Divide and Conquer (20 page)

“It’s the king’s tent,” Dak whispered out of the corner of his mouth as the flaps were pulled aside and the soldier motioned for them to enter.

That was pretty much the point at which Sera’s mind went blank. She knew she’d stood before the king, and she remembered being proud of the way Bill’s voice didn’t tremble even when her hands shook so hard she had to grasp them behind her back.

At first the king balked at the idea of ceding away so much land to a Norseman, but Bill explained that Rollo would swear fealty, making himself a subject of the king and bound by his laws — something Vikings rarely ever did — and promise to guard against future Viking invasions by stopping them from entering the Seine.

The king was tired of Viking invasions, which made it that much easier for Bill to persuade him to sign off on the deal.

They’d thought that convincing Rollo would be another matter entirely but when they approached him with the solution he merely shrugged. “I was getting too old for plundering anyway,” he’d told them. “Besides, now that I’ve got Vígi back, I figure it’s time to give her a better life and settle down.”

While everyone else had started celebrating the new arrangement, Sera found a quiet spot and pulled out the Infinity Ring.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” Dak said, holding up his hands and stepping out of reach. “Not so fast! Rollo’s becoming a duke tomorrow and invited us to the ceremony. That’s something I’m
not
going to miss.”

Sera rolled her eyes. “We’re not warping through time just so we can attend a few parties. There’s a Cataclysm we’re supposed to be preventing, if you’ll recall.”

“I don’t see why we can’t do both,” Dak offered, raising his eyebrows and giving her a hopeful smile.

“Are you forgetting that there are Time Wardens after us? They know what we look like, too,” she countered.

“We’ll wear disguises!” Dak suggested. “It’s been a rough few days. Think of this as a morale booster!”

Sera glanced at Riq, who shrugged. “Fine,” she finally said. “We stay for the ceremony and then we go. But Dak’s in charge of finding us all costumes.”

Dak started dancing around the clearing in celebration — it wasn’t a pretty sight.

Dak couldn’t stop hopping from foot to foot. He hadn’t been this excited since he’d unearthed that cache of rare coins from a hidden drawer in a famous antique desk (it wasn’t his fault the museum had such poor security). “Can you believe we’re actually here for this?” he whispered to Sera for the twenty millionth time.

She glared at him from under a large drooping hat and a tangle of horsehair meant to look like a wig. Her clothes were bulky and dirty, giving her a sloppy, misshapen appearance that wasn’t helped by the smell. She didn’t look pleased, but Dak figured that the worse they smelled, the less likely people would spend enough time around them to realize who they were under the disguises.

He gave her an innocent look in return. She’d put him in charge of procuring disguises; she should have known what she was getting herself into.

Even her discomfort couldn’t dull the excitement thrumming through him. It was just all so . . . real! The king’s men had been working all day to craft a throne and a dais for the ceremony to take place on. A crowd had started gathering early but Dak had dragged Sera and Riq to the location just beyond the river before the sun rose.

He wasn’t going to miss a minute of this!

The procession began with the blaring of horns and the arrival of important guests from nearby villages and towns. Rollo’s men were peppered through the crowd, an odd mix of those who, not too long ago, had been fighting against one another tooth and nail.

Speeches were made, descriptions of land and boundaries rattled off, and as the ceremony proceeded, something began to seem amiss to Dak. There were moments when he felt like someone was staring at him but when he glanced through the crowd to find out who it was, there was no one looking in his direction.

The uncomfortable sensation grew as the long day dragged and it began to feel like a weight on his shoulders. He found his mind wandering, his focus diverted from the details of what was going on around him.

On the stage a minstrel was singing a ballad, but Dak’s attention was drawn to a group of men gathering on the far edge of the crowd near a copse of trees. They were growing rowdy and something about it piqued Dak’s interest.

“Be right back,” he murmured to Sera, and before she could say anything to stop him, he’d slipped through the throng and disappeared. He had to fight against the surging crowd, everyone pressing forward for a view of the dais as speculation that the king’s arrival was imminent drifted from mouth to mouth.

Dak kept his gaze focused on the crowd growing around the disturbance, forcing his way nearer. As he approached the commotion his heart started to pound faster, his stomach twisting with an anticipation he didn’t understand.

The mob had their hands raised, shouting out curses. Dak asked the closest Frank what was going on. “The devil’s spawn, that’s what they are,” the man hissed before turning and shouting that they should burn the pair.

He heard a woman cry out, “No!” and then someone else, a man, shout, “Leave her alone. Get back!”

His blood froze. He knew those voices.

“Mom! Dad!” he yelled, elbowing people out of the way as he battled his way forward. It was slow going, the crowd packed so tight that he had to resort to crawling between legs at times, not caring when someone’s heel crunched his fingers.

All around him people surged, their faces twisted with rage. Dak had forgotten how superstitious most people were during this time period. Science as he knew it didn’t exist yet — anything unexplainable was chalked up to magic.

As he drew closer he caught glimpses of his parents. They both brandished what looked like rifles from the American Revolutionary War. And rifles wouldn’t be invented until the nineteenth century. No wonder the crowd was going nuts!

“Hold on!” he shouted, shoving two people out of the way. “I’m coming!”

Just as he reached the center of the circle, his parents flickered like a TV channel losing reception. “Wait!” Dak cried out.

