in my mind: all over the world and throughout history, every culture had a way of divination. Tarot cards and tasseography, dream interpreters . . . and fortune-tellers, of course. But those jobs were like chum for charlatans, as my trip to Chinatown had shown.

 

Maybe I should go back to the source of the prophecy—to Joss herself. I went to the cupboard, still open, and pulled out the maps of Honolulu that my father had collected over the years. Here, one from 1895. But it was useless; she was dead by then.

 

What about an older map? After all, Joss had known my fate by the time she’d tattooed it on my father’s back. But how had she learned it? My stomach dropped at the next thought: what if by going back to see her in a past Honolulu, I would trigger Kashmir’s loss? Could she learn my fortune from my own lips?

 

Better instead to meet her on my own timeline—after she’d already given my father the tattoo. I’d have to wait till the Royal Hawaiian Navy gave up the search for our ship, of course. Six months? A year? All I had to do was keep Kashmir safe until then. Maybe a stint in a landlocked country would be a good idea after all. Central Europe . . . perhaps Lichtenstein . . .

 

“God, my head hurts.”

 

I turned back to look at Slate; he had scooted back into the shadows of the alcove, his knees pulled up to his chest. “It’s called a hangover,” I told him. Then I frowned—my own temples were still throbbing. “You’re probably dehydrated.”

 

“Do we have any aspirin?”

 

Tucking the maps back onto the shelves, I knelt to look in the cupboard under the desk. The first aid kit had been decimated in the last few days, and the little bottle of aspirin was empty. “I’ll go get you some.”

 

“I love you, Nixie.”

 

The words made me stumble on the threshold. I licked my lips—I didn’t know how to respond, so I hurried through the doorway, pretending I hadn’t heard. Out on deck, the afternoon sunlight was like a knife through the eyes; my own headache had only worsened. When I looked west, I saw why. The horizon, so blue only half an hour ago, had curdled with clouds, and the air was as hot as steam. A summer storm was coming.

 

As I closed the door, Blake and Kashmir turned to me, faces expectant. “He’s sleeping off the drink,” I told them.

 

“And the map, amira? It wasn’t in his pockets.”

 

“It might be stolen—or it might only be misplaced.” I bit my lip. “He took it out to—to look at it. Maybe it blew into the water. Or he left it at Bruce’s. I don’t know.”

 

“Shouldn’t we alert the authorities, Miss Song?” Blake’s brow was furrowed. “Are there authorities here?”