The History Keepers Circus Maximus (11 page)

Miriam just stared back at him, stony-faced.

Galliana nodded at Jake. ‘Congratulations. You just travelled to 1350
BC
. The test proves that you could travel there in real time – although, of course, the actual journey would not be so pleasant. You have an uncommon talent, Jake.’

At this point Oceane Noire had heard enough. ‘I must go and feed Josephine, she’ll be starving,’
she announced, and flounced out of the room, bumping into Jake with her panniers again. No one paid her any attention.

‘1350
BC?
’ Jake murmured. ‘That’s . . . over two thousand years ago.’

‘Three thousand, one hundred and seventy to be precise. Apart from Rose, all anyone else could make out was vague shapes.’

‘And who was the lady at the end?’ Jake asked. ‘Was she real?’

‘She was real once. I had the dubious pleasure of meeting her. She was charming, but as dangerous as a pit of vipers.’

‘Cleopatra?’ Jake asked excitedly. In truth she was the only famous Egyptian he knew.

‘Dear me, no, not that troublemaker.’ Galliana shook her head. ‘And way before her time. It was Nefertiti.’

Jake took a deep breath. He drew himself up as tall as possible and affected his deepest, most grownup voice. ‘So does this mean I can go on the assignment with Rose?’

Galliana looked round at Miriam. For a moment there was silence, then Jake’s mum shrugged and resigned herself to fate. She knew that, try as she
might, she could not prevent her son becoming a History Keeper. ‘It was the same with Philip,’ she said quietly. ‘The power was simply too strong.’

In less than an hour Jake and Rose were being fitted for their Roman outfits in the costumiery – Jake by Signor Gondolfino himself. He’d already been given a white tunic and sandals similar to the ones Charlie had worn, and now the tailor was carefully adjusting his brilliant-white toga.

Gondolfino was chatting to him: ‘I’m dressing you as a young nobleman, the handsome son of a senator or some such. I’ve said it before, I will say it again’ – his old eyes twinkled – ‘
bel viso
, such a face for history.’ He fastened the toga in place with a gold pin and smoothed it down. ‘Now, you’ll need a sword of some description.’ He was about to step over to a table where an assortment of Roman arms were laid out when Jake stopped him.

‘Can I wear this one?’ he asked hopefully, holding up the weapon Nathan had given him.

Gondolfino adjusted his eyeglass and examined the silver hilt in the shape of a dragon. ‘Well, it’s not strictly speaking the right period’ – he shook his head – ‘but it has some of the characteristics of the
gladius
hispanus
 . . . perhaps we could just about get away with it.’

Jake excitedly fixed it to his belt.

‘
Molto galante
– very gallant!’ Gondolfino nodded, motioning for Jake to admire himself in the mirror. He looked at his reflection: a proud young Roman stood staring back at him.

On the next level up, Rose was being fitted with a dress, a Roman
stola
, by one of the other costumiers – a tall, haughty man in a checked jacket and breeches. Her hair had already been piled high up onto her head and studded with jewels. Once the costumier had secured a band around her waist he stood back to admire his creation. The dress made the most of Rose’s curvaceous figure.

‘Somewhat on the voluptuous side, wouldn’t you say?’ she chuckled as she mischievously slipped a leg through the split at the front of the dress and adopted an alluring pose.

‘I think it’s pleated perfection,’ the costumier swooned, clasping his neck dramatically.

When they were finished, Jake and Rose quickly went down to the armoury. Dr Chatterju had asked them to pass by on their way to the harbour; he and Amrit were waiting next to the shooting gallery.

The doctor called them over to look at something in his hand. ‘I have this for you to take to Sicily. It’s the prototype hoisting device designed by Agent Nathan Wylder. He’s been nagging me about it for months, so I dare say you had better give it to him now that it is finally operational.’

‘Hoisting device?’ Jake asked. He was perplexed: the object looked like a belt. It had a large golden buckle, fashioned in the shape of a lion’s head, its eyes marked with jewels, one green and one blue and each minutely engraved with the History Keepers’ logo of planets around an hourglass.

Chatterju demonstrated how it worked. He moved Jake to one side, aimed the buckle – like a gun – towards a wooden beam in the ceiling and pressed the blue eye. There was a sudden whistling sound as a small dart flew out of the mouth of the golden lion, trailing a thin wire. The dart struck the beam.

