The Spacetime Pool Read Free Page B

loomed out of the night: a gnarled tree with two trunks or a
weathered statue of an elderly man in a niche of rock. Her ties to home were
growing tenuous, unable to compete with the reality of this impossible place.
     
    Dominick put his arms
around her waist, so she didn’t fall off the biaquine. At first she sat ramrod
straight. Gradually, though, Starlight’s rocking gait lulled her. Nor did
Dominick act in any way to make her uncomfortable. She had forgotten how
comforting it felt just to be held. Her mother had always been effusive with
affection, and although her father had been less demonstrative, he had never
let them doubt his love. She had grown up secure in those close-knit ties. One
instant of violence had shattered everything. Drowning in grief, she had
withdrawn from human contact; in the past two years she had barely touched
another person.
     
    Dominick had a
strange request. He wanted a curl of her hair. When she agreed, he pulled out
his dagger. She stiffened, her gaze riveted on the long blade as it glittered
in the moonlight, but he only cut off a small tendril. He gave it to one of his
riders, who carefully placed the strands in a packet of cloth. Then the man
took off up the trail, galloping ahead of their party.
     
    “What’ll he do with
it?” Janelle asked.
     
    “My monks will
examine it,” Dominick said. “To see if you are who I think.”
     
    “How can they know
from a lock of hair?”
     
    “They have ...
spells.”
     
    “Spells?”
     
    “Well,” he amended, “so
they say.”
     
    From his tone, she
suspected he didn’t believe it any more than she did. She just hoped his monks
didn’t decide her hair had demonic properties.
     
    Exhaustion was
catching up to her, but she feared to rest, dreading what she might find when
she awoke. She had rarely slept enough during school, often studying late into
the night. It paid off; she earned high marks, even the top grade in
Mathematical Methods of Physics. Now her simple pleasure in a job well done
seemed forlorn.
     
    An owl hooted, its
call muted by the fog. Janelle shuddered.
     
    “Are you cold?”
Dominick asked.
     
    “I was thinking of
home.”
     
    Regret softened the
hard edges of his voice. “I am sorry about this.” After a pause, he added, “But
I would be lying if I denied I am glad you are here. I never really believed
this would happen.”
     
    “Prophecies aren’t
real.” She watched the biaquines plodding ahead of them on the trail. “A
rational explanation has to exist.”
     
    “Truthfully?” he
said. “I don’t think the seeress made that prediction. It was Gregor, a monk
from the monastery. He is the one who can read the Jade Pool.” His voice
tightened. “Father’s soothsayer had never even been there before. She stayed at
the palace.”
     
    “Palace?”
     
    “Where my brother is.”
     
    “Does he work there?”
     
    He gave a bitter
laugh. “You could say that.”
     
    “What does he do?”
     
    “He is the Emperor of
Othman.”
     
    Good Lord. What had
she landed in? “You’re the brother of an emperor?”
     
    “Yes.” He said it
simply, just verifying a fact. “He was born first.”
     
    If neither he nor his
brother had married, that suggested neither had legitimate offspring. “Does
that mean you’re his heir?”
     
    “For now. Until he
sires one.”
     
    “Sweet blazes,” she
murmured. “I’ve never heard of Othman.”
     
    He swept out his hand
as if to show her all of the land. “The provinces stretch from the snow fields
in the far north to the great gulf in the south. Maximillian rules it, and I
govern the Atlantic Province under him.”
     
    “The entire
continent?” It sounded like Canada and North America.
     
    “Only the eastern
half. Britain has the rest.” In a voice that sounded deceptively soft, he
added, “For now.”
     
    A chill went through
her. “And later?”
     
    “That depends on what
happens with Max.”
     
    From his tone, she
suspected that