His mother stretched out her hand and Dak reached for it. When he closed his fingers it was around nothing but air.

Dak’s parents had been pulled out of time. They were gone.

O
NCE AGAIN
Dak was missing. “Where is he?” Sera hissed at Riq. She felt like she should have this question printed up on a placard so she could just wave it around whenever necessary.

Riq scanned the crowd halfheartedly before turning his attention back to the dais where a man read the terms of the Treaty of Sainte-Clair-sur-Epte. Rollo and the king had finally taken their positions. “I’m sure he just went off to find a better view.”

“But I don’t see him.” She pressed her hand against the Infinity Ring tucked under her bulky cloak. Throughout the day she’d caught glimpses of Gorm wandering through the crowd, and he wasn’t alone this time. It was making her anxious.

“The ceremony’s started and it’s not like him to miss it. Maybe I should go look for him.” She’d just started pushing her way through the crowd when she heard a rumble of an argument followed by a collective gasp from those around her.

She spun toward Riq. “What happened?”

He looked stunned, which was unusual for him. “The bishop said that Rollo should kiss the king’s foot as a demonstration of his fealty and a thanks for the gift of the land.” He turned to face Sera. “Rollo said he’d never bend his knee to anyone or kiss anyone’s foot. If he refuses, the ceremony will end without him being appointed the Duke of Normandy.”

Sera started feeling slightly panicked. They were so close to fixing this Break — they couldn’t let it all fall apart
now
.

“We can still fix this, right?” Riq said.

Sera nodded, slowly. “I think so, if we hurry. But figuring out what it would take —” Riq was already on his feet and pushing through the crowd before Sera could finish the thought.

She stood, trying to follow, but the gaps Riq created in the crush of people closed too fast, and she was brought up short again and again. From her left she heard someone shout and a man with an SQ insignia stitched in his collar began to force his way forward. He pointed directly at her and called for backup.

They were so busted. Again.

Sera swallowed her alarm and concentrated on her efforts at catching Riq. She made it to the front of the crowd, but was too late. He’d already leapt up the steps to the dais and was beyond her reach.

“Riq,” she hissed but he couldn’t hear and she didn’t dare risk drawing more attention to herself. The Infinity Ring was already preprogrammed for Washington, DC. All she had to do was find Dak and grab Riq, and they could get out of here before being nabbed by the SQ.

Totally easy
, she thought, rolling her eyes.

Riq didn’t even appear to hesitate as he strode across the dais to where Rollo towered over the king, both of them gesturing heatedly. Sera caught snippets of the argument: The king’s bishops demanded Rollo show fealty; Rollo flat-out refused to humiliate himself by kissing another man’s muddy boot.

When he spoke, Riq’s voice rang clearly over the crowd, silencing everyone. “We can agree that the king wishes for Rollo to occupy around the city of Rouen stretching to the sea, including the mouth of the Seine River, correct?”

Shouts of agreement came from the Vikings in the crowd.

“And we can also agree that in exchange for such generosity, Rollo shall give fealty to the king and defend Francia’s borders, can we not?”

This time the Franks in the audience cheered their approval.

Riq knew what he was doing. This crowd was not going to be happy if the treaty fell through — and now both Rollo and King Charles knew it.

“In fact,” Riq continued, turning to the two leaders, “a treaty to such effect has already been agreed to, correct?”

After a slight hesitation, both men nodded.

“What’s he doing?” someone muttered in a familiar voice and Sera scoured the crowd until she found Dak standing on the other side of the aisle leading to the platform.

They’d strung chains from posts to keep the crowds at bay and there was no way Sera could cross to Dak without drawing a whole lot of unwanted attention.

“Where have you been?” she demanded loud enough that a few surrounding men grumbled for her to be quiet. She noticed that Dak’s eyes seemed a bit wild, his body almost vibrating with tension.

She had no idea what would cause him to be so agitated, and she was afraid to find out. Over his shoulder, deeper in the sea of people, Sera saw a pair of SQ agents pushing their way toward the dais. She pointed them out to Dak and he ducked, slipping through a few people to better hide himself. Sera did the same.

Whatever Riq was planning, he’d better hurry up or they’d all be in big trouble.

Riq continued with his speech. “All that remain are the formalities, and I think that both parties can agree to assign such duties to those trusted men among their ranks, right?”

If the king was unhappy with the idea, he didn’t show it. Once Rollo gave his assent the king followed suit.

With the flourish of someone who’d obviously spent a lot of time on a stage learning how to woo a crowd, Riq turned to Rollo. “May I have the great honor of representing you for such an honorable act?”

Rollo frowned and shrugged. Riq turned back to the king. “And will you accept my substitution on this fine Viking chieftain’s behalf?”

The king looked toward his men, clearly lost as to what was going on. Sera had to press her hands to her mouth to keep from giggling. Even though it was clear to her that Riq was overdoing this, the crowd was eating it up.

Eventually the king waved his hand ambiguously. If he’d been expecting Riq to kneel and lower his head to the ground, he was wrong. Riq stepped toward him and took the king’s muddy boot firmly in his hand. He then raised it to his mouth without bending over and, with loud exaggeration, kissed it.

Clearly the king was not flexible enough to have his leg lifted so high, and he tumbled backward and off the dais.