‘Amrit, if you would be so kind . . .?’ The boy stepped forward and Chatterju tied the belt around his waist and fastened it tight. He then pressed the green eye. To Jake and Rose’s amazement, Amrit – grin still firmly in place – started to ascend towards the beam, ratcheted up by the ingenious device
until his head bumped into the ceiling. Even then, he carried on smiling.

‘It’s a feat of deceptively simple engineering.’ Chatterju chuckled proudly. ‘It could take the weight of Henry the Eighth – even in his heavy period.’

Amrit was lowered down and the wire wound back. Then the device was reset and handed to Rose.

On their way out of the armoury, Jake spotted something out of the corner of his eye. He looked straight ahead, pretending he hadn’t seen it; but, hidden in the shadows behind a rack of weapons, a figure was watching them. The silhouette, with its huge panniers, was unmistakable: Oceane Noire.

‘As soon as you arrive, you’ll let us know, won’t you?’ Miriam asked Jake the moment he appeared on the quay. It was a sunny afternoon and a handful of well-wishers had gathered, including Dora the elephant and Felson, his ears pinned back anxiously at Jake’s leaving.

‘Yes, Mum.’

‘And when you reach the horizon point, hold onto Rose
tightly
– do you understand? It’s one thing going back millennia in the testing chamber;
the reality is a lot more terrifying. The first time I travelled that distance, I practically went into a coma.’

‘She’s right.’ Alan nodded. ‘Had to give her mouth-to-mouth resuscitation.’ He patted his wife on the back. ‘There are
some
benefits to the job.’

‘I got it,’ said Jake, tossing his bag onto the deck of the small ship that was waiting for them. He read her name – the
Conqueror
– written in faded gold letters. He remembered that Topaz had pointed her out to him when he first arrived on the mount, describing her as a Byzantine dhow. She was similar in shape to the
Hippocampus
, but much smaller, the size of a large fishing boat. Her square brown mainsail was decorated – also in faded gold – with the motif of a trident.

‘I made you both some food for the journey,’ Miriam continued brightly, handing her son a holdall containing various covered dishes. ‘They just need heating up. I think I may have surpassed myself,’ she added with a proud twinkle, before a tear came to her eye. ‘You look ever so handsome, darling. Doesn’t he, Alan?’

Alan gave his son a hug. ‘We’re proud of you,’ he whispered in his ear.

‘Mum, Dad, before I go, I need to tell you something.’ Jake was suddenly very serious; he looked from one to the other, then lowered his voice. ‘Will you keep an eye on Oceane Noire? I don’t trust her. Someone passed on information about the Stockholm mission. Maybe
she’s
the double agent?’

At this moment he and his parents spied her on the battlements above them. They watched as she leaned over the parapet, her back to them, and flicked open her fan.

‘A double agent?’ Miriam chuckled. ‘That would actually mean doing some work.’

Jake leaned in closer. ‘A couple of nights ago,’ he whispered, ‘I found her going into the archives in the middle of the night.’

‘The archives?’ Miriam frowned. ‘What were
you
doing there in the middle of the night?’

Jake shrugged. ‘It’s a long story. We should talk about it another time. But Oceane was behaving really oddly. She was holding a book with a picture of a palm tree on it.’

‘I don’t think it’s a crime to carry a book with a picture of a palm tree on it,’ Miriam pointed out.

‘She got into a terrible panic when I picked it up,’ Jake persisted. ‘As if she was hiding something.
And just now, in the armoury, she was watching us.’ He put his hand on his mother’s shoulder. ‘Please, will you promise me – just look into it?’

‘Of course we will, darling’ – Miriam smiled – ‘if you think it’s important.’

Galliana gave a little speech, at the end of which she handed Rose the atomium for their journey. ‘Guard it with your life,’ she whispered to her old friend. ‘Our situation is perilous.’

She watched as Rose carefully placed the consignment in her bulging carpetbag. Galliana knew that the luggage was completely wrong for ancient Rome, but said nothing, knowing that – like a talisman – Rose’s carpetbag went everywhere with her, even to
AD
27.

They all said their goodbyes. Jake was just heading up the gangplank when Felson padded forward hopefully. Jake knelt down and ran his hand across the great scarred head. ‘I’ll be back soon. Mum and Dad are going to look after you, along with Dora here.’ The elephant showed willing by reaching out her trunk and playfully hooting in his ear.

