Ides of March (Time Patrol)

TIME PATROL

BOB MAYER

"Who controls the past controls the future; who controls the present controls the past."
George Orwell:
1984
.

For

Haydn Riker Cavanaugh

“The vicissitudes of fortune, which spares neither man nor the proudest of his works, which buries empires and cities in a common grave.”

Edward Gibbon.
The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire
.

Rome, Roman Empire, 44 B.C.

MOMS HELD A WARM LIVER ABOVE
her head in supplication, dark blood oozing around her fingers, running down her arms into her armpits.

It tickled.

She wasn’t sure for whom or why she was holding it up.

Moms remained still, but her eyes darted about, checking out the immediate situation, her ears attuned for any noise. Distant, muffled sounds, nothing specific. She sniffed? Death, which was to be expected, given the fresh blood. She was inside a dark chamber, the only light coming from a round opening in the ceiling. A sheep, the source of the smell and blood, was on a dais in front of her. A knife was stuck in the opening carved in its side. A woman stood on the other side of the carcass. Her white robe trimmed with gold was splattered with blood. She was staring intently at the liver, head leaning to the side, pale blue eyes unblinking. She had pure white hair and a face lined with age, with very pale skin.

Moms figured such rapt attention meant she should keep her position. The blood finished draining. It was slowly drying on her skin, not quite ticklish any more, rather a bit bothersome, especially as it drew forth memories for Moms. Of performing triage on soldiers, comrades, who’d been wounded in battle, desperately trying to keep them alive for medevac. Often succeeding, but failing too often. Once is too often.

“Put it down, Amata,” the woman snapped, pulling Moms out of her dark memories, which were yet to be made in terms of the planet’s timeline, but she couldn’t dwell on that, because down that path lay madness.

Amata? Then it was there, in her consciousness. Not her name, but a label: a woman in training to be a Vestal Virgin.
A bit late on that
, Moms thought, although Mac had found it hilarious during the mission briefing, until Scout had cut that short.

It is 44 B.C. The world’s population is roughly 160 million humans. It is the year of the consulship of Caesar and Antony; Pharaoh Ptolemy XIV of Egypt dies; the first of Cicero’s Philippics attacking Marc Antony is published.

Moms had blood on her hands.

Some things change; some don’t.

Moms placed the liver on a silver tray. The old woman walked around the dais, leaning heavily on a cane.

She leaned over and poked at the liver with a finger. “See that?”

“Yes,” Moms said, seeing only liver.

“Ah!” the woman hissed. “I told Caesar to beware the Ides. But this? This is different.”

Spurinna.
Moms knew the woman’s name, except history had recorded the seer who warned Caesar as a man, not a woman.

Such is history’s presumptive misogyny
, Moms thought.

“Different how, Spurinna?” Moms asked.

The old woman didn’t look up from the liver, continuing to poke and prod. “Marc Antony. He must do his duty and save mighty Caesar today, since I fear my warning will not be heeded. It is Antony’s destiny. He must be told.” She gazed into Moms’ eyes. “And you are not an Amata.”

Spurinna snatched the sacrificial knife and held it to Moms’ throat.

Petrograd, Russia, 1917 A.D.

“PLEASE DON’T!” DOC PLEADED.

The Tsarina was startled by Doc’s shout. “How dare you enter my chambers!”

It was not phrased as a question, but an admonition from someone who was used to having her every word obeyed from the moment she could speak.

Her four girls were kneeling, their heads bowed, and lips moving in silent prayer to the mixture of orthodoxy and subsequent mysticism that had consumed their mother. The Tsarina held her frail boy in her arms. While one hand cradled his head, the other clenched a small knife, the point pressed against her son’s forearm. Prince Alexei’s eyes were closed and he wasn’t reacting to the pressure.

It is 1917. The world’s population is roughly one billion, eight hundred and sixty million, although the First World War, the War to End All Wars, is taking a chunk out of that, well on its way to totaling twenty million dead; J.R.R. Tolkien begins writing The Book of Lost Tales; in the U.S. imprisoned suffragettes from the Silent Sentinels are beaten in what became known as the Night of Terror; the first Pulitzer prizes are awarded; Mata Hari is arrested for spying; John F. Kennedy is born; a race riot in St. Louis leaves 250 dead.

This was Doc’s first Time Patrol mission and it wasn’t looking good.

Some things change; some don’t.

“Don’t do it, Tsarina.” Doc attempted a calmer tone, realizing he was speaking Russian, not exactly the greatest revelation at the moment.

“I must,” Alexandra said. “For all of Russia. Only then, will my dear Nicholas listen and the people understand. It is what Rasputin prophesied.” She nicked her son’s skin and blood flowed.

More blood than Doc had ever seen from such a simple cut, but this was the curse of the Royal Disease.

Palos de la Frontera, Spain, 1493 A.D.

“WHERE’S THE BAND? THE KING? THE QUEEN?
The Sons of Italy?” Mac muttered. He was watching a small ship riding its anchor chain in the muddy backwash of an estuary formed by the confluence of two rivers.

The names of the ships that had left here on a voyage of discovery the previous year ran through his brain, echoing from the historical rhyme of his childhood: The
Nina
and the
Pinta
and the
Santa Maria
.

But there was only one ship here: the
Nina.

His download confirmed that the
Santa Maria
had run aground off Haiti on Columbus’ journey. The
Pinta
? It would arrive shortly; if history remained true.

Mac couldn’t believe men traveled in such small ships across the ocean. He was standing just above the mud flats on the south bank of the estuary. Behind him were a number of low buildings. To his right, on a low rocky bluff overlooking the merging of the two rivers, was a friary, a watchtower poking above the walls. To his left, the estuary opened to the Atlantic Ocean.

