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

 

 

“Hmm.” His eyes flicked to me, then back to the harbor. “She really did fall, you know.”

 

I threw back my head and laughed; did he think me jealous? “I know.” For a long moment, we were quiet. I watched a young boy on the pier as he took a daring step toward the Dark Horse—and another. He got within spitting distance before he ran back to the safety of the crowd. A few of the men tittered, but not many—and no one else made a move toward the strange yacht. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Mr. Hart shift from foot to foot; the boy was troubled about this business with Crowhurst. Or was it about Nix? No matter which it was, I shared his concern. “Want a drink?”

 

“What?” He turned to me, his eyes incredulous. I nodded at the wharf.

 

“Well, I need one.” I stepped down the gangplank without waiting for him to follow. I set a quick pace, making the lock swing, and soon enough I heard his footsteps behind me.

 

The tavern at the top of the wharf was a long building with a roof made of flaked stone. Small windows squinted suspiciously at the windy harbor. Inside, business was brisker than it had been last night; the red-faced fishermen had gathered for a late lunch after beating the tide home, and many were drinking to one another’s health. “A la v?tre! A la v?tre!”

 

The benches were full, and the air was close with the smell of people and ale and the smoke from the fire. The decor might be convincingly called “charming” by only the greatest of liars: the walls were nailed with chipped shells and twisted driftwood, and the bar was built out of the yellowed jawbone of a great fish. I leaned against it and signaled the girl at the spigot. She looked hard at me with her washed-out eyes, but she took my coin and pulled two mugs of cider. I pretended not to notice her scrub the pennies on her apron before she put them in her pocket.

 

Still, as I took the cider back to the table, I let myself sigh. It was almost as bad in this little town as it was in modern New York City.

 

Mr. Hart and I sat across from each other at a wide wooden table. He watched me over his mug, his expression calculating. We drank for a while in a bubble of silence, and I did not fight it. Around us, conversation swirled. Men roared their toasts; others whispered in corners. They used an older dialect—different from the way I spoke it, but there were words that caught my ear: dangereux . . . magie noire . . .

 

Black magic—I traced a scar on the wood of the table. Did I speak French because of the man who drew my map? Was the suffering of my early years only some foreigner’s fantasy?

 

Spinning the mug in his hands, Mr. Hart stared at the barkeep, but I do not think he was really watching the girl. At last he spoke. “If I hadn’t seen the things I’ve seen on this journey, I’d question her sanity. Now I find myself questioning my own. The things Miss Song said, about the wolf. And the dead man. They seemed familiar, but like a dream does.”

 

I gave him a half smile. “But you do remember her falling.”

 

“Into a tunnel underground. Yes.” He spoke slowly, as though he had to draw every word from the well of his memory. “We were passing time exploring the warehouse. . . . The floor fell away, and I threw down a rope to help her back up.” He tapped his fingers on the pewter, making a dull ringing. “What do you remember from this morning?”

 

“Before the parade?” I downed a mouthful of cider. “Stealing our coin back from the harbormaster.”

 

To Mr. Hart’s credit, he laughed. “I should have expected something like that. But . . . was there anything else? Something you didn’t do but somehow remember anyway?”

 

I held the clove between my back teeth, considering. “I . . . I dreamed last night about climbing over the abbey wall. It runs beside the castle, and I wanted to take a look inside—maybe find the treasury. I spent some time here listening, talking to the drunks. Apparently the king’s treasure is kept in a pit below the castle.”

 

He frowned. “A pit?”

 

“So they say. An ingenious design, so that if the walls were breached in war, the treasury would flood to hide the gold. I dreamed I went looking for it. But in my dream, the castle was empty. . . .” I glanced down at my palms; the calluses made bumps and ridges. That scrape there—had I actually roped down into the bailey and explored the grounds, rather than only dreaming I had?

 

Mr. Hart leaned closer. “Did your dream include frightening us in the gatehouse?”

 

With a crack like a wishbone, the clove broke between my teeth. I spat the pieces to the floor. “It did,” I said, though he’d already seen the answer on my face.

 

Chewing his lip, he thrust his hand into his breast pocket, drawing out the sketchbook I’d given him. “You mentioned a pit,” he murmured, paging through. Then he stopped, whistling low under his breath. “Look here.”