Jake and Rose climbed aboard the
Conqueror
– as Rose was trained in navigation, they would sail her between the two of them – and cast off.

Rose felt a shiver of excitement. ‘This is just the sort of boat I loved to take out back in the old days – sturdy and fast.’

Jake watched the party of people and animals on the shore as they became smaller and smaller. Even when Miriam had vanished to the size of a dot, he could see that she was still waving. Then she was gone, lost in the haze.

The wind filled the sails and buffeted Jake’s hair. Once again he was overcome with the sheer thrill of the adventures that lay ahead. ‘It feels amazing, doesn’t it?’ he shouted over to Rose, who was at the helm. ‘Like a new beginning?’

Rose nodded, smiling determinedly, hiding from Jake her deep dread of the approaching horizon point. However many times she had done it in the past, however much she assured herself it would be all right, travelling into deep time filled her with terror.

On this occasion it turned out that her fears were justified.

8 O
CEAN TO THE
A
NCIENT
W
ORLD

THE HOUR BETWEEN
taking the atomium and arriving at the horizon point was one of the most peculiar and sickening in Jake’s life. As she handed him his dose with a shaking hand, Rose had warned him that no two journeys through the time flux were ever the same. ‘There are so many variables,’ she had said in ominous tones, ‘and the further back in time, the more variables there are.’ So, even though this was the sixth time Jake had taken the vile-tasting liquid, this episode was unique.

As usual, minutes afterwards, his head started to throb and he felt dizzy and disorientated; the sound of the sea became distant, and everything around him – the ship, the cabin, even Rose herself – seemed unreal. Uncomfortable as these sensations
were, he was familiar with them from previous journeys. Far more unsettling were the disturbing visions. Before, usually at the horizon point itself, Jake had glimpsed snapshots from history – the glimmer of a castle in the moonlight or a half-built cathedral. Those images were fleeting and strangely uplifting; the ones he experienced now were both diabolical and prolonged.

To begin with he heard a series of sounds: snorting horses, the clash of swords, bells tolling, distant cries – first of single people, then of multitudes. Then the noise grew, like bacteria, into
solid images
; suddenly Jake saw gory vignettes of war, of collapsing palaces, raging fires and thunderous earthquakes. He saw bloodthirsty horsemen storming a citadel; a group of wailing women escaping a massacre across a moonlit river; a procession of masked men being led to a scaffold in a snow-covered city; two vast armies charging towards each other across a valley. The sounds of battle were so loud that Jake had to cover his ears. And still the visions haunted him: skies cracking with thunder, fleets of ships sinking and graves filling with bodies.

After what seemed like a lifetime, the nightmares began to dissolve and Jake was once again aware of
the ship, the wind and the sea. He felt normal enough to sit up – he was leaning against the balustrade at the prow – and check that Rose was all right. To his horror, he found that she was no longer on deck. The ship’s helm was unmanned, the wheel turning this way and that. The rings of the Constantor were almost aligned, signifying that they were fast approaching the horizon point.

‘Rose?!’ he shouted out as he leaped to his feet. ‘Rose, are you there?’ He tore along to the stern and scanned the ocean. If the unthinkable had happened and she had somehow fallen overboard, he would need to know immediately – before he took off into the past. He couldn’t see her, but he had no idea how long he had been in a trance. He looked again at the Constantor – the axes were closer still.

‘Rose?’ he yelled desperately as he jumped down the steps and into the main cabin; but it too was deserted. A lurch of panic was added to all Jake’s other symptoms – his nausea, dizziness and thumping head. He threw open the door into the second cabin. There was no one in there either; the bunk beds were empty. Just as Jake felt himself dropping into a vortex of despair, he heard a moan and saw a sandaled foot sticking out from behind the bed.

‘Rose, are you all right?’ he said, rushing to her side.

At first she didn’t notice Jake; she was in her own world, rocking deliriously from side to side, clutching her carpetbag.

‘Rose, you have to get up. We’re close to the horizon point.’

She became aware of a figure leaning over her and smiled. ‘He loves me, you know . . . Jupitus Cole loves me.’ Then her face darkened. ‘But he’s marrying Oceane Noire.’