“Devotio Moderna?”

Mac turned. The man who’d addressed him was dressed in a plain brown robe, with a rope cinched around the waist. A small wooden cross dangled from it. Given that was exactly the way Mac was dressed, it wasn’t much of a leap on the other’s part.

“Yes.
Devotio Moderna.
”

“I am Geert. From Belgium. Welcome to Palos de la Frontera.”

“I’m Mac.”

Geert cocked his head. “’Mac’? That is all?”

“That is all.”

Geert had thinning blond hair and was several inches shorter than Mac, his face scarred from smallpox. He was slight of build, lost inside his monk’s robe. “They should give a better name before they send you back. Welcome to my time.”

Mac relaxed. But only slightly, remembering Scout’s debriefing that the first supposed Time Patrol agent in her last mission had worked for the Shadow and tried to kill her. Along with the second supposed agent.
They’d really had it in for her
, Mac thought. He hoped her trip this time was smoother. “It’s only for twenty-four hours. My name is not important.”

“True,” Geert acknowledged. He nodded at the ship. “Columbus arrived from Lisbon an hour ago. It is odd he went to Portugal first. Many are speaking of it, considering Ferdinand and Isabella financed his journey, not King John.”

It is 1493 A.D. The world’s population is roughly 425 million humans; there had been 450 million 150 years ago, but the Black Death had done some damage and the world still hadn’t recovered; England imposes sanctions on Burgundy for supporting a pretender to the English throne; Maximilian I succeeds his father, Frederick III, as Holy Roman Emperor; Russian Prince Andrey Bolshoy dies; Spain, having issued the Edict of Alhambra the previous year which demanded all Jews convert or be expelled, begins to suffer economically without many of it most successful and influential citizens.

“Why am I here?” Mac asked. His head was throbbing, not just from the knowledge downloaded before coming back, but also from a tremendous hangover.

Some things change; some don’t.

“
You
know what is supposed to happen,” Geert said. “I only know what has happened and a little of what is happening. Columbus is on board the
Nina
. He has allowed no one to disembark yet, which is strange because a number of the crew are from the town.”

That explained the group of women and children who were gathered at a small quay, talking angrily and peering at the ship.

“Why has no one come ashore?” Mac asked.

“I have no clue,” Geert said. “There are people visible on deck, but otherwise—” he shrugged. “And there is also that.” Geert looked past Mac.

Fifty meters away, six men clad in black doublets and hose were seated at a wood table outside a shabby building that appeared to be an inn, bar and eating establishment.

The men weren’t sleeping, drinking, or eating. They were gazing at the ship. They had rapiers sheathed at their waists and a demeanor Mac was familiar with, being one himself: Soldiers. Killers who knew their business; one who has served in an elite unit can always tell the difference.

“Who are they?” Mac asked.

“They’re from the
Centre Suisses
,” Geert said.

“The Hundred Swiss?” Through the fog of receding alcohol, the pertinent information materialized.

“Swiss mercenaries,” Geert said. “They fight for whatever Crown will pay them. These particular ones? They’ve been sent by Rome.”

“Why are they here?”

Geert spread his hands. “Who knows? Protect Columbus, perhaps?”

“From who?”

Geert looked at him. “Perhaps from us? You tell me. In your history, does he die today? Or does he live? Are
we
to help him live or let him die? Or kill him ourselves?” His hand strayed inside a slit in his robe to show Mac the hilt of a dagger. “Life or death. Just let me know what it is to be.”

Thermopylae, Greece, 480 B.C.

“IF THE WORDS OF YOUR ORACLE
are true, this is my final night.” The speaker, without any apparent concern in his tone about their grave situation, was clad in armor that was battered, bent, and freshly splattered with blood. He was lying on his back, looking up at the stars, a rolled up red cloak acting as an expedient pillow. His helmet was on the ground next to him, as ordinary as any other warrior’s, except for the stiff brush of horse hair indicating his rank: King.

Scout could smell the death. Worse, she could sense it, all around them. She was sitting on a stone, her dark cloak wrapped tight, one hand holding a Naga staff. On the narrow pass between the mountain and the cliff overlooking the Malian Gulf, small groups of warriors were gathered round fires, conversing softly. A wall composed of bodies and stones hastily piled together, blocked the way to the north. A handful of Spartans stood watch on the grisly bulwark.

There had been three hundred Spartans when this fight began several days ago.

Not many were left standing.

Scout realized King Leonidas was staring at her. “What say you, priestess of the Oracle of Delphi? What of the prophecy?”

“The words are true,” Scout said, but didn’t add:
If my mission today succeeds.
Which naturally led to the next thought:
Of course, it would be nice to know exactly what the mission was.

“The way you paused,” Leonidas said. “It almost gave me hope. But it’s strange. Before every battle, I have felt fear. Of being maimed. Killed. Most of all defeated. But no matter how dire the fight appeared, or how terrible the odds, I always believed deep inside that none of those would happen.” He sat up and looked at his soldiers. “We all know we’ll die one day. Everyone does. In battle or of disease or inevitably of old age. But it’s always in the future. Not today.”

Leonidas reminded Scout of Nada. Despite what the king was saying and the circumstances, there was calmness surrounding him, a steadiness that inspired confidence. It was reflected by the remaining Spartans. Even though they’d all experienced enough battles to know what awaited them in the morning, prophecy, or no prophecy, they were poised. There was no sense of panic. Military reality dictated they were at the breaking point; as their number dwindled with each death, King Xerxes of Persia had an endless supply of warriors to throw against them.